Note: You must establish a session for Winter Academic Term 2004 on wolverineaccess.umich.edu in order to use the link "Check Times, Location, and Availability". Once your session is established, the links will function. Courses in PhilosophyThis page was created at 6:19 PM on Wed, Jan 21, 2004. Winter Academic Term 2004 (January 6 - April 30)PHIL 406. Aristotle.Section 001.Instructor(s): Rachana Kamtekar (rkamteka@umich.edu)Prerequisites: One philosophy introduction. (3). May not be repeated for credit. Credits: (3; 2 in the half-term). Course Homepage: http://coursetools.ummu.umich.edu/2004/winter/phil/406/001.nsf In this course we will work through, first, Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics, and second, Aristotle's Metaphysics. In the first half of the course, we will explore such questions as: What method(s) does Aristotle employ in ethical inquiry, and how does that influence his conclusions? What is Aristotle's conception of human happiness and how does it relate to his conception of human nature? What is the relationship between reason, moral virtue, and happiness? Is Aristotle's conception of virtue psychologically plausible? What is the role of intellectual activity in the happy life? In the second half of the course, we will look at how Aristotle articulates the notion of wisdom, or the study of first principles, in his Metaphysics, both through his criticisms of Plato's theory of Forms and through his positive account of first principles.
PHIL 409. Philosophy of Language.Section 001.Instructor(s): Jason C Stanley (jasoncs@umich.edu)Prerequisites: PHIL 345 or 383. (3). May not be repeated for credit. Credits: (3; 2 in the half-term). Course Homepage: No homepage submitted. This is an advanced introduction to topics in the Philosophy of Language. Logical truths are those truths that are true in virtue of the meaning of logical terms. The focus of the course will be on semantic investigation into the meaning of logical words as they occur in natural language. We will begin with the work of Paul Grice, who attempted to defend one view about the meaning of words such as "and", "or", and "if..then" by appealing to general considerations about the relation between meaning and use. We will then delve into classic semantic discussions of the meanings of some logical terms, such as the conditional, conjunction, and the quantifiers. The prerequisite for this course is one course in logic, at any level (this course does not need to have been taken in a philosophy department; a computer science or math course is equally good).
PHIL 416. Modal Logic.Section 001 — The logic of necessity, possibility, and other intensional items.Instructor(s): Richmond H Thomason (rthomaso@umich.edu)Prerequisites: PHIL 414. (3). May not be repeated for credit. Credits: (3; 2 in the half-term). Course Homepage: No homepage submitted. The course will begin by surveying possible worlds semantics for some classical modal logics and running through the proofs of semantic completeness. Contemporary modal logic is pursued and applied in many different areas. The rest of the course will survey as many of these as possible, with emphasis depending on the interests of the class. Topics include: logic of single-agent knowledge and perception, multi-agent logics, mutual knowledge, branching time and historical necessity, deontic logic, modality and nonmonotonicity, proof theory, modality and modularity in reasoning. This course assumes background in logic. If you have not had PHIL 414 or the equivalent, you should communicate with the instructor before registering for this course. This course will be arranged so that students can get credit either by doing regular exercises and taking two examinations or by doing a research project.
PHIL 420. Philosophy of Science.Section 001 — Meets with NURSING 570.001.Instructor(s): Roger JonesPrerequisites: A course in logic, and either PHIL 345 or 383. (3). May not be repeated for credit. Credits: (3). Course Homepage: No homepage submitted. In this course, we will explore some questions about the aims of science and the methods employed by scientists to achieve these aims. What is it to offer an "explanation" in science? What reasons do we have to "accept" an explanation? Are explanations "true"? What kinds of evidence do scientists give for the "reality" of entities postulated in explanations? How do our judgements about acceptance, truth, and reality change when one theory replaces another? We will examine these questions with readings from the classic literature of philosophy of science, and with case studies prepared by students in the course. In addition to a case study paper, there will be two exams.
PHIL 422. Philosophy of Physics.Section 001.Instructor(s): Lawrence Sklar (lsklar@umich.edu)Prerequisites: One philosophy introduction or logic introduction or 12 credits of science. (3). May not be repeated for credit. Credits: (3; 2 in the half-term). Course Homepage: No homepage submitted. Probability played its first central role in physical explanations in the theory of heat. Kinetic theory and statistical mechanics provided the atomistic and mechanistic underpinning to the older thermodynamic theory. But many fascinating questions in the border area of physics and philosophy arose out of these theories. What is the notion of probability involved? How are probabilities used in explanations in these theories? What explains why the fundamental probabilistic posits work as well as they do? How does the non-equilibrium theory that is asymmetrical in time arise out of an underlying time-symmetrical dynamics? What role does cosmology play in the explanations? Is thermodynamics really reducible to statistical mechanics? Finally, does our intuitive idea that time itself is asymmetrical, with past deeply unlike future, arise out of the physical asymmetries studied in this theory? The primary text will be L. Sklar, Physics and Chance.
PHIL 431. Normative Ethics.Section 001.Instructor(s): Christopher Knapp (cknapp@umich.edu)Prerequisites: One philosophy introduction. (3). May not be repeated for credit. Credits: (3; 2 in the half-term). Course Homepage: No homepage submitted. Normative ethics is the search for the basic principles that determine what kinds of actions are right and what kinds of actions are wrong. In this course, we will join this search at two different levels. In the first half of the course, we will survey a range of features that are commonly thought to determine whether an action is morally right or wrong. This will involve us in discussions of the nature and significance of well-being, equality, desert, and constraints against harming, lying and promise-breaking. In the second half of the course we will survey some of the most prominent foundational theories in normative ethics — theories that try to say precisely which of these features of actions are morally relevant and why. Here we will discuss consequentialism, virtue theory, and several forms of deontology. The goal of the course will be to gain a critical understanding of the central positions and arguments that shape contemporary philosophic work on the question of how one ought to live. The course is designed to be at the level of an advanced undergraduate who has some prior background in moral philosophy. PHIL 361 is an excellent background.
PHIL 433. History of Ethics.Section 001.Instructor(s): Stephen Leicester Darwall (sdarwall@umich.edu)Prerequisites: PHIL 361. (3). May not be repeated for credit. Credits: (3; 2 in the half-term). Course Homepage: http://www-personal.umich.edu/~sdarwall/Phil433.html The modern period in moral philosophy began with Thomas Hobbes, whose Leviathan (1651) shook the traditional foundations of ethics and forced those who would defend ethics against (what they saw to be) Hobbes' nihilism to do so in a broadly naturalistic framework that took serious account of recent advances in science. Thus began a period of exciting and fruitful moral philosophy that stretched through the end of the eighteenth century and into the nineteenth. Indeed, debates now current in moral philosophy almost always can be traced back to origins in this period. This course will be a study of several of the central writers and texts of this "enlightenment" and post-enlightenment period. In addition to Hobbes, we shall read some of Hutcheson, Butler, Hume, Kant, Bentham, Rousseau, and Fichte, and end with a radical critic of this broad tradition: Nietzsche. Course requirements: short paper, long paper, final exam.
PHIL 455. Contemporary Moral Problems.Section 001 — Meets with PHIL 355.001.Instructor(s): Christopher Knapp (cknapp@umich.edu)Prerequisites: Not open to graduate students in philosophy. (4). May not be repeated for credit. No credit granted to those who have completed or are enrolled in PHIL 355. Does not meet the Philosophy Department's 400-level course requirement for Philosophy concentrators. Credits: (4; 2 in the half-term). Course Homepage: No homepage submitted. Intended primarily for graduate students outside the philosophy department. Course content is the same as in PHIL 355. PHIL 455 requires longer and more substantial papers than those expected in PHIL 355.
PHIL 458. Philosophy of Kant.Section 001.Instructor(s): Ian N Proops (iproops@umich.edu)Prerequisites: PHIL 389, 461, or 462, or permission of instructor, or concentration advisor. (3). May not be repeated for credit. Credits: (3; 2 in the half-term). Course Homepage: http://www-personal.umich.edu/~iproops/practice/kant45803.html This course studies Kant's mature philosophical system, paying particular attention to his metaphysics and epistemology. We'll examine Kant's effort to work out the scope and limits of possible human knowledge and his effort to give a purely moral basis to religious faith. But the bulk of our time will be devoted to the account of human experience and human factual knowledge in the Critique of Pure Reason. There Kant argues that the world of our experience must possess certain very general features if experience is to be possible for example, that every event must have a cause. And he argues that 'behind' the familiar world of our experience is a second, more fundamental world of "Things in themselves" about which we can know next to nothing. Secondary readings from Henry Allison, James van Cleve, Paul Guyer, and others. A full syllabus is available on my web page. http://www-personal.umich.edu/~iproops/practice/kant45803.html.
PHIL 463. Topics in the History of Philosophy.Section 001 — Classical Chinese Philosophy. Meets with PHIL 397.001 and ASIAN 380.005.Instructor(s): Christoph HarbsmeierPrerequisites: PHIL 388 or 389. (3). May not be repeated for credit. Credits: (3). Course Homepage: No homepage submitted. The core concepts and basic ideas of Classical Chinese philosophy have had a formative influence throughout the Far East, and in particular in Korea, Japan, Vietnam, and notably in Singapore, down to the present day. Moreover, this Chinese intellectual tradition remains a powerful factor wherever in the modern world Overseas Chinese form significant social groups, and by now this is the case nearly everywhere, and particularly in the wealthier parts of the Americas, Western Europe, South East Asia, as well as Australia. One can argue that the creation of the unified state of China was the result of a deliberate application in practice of the principles of Legalist Chinese philosophy. Confucianism, again, was not a mere academic "philosophy", it was a cultural practice, and it remains a powerful practical factor wherever Chinese culture is present. Understanding the basic principles of Chinese philosophy is thus not a matter of exotic intellectual curiosity only, it is a matter of basic intellectual and historical orientation in a world in which Chinese ways of moral and strategic thinking are beginning to play a more and more significant global role. This course assumes that the excitement of understanding Chinese philosophy is in paying close attention to what the ancient thinkers were actually saying: in the case of Confucius, the point it is to sensitise oneself to the Master's Voice, to the specific spirituality of his approach to human life, and in particular to moral self-cultivation. This involves a very close reading of his most important sayings. Understanding these sayings will naturally involve comparing and contrasting them with what ancient Greek philosophers said at roughly the same time. Through close reading of selected texts from the intellectually formative period -5th to the +1st century, this course will try to put Chinese thinkers into an analytic and comparative global intellectual perspective, always with close attention to intellectual "music" of the primary ancient Chinese (and occasionally Greek) sources. Among many other things, we shall analyse Han Fei's discovery of a morally neutral social technology of political control which was first parallelled in the West by Machiavelli, and which inspired the unification of China in 221 BC. Finally, we shall sample in some detail a -2nd century BC systematisation of the schools of thought in ancient China, and we shall survey a +1st century AD bibliography of Chinese philosophy which summarises another ancient Chinese perception on ancient Chinese ways of thought. Thus the sources of Chinese civilisation will allow us to try to look upon Chinese intellectual history with Chinese eyes, and not only to impose Western analyses on it. Chinese intellectual culture will emerge as an advanced civilisation manifestly capable of cultural self-reflection. Throughout, Chinese philosophy will be introduced through a comparative analysis of primary Chinese sources. All the passages to be discussed will be made available on the Web. Supplementary secondary-source readings in current textbooks will be suggested. No familiarity with Chinese culture or language will be required.
PHIL 477. Theory of Knowledge.Section 001.Instructor(s): Eric P Lormand (lormand@umich.edu)Prerequisites: PHIL 345 or 383. (3). May not be repeated for credit. Credits: (3; 2 in the half-term). Course Homepage: No homepage submitted.
PHIL 481. Metaphysics.Section 001.Instructor(s): Daniel StoljarPrerequisites: PHIL 345 or 383. (3). May not be repeated for credit. Credits: (3; 2 in the half-term). Course Homepage: No homepage submitted. An examination of some of the central problems in metaphysics such as appearance and reality, time, universals and particulars, causation, realism and anti-realism, ontology, and others.
PHIL 517. Topics in the History of Philosophy.Section 001 — Metaphysics of Substance in Early Modern Rationalism.Instructor(s): Martin LinPrerequisites: Graduate standing. (3). May not be repeated for credit. Credits: (3; 2 in the half-term). Course Homepage: No homepage submitted. The concept of substance is central to the metaphysical thinking of the early modern rationalists. Not only does it constitute one of their fundamental ontological categories, but it also has important connections to their ideas about God, mind, body, essence, causality, and modality. In this course, we shall explore the concept of substance in the work of the three great rationalists — Descartes, Spinoza, and Leibniz.
PHIL 530. Topics in Epistemology.Section 001 — Epistemology.Instructor(s): Jason C Stanley (jasoncs@umich.edu)Prerequisites: Graduate standing. (3). May not be repeated for credit. Credits: (3; 2 in the half-term). Course Homepage: No homepage submitted. This course is an advanced introduction into recent topics in epistemology. Topics will include relevant alternatives theory, contextualism, the status of the closure principle, and the problem of the lottery.
PHIL 550. Topics in Philosophy of Language.Section 001.Instructor(s): ThomasonPrerequisites: Graduate standing. (3). May not be repeated for credit. Credits: (3; 2 in the half-term). Course Homepage: No homepage submitted. This will be an extended and advanced investigation of one (or possibly more than one) topic in the philosophy of language. The course will begin by looking at two classics, David Lewis on Convention and Paul Grice on Speaker Meaning and on Implicature. This will position us to concentrate on a large number of topics. One possibility would be the nature of meaning and architectural issues having to do with how to make sense of the diverse conceptions of meaning that seem to be come into play when you think carefully about language. But what we actually do will be determined by class interest. Students who take this course for credit will need to choose and execute a research project.
PHIL 553 / STATS 553. Conceptual Foundations of Statistical Inference.Section 001 — [4 credits]. Meets with RACKHAM 570.001.Instructor(s): James M Joyce (jjoyce@umich.edu) , Michael B Woodroofe (michaelw@umich.edu)Prerequisites: A course in statistical theory (STAT 405, PSYCH 613, ECON 405) and upperclass standing. (3-4). May not be repeated for credit. Credits: (3-4). Course Homepage: https://coursetools.ummu.umich.edu/2004/winter/phil/553/001.nsf This course serves as an introduction to conceptual issues in the foundations of probability theory and statistical inference. It is intended for graduate students and advanced undergraduates, in all academic disciplines, with at least a modest background in statistics. During the first few weeks axiomatic and combinatorial probability theory will be briefly surveyed, and some elementary statistical concepts and techniques will be discussed. Most of the course will be spent comparing and contrasting the main "philosophical" interpretations of the probability calculus. These include the frequentist model of Neyman and Pearson assumed by much of classical statistics, R.A. Fisher's fiduciary approach, the logical model of Rudolf Carnap and J.M. Keynes, subjective Bayesian approaches, and the "objective" Bayesian approach championed by E.T. Jaynes, and the empirical Bayes approach. Topics from expected utility theory and statistical decision theory will also be explored. This course is being taught in connection with research supported by a Rackham Interdisciplinary Grant that crosses statistics, philosophy, and astronomy.
PHIL 596. Reading Course.[3 credits].Instructor(s):Prerequisites: Graduate standing and permission of instructor. (2-3). (INDEPENDENT). May not be repeated for credit. Credits: (2-3). Course Homepage: No homepage submitted. A faculty-directed independent study.
PHIL 598. Independent Literature Survey.Instructor(s):Prerequisites: Graduate standing. Permission of instructor required. (3). (INDEPENDENT). May not be repeated for credit. Credits: (3). Course Homepage: No homepage submitted. An independent literature survey in which a student reviews basic literature in a given area of philosophy and writes an extended bibliographic essay that sets forth a range of major positions within that area, indicates how various philosophers fit within this range of positions, and provides critical commentary on the positions, indicating, for example, the chief advantages and disadvantages of each, resulting in a critical bibliographic essay. Students must seek guidance from a faculty member in selecting a reasonable range of works for study. Students are encouraged to carry out such surveys during the summer months. If the ILS is to commence in the Spring/Summer or Fall, initial guidance should be sought the preceding April; if it is to commence in the Winter, initial guidance should be sought no later than the preceding December. The bibliographic essays will be evaluated by the faculty member and may, if appropriate, be certified for distribution
PHIL 599. Candidacy Reading Course.[3 credits].Instructor(s):Prerequisites: Graduate standing and permission of instructor. (2-3). (INDEPENDENT). May not be repeated for credit. Credits: (2-3). Course Homepage: No homepage submitted. A faculty-directed candidacy reading course in which a student — having already successfully completed an independent literature survey in the area of his or her projected dissertation — works toward identifying a specific thesis topic and writing a dissertation prospectus, and begins to write material which can be expected to represent some component of the dissertation. If the reading course is to commence in the Fall, students should arrange for faculty direction the preceding April; if it is to commence in the Winter, students should arrange for faculty direction no later than the preceding November. Faculty service in this capacity does not commit the student to asking the faculty member to serve on his or her dissertation committee, nor does it commit the faculty member to agreeing to do so. A student wishing to elect PHIL 599 must submit a proposed plan of study no later than the beginning of the term for which the course is elected. (Students are urged to consult with their advisors and prospective faculty sponsors as early as possible during the planning of their Reading Course). The plan must be accepted by the faculty sponsor of the course within a week of the beginning of the term. A plan will normally not be acceptable if it overlaps significantly with a departmental course.
PHIL 600. Advanced Studies.Instructor(s):Prerequisites: Graduate standing. Permission of instructor required. (3). (INDEPENDENT). May not be repeated for credit. Credits: (3; 2 in the half-term). Course Homepage: No homepage submitted. Independent study program arranged between instructor and student.
PHIL 609. Seminar In Philosophy of Mind.Section 001.Instructor(s): Daniel StoljarPrerequisites: Graduate standing. (3). May not be repeated for credit. Credits: (3; 2 in the half-term). Course Homepage: No homepage submitted. This course examines what is sometimes called the epistemic solution (or the incomplete physical knowledge solution) to the consciousness problem in philosophy of mind. According to this view, the central arguments about conscious experience, such as the conceivability argument and the knowledge argument, teach us, not that some form of metaphysical dualism is true, nor that some form of conceptual or sentential dualism is true, but rather that we are ignorant of some aspects of the physical or non-experiential world. In the course of clarifying this position and the arguments for and against it, we will raise some of the most discussed issues in contemporary philosophy of mind: the link between conceivability and possibility, the role of the necessary a posteriori, the definition of physicalism, the relation between the intentional and phenomenal aspects of experience, and others.
PHIL 610. Seminar in History of Philosophy.Section 001 — Philosophy of John Dewey.Instructor(s): Elizabeth S Anderson (eandersn@umich.edu)Prerequisites: Graduate standing. (3). May not be repeated for credit. Credits: (3; 2 in the half-term). Course Homepage: No homepage submitted. This seminar will explore the philosophy of John Dewey. For several decades around the turn of the 20th century, John Dewey was America's leading philosopher. He developed the most wide-ranging version of pragmatism of all time. Many of his ideas were put into practice outside philosophy, most notably in education. Yet today, few philosophers pay close attention to Dewey's writings, even those who call themselves pragmatists. This seminar will be an exercise in recovering Dewey's pragmatism for today. We will explore together some of Dewey's main books and articles, with a focus on his epistemology, ethics, and social philosophy.
PHIL 640. Seminar in Ethics.Section 001 — Ethics.Instructor(s): Allan F Gibbard (gibbard@umich.edu)Prerequisites: Graduate standing. (3). May not be repeated for credit. Credits: (3; 2 in the half-term). Course Homepage: No homepage submitted. The seminar will investigate the bearing of theories and findings in the empirical sciences on issues in metaethics. Do discoveries in psychology, sociology, neurophysiology, and the like have implications for the nature of moral and other normative judgments and the meanings of moral and other normative terms — and if so, how? What if any bearing might evolutionary theory have on these matters? In particular, emotions are subject to empirical investigation and evolutionary treatment; how might findings about the nature of emotions or sentiments bear on moral meanings? Topics might include evolutionary game theory, sexual selection, brain imaging, psychopathy, and the dynamics of moral agreement and disagreement.
PHIL 990. Dissertation/Precandidate.Instructor(s):Prerequisites: Election for dissertation work by doctoral student not yet admitted as a Candidate. Graduate standing. (1-8). (INDEPENDENT). May be repeated for credit. This course has a grading basis of "S" or "U." Credits: (1-8; 1-4 in the half-term). Course Homepage: No homepage submitted. Election for dissertation work by doctoral student not yet admitted as a Candidate.
PHIL 995. Dissertation/Candidate.Instructor(s):Prerequisites: Graduate School authorization for admission as a doctoral Candidate (Prerequisites enforced at registration). (8). (INDEPENDENT). May be repeated for credit. This course has a grading basis of "S" or "U." Credits: (8; 4 in the half-term). Course Homepage: No homepage submitted. Graduate School authorization for admission as a doctoral Candidate. N.B. The defense of the dissertation (the final oral examination) must be held under a full term Candidacy enrollment period.
Undergraduate Course Listings for PHIL.This page was created at 6:19 PM on Wed, Jan 21, 2004.
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