PHIL 100
Mind, Knowledge and Reality
Please note: this is archived course information from 2019 for PHIL 100.
Description
This course deals with fundamental philosophical problems and puzzles about the nature of the world and human beings. Examples include philosophical questions about the existence of God, the relationship between physical reality and mental life and the nature of identity and the self. The theory of knowledge studies philosophical problems concerning the sources, limits and justification of human knowledge and understanding (particularly, as distinct from mere opinion or belief). The course will introduce students to a selection of such topics and to some of the important philosophical discussions and debates to which they have given rise.
The course is divided into three parts (1) Plato and Descartes, (2) Hume’s Epistemology and Philosophy of Religion, (3) Selected problems in metaphysics and epistemology.
The first part of the course (4 weeks), taught by Robert Wicks, will discuss Plato’s metaphysical theory of timeless forms, Descartes’s quest for certainty though his “method of doubt” and the distinction between mind and body. The second part (4 weeks), taught by John Bishop, will discuss Hume’s empiricist theory of knowledge and its application to the question of God’s existence. For the third part of the course (4 weeks) Raamy Majeed will give lectures on problems in the Philosophy of Mind
Course outcomes
Students who successfully complete this course will, at an introductory level, gain an understanding of epistemology and leading metaphysical ideas in the Western tradition of philosophy, and be motivated to pursue philosophical studies at the advanced undergraduate level.
Students should be able to explain and critically assess the theories and arguments of the philosophers discussed in the course in their own words and in a way that shows good familiarity with the prescribed readings. The teaching in the course will aim to encourage students to discover and develop the capacity to exercise their own philosophical imagination, creativity and critical judgment in thinking about the "big questions" concerning mind, knowledge and reality in response to the works studied.
In this introductory course there is an emphasis on reading primary sources rather than secondary literature and commentaries.
Availability 2019
Semester 1
Lecturer(s)
Lecturer(s) Professor John Bishop
Dr Raamy Majeed
Professor Robert Wicks
Recommended Reading
Readings for the course will be made available through web-based resource materials on Canvas. These will include selections from Plato’s Dialogues, Descartes’s Meditations on First Philosophy and Hume’s Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion.
Assessment
Coursework and exam
Points
PHIL 100: 15 points
