Philosophy 240 / Belief and Reality / Spring 2009

This is an entry-level course in analytic epistemology (i.e., theory of knowledge) and metaphysics for the philosophically-inclined. We will address aspects of human belief and knowledge, followed by fundamental questions about the nature of the self. Among the topics we will discuss are these: meaning and meaningfulness, the analysis of knowledge, skepticism, the mind/body problem, free will, and personal identity.

There are no prerequisites for this course, although you need to be comfortable with the give and take of intellectual argument. I am trained as an analytic philosopher, which means that I focus on conceptual analysis and traffic in logical argumentation. Philosophy may seem like a free-for-all, but it isn't---you will need to defend the views you champion with argument.

The course is also writing-intensive, with many papers written over the course of the semester. You learn philosophy best by writing it.