printer friendly pagePHIL 115: Problems in Medieval Philosophy: Islamic Aristotelianism and Western Scholasticism (PHIL 215)
The western world adopted Aristotle's metaphysics and natural philosophy as the foundation of its educational system and scholarly life between 1210 and 1255. Christian Europe was thereby following the example set by Islam in Spain and the Near East. Today some people believe that this development was independent, and others think that the scholastics copied even their methods from Arabic philosophers. Historical evaluation of those claims.
Last offered: Spring 2010
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum
| Repeatable
for credit
PHIL 116: Aquinas (PHIL 216)
This course is an introduction to the metaphysical thought of St. Thomas Aquinas (1225 ¿ 1274), one of the most important and influential philosopher-theologians of the High Middle Ages. Readings will be drawn primarily from the "Summa theologiae."
Last offered: Spring 2016
PHIL 117: Descartes (PHIL 217)
(Formerly 121/221.) Descartes's philosophical writings on rules for the direction of the mind, method, innate ideas and ideas of the senses, mind, God, eternal truths, and the material world.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 4
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum
Instructors:
De Pierris, G. (PI)
PHIL 118: British Empiricism, 1660s-1730s
Focus is on the big three British Empiricists and their developments of thought based on the foundational role that they give to sensory perception or experience as the source of knowledge. Topics may include the theory of ideas, idealism, personal identity, human agency, moral motivation, causation, and induction. Readings predominantly from Locke, Berkeley, and Hume.
Last offered: Spring 2007
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum
PHIL 118A: Origins of Empiricism: Gassendi, Locke, and Berkeley (PHIL 218A)
Particular light is shed on both the strengths and weaknesses of empiricism by studying it as it first arose during the 17th century revolution in philosophy and the sciences initiated by Descartes. Three philosophers of that period helped to advance empiricism: Pierre Gassendi (1592-1655), John Locke (1632-1704), and George Berkeley (1685-1753). A brief introduction to Descartes is followed by Gassendi's reaction to Descartes and his influence on Locke; Locke's theory of ideas, mind, language, reality, and natural philosophy expounded in his An Essay concerning Human Understanding (Fourth Edition, 1689); and Berkeley's later reaction to Locke.
Last offered: Spring 2014
PHIL 119: Rationalists (PHIL 219)
Developments in 17th-century continental philosophy. Descartes's views on mind, necessity, and knowledge. Spinoza and Leibniz emphazing their own doctrines and their criticism of their predecessors. Prerequisite: 102.
Last offered: Winter 2013
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum
PHIL 120A: The Leibniz-Clarke Correspondence (PHIL 220A)
Correspondence on metaphysics, theology, and science.
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum
PHIL 120W: Richard Rufus on Aristotle's Metaphysics: Ontology, Unity, Universals, & Individuation (PHIL 220W)
Mini-Course taught by Rega Wood in association with Santiago Melo Arias & Professors Alan Code & Calvin Normore. Code, Wood, & Melo Arias have spent the last 6 months intensively studying Richard Rufus of Cornwall's commentary on Aristotle's Metaphysics Zeta, Eta, & Theta. This June we will present Rufus' views on ontology, unity, & universals. There will be 6 two hour sessions on June, 4,5, & 6 (Thurs - Saturday), 10-12 noon , 2-4 pm. Readings will be taken chiefly from Melo Arias' new translations of Rufus' circa 1238 commentary; other readings, from Aristotle and Averroes. We will consider the difference between the treatment of definition, essence and being in logic and in metaphysics, the sense in which accidents have definitions, the unity of genus and differentia in the ndefinitions of substances, the unity of form and proximate matter in hylomorphic compounds, and the unity of the parts of the rational soul. In this context we will discuss the formal distinction pioneered by Rufus as a description of differences in formal predication consistent with real sameness.Richard Rufus was the nfirst Western professor to lecture on Aristotle's metaphysics in Medieval Europe.
Last offered: Spring 2015
PHIL 122: Hume (PHIL 222)
(Formerly 120/220; graduate students enroll in 222.) Hume's theoretical philosophy, in particular, skepticism and naturalism, the theory of ideas and belief, space and time, causation and necessity, induction and laws of nature, miracles, a priori reasoning, the external world, and the identity of the self.
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum
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