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A required seminar for third year philosophy PhD students designed to help them transition to writing a dissertation.

Graduate seminar. 2-unit option only for Phil PhDs beyond the second year. In this seminar, we'll examine some of the central issues in Aristotle's Ethical Psychology. Topics include: (1) weakness of will (acrasia), (2) self-control, (3) what the virtuous know and how they know it, (4) ethical training and learning to be good, (5) the nature of the fine (the kalon), (6) the nature of non-rational motivations, (7) the nature of particular character virtues such as courage and moderation, (8) the nature and ethical role of pleasure, (9) Aristotle's views on the use of reasoning and persuasion in ethical education, and (10) the nature and ethical role of emotion.

2-unit option available only to PhD students beyond the second year. Undergraduates wishing to take this course must have taken Philosophy 100 or a more advanced Philosophy course in ancient philosophy and have the permission of the instructor.

In this course, we shall examine conceptions of goodness both ancient and modern. Things can be good or bad for people, for dogs, for trees, and so on. This is relational goodness. (Can things be good or bad for artifacts, e.g., books and paintings?) There can be good teachers and bad teachers, good poets and bad poets, good and bad oak trees and cats. This is attributive goodness. But is there also a kind of goodness that's a simple and intrinsic property of things? This would be absolute goodness. We shall read, among others, Plato, Aristotle, Kant, G.E. Moore, and Judith Jarvis Thomson. We shall examine questions including the following. What basic kinds of goodness are there (e.g. relational, attributive, absolute) and what are the relations among them? Is moral or ethical goodness a distinct kind of goodness? Are any kinds of goodness objective? Do non-moral or non-ethical goods benefit the unvirtuous as Plato denies and Aristotle (at least sometimes) accepts? Is Kant right that the only thing good without qualification is a good will? Graduate seminar. 2 unit option only for Phil PhDs beyond the second year.

Grad seminar. 2 unit option only for Philosophy PhD students beyond the second year.

A seminar based around a close reading and analysis of Aristotle's De Motu Animalium. This short text, on how animals bring about action (motion), is something of a treasure-trove of various interesting details and complications concerning Aristotle's philosophy of action, psychology, physics, and metaphysics. It is also heterogenous or interdisciplinary in its discussions, which will lead us to consider questions of method in Aristotle. We additionally have the treat of seeing what we make of a brand new (summer 2020) major edition from the Symposium Aristotelicum series.The 2 unit option is only for Philosophy PhD students beyond the second year; all others take for 4 units.

The idea that humans have a special function (ergon) plays an important role in Plato's ethics and a fundamental role in Aristotle's ethics. In this seminar, we'll examine the content and role of the idea of function in both philosophers. Readings will include parts of Plato's Republic and Aristotle's Eudemian Ethics, Magna Moralia, Nicomachean Ethics, and Protrepticus. May be repeated for credit. 2 unit option only open to Philosophy PhD students beyond the second year.

2 unit option only open to Philosophy PhD students beyond the second year.

This seminar examines Plato's basic views in normative ethicsand metaethics. Although there's a large literature on Plato's normative ethics, there's been surprisingly little work on his metaethics and the relation between his metaethics and his normative ethics. We'll focus on the following issues. (1) What ethical properties does Plato use? (2) Plato is a Rational Eudaimonist (roughly, the ultimate end of all rational action is the agent's own greatest happiness). Is Rational Eudaimonism unacceptably egoistic and insufficiently impartial? (3) Why does Plato move from accepting Psychological Eudaimonism (roughly, whenever a person acts, she tries to perform the action that she believes optimally conduces to her greatest happiness) to rejecting it and accepting weakness of will (akrasia)? What are the implications for views about the unity of the person and mental transparency? (4) What's the place of pleasure in happiness and ethical learning? This question leads to some basic issues in Plato's ethical psychology, ethical epistemology, and metaphysics of value. (5) What's the relation between ethical knowledge and ethical belief? This question leads to basic issues in Plato's epistemology and metaphysics. (6) What conceptions of goodness does Plato have (attributive, relational, and non-relational) and what are the relations among them? (7) In Plato's axiology, does he accept an organic unity account of goods (as did G. E. Moore in Principia Ethica) or a conditionalist view of goods (as did Kant in The Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals)? 2-unit option only open to Philosophy PhD students beyond the second year; all others enroll in 4 units.