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Fall 2025 Undergraduate Courses
For course days and times, please go to Course Search and Enroll
Jump to Fall 2025 Graduate Courses
101-2: Introduction to Philosophy
Instructor: Matthew Maxwell
Introduction to various philosophical questions and to the strategies that philosophers use to address these.
101-3: Introduction to Philosophy
Instructor: Michael Titelbaum
My 8-year-old daughter once asked me, “Why isn’t it okay to hurt someone’s feelings if you don’t like them?” I responded that it’s never okay to hurt anyone, no matter how you feel about them. She said, “I know that. I’m just trying to wonder it deeply.”
Philosophy is a business of wondering deeply. Sometimes we wonder about things that are obvious, so we can understand them better. (Do I have free will? How do I know the universe is more than 5 minutes old?) Sometimes we wonder about things that are difficult, or controversial. (Is there a right way to live? Can I trust the opinions of experts?) But more than just wondering, philosophers make progress on these questions by reasoning through them carefully and rigorously. Come join the fun!
101-4: Introduction to Philosophy
Instructor: Farid Masrour
What is the meaning of life? What is the nature of consciousness? Are there moral rights or wrongs? Do we have free will? Does God exist? Can AI really think? Philosophers have asked questions like these for a long time, long before natural sciences such as physics, biology, and chemistry emerged out of philosophy. This course surveys and evaluates some of the answers that philosophers have given to such questions. However, our goal is not merely to learn about philosophical ideas and methodology; an equally important goal is to reflect on a broader set of questions about philosophy’s role in addressing them. Many scientists and scientifically minded philosophers think that natural sciences provide answers to some or even all of these questions. For example, they argue that scientific methods fully explain consciousness, that everything is ultimately physical, that free will is an illusion, and that moral values are merely products of societal conventions. But is this correct? And how should our answer to this question inform our conception of philosophy and its role in intellectual inquiry? Throughout the course, we will discuss these questions in depth. In doing so, we will not only assess the limits of scientific explanation but also consider whether philosophy itself has a distinctive contribution to make.
101-5: Introduction to Philosophy
Instructor: Alexander Roberts
A remarkable feature of many central questions of philosophy is that they can be stated in particularly simple terms. Does God exist? Do we have free will? When is an act right or wrong? What are we able to know about the world? However, as we will see in this course, these easily statable questions are far from easy to answer. To attempt to determine their answers, we will study and critically evaluate some of the most influential arguments in the history of philosophy. Throughout the course, students will become acquainted with the distinctive methods of philosophy. In the graded assignments, students will be expected to apply these methods in justifying their own answers to philosophical questions.
101-6: Introduction to Philosophy
Instructor: Annina Loets
Many people ask themselves philosophical questions from time to time. If God exists, why is the world so messed up? What is beauty? Am I justified in believing the experts? Does anyone ever truly have a choice? Would it be wrong to get an abortion? Philosophers don’t merely ask themselves such questions, but they aim to provide general and principled answers to them and to support these answers by rational argument. The aim of this class is to introduce you to a wide range of influential philosophical arguments and get you started on crafting good arguments of your own. If you do the work, this class will teach you how to think, speak, and write more clearly, and how to employ these skills in pursuing the questions you care about, whether philosophical, or not.
101-7: Introduction to Philosophy
Instructor: Martha Gibson
The aim of this course is to introduce the student to philosophy, both the subject matter and the method. We will study some different areas in philosophy and the problems and questions addressed therein. But we will also study how philosophers go about answering these questions – what kinds of arguments they give, what reasons led them to their views. We will evaluate whether their arguments are good ones and try to understand what work needs to be done to build adequate accounts of such things as knowledge, free will, moral goodness. The different areas of philosophy we will study include the following : Epistemology or the theory of knowledge which is concerned with questions about the nature and extent of knowledge; Philosophy of Religion, where we will examine arguments for and against the existence of God; Ethics, where the focus will be on whether there really is such a thing as right or wrong, and if so, what makes something right or wrong; and finally, Free Will, where we will examine whether human beings can have free will if their actions are a part of the natural, causal order.
104-1: Spec Topics in Philosophy for Freshmen FIG and Honors Optional
Topic: Death and Sex
Instructor: James Goodrich
The natural and social sciences tell us something about who and what we are. How should this affect what we should and shouldn’t do with our lives? In this course, we will approach this broad question within two different topics: Death and Sex. We will consider questions like, “What is Death?,” What are we?,” “What makes death bad and life good?,” “What makes killing wrong?,” “What is sexual orientation?,” “How does sexual consent work?,” “What is biological sex?,” “What is gender?,” and “How and to what extent do the natural and social sciences help us answer these questions?”
104-2: Spec Topics in Philosophy for Freshmen FIG
Topic: Children, Marriage and the Family
Instructor: Harry Brighouse
This is a class in moral philosophy that examines the ethical questions surrounding family life. We shall be looking at a series of issues concerning a very specific area of morality: the issues concerning children, parents, and family life. What moral norms or values ought to guide both public policy and personal behavior? How should those norms guide us? So, it is very tightly focused on issues that you ought, already, to have thought about. In addition to the philosophical readings, we will be reading a good deal of non-philosophical literature. In order to reflect critically on the norms and values relevant to the family, we have to know something about the family: what families have actually been like and what they actually are like, as well as about their effects on the social environment. Here are just three of the topics we will discuss:
• Should parents be licensed?
• Should the government promote marriage?
• How much should parents control their children’s values?
The class involves reading, a little lecturing, and a lot of discussion. The new ideas you encounter will stretch your imaginations, will also help you to think better about some of the central decisions in your life, like whether to have children, how to raise them, whether to marry (and if so, who you should choose!). We’ll form a community of learners: you will get to know your classmates. You will discover that, even within a small class, students have had very different experiences of family life, and you will get to understand and reflect on their perspectives. No prior exposure to Philosophy is needed; and most students find, to their surprise, that they want to take at least another course on the same kinds of issues.
210-1: Reason in Communication
Instructor: Varsha Pai
Argument in familiar contexts; emphasis upon developing critical skills in comprehending, evaluating, and engaging in contemporary forms of reasoning, with special attention to the uses of argument in mass communication media.
210-2: Reason in Communication
Instructor: Alec Michael
Argument in familiar contexts; emphasis upon developing critical skills in comprehending, evaluating, and engaging in contemporary forms of reasoning, with special attention to the uses of argument in mass communication media.
211-2: Elementary Logic
Instructor: John Mackay
This course is an introduction to formal logic, the study of valid reasoning. An argument is valid if its conclusion follows from its premises. We will study methods for proving that an argument is either valid or invalid. Much of the class will involve working with a formal, symbolic language in which the form of sentences is made explicit. We will study both truth-functional and quantificational logic and use a deductive proof procedure for each.
211-4: Elementary Logic
Instructor: Bruno Whittle
Logic is the study of arguments. An argument, in this sense, is a bit of reasoning, that starts from certain assumptions, and extracts some piece of information from these. For example: Helen is a bear; all bears gamble; therefore, Helen gambles. There are two things that we can ask about an argument. (a) Are the starting points true? And (b) does the end point really follow from these? We will focus on (b). (Your other classes should all, in one way or another, help you with (a).) We will learn some general techniques for determining whether a claim follows from some others. These will allow us to evaluate arguments regardless of their subject matter—be it chemistry, politics, or where to go for dinner. We will use a precise artificial language that allows perspicuous representations of natural language arguments, and that also allows rigorous methods for determining what follows from what.
211-5: Elementary Logic
Instructor: Alex Meehan
We often reach conclusions by means of arguments, in which we put forward a series of premises on a conclusion’s behalf. A crucial question is whether the purported conclusion really does follow from its premises. Logic is the study of reasoning and this relation of “following”. One way to approach following is to consider a range of arguments, both good and bad, in the hope that the difference between what logicians call “valid” arguments (in which the relation of following is present) and “invalid” ones (in which it’s absent) will eventually sink in. But we will proceed more systematically. Elementary Logic will be a course in formal or symbolic logic. We’ll begin with arguments stated in English. We’ll translate these ordinary-language arguments into a symbolism or artificial language, in which the features on which validity depends are laid bare. We’ll then apply formal techniques in order to decide whether the original English arguments are valid. Might this method lead us astray? Are there types of arguments or reasoning that our formal techniques cannot capture? We will touch on these “meta” questions, among others, as the course proceeds.
241-2: Introductory Ethics Fulfills Category B
Instructor: Hubert Marciniec
The course will examine a number of prominent moral theories including utilitarianism, Kantian ethics, and virtue theory. We will attempt to understand and evaluate their various claims about what has fundamental value as well as their approaches to moral reasoning and recommendations for right action.
241-3: Introductory Ethics Fulfills Category B
Instructor: Emily Fletcher
In this course we will investigate the ethical dimension of human life. What makes an action right or wrong? What obligations do we have to other people or the community and what do we do when these obligations conflict? What makes someone a good or bad person? How do we make ethical judgments and can they be objective? We will examine three historically important theoretical approaches to ethics (virtue ethics, utilitarianism and Kantian ethics), as well as objections that have been raised against each of them.
241-4: Introductory Ethics Fulfills Category B
Instructor: Russ Shafer-Landau
This course presupposes no prior philosophy background and will offer a lightning survey of such topics as the nature of the good life, the meaning of life, free will, whether morality is just ab human creation, the basic principles of moral duty, and a handful of contemporary moral issues such as animal rights and abortion.
241-5: Introductory Ethics Fulfills Category B
Instructor: Joel Ballivian
The course will examine a number of prominent moral theories including utilitarianism, Kantian ethics, and virtue theory. We will attempt to understand and evaluate their various claims about what has fundamental value as well as their approaches to moral reasoning and recommendations for right action.
243-1: Ethics in Business
Instructor: Kate Lohnes
Case studies of moral issues in business; types or reasons appealed to for settlement.
243-2: Ethics in Business
Instructor: Arun Baxter
Case studies of moral issues in business; types or reasons appealed to for settlement.
244-1: Introductory Artificial Intelligence(AI) and Data Ethics
Instructor: Burgandy Basulto
In-depth examination of contemporary moral and political issues in AI and Data Ethics, integrating urgent controversies and continuously updated case studies. Covers topics such as the use of facial recognition technology in law enforcement; algorithmic decision-making in hiring, finance, medicine, and education; the ethics of AI-powered creativity; the rights of those interacting with AI (e.g. the right to be treated as a individual, the right to an explanation, and the right to be forgotten) as well as the rights of artificial agents themselves. Includes critical engagement with cutting-edge research in applied moral/political philosophy, such as on competing theories of justice and political legitimacy as well as on key normative concepts like trust, accountability, autonomy, privacy, explainability, coupled with relevant recent work in computer science and applied statistic
304-1: Topics in Philosophy: Humanities
Instructor: Harry Brighouse
Note: Enrollment is limited to First-Year Interest Group Students who took 304 in Fall 2024. This course is about love, sex, friendship and partiality. Philosophers spend a lot of time thinking about the structure of thought, language, and reasons. They have, at least in the western tradition, paid less attention to the more visceral and emotional aspects of human experience. In this course, we’ll use some of the tools developed in philosophy to examine questions central to most of our lives: what makes a relationship a friendship?; what do we owe our friends, and how can we be good friends?; what is love, and why is it such an important feature of human life?; when is love bad, and when is it good?; what is sex?; when is sex wrong, and when is it good?; can friends be lovers? We’ll take our starting points as the readings that I have assigned. But this is primarily a discussion-based class; I want you to think hard about what we read and the issues that get raised, and to contribute to each other’s (and my) learning about them.
341-2: Contemporary Moral Issues Does NOT fulfill Comm B requirement
Instructor: Alexander Meinhof
A philosophical study of some of the major moral issue in contemporary society, such as those concerning abortion, euthanasia, punishment, property, politics, sex, nuclear disarmament, and world hunger.
341-3: Contemporary Moral Issues Does NOT fulfill Comm B requirement
Instructor: Casey Rufener
A philosophical study of some of the major moral issue in contemporary society, such as those concerning abortion, euthanasia, punishment, property, politics, sex, nuclear disarmament, and world hunger.
341-4: Contemporary Moral Issues Does NOT fulfill Comm B requirement
Instructor: Peter Vranas
Under what circumstances, if any, is abortion morally permissible? Should the death penalty be abolished? What causes terrorism, and is it ever morally permissible to torture terrorists? This course teaches students how to think systematically about these fascinating questions. The emphasis is not on defending particular answers but is instead on providing students with the tools they need to reach their own answers.
341-5: Contemporary Moral Issues Does NOT fulfill Comm B requirement
Instructor: Liam O’Brien
A philosophical study of some of the major moral issue in contemporary society, such as those concerning abortion, euthanasia, punishment, property, politics, sex, nuclear disarmament, and world hunger.
341: Contemporary Moral Issues Fulfills Comm B requirement
A philosophical study of some of the major moral issue in contemporary society, such as those concerning abortion, euthanasia, punishment, property, politics, sex, nuclear disarmament, and world hunger. (Fulfills Comm B requirement).
Lec. 92 Instructor: Abiral Chitrakar Phnuyal Fulfills Comm B
Lec. 94 Instructor: Xavier Schultze Fulfills Comm B
Lec. 94 Instructor: David Vessel Fulfills Comm B
430-1: History of Ancient Philosophy
Topic: Metaphysics and Epistemology in Ancient Greek Philosophy: From Thales to Aristotle
Instructor: Paula Gottlieb
Unscrupulous politicians, democracy in peril, foreign interference, fake information, and the plague. Welcome to Athens in the fifth century BCE! The philosopher Socrates, who lived in such turbulent times, said that the unexamined life is not worth living, and his most famous follower, Plato, argued that the examined life requires consideration of what we can know (epistemology) and what exists (metaphysics). In this class we’ll be studying in depth and with close attention to the texts, Plato’s, Aristotle’s and earlier philosophers’ attempts to answer the following questions: What sorts of things are there in the world? Is a world of change consistent with a world of enduring objects? What would be a satisfactory account of unity and diversity? What sort of knowledge, if any, can we have of the world in which we live? Why are reason and logic important? Why become a philosopher and what is the difference between the philosopher and the sophist?
Good participation in section is required. There will also be tutorials. Class participants will be asked to write a series of 1500-word essays answering specific and challenging questions on assigned texts or particular topics. They will then come in pairs to see the instructor for an hour or so, during which time they will read out and discuss their work. Grades will be assigned to the written work. The point of the tutorial is purely educational and fun
432-1: History of Modern Philosophy
Instructor: Steve Nadler
In this course we will read a selection of philosophical works from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. This was a crucial period for the early development of modern philosophy (which, at the time, included what we now consider “science”). The philosophers we will study will be drawn from among René Descartes, Elisabeth of Bohemia, Thomas Hobbes, Baruch Spinoza, Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, George Berkeley, David Hume and Immanuel Kant. We will cover topics in metaphysics, epistemology, philosophical theology, and moral and political philosophy.
440-1: Existentialism
Instructor: Henry Southgate
Feeling like life is absurd, that existence is meaningless? Worried that you aren’t living authentically? Then a course in Existentialism is just what you need. Study the classic texts of this intellectual movement that expressed despondency about Western civilization, its decadence, and its values, and that explored the implications of the concept of freedom for the nature of the self and the meaning of life. Along the way you’ll meet the likes of Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Heidegger, Sartre, Camus, and De Beauvoir.
454-1: Classical Philosophers
Topic: Plato and Aristotle on Friendship
Instructor: Paula Gottlieb
What is friendship? Why is friendship important? What kinds of people make the best friends? Can lovers be friends? Can parents be friends with their own children? Can you be happy without friends? Can you be friends with an inanimate object? When, if ever, should you break off a friendship? What is the connection between friendship and a just society?
We’ll be considering these questions and others as we read Plato’s Lysis and selections from Aristotle’s ethical and political works.
There will be at least two tutorials. Class participants will be asked to write a series of 1500-word essays answering specific and challenging questions on assigned texts or particular topics. They will then come in pairs to see the professor for an hour or so, during which time they will read out and discuss their work. Grades will be assigned to the written work. The point of the tutorial is purely educational and fun.
The class will be run like a seminar, with a great deal of discussion. There will also be three tutorials. Class participants will be asked to write a series of 1500-word essays. They will then come in pairs to see the professor for an hour or so, during which time they will read out and discuss their work. Grades will be awarded to the written work. The point of the tutorial is purely educational and fun.
503-1: Theory of Knowledge Fulfills Category A
Instructor: TBD
A survey of problems concerning the nature, sources, and limits of human knowledge, including such topics as scepticism, the concept of knowledge, sensory perception, evidence, justified belief, induction.
516-1: Language and Meaning Fulfills Category A
Instructor: John Mackay
The course will cover some of the main themes in the philosophy of language. The human ability to communicate information about the external world through language is remarkable and raises a number of philosophical questions. Topics to be considered include: what it is for a linguistic expression to be meaningful; how it could come about that a linguistic expression – which is at some level just an arbitrary group of sounds or symbols – could have a meaning; how both the mind and the external world interact with language to determine meaning; how speakers use and manipulate language in different settings to communicate different kinds of information; and the way in which the meaning of a term depends on context.
530-1: Freedom Fate and Choice Fulfills Category A
Instructor: Martha Gibson
This is a course on the freedom of the will. We will cover the following kinds of material: classic arguments from fatalism and determinism to the effect that human beings do not have free will; ‘compatibilist’ accounts of the freedom of the will which maintain that we can have freedom of will, even if past events and the laws of nature determine what we do; and ‘reason-responsive’ accounts which tie the freedom of the will to the agent’s ability to make rational decisions. We will examine the sort of cases in which it seems people do not do what they do of their own free will— e.g., cases in which the impediment seems internal and psychological, (addiction or phobia) and cases in which the impediment seems external (coercion). We will see whether it is possible to give a theory that accounts for all of our intuitions about when people do act of their own free will. Readings will include classic philosophers—Descartes, Locke, Moore— but most of the material will be from more contemporary sources—Van Inwagen, David Lewis, P.F. Strawson, Rogers Albrittion, Gary Watson, Harry Frankfurt, and others.
541-1: Modern Ethical Theories Fulfills Category B
Instructor: Rob Streiffer
Physicists are after the “theory of everything” — a single, elegant, and unified theory that explains everything about the physical universe. Could there be such a theory for morality? Could a single, elegant, and unified theory explain the morality of war, abortion, and ghosting your ex? In this course, we will dive deep into moral philosophy and ask how close humanity has come or could come to uncovering “the moral theory of everything.”
541-2: Modern Ethical Theories Fulfills Category B
Instructor: TBD
Ethical theories and problems as discussed in the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Prerequisites: Junior Status 3 credits in philosophy or consent of instructor.
541-3: Modern Ethical Theories Fulfills Category B
Instructor: TBD
Ethical theories and problems as discussed in the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Prerequisites: Junior Status 3 credits in philosophy or consent of instructor.
549-1: Great Moral Philosophers Fulfills Category B
Instructor: Russ Shafer-Landau
This course will consider a number of central moral questions–what is the nature of human flourishing? What is the ultimate standard of rightness? Where does morality come from?–as they are addressed in classic texts by Plato, Hobbes, Hume, Kant, Mill, and a handful of 20th century thinkers.
549-2: Great Moral Philosophers Fulfills Category B
Instructor: TBD
Major themes of moral philosophy, from Plato and Aristotle to Bentham and Mill, with critical study of outstanding works.
551-1: Philosophy of the Mind Fulfills Category A
Instructor: Farid Masrour
This course surveys central topics in contemporary philosophy of mind. We will discuss issues such as the relationship between the mind and the physical world, whether a scientific understanding of consciousness is possible, theories of mental representation, the nature of perceptual experience, and whether minds could be modeled as computers.
551-1: Philosophy of the Mind Fulfills Category A
Instructor: TBD
Nature of mind (mental states such as thinking and feeling) and its relation to physical states, with emphasis on recent advances in philosophy and psychology.
553-1 Aesthetics Fulfills Category B
Instructor: Bruno Whittle
The aim of this class is to think, talk and write about art. Questions considered may include the following. What is art? What is the point of it? Can we evaluate art objectively? Is arguing about taste pointless? Is art a form of self-expression? If so what exactly does it express? What is style, and what is beauty? There will be an emphasis not just on thinking and talking, but also on writing: form as well as content, experimenting with different ways of writing. To this end, we will read mainstream philosophical texts, but also essays in different styles (e.g. by artists or critics).
555-1 Political Philosophy Fulfills Category B
Instructor: Harry Brighouse
This course is an advanced introduction to political philosophy as it is practiced today. We shall look at leading contemporary theories of distributive justice, such as egalitarian liberalism and libertarianism, and shall explore contemporary issues of interest to political philosophers, such as the rights and responsibilities of victims of injustice, justice and the family, justice in the education system, and how justice matters for personal and intimate relationships.
555-2 Political Philosophy Fulfills Category B
Instructor: Elizabeth Brake
This course is a discussion-heavy, highly interactive, advanced introduction to contemporary analytic political philosophy. We will cover three broad themes: competing theories of state authority, and their implications for the obligation to obey the law, for the ethics of political resistance, and for different justifications of punishment; competing theories of distributive justice, and their broader implications for topics like global justice, intergenerational justice, and environmental justice; as well as competing theories of democracy, and their implications for the value of democratic legitimacy, the accountability of public officials, and for taking collective responsibility for wrongdoing.
562-1: Special Topics in Metaphysics
Topic: Time Travel
Instructor: Peter Vranas
If you believe that time travel is a frivolous topic, good for science fiction but not for rigorous scientific or philosophical investigation, think again. The physical possibility of time machines has recently become the subject of an active debate in leading physics journals. Concurrently, the philosophical literature concerning the metaphysical issues related to time travel has mushroomed. This course examines the physics, the metaphysics, and the paradoxes of time travel. No knowledge of physics is presupposed.
562-2: Special Topics in Metaphysics
Topic: Philosophy of Quantum Mechanics
Instructor: Alex Meehan
Physics is one of our best sources of knowledge about the nature of the world. The theory of quantum mechanics is an incredibly successful physical theory that allows us to predict the behavior of microscopic systems like particles. But this theory is also infamously difficult to interpret. If you have heard about quantum mechanics, you may have heard that it tells us some surprising and novel things, such as: systems change their behavior depending on whether we are observing them; consciousness plays a role in fundamental physics; cats can be both dead and alive simultaneously; the universe is fundamentally indeterministic. Does quantum mechanics actually have these implications? If not, what does it tell us about the world? This class will explore these questions. We will look at the formalism underlying the theory of quantum mechanics, and then we will investigate the various interpretations of that formalism that physicists and philosophers have proposed, and assess the philosophical issues at stake. No background in physics is required, however students will be expected to learn some mathematical formalism, such as how to add and subtract vectors and take inner products, as we go along. If you are not sure if you have enough math background, please contact the instructor. (More details on the math background: If you learned about vectors in high school or a university math class that is probably enough; if you don’t have that specific background but are otherwise comfortable with formal areas, such as symbolic logic, that may also be enough, but you should email the instructor to check.)
562-3: Special Topics in Metaphysics
Topic: TBD
Instructor: TBD
An intensive study of one or more topics such as: existence, universals and particulars, space and time, individuals, individuation, categories, substance and attribute, necessity, events and processes.
Fall 2025 Graduate Courses
For course days and times, please go to Course Search and Enroll
701 Reading Seminars (combined with Graduate Seminars) Instructor Consent
701-001 Reading Seminars Topic: Spinoza’s Theological-Political Treatise
Instructor: Jacob Zellmer 701-001 meets with 835-1. Please see the description of 835-1 below.
701-004 Reading Seminars Topic: Taxonomy and Classification
Instructor: Aja Watkins 701-004 meets with 920-1. Please see the description of 920-1 below.
701-005 Reading Seminars Topic: The Moral Magic of Consent
Instructor: Jimmy Goodrich 701-005 meets with 941-1. Please see the description of 941-1 below.
701-007 Reading Seminars Topic: TBD
Instructor: Sam Roberts 701-007 meets with 911-1. Please see the description of 911-1 below.
835-1 Advanced History of Philosophy
Topic: Spinoza’s Theological-Political Treatise
Instructor: Jacob Zellmer
In the 1660s, the Dutch Monarchists were gaining power and threatened to overthrow the existing Dutch Republic. The Monarchists advocated for constraints on academic freedom and threatened censorship of ideas that disagreed with Calvinist theology, the dominant theology in the Netherlands. With a sense of urgency, Spinoza set aside his work on metaphysics—for which he is perhaps best-known today—and wrote the Theological-Political Treatise (TTP), arguably the most important philosophy of religion in the early modern period. Published in 1670, the TTP was a political intervention that aimed to protect the freedom to philosophize from theological constraints. Today, Spinoza’s naturalistic vision of the world has seemingly won in the ‘West.’ However, superstition remains a dominant force in current societies and theology still plays a prominent role in secular politics. In addition, new constraints on intellectual inquiry threaten the freedom to philosophize. This seminar will closely read Spinoza’s TTP, focusing on his naturalistic accounts of prophecy, divine law, miracles, Biblical interpretation, faith, politics, and the role of religion in politics. The goal of our close reading will be to understand the TTP on its own terms and to resolve philosophical difficulties that arise in interpreting the text.
902-1 Proseminar in Philosophy
Instructor: Alex Roberts and Jesse Steinberg
The seminar for incoming students is required. It provides a background in core analytic philosophy across diverse specialties. There will be a close reading of texts and an emphasis on writing skills.
904-1 Teaching Philosophy
Instructor: Harry Brighouse
Becoming a better teacher requires that you have good content knowledge, but it also involves the development and practice of complex skills. What we’ll do in this class is very preliminary: we’ll introduce you to some specific strategies that will help you induce your students to learn; we’ll develop a common language for discussing teaching and (by actually discussing specific instances of teaching and learning); and we’ll introduce you to some intellectual resources for considering and reflecting on the kinds of issues that will arise regularly throughout your career as a teacher. Because we want to introduce strategies, because strategies can’t work without content, and because there is some literature we want you to think about, we’ll structure most classes by using the strategies we want you to learn to facilitate discussion of the literature we want you to think about.
911-1 Seminar – Logic
Topic: Higher-Order Logic for Philosophers
Instructor: Sam Roberts
There’s a lot of exciting work in contemporary philosophy that uses the tools of higher-order logic to explore deep philosophical questions—for example, about the nature of possibility, existence, meaning, belief, identity, infinity, and more. However, the technical demands of higher-order logic pose a significant barrier to entry. In response, this course will provide a gentle introduction to the technical aspects of higher-order logic, specifically designed to prepare students to engage with this emerging body of work. In particular, once we have acquired the necessary tools, we will apply them in carefully working through a small selection of key philosophical papers in higher-order metaphysics.
920-1 Seminar – Philosophy of Science
Topic: Taxonomy and Classification
Instructor: Aja Watkins
Scientific inquiry is often facilitated by the organization or categorization of objects or processes into classes or kinds. This course will investigate what it means to taxonomize or classify the natural world, how scientists identify criteria on which to base their classifications, and the impact that classification has on scientific investigation. Students will have an opportunity to become experts at classification practices in their areas of interest, as well as develop an understanding of relevant philosophical literature on natural kinds and related topics.
941-1 Seminar – Ethics
Topic: The Moral Magic of Consent
Instructor: Jimmy Goodrich
Consent seems like a kind of moral magic. It can transform “a trespass into a dinner party; a battery into a handshake; a theft into a gift; an invasion of privacy into an intimate moment; a commercial appropriation of name and likeness into a biography.” (Hurd 1996, p. 123) In this seminar, we will explore the metaphysics, epistemology, pragmatics, and normative ethics of consent in an effort to discover how the magic trick is done.
Spring 2026 Undergraduate Courses
Jump to Spring 2026 Graduate Courses
101-1: Introduction to Philosophy
Instructor: TBD
Introduction to various philosophical questions and to the strategies that philosophers use to address these.
101-2: Introduction to Philosophy
Instructor: James Messina
In this course, you will gain a sense of what philosophy is, what it is good for, and how it is done. We will proceed by considering answers to philosophical questions like the following: What, if anything, makes me at 44 years old the same person I was when I was 16? If death is the total and permanent annihilation of my existence, what attitude should I have towards it? Do I have free will? Does God exist? What is knowledge and what can be known? What kinds of actions are morally right and morally wrong? Is there even an objective morality? Is my life meaningful? Is it better to exist or not to exist? We will be reading a mixture of historical and contemporary sources. As will soon become clear, much of philosophy consists in formulating and evaluating arguments. Assuming you do the work, you can expect to emerge from this class with improved analytical skills and with an understanding of some fundamental philosophical issues.
101-3: Introduction to Philosophy
Instructor: Farid Masrour
What is the meaning of life? What is the nature of consciousness? Are there moral rights or wrongs? Do we have free will? Does God exist? Can AI really think? Philosophers have asked questions like these for a long time, long before natural sciences such as physics, biology, and chemistry emerged out of philosophy. This course surveys and evaluates some of the answers that philosophers have given to such questions. However, our goal is not merely to learn about philosophical ideas and methodology; an equally important goal is to reflect on a broader set of questions about philosophy’s role in addressing them. Many scientists and scientifically minded philosophers think that natural sciences provide answers to some or even all of these questions. For example, they argue that scientific methods fully explain consciousness, that everything is ultimately physical, that free will is an illusion, and that moral values are merely products of societal conventions. But is this correct? And how should our answer to this question inform our conception of philosophy and its role in intellectual inquiry? Throughout the course, we will discuss these questions in depth. In doing so, we will not only assess the limits of scientific explanation but also consider whether philosophy itself has a distinctive contribution to make.
101-5: Introduction to Philosophy
Instructor: Bruno Whittle
In this class we will ask, and set about answering, some classic philosophical questions. These might include: Are you a purely physical thing? Is there such a thing as free will? Does moral responsibility make sense? What if anything can we know about the world? People talk about doing the right thing but what does that mean really? What general categories of things exist? Does God exist? What is happiness and how do you get it? By the end of the class you will know the answers to these questions. So will the person sitting next to you. I can’t absolutely promise these answers will match.
101-6: Introduction to Philosophy
Instructor: TBD
Introduction to various philosophical questions and to the strategies that philosophers use to address these.
210-1: Reason in Communication
Instructor: TBD
Argument in familiar contexts; emphasis upon developing critical skills in comprehending, evaluating, and engaging in contemporary forms of reasoning, with special attention to the uses of argument in mass communication media.
211-1: Elementary Logic
Instructor: Michael Titelbaum
Suppose I say, “If no one moved the cheese since last night, it’s in the fridge. If I didn’t move the cheese, then no one did. I didn’t move the cheese. So it’s still in the fridge.” This argument concerning the whereabouts of the cheese contains some premises followed by a conclusion. The argument is structured so that if the premises are true, the conclusion must be true as well. In this course we will represent arguments in symbols to reveal their structure, then study argumentative structures that guarantee a true conclusion from true premises. We will also learn how to prove that an argument with a particular structure is valid. The techniques we will learn are necessary for every area of contemporary philosophy, and are relevant to areas of economics, mathematics, computer science, rhetoric, and the law.
211-2: Elementary Logic
Instructor: Sam Roberts
Making and evaluating arguments is central to our lives, from deciding what to think about politics, physics, or philosophy, to deciding where to have lunch. For example, I have a very temperamental dog. Knowing that he’s either in the kitchen or the garden, and seeing he’s not in the garden, I conclude that he must be in the kitchen, which I then avoid. That simple argument—from the premises “the dog is either in the kitchen or the garden” and “the dog is not in the garden” to the conclusion “the dog is in the kitchen”—might well have saved my life! Good arguments show that their conclusion is likely to be true, given their premises. In the best case, an argument shows that its conclusion must be true, given its premises. These are the valid arguments. To see that the argument above is valid, just try to imagine what it would mean for its premises to be true, but its conclusion false! Formal logic is a systematic study of the valid arguments, and it will be the focus of this course. It provides formal languages in which we can frame many of the arguments we make in natural language and uses simple but powerful mathematical tools to determine which of them are valid. Formal logic allows you to practice reasoning in a clear, controlled, and precise form—a kind of sandbox for thought. Once you see how good reasoning works in the logic classroom, you’ll be better prepared to tackle the messy arguments that occur all around us in the real world.
241-1: Introductory Ethics Fulfills Category B
Instructor: TBD
The course will examine a number of prominent moral theories including utilitarianism, Kantian ethics, and virtue theory. We will attempt to understand and evaluate their various claims about what has fundamental value as well as their approaches to moral reasoning and recommendations for right action.
241-2: Introductory Ethics Fulfills Category B
Instructor: TBD
The course will examine a number of prominent moral theories including utilitarianism, Kantian ethics, and virtue theory. We will attempt to understand and evaluate their various claims about what has fundamental value as well as their approaches to moral reasoning and recommendations for right action.
241-3: Introductory Ethics Fulfills Category B
Instructor: TBD
The course will examine a number of prominent moral theories including utilitarianism, Kantian ethics, and virtue theory. We will attempt to understand and evaluate their various claims about what has fundamental value as well as their approaches to moral reasoning and recommendations for right action.
243-1: Ethics in Business
Instructor: TBD
Case studies of moral issues in business; types or reasons appealed to for settlement.
243-2: Ethics in Business
Instructor: TBD
Case studies of moral issues in business; types or reasons appealed to for settlement.
243-3: Ethics in Business
Instructor: TBD
Case studies of moral issues in business; types or reasons appealed to for settlement.
244-1: Introductory AI and Data Ethics
Instructor: TBD
Introduction to contemporary moral and political issues in Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Data Ethics, integrating urgent problems, controversies, and continuously updated case studies. Introduces basic technical concepts such as the bias/variance tradeoff, the reference class problem, and inductive risk. Covers topics such as data and privacy, the impacts of automation on society, and the use of algorithms in medicine and criminal law.
320-1: Philosophy of Science
Instructor: Aja Watkins
Science helps us understand the world and make important decisions—from shaping public policy to guiding personal choices. But science isn’t perfect. It faces big challenges: we can’t always be sure our conclusions are right, evidence can support multiple theories, personal values often influence research, and history shows that many scientific ideas eventually get replaced.
This course explores whether and why we can trust science despite its flaws. We’ll look at how science works, why it sometimes goes wrong, and why it’s still the most reliable tool we have for learning about nature. Along the way, we’ll apply these ideas to real-world issues in medicine, environmental science, and beyond.
341-1: Contemporary Moral Issues Does NOT fulfill Comm B requirement
Instructor: TBD
A philosophical study of some of the major moral issue in contemporary society, such as those concerning abortion, euthanasia, punishment, property, politics, sex, nuclear disarmament, and world hunger.
341-2: Contemporary Moral Issues Does NOT fulfill Comm B requirement
Instructor: Harry Brighouse
This course will introduce you to the philosophical and other argumentative literature on a range of contemporary moral issues of public concern. At its core, careful thinking about moral issues is a matter of identifying, considering and weighing reasons for and against certain courses of action, and I want you to learn how better to engage in a practice of reason-giving and reason–taking that constitutes our best way of getting closer to truth about moral questions. We’ll engage with several issues, including: is abortion morally permissible?; Should schools defer to parental wishes about their children’s education?; should parents be licensed?; and is the gendered division of labor a source of injustice?
341-3: Contemporary Moral Issues Does NOT fulfill Comm B requirement
Instructor: Peter Vranas
Under what circumstances, if any, is abortion morally permissible? Should the death penalty be abolished? What causes terrorism, and is it ever morally permissible to torture terrorists? This course teaches students how to think systematically about these fascinating questions. The emphasis is not on defending particular answers but is instead on providing students with the tools they need to reach their own answer
341-SCF: Contemporary Moral Issues Fulfills Comm B requirement
A philosophical study of some of the major moral issue in contemporary society, such as those concerning abortion, euthanasia, punishment, property, politics, sex, nuclear disarmament, and world hunger. (Fulfills Comm B requirement).
- Lec. 91 Instructor: TBD Fulfills Comm B
Lec. 92 Instructor: TBD Fulfills Comm B
Lec. 93 Instructor: TBD Fulfills Comm B
Lec. 94 Instructor: TBD Fulfills Comm B
430-1: History of Ancient Philosophy
Instructor: Emily Fletcher
In this course, we will examine how ancient Greek philosophers approached fundamental questions about knowledge and reality. What is the nature and origin of the world? Did it come to be by chance, intelligence or some other cause? How do the senses and reason contribute to our understanding of the world? What is the connection between language and reality? We will focus on Plato and Aristotle, but we will also study some of their philosophical predecessors, such as Parmenides and Heraclitus, as well as the post-Aristotelian philosopher Epicurus
432-1: History of Modern Philosophy
Instructor: Jacob Zellmer
In this course we will read a selection of philosophical works from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. This was a crucial period for the early development of modern philosophy (which, at the time, included what we now consider “science”). The philosophers we will study will include René Descartes, Elisabeth of Bohemia, Benedict de Spinoza, Galileo Galilei, Anton Amo, Mary Astell, Zera Yacob, David Hume, Mary Shepherd, the Comte de Buffon, and Immanuel Kant. We will cover topics in metaphysics, epistemology, philosophical theology, the grounding of science, early conceptions of race, and moral philosophy.
454-1: Classical Philosophers – Kant’s First Critique
Instructor: James Messina
Immanuel Kant is perhaps the most important philosopher since Aristotle. His Critique of Pure Reason dealt a death blow to traditional “dogmatic” philosophy, whose proponents thought that it was possible to provide proofs of the immortality of the soul, the existence of God, and the reality of human freedom. In addition to denying the possibility of proving these specific claims, Kant went further by denying us any knowledge of reality in itself. This “negative” (i.e. depressing) aspect of the Critique earned Kant the moniker “the all-destroyer.” And yet, Kant also saw his philosophy as constructive – indeed, he thought he was saving Reason and the Enlightenment. In this course, we will study Kant’s seminal book and the crucial philosophical issues raised by it. We will also consider some related texts, including works criticizing Kant’s claims.
454-2: Classical Philosophers – Buddhist Philosophy
Instructor: Jeremy Manheim
Buddhist philosophy starts from the intuition that our suffering and dissatisfaction are the result of misunderstanding both ourselves and the way things are. How do such misunderstandings cause suffering? How can they be dispelled? What is a correct understanding of ourselves? And, of course, what is real? As we will see, Buddhist answers to these questions resulted in rich, deep, and often complex views about the nature of mind, reality, knowledge, and value. In this course, we too will start from the problem of suffering by looking at the forms it takes in our lives: meaninglessness, mortality, and generalized human misery. Over the course of the semester, we will explore many of the solutions to these problems that Buddhist philosophers have proposed over the millennia. And, along the way, we will attempt to unravel some of Buddhism’s most perplexing philosophical puzzles.”
503-1: Theory of Knowledge Fulfills Category A
Instructor: Michael Titelbaum
We will survey epistemology by focusing on three large epistemological problems and considering the issues that arise in attempting to resolve them. Readings will primarily be from academic articles written by contemporary philosophers. Topics covered will include: knowledge (what does it take to know something?), justification (how can our beliefs be justified?), skepticism (do we know a material world exists?), closure (do I know everything that’s entailed by what I know?), internalism vs. externalism (does the justification of my beliefs depend on anything besides my other beliefs?), and disagreement (should any two people with the same evidence draw the same conclusion?). Previous experience reading and writing philosophical papers is required.
512-1: Methods of Logic
Instructor: Peter Vranas
If mathematicians are necessarily rational but cyclists are not, is an individual who is both a mathematician and a cyclist necessarily rational or not? This is just one of the numerous puzzles associated with the notions of necessity and possibility, the notions that form the subject of modal logic. This course is a continuation of Philosophy 211 (Elementary Logic) and presupposes thorough familiarity with 211. The main object of the course is to enable students to (1) translate into logical notation English arguments involving the notions of necessity and possibility, and to (2) easily determine whether the translated arguments are valid or not. There is also a lot of philosophical discussion of issues related to modal logic.
516-1: Language and Meaning Fulfills Category A
Instructor: John Mackay
The course will cover some of the main themes in the philosophy of language. The human ability to communicate information about the external world through language is remarkable and raises a number of philosophical questions. Topics to be considered include: what it is for a linguistic expression to be meaningful; how it could come about that a linguistic expression – which is at some level just an arbitrary group of sounds or symbols – could have a meaning; how both the mind and the external world interact with language to determine meaning; how speakers use and manipulate language in different settings to communicate different kinds of information; and the way in which the meaning of a term depends on context.
541-1: Modern Ethical Theories Fulfills Category B
Instructor: Jimmy Goodrich
Physicists are after the “theory of everything” — a single, elegant, and unified theory that explains everything about the physical universe. Could there be such a theory for morality? Could a single, elegant, and unified theory explain the morality of war, abortion, and ghosting your ex? In this course, we will dive deep into moral philosophy and ask how close humanity has come or could come to uncovering “the moral theory of everything.”
549-1: Great Moral Philosophers Fulfills Category B
Instructor: Henry Southgate
A rigorous, text-critical, discussion-based study of classic works in value theory, normative ethics, and metaethical skepticism, with the aim of evaluating social institutions and individual practices. Readings will be drawn from principal works of Aristotle, Bentham, de Beauvoir, Kant, Mill, Murdoch, and Nietzsche.
551-1: Philosophy of the Mind Fulfills Category A
Instructor: Farid Masrour
This course surveys central topics in contemporary philosophy of mind. We will discuss issues such as the relationship between the mind and the physical world, whether a scientific understanding of consciousness is possible, theories of mental representation, the nature of perceptual experience, and whether minds could be modeled as computers.
556-1: Topics in Feminism and Philosophy – Reproductive Health
Instructor: Aja Watkins
How do science and policy shape our most intimate experiences of health and reproduction? This course dives into feminist perspectives on this question, exploring how ideas about gender and power influence everything from sex education and birth control to pregnancy and childbirth.
We’ll examine both classic and cutting-edge feminist scholarship to unpack topics like reproductive rights, abortion access, maternal health, and labor and delivery practices. Along the way, we’ll ask big questions about autonomy, justice, and the role of science in shaping public policy and personal lives.
560-2: Metaphysics Fulfills Category A
Instructor: Sam Roberts
This course is an advanced introduction to metaphysics. We’ll explore some of the most fundamental and general aspects of reality, focusing on the nature of existence, identity, and possibility. We’ll address questions like: What is there? Do you exist in addition to the physical matter that you’re made of? Are there abstract objects like numbers? What about fictional objects, like Kang the Conqueror? Am I the same person today as I was yesterday? And if not, why should I be held responsible for my past actions? I’m not the head of a galaxy-spanning evil empire, but I could have been, given the right—though very far-fetched—circumstances. How should we understand the sense in which this, and many more mundane—though more important—scenarios, are possible?
At various points during the semester, we’ll also ask deep methodological questions about how to go about answering the questions of metaphysics. In other words: we’ll do some metametaphysics
Spring 2026 Graduate Courses
For course days and times, please go to Course Search and Enroll
701 Reading Seminars (combined with Graduate Seminars) Instructor Consent
701-001 Reading Seminars Topic: Causation in Early Modern Philosophy
Instructor: Steven Nadler 701-001 meets with 835-1. Please see the description of 835-1 below.
701-002 Reading Seminars Topic: Aesthetics
Instructor: Bruno Whittle 701-002 meets with 941-2. Please see the description of 941-2 below.
701-003 Reading Seminars Topic: Modality and Assertion
Instructor: John Mackay 701-003 meets with 916-1. Please see the description of 916-1 below.
701-004 Reading Seminars Topic: Ethics in Intimate Relationships
Instructor: Elizabeth Brake 701-004 meets with 941-1. Please see the description of 941-1 below.
701-005 Reading Seminars Topic: Behaviorism, Functionalism, and Dispositionalism
Instructor: Jesse Steinberg 701-005 meets with 951-1. Please see the description of 951-1 below.
835-1: Seminar- Advanced History of Philosophy
Topic: Causation in Early Modern Philosophy
Instructor: Steven Nadler
The concept of causation was central in early modern (17th and 18th century) metaphysics, natural philosophy (especially of the “new” mechanical variety) and philosophy of science. Accounts of causal relations grounded in interactionism, occasionalism and preestablished harmony vied competitively for the attention of Cartesians and anti-Cartesians alike.
Our texts will include René Descartes, Elisabeth of Bohemia, Baruch Spinoza, Louis de La Forge, Géraud de Cordemoy, Nicolas Malebranche, Anne Conway, John Locke, Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, Isaac Newton, George Berkeley and David Hume.
916-1: Seminar -Philosophy of Language
Topic: Modality and Assertion
Instructor: John Mackay
Possible worlds have a dual role in contemporary philosophy of language and semantics. On the one hand, they are used to describe the meanings of specific expressions such as modals and conditionals. On the other hand, they are used to model general phenomena about meaning and communication; possible worlds are used to give theories of propositions, assertion, and conversational update. In this seminar we will examine both of these roles and their interaction. We will begin by reading a few classic works on the semantics of modals and conditionals, and then turn to some foundational papers on the pragmatics of assertion and communication. In the later part of the seminar, we will look at contemporary work about the interaction of these themes, much of which uses modal and conditional language to argue for new models of content and communication.
941-1: Seminar – Ethics
Topic: Ethics in Intimate Relationships
Instructor: Elizabeth Brake
Intimate relationships are sources of great value and of great vulnerability. What do we owe to each other in intimate relationships, and why? What distinctive wrongs do intimate relationships enable? How, if at all, should the state be involved in promoting the goods of relationships – or protecting against the wrongs which can occur within them? In this course, we will discuss a range of classic and newer work on these questions.
941-2: Seminar – Ethics
Topic: Aesthetics
Instructor: Bruno Whittle
This class will consider a range of philosophical questions about art. The focus will be on questions that emerge naturally from engagement with art (pictures, movies, TV shows, novels etc.); questions you might expect someone to be interested in, if you know they are interested in art; as opposed to philosophical questions that just happen to take art as their object. For example, questions about the point of art, about its value to us, or consideration of general schemes for thinking about how art works. Most of the readings will probably be more or less recent works of analytic philosophy. But some might be less academic writings by philosophers, or even works by critics, novelists etc. that can (it is hoped) be treated philosophically
951-1: Seminar – Philosophy of Mind
Topic: Behaviorism, Functionalism, and Dispositionalism
Instructor: Jesse Steinberg
We’ll discuss the three theoriest mentioned in the title of this course with our attention focused on how best to develop an account of mental states like beliefs, desires, intentions, hopes, etc. While we’ll be primarily concerned with issues that are core to philsophy of mind, we’ll also touch on issues in philosophy of science, epistemology, philosophy of action, and metaphysics. I’m reserving quite a few sessions of the course to be devoted to topics of interest to the students. As for assignments, we will have one major writing assignment that is geared around the process of publishing a paper in a philosophy journal. This will involve a draft process, a “revise and resubmit” phase, and a final submission at the end of the semester.