School of Liberal Arts: Philosophy
2008-2009 Academic Year
445
PHIL 106 Critical Thinking (3)
Prof. Lee. This course is intended to enhance the student's analytical reasoning
skills. Emphasis is placed on the study of arguments and the development of
techniques of informal logic for assessing their cogency.
PHIL 121 Elementary Symbolic Logic (3)
Prof. Lee. The course concerns techniques of analyzing sentences and arguments
by uncovering the formal structures and relations which underlie them. This
involves translating ordinary language into the symbolic formulas of elementary
logical systems and proving formalized arguments. This course satisfies the
mathematics proficiency requirement.
PHIL 133 The Meaning of Life (3)
Staff. The question, What is the meaning of life?, has been regarded as one of the
most important and profound of human inquiries. This course will examine a
number of different philosophical attempts to address this question.
PHIL 201 History of Ancient Philosophy (3)
Prof. Burger. A study of ancient Greek philosophy, focusing on the thought of the
Pre-Socratics, Plato, and Aristotle. Same as CLAS 201.
PHIL 202 History of Modern Philosophy (3)
Prof. Sensen, Prof.Velkley. A study of early modern philosophy, focusing on the
period from Descartes through Kant.
PHIL 211 Classics of Political Philosophy I (3)
Prof. Burger. A study of classical works of political philosophy in the Western
tradition, primarily Plato's Republic and Aristotle's Politics. Same as CLAS 211.
PHIL 212 Classics of Political Philosophy II (3)
Prof. Mack, Prof. Sensen, Prof. Velkley. A study of classical works of modern
political philosophy in the Western tradition, including those of Machiavelli,
Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau, Marx, or Mill.
PHIL 219 Philosophy and History of Natural Science (3)
Prof. Lee. Scientific method will be analyzed as a process of stages and illustrated
by historical examples. The philosophical presuppositions of science are
examined in light of the historical shift from Aristotelian to modern science.
Whether change in scientific theories is revolutionary or evolutionary is studied
with reference to actual case histories.
PHIL 220 Matter and Consciousness (3)
Prof. Bogdan. A systematic survey of philosophical and foundational theories of
mind and cognition of this century. The course begins with the philosophical
legacy of earlier centuries (mind/body dualism, consciousness and privileged
access, introspection, sense data, and phenomenology), considers the first
scientific response to this legacy (behaviorism and the rise of scientific
psychology), and then follows the major theoretical positions and debates of this
century such as physicalism and reductionism, functionalism and the computer
model of the mind, eliminative materialism and neurophilosophy,
instrumentalism, and common sense psychology.