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Course Format: The course willconsist of short lectures and critical discussions, which will analyzeand evaluate the key ideas in the readings. Presence in the class and participationin the discussions is necessary. Attendance: Attendance is required for all classes and will be recorded. Grading: The final grade will reflecta student's ability to communicate their comprehension of course material in writing and speaking formats. Grading will be based on the followingelements: 1. Attendance and participation in class discussions. 20%Policies: Written work will be graded for thought content and only the final paper will be graded for both form and content. Points will be deducted for assignments turned in after the due date. In order to pass the course, all assignedwork must be handed in. Absent students are responsible for gettingclass notes and assignments from a classmate and coming prepared to thenext class. Active participation is a necessary partof the work of this course. You should come prepared with quality input, such as, ideas, criticism, and questions. You should listen respectfullyto the input of others, especially those with which you may disagree. Therule that one person speaks at a time reflects the value of respectingindividual and their thought process. Cell phones, pagers, and headsetsare to be turned of during class. The grades of "I" and "Y" are not givenin this course. A student who drops the course must formally withdraw fromthe course or a final grade of "F" will be given. All written work must be typed, except for the in-class quiz. The final paper must be double-spaced and includea Reference page. In the upper right hand corner of page one, and singlespaced, put the following information: Your nameOn all following pages, including the Referencepage, put your last name and page number in the right hand corner, forexample: Gonzales 3 of 8. Please attach the pages together with a staple. No title pages or special covers for the papers. Disabled students will be accommodated. Disabled students may contact the appropriate Disabled Student ResourceOffice at 206 6128. You should not abandon your sense of humorwhile entering the class. We should discuss philosophical issues with ahealthy dose of humor. Recommended Reference Books for AllCourses:
Required Text: Recommended Text: Objectives:
Recognize and examine major philosophicalissues. Required Text:
Logic or reason is despised by some as "the art of going wrong withconfidence" (Joseph Wood Krutch ), "the greatest enemy that faith has"(Martin Luther), "an emotion for the sexless" (Heatcote Williams), "reason enslaves whose minds are not strong enough to master her . . . the reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in tryingto adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man" (G.B. Shaw), and "I'll not listen to reason. . . . Reason always means what someone else has got to say" (Elizabeth Gaskell). However, logic and reason is praised by many as "the anatomy of thought....natural revelation" (John Locke), "the only oracle given you by heaven" (Thomas Jefferson), "come now, and let us reason together, says the Lord"(Isaia 1:18), "the divine gift that guides humans to the truth" (Quran),"the only faculty we have wherewith to judge concerning anything, evenrevelation itself" (Joseph Butler), "the light and lamp of life" (Cicero), "God's emissary" (Abraham Ibn Ezra), "the technique by which we add conviction to truth" (Jean de La Bruyere). Logic is the study of reasoning: how it is done correctly, how it goeswrong, and how to distinguish between the two. We are born with a hardwareand system software that uses the rules of logic in interpreting informationand arriving conclusions. Bad reasoning can hurt individuals, societies,nations, and even your grades. Objectives: Grading: The final grade will reflect a student's ability to communicate theircomprehension of course material in writing and speaking formats. Grading will be based on the following elements: 1. Attendance and participation in class discussions. 20%
This course is an introduction to Westernphilosophical methods as applied to metaphysics. Topics will include, logicalreasoning, philosophy and religious belief, classical and modern arguments for and against the existence of God, epistomology, faith and reason, self-mind-body, free will, determinism, the problem of evil, mind and matter, minds-brains-science, life after death. Various writings of Western philosopherswill be analyzed: Democritus (d. 360 B.C.), Lucretius (55 B.C.), Socrates,Plato (347?), Anselm (1109), Thomas Aquinas (1274), Rene Descartes (165?),John Locke (1704), John Berkeley (1753), David Hume (1776), Immanuel Kant(1804), Thomas Jefferson (1826), William James (1910), Edmund Husserl (1938),Sigmund Freud (1939), Arthur Eddington (1944), Bernart Russel (1972), GilbertRyle (1976), Martin Heiddegger (1976), Soren Kierkegaard (1855), Jean PaulSartre (1980), B. F. Skinner (1990), Carl Sagan (1997), Patterson Brown, Clarence Darrow, Jerry Fodor, Richard Taylor, Derek Parfit, John Hospers, Paul Kurtz, John Searle, Daniel Dennett, Antony Flew, John Wisdom, BasilMitchell, Richard Dawkins. Objectives: 1. Develop the skills of attentivelistening and dialog in group discussion
This course is an introduction to the classical theories of ethics inWestern tradition, which utilizes reason and experience to search for thepurpose of life, for the moral principles concerning good and the bad,the right and the wrong, for the ideal interaction of individual with theuniverse around them. Socrates, thousands years ago, emphasized the importance of ethics by a powerful statement: "the unexamined life is not worth living." Throughout the centuries, philosophers searched for universal rules orformulas that would guide every individual and group to do what is rightand to attain happiness. We will study and discuss the views of major Western philosophers, suchas, Plato, Aristotle, Epicurus, Epictetus, St. Augustine, St. Thomas Aquinas,Thomas Hobbes, Joseph Butler, David Hume, Immanuel Kant, John Stuart Mill,Soren Kierkegaard, Karl Marx, Henry Sidgwick, Friedrich Nitzche, John Dewe,G. E. Moore, W. D. Ross, A. J. Ayer, Jean-Paul Sartre, Kurt Baier, JohnRawls, Philippa Foot, Annette Baier, William K. Frankena, Carl Sagan... Objectives:
Required Texts:
This course is an introduction to Westernphilosophical thought. PP: A Preface to Philosophy TOP |