Texts
You need to buy four books (none is expensive).
Perry, John. A Dialogue on Personal Identity and Immortality. Indianapolis, IN: Hackett, 1978. ISBN: 0915144913.
Parfit, Derek. Reasons and Persons. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 1984. ISBN: 0198246153.
Harman, Gilbert, and Judith Jarvis Thomson. Moral Relativism and Moral Objectivity. Cambridge, MA: Blackwell, 1996. ISBN: 0631192093.
Kuhn, Thomas. The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. 3rd ed. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1996. ISBN: 0226458075.
Some supplementary readings will be distributed in class and/or posted to the course site:
Pryor, James. "Guidelines on Writing a Philosophy Paper."
———. "Philosophical Terms and Methods."
Holton, Richard. "How to Build an Argument, and How to Write an Essay."
Blackburn, Simon."The World." In Think: A Compelling Introduction to Philosophy. Oxford, New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 1999, pp. 233- 264. ISBN: 0192100246.
Popper, Karl. "Selections from Logic of Scientific Discovery." Chaps. 9, 10, 11 in Popper Selections. Edited by David W. Miller. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1985. ISBN: 0691020310.
Putnam, Hilary. "The 'Corroboration' of Theories." Scientific Revolutions. Edited by Ian Hacking. Oxford, NY: Oxford University Press, 1981, pp. 60-79. ISBN: 019875051X.
Reading Assignments
There is a reading assignment for each class meeting. These are often relatively short, but they aren't easy; they are not introductions to philosophy but examples of it. If you have trouble understanding what the author says, please ask.
| LEC # | TOPICS | READINGS |
|---|---|---|
| Week 1 | ||
| 1 | Thinking Like a Philosopher | For next week, read Perry right through, and Parfit, chap. 10 |
| Week 2 | ||
| 2 | Staying One and the Same Thing Over Time | |
| 3 | Persistence for Persons | For next week read Parfit, chap. 11 |
| Week 3 | ||
| 4 | Remembering who you are | |
| 5 | Personal Identity as Psychological Continuity | For next week read Parfit, chaps. 12-13 |
| Week 4 | ||
| 6 | The Importance of Being Identical (?) | |
| 7 | Identity is Not what Matters | For next week, read Parfit, chap. 15 |
| Week 5 | ||
| 8 | The Truth will Set you Free | |
| 9 | First Debate | For next week, read Harman and Thomson, chap. 6 |
| Week 6 | ||
| 10 | Knowing Right from Wrong | |
| 11 | What's your Evidence? | For next week, read Harman and Thomson, chap. 7 |
| Week 7 | ||
| 12 | Not a Fact but a Feeling | |
| 13 | True for you, Maybe | For next week, read Harman and Thomson, chaps. 1-5 |
| Week 8 | ||
| 14 | Lessons from Einstein on Ethics | |
| 15 | What are we Arguing about? | For next week, read Harman and Thomson, chaps. 9 and 10 |
| Week 9 | ||
| 16 | Insiders, Outsiders | |
| 17 | Second Debate | For next week, read Blackburn "The World", Popper selections, and Putnam, "The 'corroboration' of theories" |
| Week 10 | ||
| 18 | Galileo, Descartes, Berkeley, Locke, Kant | |
| 19 | Hume, Popper, Putnam | For next week, read Kuhn, chaps. 1-5 |
| Week 11 | ||
| 20 | Kuhn as Kant all Over Again | For next week, read Kuhn, chaps. 6-13 |
| Week 12 | ||
| 21 | Four Kinds of Incommensurability | |
| 22 | No Shared Reasons | For next week, read chaps. 6-13 again, plus the Postscript |
| Week 13 | ||
| 23 | No Shared Meanings | |
| 24 | No Shared World | For next week, reread the Postscript |
| Week 14 | ||
| 25 | The Idea of Progress | |
| 26 | Third Debate | |