Department of Philosophy (PHI)
Course Offerings for Spring 2008
DEPARTMENT OF PHILOSOPHY
WINTER SESSION and SPRING 2008
PHI 111 Introduction to Philosophy
Professor Jones TR 8:00 - 9:15 or 9:30 - 10:45
For all we know, we could be in a Matrix world. At least, that is what some philosophers claim. Whether or not we agree with these philosophers, the claim depends on the assumption that there is a gap between appearance and reality, a gap, according to some, which cannot be closed. The problem of the gap between appearance and reality provides the frame-work for this introductory course. Within that framework, various epistemological questions will be addressed. Some of these include: Can we gain knowledge of the external world? Is there any knowledge of which we can be certain? Does science provide genuine knowledge? We will use a variety of tools to address these questions, including philosophical texts, movies and news articles, in which the key concepts and the problems under investigation are illustrated.
PHI 111 Introduction to Philosophy
Rick Gallimore MWF 10:00 – 10:50 or 11:00 – 11:50
Introduces students to the central problems, topics, and figures in western philosophy through a careful consideration of classical and contemporary readings. Non-western and continental philosophies are not covered in this course. Topics to be discussed include: the existence of God, knowledge and skepticism, the mind-body problem, consciousness and personal identity, and freedom and determinism. The format for the course is a mix of lecture and discussion. The primary goal is to enable students to think more critically about philosophical issues and their connections to everyday life.
PHI 111 Introduction to Philosophy
Professor Hoffman TR 11:00 - 12:15
This course is a survey of important problems of philosophy in some of the main topic areas, including logic or correct reasoning, the theory of knowledge (what is knowledge?), ethics (what makes something right or wrong), and philosophy of religion (questions about the nature and existence of God).
PHI 115 Practical Reasoning
Professor King TR 11:00 – 12:15 or 2:00 – 3:15
An introductory survey of things you need to know to be a critical thinker. Elementary forms of correct deductive and inductive reasoning, fallacies, principles for comparing and evaluating hypotheses and theories, guidelines for assessing the reliability of information sources including the media, experts, and your own personal experience.
PHI 115 Practical Reasoning WI
Professor Leplin MW 5:00 - 6:15
This writing-intensive course is designed to impart and improve reasoning skills, particularly in the evaluation of empirical claims. Topics include scientific methods, the nature of evidence, the testing of hypotheses, calculation of probabilities, statistical reasoning, and rational decision-making under conditions of risk or uncertainty. The goal is to become a critical thinker, able to bring diverse resources to bear on a wide range of intellectual problems.
PHI 119 Introduction to Ethics
Dr. Gallimore MWF 1:00 – 1:50 or 2:00 – 2:50
In this course, we will examine some of the most prominent approaches to ethical theory in the Western philosophical tradition. We will not be concerned with concrete moral questions such as “Is the death penalty morally justifiable when applied to juvenile offenders?,” but instead with abstract questions such as, “what makes killing wrong?” and the even more abstract question, “what makes any action wrong?” Among the theories we will consider are moral relativism, divine command morality, social contract morality, utilitarianism, and the moral theories of Immanuel Kant and Aristotle.
PHI 121 Contemporary Moral Problems
Professor Zimmerman TR 9:30 - 10:45 or 3:30 - 4:45
Readings on and discussion of contemporary moral problems, such as those posed by abortion, homosexuality, prostitution, cloning, war, capital punishment, euthanasia, and the treatment of animals.
PHI 121 Contemporary Moral Problems
Barbara Hands MW 2:00 – 3:15 or 3:30 – 4:45; or T 7:00 – 9:50 pm
Moral problems are questions about which people hold differing opinions with respect to the morality of the issue. In this course, you will be acquainted with the critical reasoning skills of philosophical methodology and with the most prominent theories of ethics. We will discuss how these theories might guide our actions and apply these theories to moral issues of the day.
PHI 121-81D Contemporary Moral Problems WINTER SESSION – ON-LINE COURSE
Chris Metivier WINTEROn-line
This course is a survey of moral issues that face contemporary society. As an online course, it focuses on student discussion of these moral questions and analysis of contemporary arguments. Topics include human enhancement, war, terrorism, advertising ethics, and technological alienation.
FMS 140 Philosophy and Science Fiction FRESHMAN SEMINAR
Barbara Hands TTh 2:00 – 3:15
Throughout the ages, philosophers have been concerned with formulating and reformulating a variety of concepts trying to answer the big questions concerning the nature of reality, morality, and the soul, as well as developing and defending the idea of the ideal society and the ideal person. Under the umbrella of science fiction, both the film industry and the literary world have created stories that challenge these philosophical ideals and offer up varying interpretations that stretch these concepts, sometimes to the breaking point. This class will explore some of these stories and perhaps arrive at a better understanding of these philosophical theories and how they might impact humanity.
PHI 220 Medical Ethics
Professor Gert MW 2:00 – 3:15 or 3:30 – 4:45
The purpose of this course is to introduce students to some of the core ethical concepts relevant to discussions of medical ethics and to apply these concepts to central issues in contemporary medical ethics. Some of these concepts are competence, consent, and confidentiality, and some of the topics we will use these concepts to talk about are euthanasia, abortion, and the use of embryonic stem cells. During the course of the semester, we will see that even though there is substantial disagreement about some of these “hot button” issues, there is wide agreement among people (including health care professionals) about most of the factors that should be taken into account when dealing with specific cases. We will also see that having a clear view of the core concepts can make it easier to deal with the especially complex ethical issues which are so common in medical settings.
PHI 252 History of Modern Philosophy
Professor Hoffman TR 2:00 – 3:15
This course surveys the ideas of important philosophers of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, including Descartes, Leibniz, Spinoza, Locke, Berkeley, Hume, and Kant. The relation of the development of modern science to the writings of these figures is one of the main themes of the course, so thinkers such as Copernicus, Kepler, Galileo, and Newton are also studied. Another course theme is how modern philosophy was a revival, to an important extent, of ancient philosophy after the rediscovery of ancient texts during the Renaissance.
PHI 301 Topics: The Moral Significance of Luck WI
Professor Zimmerman TR 11:00 – 12:15
This writing-intensive course will examine the moral significance of luck. Luck has two aspects; one aspect concerns control. (All else being equal, the less control one has over some event occurring, the more its occurrence is a matter of luck.) The other aspect concerns chance or probability. (All else being equal, the lower the probability of some event occurring, the more its occurrence is a matter of luck.) Philosophers disagree about the relevance of each of these aspects of luck to moral judgments concerning such matters as obligation, responsibility, desert, and character. We will inquire into the reasons for this disagreement and try to determine whether and how it might be satisfactorily resolved. Readings will be taken from contemporary sources.
PHI 310 Introduction to Formal Logic
Professor Leplin MW 2:00 – 3:15 or 3:30 – 4:45
This is a basic course in formal deductive logic. The discipline is common to mathematics and philosophy. Its principles and methods are the foundation of all rational thought. The material is organized into four units: proof theory for propositional logic, semantics for propositional logic, proof theory for predicate logic, and semantics for predicate logic. We will study this material sequentially, with a written, graded exercise on each unit. The proof method we will use is derivational. This course does not include metatheory.
PHI 331 Social and Political Philosophy
Professor McConnell MW 2:00 – 3:15
Why do we need government? What makes a government legitimate? What principles should governments follow in enacting legislation? What means may governments employ to promote the good of the whole? How should people respond to injustices perpetrated by their own governments? These questions will be examined in this class through the writings of such authors as Hobbes, Locke, Mill, Machiavelli, Plato, and King.
PHI 336 Philosophy of Crime & Punishment WI
Professor Lefkowitz MWF 10:00 – 10:50
Critical discussion of philosophical questions raised by criminal law, including the moral justification of punishment, the theoretical underpinnings of various criminal defenses, and the conceptual distinctions between types of crimes. Writing-intensive course.
PHI 353 Major Philosophies: Philosophical Skepticism
Professor King TTh 9:30 – 10:45
What are we actually able to know about the world and our place in it? Little, if anything, according to philosophical skepticism, a tradition that began in ancient times and has persisted up to the present. We will survey the writings of philosophical skeptics to learn what kinds of skepticism they endorsed, what arguments they gave, and how they influenced other thinkers inside and outside of philosophy.
PHI 357 Metaphysics WI
Professor Hoffman TTh 3:30 – 4:45
An intense study of some of the basic topics in metaphysics, such as the problem of universals, the nature of individual substance, the difference between the nature of living and non-living things, and the basic categories of entities that populate reality, such as time, space events and properties. Writing-intensive course.
PHI 359 Philosophy of Religion WINTER SESSION – ON-LINE COURSE
Professor Rosenkrantz WINTEROn-Line
Arguments concerning God’s existence, the problem of evil, God’s foreknowledge and human freedom, the analysis of divine attributes, immortality, and the soul. (See detailed description on next page)
PHI 359 Philosophy of Religion
Professor Rosenkrantz SPRINGOn-Line
The three great religions of the Western world, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, are forms of ethical monotheism. These three share the core belief that there is only and one divine being and this divine being is a perfect or maximally great being. This course will focus on the key idea of God as a perfect or maximally great being, though attention will also be paid to other ideas of the divine. Our studies will include a consideration of (1) the extent to which our concepts of divine attributes can be analyzed or defined, (2) the coherence or intelligibility of those concepts, taken individually, and in combination, and (3) arguments or reasons put forward to prove or disprove, confirm or disconfirm, the existence of God, including the Cosmological Argument, the Ontological Argument, the Design Argument, religious and mystical experiences, and the Problem of Evil. On-line course.
PHI 361-81D Ethical Issues in Business WINTER SESSION – ON-LINE COURSE
Wade Maki WINTER On-line (see description below)
PHI 361 Ethical Issues in Business
Wade Maki MWF 9:00 – 9:50 or 10:00 – 10:50 (Spring)
This course begins with a survey of major ethical theories and their application to the international business environment. We will then examine answers to questions such as: What is the purpose of the corporation? What obligations do corporations and business people have? How do we determine responsibility? What information should salespeople provide customers? When is an ad deceptive? When in Rome, shall we always conduct business the Roman way? Additional topics include discrimination in hiring, whistle blowing, workplace privacy, intellectual property, affirmative action, the environment, bribery, ethical challenges of globalization, and social justice. Special focus is given to analyzing real world cases in business ethics.
PHI 401 – Reading Course for Seniors
PHI 402 – Independent Study
PHI 493 – Honors Work
PHI 494 Senior Capstone Course Topic: Kripke’s Naming and Necessity WI and SI
Professor Gert MW 5:00 – 6:15
This writing and speaking intensive capstone course will focus on one of the most influential books in philosophy written during the past century, Saul Kripke’s Naming and Necessity. Topics to be covered include the reference theory of meaning, and the connection between a priority, necessity, and analyticity. In order to better understand the text, we will begin by reading some writings that Kripke is responding to in his book, such as J. S. Mill On Names, as well articles by Russell and Frege. In the last section of the course, we will read some contemporary writings that are themselves responses to Kripke’s theory. Topics of these articles will range from philosophy of language to ethics. It’s a very influential book!
PHI 620 Ethics and Genetics WI
Professor McConnell Th 1:00 – 3:50
For graduate students or Independent Study by special permission. Writing-intensive course.
Please refer to the UNCG Website or Undergraduate Catalog for complete registration information, major/minor requirements, section numbers, prerequisites, etc.