PHIL-UA 1; Central Problems in Philosophy; M/W 12:30-1:45; Ian Grubb
This course is an introduction to philosophy that focuses on three of its central problems. First, we'll think about the relationship between the physical and non-physical facts, paying special attention to issues surrounding the thesis that everything is ultimately physical. Second, we'll think about the nature of knowledge and the different means that we have of acquiring it. Third, we'll think about what's required in order for us to be morally responsible for our actions and whether our world really is one where it make sense to hold people morally responsible. In addition to achieving a better understanding of these problems, we'll focus on developing our skills at analyzing and constructing arguments, both in writing and in discussion.
You must sign up for one of the following recitation times:
Mondays 2-3:15
Mondays 4:55-6:10
PHIL-UA 3; Ethics and Society; T/TH 3:30-4:45; Daniel Viehoff
This class introduces students to the methods of contemporary analytic philosophy through the study of selected moral, social, and political topics. Our focus will be on punishment, political authority, civil disobedience, toleration, and freedom of speech. We will consider such questions as: What could justify punishment? Do we have a duty to obey the law? Does that duty extend to unjust laws, or to minorities who are significantly disadvantaged by existing arrangements? To what extent, if any, should the state abstain from regulating or punishing harmful or offensive behavior? Should harmful speech be permitted where harmful actions would not be?
You must sign up for one of the following recitation times:
Mondays 11-12:15
Mondays 4:55-6:10
Fridays 9:30-10:45
Fridays 11-12:15
PHIL-UA 6; Global Ethics; M/W 9:30-10:45; Anthony Appiah
This course aims to accomplish two things. The first is to introduce three broad traditions of normative thinking about social issues from around the globe: a Confucian tradition, one based in Islamic legal traditions, and one derived from European liberalism. The second is to address three current areas of normative debate: about global economic inequality, about gender justice and human rights. We shall explore these first-order questions against the background of the three broad traditions. Our aim will be to understand some of differences of approach that shape the global conversation about these issues that concern people around the world.
PHIL-UA 7; Consciousness; T/TH 12:30-1:45; Ned Block
The philosophy and science of consciousness. Topics covered will include: The concept of a neural basis of consciousness and how we could discover what it is; whether there are different kinds of consciousness; the relation between consciousness and attention, cognitive accessibility, intentionality and agency; the function of consciousness; the unity of consciousness; whether the representational contents of perception are just colors, shapes and textures or include "rich" properties such as facial expressions and causation. The course will also cover some theories of consciousness such as mind/body dualism, behaviorism, functionalism, physicalism and theories of consciousness as representation. Among the topics discussed will be some famous thought experiments, such as whether there could be an inverted spectrum and whether Wittgenstein's views of the mind make room for an inverted spectrum; zombie thought experiments; Jackson's example of the scientist raised in a black and white environment who sees red for the first time and learns something about color vision that she could not find out from textbooks. Readings from philosophers such as Thomas Nagel and David Chalmers and neuroscientists such as Victor Lamme and Stanislas Dehaene. Please find the course website here.
You must sign up for one of the following recitation times:
Mondays 12:30-1:45
Fridays 9:30-10:45
Fridays 11:00-12:15
Fridays 12:30-1:45
PHIL-UA 21; History of Modern Philosophy; M/W 11-12:15; Tim Maudlin
We will carefully read a selection of classic texts of Modern Philosophy, viz.
- René Descartes, Meditations
- John Locke, An Essay Concerning Human Understanding (Selections)
- George Berkeley, Three Dialogues
- Gottfried Leibniz, The Monadology and Discourse on Metaphysics
- David Hume, An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding
- Immanuel Kant, Prolegomenon to Any Future Metaphysics
Among the questions we will pursue with each of these authors are:
- What is an idea?
- Where do our ideas come from?
- What is the relation between our ideas of the world and the world itself?
- How do we know the answer to the previous question?
- How is consciousness related to the physical world?
- What is the nature of the physical world?
- What is the nature of consciousness?
- What can we know?
Students should expect to spend considerable time and effort reading carefully to understand each author’s views on these topics.
You must sign up for one of the following recitation times:
Thursdays 12:30-1:45
Thursday 2:00-3:15
Fridays 9:30-10:45
Fridays 11-12:15
Prerequisite: one introductory course
PHIL-UA 22; Plato; T/TH 3:30-4:45; Jessica Moss
Plato's dialogues form the foundation for Western philosophy. We will closely study five dialogues, including Plato's masterpiece, the Republic. We will explore issues in ethics, metaphysics, epistemology, psychology, and political philosophy, studying Plato's views on these topics as well as working to critique them and to engage with them philosophically. The course will require weekly writing assignments as well as active participation in discussion.
Prerequisite: one introductory course. Note that this course satisfies the Ancient Philosophy requirement.
You must sign up for one of the following recitation times:
Mondays 2-3:15
Fridays 12:30-1:45
PHIL-UA 40; Ethics; T/TH 11:00-12:15; Samuel Scheffler
An introduction to the philosophical study of morality. Topics to be considered may include: traditional vs. consequentialist moral outlooks; contractualism; the nature of moral motivation; the rationality of morality; the objectivity or subjectivity of ethics; moral relativism; the explanatory role of morality; the compatibility of morality with a purely naturalistic understanding of human beings. Readings will be drawn from a variety of classical and contemporary sources.
You must sign up for one of the following recitation times:
Fridays 9:30-10:45
Fridays 11-12:15
Prerequisite: one introductory course.
PHIL-UA 41; The Nature of Values; M/W 3:30-4:45; Zoë Johnson King
This course will address questions like the following:
- Does the existence of widespread moral disagreement mean that there can't be any moral facts and it's all just a matter of opinion?
- Can we reconcile the idea of objective moral values with evolutionary and sociological arguments that explain how we developed our moral beliefs?
- Is it strange that there can be facts that tell you what to do?
We will begin by examining three famous arguments for an "anti-realist" view of morality: J.L. Mackie's arguments from disagreement and from "queerness", and Sharon Street's "Darwinian dilemma". All three of these arguments are supposed to challenge the idea that our moral beliefs reflect mind-independent moral facts. We will begin to develop philosophical skills through close analysis of these arguments, identifying their logical structure and the places where they could be challenged. We will then apply these skills to a series of classic texts defending alternative views of the nature of moral value and our relationship to it, including quasi-realism, reductive and non-reductive naturalism, constructivism, and robust realism. We will explore these views and consider the main challenges for each of them. Throughout, we will ask whether our moral beliefs are on surer footing than some of our other kinds of beliefs, especially empirical beliefs, beliefs about mathematical and logical truths, and - most importantly - beliefs about what we should believe.
You must sign up for one of the following recitation times:
Thursdays 9:30-10:45
Fridays 9:30-10:45
Prerequisite: one introductory course.
PHIL-UA 50; Medical Ethics; M/W 3:30-4:45; Claudia Passos-Ferreira
Examines moral issues in medical practice and research. Topics include euthanasia and quality of life; deception, hope, and paternalism; malpractice and unpredictability; patient rights, virtues, and vices; animal, fetal, and clinical research; criteria for rationing medical care; ethical principles, professional codes, and case analysis (for example, Quinlan, Willowbrook, Baby Jane Doe).
PHIL-UA 60; Aesthetics; T/TH 3:30-4:45; Robert Hopkins
This course provides a guide to some of the main issues in aesthetics and the philosophy of art. The issues fall into three main groups. First, what is art, and why does it matter? Does art offer us knowledge of a distinctive kind? Does it give voice to feelings and aspects of our lives we cannot articulate by other means? Does it reshape the way we see the world? More generally, does it offer a realm of value that is autonomous, or is the beautiful an aspect of the good or the true? Second, how do we engage with art? What is the role in that engagement for emotion, imagination, reason or experience? What role is there for knowledge or expertise, given that it is tempting to think judgements about art should be based on our own experience? Third, what is the nature and significance of certain of art’s key features, such as intention and meaning; matter, medium and technique; representation and expression; form and content; beauty and sublimity; style, genre and tradition?
We’ll look at a range of literature, much of it contemporary, some classic (e.g. Kant, Collingwood, Langer and Goodman). Some of our discussion will apply to art per se, some will be limited to individual arts. And not everything we discuss will be art – some of the questions, and some of the possible sources of art’s value, have close parallels in things that are not art, or, at the limit, not even artificial.
PHIL-UA 70-001; Logic; T/TH 2:00-3:15; Vishnya Maudlin
An introduction to the basic techniques of sentential and predicate logic. Students learn how to put arguments from ordinary language into symbols, how to construct derivations within a formal system, and how to ascertain validity using truth tables or models.
PHIL-UA 70-002; Logic; M/W 9:30-10:45; Martín Abreu Zavaleta
An introduction to the basic techniques of sentential and predicate logic. Students learn how to put arguments from ordinary language into symbols, how to construct derivations within a formal system, and how to ascertain validity using truth tables or models.
PHIL-UA 70-003; Logic; T/TH 8:00-9:15; Christopher Prodoehl
An introduction to the basic techniques of sentential and predicate logic. Students learn how to put arguments from ordinary language into symbols, how to construct derivations within a formal system, and how to ascertain validity using truth tables or models.
PHIL-UA 78; Metaphysics; T/TH 2:00-3:15; Antonia Peacocke
In this class we will ask some of the following questions. What is there? Why is there anything at all, rather than nothing? What kinds of things are there? What kinds of properties do they have? Do merely possible things exist? How about things in the past and future? What is space? What is time? Is time-travel logically possible?
You must sign up for one of the following recitation times:
Mondays 9:30-10:45
Tuesdays 9:30-10:45
Prerequisite: one introductory course.
PHIL-UA 85; Philosophy of Language; M/W 4:55-6:10; Stephen Schiffer
Language is amazing: simply by uttering a sentence a speaker may transmit something she knows to her hearer, or get him to do something she wants him to do, even though the sentence she uttered had never before been uttered. What must be true of language, us, and the world in order for that to be possible? Answering such questions requires answering foundational questions about the relation between language and mind and between language and the world. In investigating these questions we’ll explore work by key figures in the philosophy of language, as well as how work in philosophy of language is importantly related to work in such neighboring disciplines as logic, linguistics, and psychology. All readings will be made available on NYU Classes. There will be an 8-12 page paper (due at the end of the semester), a midterm and final; the questions to be answered on the midterm and final will be selected by lottery at the exams from questions distributed a week before the exams.
You must sign up for one of the following recitation times:
Mondays 2-3:15
Fridays 12:30-1:45
Prerequisite: one introductory course
PHIL-UA 101; Topics in the History of Philosophy; M/W 12:30-1:45; Michael Zhao
Prerequisite: History of Ancient Philosophy (PHIL-UA 20) or History of Modern Philosophy (PHIL-UA 21).
This is an introductory course in classical Chinese philosophy. We'll focus on philosophy from the Warring States periods (475-221 BC), which saw the rise of the "Hundred Schools of Thought." In particular, we'll trace the development of early Confucianism, focusing on three philosophers: Kongzi (Confucius), Mengzi (Mencius), and Xunzi. We'll also look at the ways in which these philosophers influenced and were influenced by philosophers from rival schools, like Mohism, Yangism, Daoism, the School of Logic, and Legalism. No familiarity with Chinese language is needed for this course, although having taken at least one philosophy course is a prerequisite.
PHIL-UA 102; Topics in Ethics and Political Philosophy; T/TH 4:55-6:10; Peter Unger
This course will be organized around two main issues, though we will discuss some other matters as well.
One main issue will concern the value for us of living a long life, the longer the better, providing that the quality of our lives is usually quite high, and we are usually quite happy people. With this issue, we will discuss the question of the quite certain cessation of our lives, during the next century or so, and what is an appropriate attitude for us to take toward our termination.
The other main issue will concern what one must do, morally speaking, toward saving the lives of others, both when such saving will come at relatively little cost to one and also, as will happen only rarely, when it will cost one the loss a limb or, even, the loss of one’s life.
Prerequisite: Ethics (PHIL-UA 40), The Nature of Values (PHIL-UA 41), or Political Philosophy (PHIL-UA 45).
PHIL-UA 103; Topics in Metaphysics and Epistemology; T/TH 9:30-10:45; Michelle Dyke
Prerequisite: Epistemology (PHIL-UA 76) or Metaphysics (PHIL-UA 78) or Philosophy of Science (PHIL-UA 90).
- “You shouldn’t lie to your sister.”
- “It is wrong to harm an innocent creature for personal gain.”
- “Parents have a moral duty to take care of their children.”
Claims like these, which express moral demands, strike many of us as obviously true. Yet how do we know them? What kinds of evidence could we provide to justify our beliefs in these claims? Unlike “descriptive” claims about how the world is, moral claims instruct us about what to do. If there are facts about what morality demands of us, these facts would have to be importantly different from the many other sorts of descriptive facts with which we are familiar, such as facts about astronomy, geology, medicine, psychology, economics, and history.
Some philosophers, precisely because they find it so difficult to explain how it is that we could acquire any evidence that bears directly upon the answers to moral questions, have argued that this point undermines the “realist” idea that there are objective facts about what we are all morally obligated to do. Unlike the answers to scientific questions, the answers to moral questions cannot be observed via the senses, encountered in nature, or tested in a laboratory experiment. According to some “antirealist” views, the moral facts are not objective and mind-independent (as are facts about protons and galaxies), but are instead dependent upon us; moral claims are made true by things like our desires, values, or cultural norms. Other antirealists defend the view that there aren’t actually any facts about morality at all.
In this course, we will learn about how epistemological considerations regarding the ways in which we acquire and justify our moral beliefs might (or might not) help us to resolve this debate regarding the nature of the moral facts. Our readings will consist mostly of recent journal articles and book excerpts by philosophers.
PHIL-UA 104; Topics in Language and Mind; M/W 11-12:15; Crispin Wright
Prerequisite: Logic (PHIL-UA 70) and either Philosophy of Mind (PHIL-UA 80) or Philosophy of Language (PHIL-UA 85).
This course will concentrate on a small number of central questions in recent philosophy of language and some connected issues in philosophy of mind. Topics to be covered include skepticism about meaning, with special reference to writings of Quine and Kripke; what it is to understand a language, with special reference to the work of Davidson, Dummett and Wittgenstein; the paradoxes of vagueness; the competing accounts of singular thought deriving from Frege and from Kripke; Kripke’s famous argument against the identification of mental states with physical ones; and some puzzles about the first person, ‘I’.
PHIL-UA 123; Readings in Chinese Philosophy; M/W 11-12:15; Moss Roberts
Cross-listed with EAST-UA 772
Coverage from the era of Confucius (d. 479 B.C.E.) to the unification of the realm in 206 B.C.E., the pre-imperial period that is also known as the warring states. Begins with the Analects to establish the key elements of Confucius' ethical and political philosophy and then examines his critics and followers. Concludes with Sima Qian's Record of the Historian (excerpts) and the novel The Three Kingdoms. The former addresses the establishment of the Qin and Han dynasties; the latter chronicles the fall of the Han dynasty some four centuries later and the reconstitution of a unified realm.
PHIL-UA 200; Advanced Seminar; TH 12:30-2:30; Ginger Schultheis
This seminar will cover a selection of topics currently under active discussion in philosophy. It is designed to expose future honors students to possible topics for an honors thesis, but it is not limited to those planning to enter the honors program.
The seminar is open to all philosophy majors with a grade-point average of 3.65 or higher in philosophy and overall. It has a prerequisite of two prior courses numbered higher than PHIL-UA 7.
For students applying to the honors program, both advanced seminars are required, and at least one of these two seminars must be taken before the end of the junior year. PHIL-UA 200 is offered every spring; PHIL-UA 201 is offered every fall.
Introduces students to a variety of topics that are appropriate for honors theses. For students not completing honors, these seminars will count as electives toward the philosophy major. See the description of the honors program.