Temple University, Department of Philosophy
Course Descriptions Spring 2008
Undergrad Only
3210 Special Topics: The Philosophy of Death Smuts
Epicurus argued that we should not fear death, since it could not cause us harm: where death is, we are not; where we are, death is not. Although this argument is patently absurd, it and similar arguments have been difficult to refute conclusively. In this course we will try to answer the question: Is death an evil? In order to answer this question we will first need to know what "death" is. We will explore several major puzzles surrounding the value and nature of life and death. We will also examine the inverse of the harm question: would immortality be desirable? Although it seems obvious that we would like to live forever, philosophers have presented a few serious problems that cast doubt on the value of an immortal life. Independent of its harmfulness, we will consider reasons to think that death might actually add value to our lives.
3222 Contemporary Ethical Theory Taylor
In this course we will survey several of the main approaches to ethical theory. We will begin by reading a seminal text in each of the three central traditions that shape analytic moral theory – utilitarianism, deontology, and virtue ethics – and then continue by reading contemporary work that in some way resonates with each of these texts. We may also explore nineteenth century critics like Schopenhauer and Nietzsche, and the twentieth century innovations undertaken by John Dewey, Emmanuel Levinas, and the founders of analytic meta-ethics.
3226 Classics in Moral Philosophy Wolfsdorf
The course will examine the ethical theories of several Greek thinkers, including Plato, Aristotle, Epicurus, and the Stoics.
Undergrad/Grad
4/5229 Philosophy in Literature Dyke
The Phil of Lit course is a trip to the lighthouse -- Virginia Woolf's lighthouse. In getting there we'll look at some Conrad, Gide, Pirandello, Camus, Hasek, Borges that should all shed some light -- from a variety of perspectives, intermittently.
4/5233 Problems in Aesthetics Taylor
Aesthetics has long been a serious concern for those who participate in and study black life-worlds and political movements. From the Harlem Renaissance and the Negritude movement to the Black Arts Movement and the discipline of Black British cultural studies, black people and students of black life have made art and offered analyses that wrestle with deep and clearly philosophical issues. This course will explore the role of aesthetic practices in highlighting and addressing the philosophical issues that arise in black life-worlds. Considering those issues will raise questions like these: What is aesthetic experience? And what, if anything, does race have to do with it? Is there such a thing as traditional African art? Has evolution determined our judgments about human beauty? Likely readings will include pieces by W.E.B. Du Bois, Brenda Dixon-Gottschild, Lewis Gordon, Toni Morrison, Ralph Ellison, Amiri Baraka, and Arthur Danto, and Monique Roelofs.
3/5234 Philosophy of Music Alperson
This course examines our preconceptions about music. It centers around three basic questions: What is music?, Why do we enjoy it?, and Why, if at all, should we listen to, play, or study it? Along the way, we address other questions: Does instrumental music have meaning? Is music a (or the) language of feeling? Why do we listen to sad music? Does music in some way reveal the secret inner nature of the world? Does music reflect prevailing social conditions? Can it control or predict changes in society? Or is the meaning of music is purely musical? Does the significance of music consist, for example, in the expectation it arouses in the listener that certain musical events will follow? If so, can musical meaning be adequately described in term of information theory and a good computer? Is music ineffable? Or meaningless? What happens to instrumental music when it gets mixed up with words and action, as in song, opera, rap, and musical theater? Is the resulting product superior to instrumental music? Inferior? What is it to compose music? Are performers creative artists or are they just lackeys following the directions of the real artists—the composers? Is a performance of a work in which a few of the notes are wrong or omitted still a performance of the work? Is musical improvisation a species of composition? Of performance? What light can psychologists or sociologists shed on musical experience? Does music therapy have anything to do with music? Is Muzak music? Is rock ‘n’ roll a bastion of moral turpitude? Can rock music mold personal and political identities? Can a feminist be a Stones fan? Is rock superior to classical music? Is classical music dead? Is jazz the new classical music? What roles do race, class, gender, cultural and corporate interests play in our musical lives? Can white people sing the blues? Can the birds make music? Can computers?
4/5271 19th Century Philosophy Gjesdal
This course focuses on the work of the German philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770 – 1831). We start out by examining the young Hegel’s celebration of poetry and imagination at the Tübingen Stift, proceed to study the Phenomenology of Spirit (excerpts), and round off by looking at his late lectures on art, history, and religion in Berlin. The course will provide a good, systematic grasp of Hegel’s main arguments, yet maintain a focus that is historically informed throughout. We will see how Hegel draws on the philosophical tradition (Aristotle, Descartes, Hobbes, Kant, Adam Smith, the romantics), and how he shapes the horizon of later European philosophy from Nietzsche and Schopenhauer to Marx, Heidegger, and Sartre. Through class-work and written assignments, we will also discuss the resurgence of Hegelian thinking in the work of contemporary Anglophone philosophers such as Arthur Danto, Charles Taylor, Robert Brandom, and John McDowell.
4278/5272 Philosophy of Culture Margolis
The emphasis will be on the difference and interrelationship between physical nature and human culture; the natural and human sciences; the theory of persons; the role of language; physical and cultural predicates; norms; the fine arts; the theory of time and history; and the adequacy of naturalism.
Graduate
5221 Social and Political. Philosophy Gould
This graduate seminar will focus on a set of outstanding problems that are currently subject to lively debate among political philosophers and normative theorists of international politics. We will try to collectively make progress in resolving them. The issues are: 1) Should we “tolerate the intolerable”? That is, what are the limits of allowable cultural practices that may be oppressive or repressive, and how should those limits be arrived at? 2) Do the requirements of mitigating global inequalities trump our obligations to compatriots, and if so, what means should be used to achieve a more just distribution? What are the philosophical underpinnings for justice in this broader domain—rationality, empathy, solidarity, fundamental human rights? 3) What are the appropriate limits to sovereignty in this period of increasing globalization and the expansion of international law? What is the status of the key agents involved—the nation-state and nonstate actors, e.g., corporations and civil society organizations—and should we understand them as individuals or collectives? Are more transnational or global forms of democracy viable in this new context, and if so, what are suitable models for it? 4) What is a plausible conceptual account of peace as a realistic goal? Short of its achievement and in view of current forms of conflict and war, are just war principles still helpful?
The seminar will make use of cutting edge readings to facilitate an understanding and possible resolution of these problems through a collaborative discussion method. The readings will be selected to help us elucidate and make progress concerning these hard questions and will include essays by Martha Nussbaum, Herbert Marcuse, Susan Okin, Anthony Appiah, Michael Walzer, Richard Falk, Allen Buchanan, and David Held. Students will be asked to write an original term paper and to give an oral presentation dealing with one of the hard questions under discussion.
8602 Seminar in Greek Philosophy Wolfsdorf
This course will examine Greek conceptions of pleasure. Central texts will include: Hesiod's Works and Days 287-319, Xenophon's Memorabilia 2.1, Plato's Republic 9, Plato's Philebus, Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics 7 and 10, Diogenes Laertius' Life of Aristippus and Cyrenaic doxography 2.65-96, and the relevant Epicurean and Stoic fragments.
8661 Seminar in British Empiricism Vision
We shall study the major works of two classical empiricists, Locke (An Essay
Concerning Human Understanding) and Hume (A Treatise on Human Nature), and
of one classical rationalist, Descartes (Meditations on First Philosophy). Views
arising from their theories of ideas will be our main focus. We should cover
many (or, if things go smoothly, all) of the following topics on which our authors
wrote: empiricism vs. rationalism, minds, innate ideas, abstract ideas, substance
philosophy, personal identity, the nature of belief, causation, induction, matter,
perception, essences, the foundations of knowledge, and skepticism.
Students will be expected to contribute to our discussion, to lead one seminar
session with a short a paper, and to write a more substantial term paper. There
may be additional short assignments depending upon how the seminar
progresses.