How do we know things? What, for that matter, are things? These are two extremely important questions that you will probably only get to properly discuss in a philosophy class. In the first half of our course we will discuss the basis of claims to knowledge: what is the value of knowledge; what is the nature of certainty; what is the nature of justification; can ever know that we’re not in the matrix – and does it in fact make any difference if we are. In the second half, we will discuss the nature of the objects of knowledge – the basic stuff of reality. Here we will ask questions like: how are objects distinguished one from another? Do abstract objects like numbers exist? Are there both material and immaterial things? What are persons? Is free will possible, or has every event been predetermined since the beginning of time?
Course Text: Pritchard, Duncan (2009), What is This Thing Called Knowledge? Routledge, 2nd revised edition ISBN: 9780415552981
All other readings will be made available online. Lectures will be posted here as the course progresses, lectures are presented in pairs (by week, not by lecture).
Evaluation:
Students’ work will be evaluated on the basis of a series of a final essay (35%) and a final exam (65%).
Essay questions (updated!)
PART I: Knowledge
Week 1. The Value of Knowledge
Readings: Pritchard Chp 1 & 2
Week 2. What Counts as Knowledge
Readings: Pritchard Chp 3
Readings: Gettier, Edmund (1963) ‘Is Justified TrueBelief Knowledge?’, Analysis 23, 121–3
Week 3 The Nature of Justification
Readings: Pritchard Chp 4
Readings: Descartes Meditations 1 and 2
Week 4. The Nature of Rationality
Readings: Pritchard Chp 5, pp.46-52
Saka, P, “Pascal’s Wager About God”, Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy: http://www.iep.utm.edu/pasc-wag/
Week 5. Knowing as Being Reliable
Readings: Pritchard Chp 6
Week 6. Perception and Knowledge, and More on Skepticism
Readings: Pritchard Chp 7
Readings: Chalmers, D. “The Matrix as Metaphysics” http://consc.net/papers/matrix.html, sections 1-5
Optional:
Kant, Prolegomena, Part 1, Remark II (289ff)
Berkeley, Three Dialogues Between Philonous and Hylas, First Dialogue
Part II: Reality
Week 7: Necessity andPossibility
Reading: Hayden: The Principle of Explosion http://garyhaydenspopularphilosophyblog.blogspot.com/2011/05/principle-of-explosion.html
Reading: Lewis,D. (1986). “A Philosopher’s Paradise”. In Lewis, D. On the Plurality of Worlds. (Oxford: Blackwell).
Week 8: PersonalIdentity: What Must I be?
Reading: Descartes,R. (1641/1988). Sixth Meditation, sections 9 and 19. In Descartes, R. Meditations on First Philosophy. Trans. John Cottingham. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press).
Reading: Kripke,S. (1972). Selection from Naming and Necessity. (Oxford: Blackwell). Pages 34-39, 102-105
Week 9. Personal Identity II: What Might I be?
Reading: Williams,B. (1970) The Self and the Future. Philosophical Review 79 (2):161-180.
Reading: Parfitt,D. (1971). Personal Identity. Philosophical Review 80.
Week 10: Free Will and Determinism: Compatible or Incompatible?
Reading: Hume, D. (1740). Of Liberty and Necessity. From A Treatise on Human Nature, book II, part iii,sections 1 and 2; edited by E.C. Mossner (London: Penguin Books).
Week 11: Freedom, Psychology, and Value:
Frankfurt,H. (1971). Freedom of the Will and the Concept of a Person. Journal ofPhilosophy 68(1).