Philosophy Program
New in 2009
Philosophy will have four new units in 2009.
New First Year Units
Great Philosophical Ideas (PHI1GPI)
Great philosophical ideas inspire us to change the ways we think about ourselves and our place in the world. Philosophy offers many responses to the question, how to think freely and responsibly in creating new ways to live. For example, Renè Descartes, a precursor of the Enlightenment, used the notion of an evil genius to establish what we really know. The world is composed of living machines and yet, here we are: thinking, breathing, feeling persons. How can these two things be reconciled? Jean-Paul Sartre was equally controversial, claiming that all human beings are free, no matter what! Even the person held to ransom is, for Sartre, radically free and therefore responsible for his or her behaviour. A very different picture of our place in the world emerges when we consider Thomas Hobbes’ claim that without the rule of an all-powerful sovereign, life would be ‘nasty, brutish and short’. If you don’t like the idea of an all-powerful sovereign, what would you put in its place?
This is a 15 credit points, first semester unit that will be taught by many of the Philosophy staff. It will be taught in semester 1. It consists of a one hour lecture and one tutorial per week and the assesment consists of two essays, a multiple choice exam and an essay exam. See the Unit Database for precise details.
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Philosophical Problems (PHI1PPR)
In this unit we examine some of the central problems that have captivated philosophers throughout millennia,
as well as those that scientific advances and cultural changes have only recently brought to our attention.
These might include: how ought we respond to terrorism, and to climate change, given the disparities between the first and third world? Where did the universe come from? Might a machine think? Is time travel possible? Is it morally acceptable to eat meat, or to design children genetically? Does the world suggest the existence of a designer, a God? Is forgiveness and apology an appropriate response to past injustices? Students will focus on examining the merits of the various arguments on these issues, dealing with each philosophical problem for a week. Students will be introduced to most of the major philosophical areas, including epistemology (what can we know?), metaphysics (what is the nature of reality?), ethics, personal identity, and philosophy of mind.
This is a 15 credit points, first semester unit that will be taught by three of the Philosophy staff. It will be taught in semester 2. It consists of a one hour lecture and one tutorial per week and the assesment consists of two essays and an essay exam. See the Unit Database for precise details.
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New Second and Third Year Units
Logic (PHI2/3LOG)
Logic is one of humanity’s oldest intellectual preoccupations, puzzling and inspiring thinkers from before the time of Aristotle up to the present. The nineteenth century saw a revolution in logic which in turn led to the emergence of the new philosophies in the twentieth century, pioneered by people like Bertrand Russell, Ludwig Wittgenstein, Rudolf Carnap, W. V. Quine, Donald Davidson and David Lewis. The unit introduces students to the basic ideas in propositional and predicate logic, that are needed in order to understand twentieth century analytic philosophy. Logic is central to computing and mathematics, so the unit also reveals the fundamental concepts at the heart of systematic thinking in these areas.
This second and third year, first semester unit brings logic into the Philosophy major. It is a 20 credit points unit. It will have a two hour lecture and one tutorial per week and the assesment consists of an essay, and an exam. See the Unit Database for precise details.
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Philosophy Today (PHI2/3PHT)
This course was to be offered for the first time in 2009. However, changes of staff in the Philosophy programme have led to the withdrawal of Philosophy Today from the 2009 programme and the substitution of Certainty and Subjectivity (PHI2/3CAS) and Freud (PHI2/3FRD).
In this unit members of staff will introduce students to their research areas, explaining the research questions that motivate their work. Examples are: intergenerational justice, forgiveness, reconciliation, forgiveness, paradoxes, racism and critical whiteness studies, personal identity. Staff teaching the unit will vary from year according to availability, and students will normally be introduced to at least six different research areas during the semester’s work. .
This subject has 20 credit points and will be taught by many of the Philosophy staff. It will have a two hour lecture and one tutorial per week, and the assesment consists of two essays and a class presentation. See the Unit Database for precise details.
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