An examination of the ethical impact of recent technologies such as computers/Internet, biomedicine, and environmental technologies. Case studies are used to understand how these advances pose dangers and possibilities to our traditional conceptions of human value.Course credit exclusions: None.Prior TO FALL 2009: Course credit exclusion: AK/PHIL 3776 3.00.
An introduction to philosophical issues in Artificial Intelligence (AI). The goal is for students to be able to gain basic understanding of the cognitive architectures used by Al programmers, and reflect critically on research in Al from a philosophical perspective.Prerequisite: AP/PHIL 2100 3.00 and one of AP/PHIL 2160 3.00 or AP/PHIL 2240 3.00. Course credit […]
An examination of philosophers identified with the Post-Modernist critique of culture and philosophy; for example, Derrida, Deleuze, Foucault, Rorty, Irigaray, Heidegger, Baudrillard and Kristeva.Prerequisite: At least six credits in Philosophy. Course credit exclusions: None.PRIOR TO FALL 2009: Course credit exclusions: AS/PHIL 3990C 3.00 (prior to Fall/Winter 2002-2003), AK/PHIL 3690 3.00.
How does meaningful experience arise for individual consciousness? How do we understand and interpret different objects, artworks and cultures? This course examines the answers of philosophers such as Husserl, Heidegger, Dilthey and Gadamar.Prerequisite: At least 6 credits in Philosophy. Course credit exclusions: None.PRIOR TO FALL 2009: Course credit exclusion: AS/PHIL 3640 3.00.
A critical examination of philosophical problems raised by neuroscientific research, which asks whether such research can help to answer traditional philosophical questions. The course introduces the goals, methods, techniques and theoretical as well as conceptual commitments of neuroscience and examines the field's background assumptions, limitations and pitfalls.Prerequisites: AP/PHIL 2160 3.00 or AP/PHIL 2240 3.00. Course […]
The empiricists and rationalists include such eminent philosophers as Hume, Descartes, Berkeley and Locke (among others). This course examines selected readings from one or more representatives of each tradition.Prerequisite: At least six credits in philosophy. Course credit exclusions: None.PRIOR TO FALL 2009: Course credit exclusion: AS/PHIL 3620 3.00.
An examination of the background, structure and arguments of one of the great works of Plato or Aristotle. Alternatively, it may also focus on the works of others, including the Presocratics, the Stoics, the Epicureans and the Neoplatonists.Prerequisite: AP/PHIL 2010 3.00 or AP/PHIL 2015 3.00. Course credit exclusion: GL/PHIL 3927 3.00.PRIOR TO FALL 2009: Course […]
An examination of the role of norms in the analysis of international relations, in particular as they apply to foreign actor involvement in conflicts within states as a response to massive human rights violence, ethnic cleansing, and genocide.Prerequisites: AP/PHIL 2060 3.00, AP/PHIL 2070 3.00 or AP/PHIL 2075 3.00. Course credit exclusions: None.PRIOR TO FALL 2009: […]
An investigation into how ethics, law and policy should respond to the tensions between paternalism and autonomy, and therapeutic and scientific responsibilities in biomedical research with human subjects.Course credit exclusions: None.Prior TO FALL 2009: Course credit exclusion: AK/PHIL 3576 3.00.
Should comatose patients be kept alive indefinitely? Should an alcoholic receive a liver transplant? This course explores the philosophical dimensions of bioethics, i.e., the branch of applied ethics that proposes practical responses to moral problems that arise in medical practice and in the development and distribution of health care resources.Course credit exclusion: AP/PHIL 2077 3.00 […]