Philosophy 231,
Knowing, Being, and Doing: Philosophical Method and its Applications
Spring 2005, Tuesdays and Thursdays, 8:15-9:30
Instructor: Tony Doyle, tdoyle@hunter.cuny.edu
Office: 325T; office hours: by appointment
Course Description:
This is a general introduction to philosophy. The course is
divided into four units: (1) knowledge and skepticism; (2) the existence of
God; (3) ethics; and (4) justice and political philosophy. After a brief
introduction to philosophy and the nature of reasoning we will begin with a
discussion of what, if anything, we can know in the context of the work of the
famous seventeenth century philosopher, René Descartes. Next we will cover
several traditional arguments for God’s existence and their criticisms. Then we
will move on to some considerations that atheists have offered against God’s
existence, for instance, (1) How could God exist given how much suffering there
is in the world (the problem of evil)? And (2) Does the advance of science
deprive us of good reasons for believing in God (naturalism)? In the third unit
we will be looking at the nature or morality and at several theories that
philosophers have proposed for distinguishing right and wrong. We will be
asking some of the following questions: Is morality relative to cultures? How
might morality and religion be related? Might moral standards be independent of
religion? In unit 4 we will focus the central notion in political philosophy,
justice. What makes one society more just than another? Does government have a
responsibility to ensure that all of its citizens have equal opportunity in
education and career? We will look at John Rawls’s highly influential theory of
justice, a criticism of Rawls, and Rawls’s response to that criticism.
Required texts:
Feinberg, Joel and Russ Shafer-Landau, eds. Reason and
Responsibility, 12th edition.
Blackburn, Simon. Think: A Compelling Introduction to
Philosophy
Written requirements:
1. Short, unannounced quizzes. As you’ve probably noticed,
this class meets early. To encourage punctuality, from time to time I will
begin class with ten minute exercises. These will cover both the reading and
topics we have recently covered in class. You’ll be able to use your notebooks
but not any texts, unless expressly permitted.
2. Hour exam. I will ask you to write two thirty-minute
essays.
3. Two formal papers (600-800 words), one on the existence of
God, the other on ethics. These papers will give you an opportunity to go
beyond the readings and class discussion. What I am mainly interested in seeing
in these essays is that you can present the ideas from class and the readings
in clear, jargon-free prose and that you can use your own examples to support
your case. For these essays I will be recommending relevant articles from The
Encyclopedia of Philosophy (In library at Ref. B41.E5) and The Stanford
Encyclopedia of Philosophy (http://plato.stanford.edu). Although these essays
aren’t research papers, I expect them to have a proper bibliography, American
Psychological Association (APA) style. For a digested version see http://rwc.hunter.cuny.edu/writing/on-line.html;
Documentation Styles. If you feel you need help with your writing, you can go
to The Writing Center (2307 North Hall) for a free tutorial.
4. Final exam, two hours. I will ask you to write three
forty-minute essays. This exam will cover everything we’ve done for the
semester.
Other requirements:
Assignment dates and percentage of final grades
Quizzes and class participation: 20%
Two formal papers: paper one due March 1; paper 2 due April
21; 15% each
Midterm: March 29; 20%
Final: May 24, 8:00-10:00; 30%
Blackboard. This course will have a Blackboard site. There you
will find the complete syllabus followed by a detailed course outline. I will
be posting handouts there. I will also be posting your reading assignments and
further information about your two formal essays there. I will be posting
information about your assignments for the next class on Tuesdays and Thursdays
by 5PM. You’re responsible for checking Blackboard prior to each class. I will
be giving you more information about Blackboard next week.
Rules:
Attendance. Attendance is required. Be on time. If you’re more
than fifteen minutes late, I will count you as absent for that day. Lateness
within the first fifteen minutes will be counted as half an absence. You will
be unable to complete the course if you miss more than four classes. Please
note that all absences (justified or unjustified, or due to late registration)
count toward the total allowable absences in class. These restrictions don’t
apply to those who, due to a disability, illness, or extreme hardship can’t
make it to class or can’t get to class on time. However, I expect you to get my
permission beforehand.
Make-ups. There will be no make-ups for the unannounced
quizzes. If you’re late for a quiz, you won’t be allowed to take it. I expect
you to produce a legitimate, documented excuse to make up the exams. Without
one, you won’t be able to take a make up.
Late work. You will lose a third of a grade for every class
day that your work is late. For instance, if an assignment is due on Thursday
and you hand it in on the following Tuesday, an A becomes an A-, and A- a B+
and so on. I will accept nothing by email.
Plagiarism and cheating. Cheating on an exam will result in an
automatic F for the exercise. I will also pass your name along to the college’s
student disciplinary committee for possible further sanctions. Plagiarism is
any attempt to pass someone else’s ideas or research off as your own, through
either unattributed direct quotation or paraphrasing. Plagiarism on either of
the essays will also result in an automatic F for the assignment, and I will again
pass your name along to the student disciplinary committee. Plagiarism doesn’t
pay: if you try it, you will almost certainly get caught. (See attached
"Plagiarism Policy.")
Classroom rules. CUNY’s rules and regulations for the
maintenance of public order apply at all times. Also, no eating in class.
Please shut off all cell phones and other electronic gadgets during class.
Please seek my permission if you’d like to record a class. Any student
violating these rules will be subject to the following range of sanctions:
absent mark, warning, expulsion from class, over-all grade reduction, or
suspension from class.
Introduction
I.What is philosophy?
II. Argument
A. What is an argument?
B. Why offer arguments?
C. Premises and conclusions
D. Truth, falsity, and evidence
Reading: Blackburn, 193-195; recommended: 1-13
Unit 1: Descartes and Skepticism
I. Introduction to Descartes’s Meditations
Reading:
II. Extreme (exaggerated or "hyperbolic") doubt
(numbers below correspond to the paragraphs of the Mediation)
A. Why offer skeptical arguments at all? 1.2;
B. Sense deception argument
1. D’s presentation: 1.3
2. D’s rejection: 1.4
C. Dream argument
1. D’s presentation: 1.5
2. D’s rejection: 1.6-1.8
D. Deceptive God argument: 1.9-1.11
E. The evil demon: 1.12
Additional reading:
III. Initial absolute ("metaphysical") certainties:
Meditation 2
A. Summary of the results of Med 1: 2.1-2.2
B. The cogito: 2.3
C. Related beliefs that survive extreme doubt: 2.4-2.9
Additonal reading:
IV. God’s existence and the attempt to remove extreme doubt:
Meditation 3
A. Summary of Meds 1 and 2: 3.1-3.4
B. D’s criterion of truth: 3.2;
C. God’s existence and the removal of extreme doubt: 3.4 (See
also 5.12-5.16)
D. The attempt to show that some of D’s ideas must be caused
from without
1. First effort: 3.5-3.12
2. Second effort; appeal to the causal principle: 3.13-3.21
E. D’s (first) proof for God's existence (The Trademark
Argument): 3.22-3.24; Blackburn, 34-37
F. Arnauld’s objection (The Cartesian Circle): p. 106.2-106.3
;
V. Why God isn’t a deceiver: Med 4
A. The "problem of error:" 4.2-4.4
B. D’s proposed solution to the "problem of error"
1. Appeal to the notion of the best of all possible worlds:
4.5-4.7
2. Explanation of the cause of error: 4.8-4.11
3. Explanation of why God isn’t responsible: 4.12-4.17
VI. The physical world
A. Proof of the physical world
B. Why D feels he needs to offer such a proof: 6.6
C. Rehearsal of reasons for doubting the physical world in the
first place: 6.7-6.8
D. The proof itself: 6.10
E. D’s own reservations about the effectiveness of his proof:
6.10-6.11
VII. Assessment of Descartes
Reading:
Questions to bear in mind as you read Descartes
1. What are D’s overall goals in the Meditations?
2. What role does extreme doubt play in D’s project?
3. What role do skeptical arguments play in the execution of
extreme doubt?
4. What are the main skeptical arguments that D presents in
Meditation 1 and what does he make of them?
5. What is it about D’s existence in particular that resists
extreme doubt?
6. Given that D can be absolutely (metaphysically) certain
that he exists, what else does he think that he can be absolutely certain of?
(See Meditation 2.4-2.9.)
7. What criterion of truth does D claim to discover? What's
the relationship between D’s acceptance of this criterion and the existence of
a non-deceiving God?
8. What is D’s (first) proof for the existence of God? How
does Arnauld criticize this?
9. How does D try to show that God isn’t a deceiver?
10. Why does D think that he needs to prove the existence of
the physical world? How does he attempt to do so? Does D himself have any
reservations about this proof? Do you have any reservations about how D
proceeds here?
11. Is the moral of Descartes’s "story" that there
is no way to overcome complete skepticism?
Unit
2. Arguments for and against God’s existence
I. Background: The concept of God; why there has to be some consensus at the
outset
II. Anselm’s ontological argument
A. Key assumptions of Anselm’s argument
1. God=greatest possible being
2. God exists in the mind (or thought or the understanding)
3. Existence in reality is a perfection
B. A’s argument
1. What is a reductio ad absurdum?
2. The argument itself
C. Gaunilo’s perfect island objection
D. A’s response to this
1. No single concept of the perfect island
2. Perfect island isn’t the greatest possible being.
E. Kant’s criticism that existence in reality isn’t a perfection
Reading: Blackburn, 149-52; Gaunilo, "On Behalf of the Fool;" (in
Feinberg), p. 8, sec. 1; p. 10, sec. 6; Rowe, "The Ontological
Argument" (in Feinberg), 11-14 (left column) and 15-16.4; "Anselm’s
Ontological Argument" (handout on Blackboard)
Suggested reading: Anselm from Proslogium (in Feinberg), 6-7
III. The first cause argument
A. What’s the one thing that the theist claims that the atheist can’t
satisfactorily explain?
B. The argument itself
C. Objections
1. Hume’s contention that the universe isn’t a thing
2. What caused God?/Why assume that the universe must have had a cause?
3. The theist left with two mysteries, the atheist only with one
4. Even if universe had a cause, no reason to suppose that it=God
Reading:
IV. The argument from Design
A. The argument itself
1. What analogy does the argument try to establish between human-made machines
on the one hand and components of the universe on the other?
a. Cleanthes
b. Paley
2. Why does the defender of the argument claim we have to appeal to God?
B. Hume’s objections
1. Why select thought as a model for the universe?
2. The universe doesn’t seem to be perfect.
3. Even if the universe is perfect, no proof that God is
4. Many gods
5. No reason to prefer any of the following designer hypotheses
a. God
b. Infant god
c. Subordinate god
d. Senile god
e. Many gods
V. The Problem of Evil
A. What is it? Why does the atheist claim that there would be no evil if a
being with the characteristics of Anselm’s God existed?
B. The Theist’s response
1. The best of all possible worlds
2. Free will
a. Its place in the best of all possible worlds
b. How it (apparently) solves the problem of moral evil
C. The problem of natural evil
D. The Theist’s response
1. Natural evil needed for higher goods
E. The atheist’s objection to this
F. Theist: Evil has to be seen in overall context; the evil that occurs is the
least possible in order that this greater good can be achieved.
G. The atheist’s objection to this: Why so much?
Reading:
Optional reading: Swinbrune, "Why God Allows Evil" (in Feinberg):
89-97
VI. God and Science: Naturalism
A. The case for naturalism
1. What does it mean to describe God as a hypothesis?
2. Why does the naturalist claim that there is no longer any work for God,
considered as a hypotheses, to do?
3. Evolution
a.
b. Why before
c. Why
Reading: Richard Dawkins, from The Blind Watchmaker (on reserve)
4. What role does Ockham’s Razor play in the naturalist’s argument?
5. Why does Baier claim that the (medieval) Christian world picture is
incompatible with the scientific world picture?
6. Why does Baier claim that, whenever there’s a conflict between the claims of
religion and the claims of science, we should always side with science?
B. Criticism of naturalism: science can at best explain how events occur; only
religion can answer the more important why questions.
C. The Naturalist’s response
Reading: Kurt Baier, "The Meaning of Life," in E.D. Klemke, The
Meaning of Life (on reserve); Jeffrey Olen, "Natualism," From Persons
and Their World (on reserve)
VII. Pascal’s Wager
A. The decision matrix
1. What is an outcome?
2. How does one calculate the
expected utility of an alternative?
B. What are Pascal’s assumptions?
1. The existence of God
2. The nature of divine reward and
punishment
C. Pascal’s decision matrix
1. What numbers go in each box?
2. What’s the expected utility of
belief in God?
3. What’s the expected utility of
non-belief?
4. Why does Pascal have to assume
that there is at least some chance that God exists?
5. Why is it irrelevant whether
non-believers are punished eternally or simply have no afterlife?
D. Why is his wager not an
argument for God’s existence?
E. Why does Pascal think that it’s
more reasonable to behave as if God exists than otherwise?
F. What is the many-gods (many
religions) criticism of Pascal’s Wager?
1. Can we know what God’s
preferences are if he exists?
2. Different religions expect
different types of behavior from its adherents
3. Why does Pascal’s Wager end in
a contradiction?
Reading: Blackburn, 185-89; Pascal
(in Feinberg), 114-116.1
Unit
3: Ethics
I. What is ethics?
Reading: Peter Singer, Practical Ethics,
ch 1 (on reserve)
II. Cultural Relativism
A. What is it?
B. Argument for: the argument from cultural diversity
C. Objection to the argument from cultural diversity:
disagreement about moral standards doesn't show that neither society is
correct.
D. Nussbaum on female genital mutilation and the defenders
of Cultural Relativism
1. It's morally wrong to criticize the practices of another
culture unless one is prepared to be similarly critical of comparable practices
in one's own culture.
2. Nussbaum's response
3. It is morally wrong to criticize the practices of
another culture unless one's own culture has eradicated all evils of a
comparable kind.
4. Nussbaum's response
5. Female genital mutilation is morally on a par with
dieting and body shaping in American culture.
6. Nussbaum's response
E. General criticisms: Consequences of taking CR seriously
1. We can't say that the moral practices of some cultures
are superior or inferior to our own.
2. We could tell whether an action was right or wrong just
by looking at the standards a given culture.
3. We have to deny that there could be moral progress.
F. Why there's less disagreement than there seems
1. Inuits and infanticide
2. Inuits and the elderly
G. Values that all cultures have in common
1. Care for young
2. Rules against lying and deception
3. Stern prohibitions against murder
Reading: Rachels, From Elements of Moral
Philosophy: (e-res); Martha Nussbaum, "Judging Other Cultures: A Case
of Genital Mutilation" (in Feinberg)
III. The Divine Command Theory
A. What is it?
B. What reason can be offered in favor of it?
C. Criticisms
1. Plato’s criticism
a. Problem with claiming that actions are right or obligatory because God
commands them
b. Problem with claiming that God commands us to do certain things because he
can see that they’re obligatory.
2. Other problems
a. Theory only as good as the
evidence in favor of God’s existence.
b. Given God’s existence, how do
we know what he has commanded?
c. Assume that the Ten
Commandments are divinely commanded
i. They don’t cover all cases
(Bentham)
ii. They seem wrong
iii. No way to resolve conflicts
between them
d. In order to know whether something
is permitted (or forbidden) by God we first have to know whether it’s right (or
wrong).
Reading: Quinn, pp. 564-67; 575 (in Feinberg); Plato, Euthyphro, 5c-11b (e-res); Bentham, From Principles of Morals and Legislation (e-res), 21.3.
IV. Deontology: Ross’s theory
A. What is deontology
B. Why Ross is a deontolgist?
C. Prima facie duties
1. Some examples of prima facie duties
2. Prima facie duties as
exceptionless
2. Prima facie duties as self-evident
D. Prima facie duties vs. actual duties
1. What’s the difference?
2. Does Ross offer a method for
determining what our actual duty is in cases of conflict?
E. Ross’s criticisms of utilitarianism
1. Why Uism distorts the way we
think about our ordinary moral obligations like keeping a promise or paying
back a debt.
2. Why Uism can’t account for
morally significant relations.
Reading: Ross in Feinberg,
608.3-611.1; pay special attention to 608.3-609.1 and 610.2.
V. Mill and Utilitarianism
A. Fundamentals of the theory
1. The principle of utility
2. The principle of equal consideration of interests
3. Rules of thumb
4. The right action vs. the good intention
5. See also Questions on Mill's Utilitarianism (in Course Documents)
B. Response to the criticisms of Ross
1. Morally significant relations and the trolley case
2. Promise-keeping, prima facie duties, and rules of thumb
Reading: Utilitarianism (in Feinberg), 602.4-604.2 and 605.3-607
C. Singer and our obligtions to those suffering from famine
1. What point is Singer trying to make with his Concorde and Sydney Opera House
examples?
2. What conclusion does Singer propose to argue for in this essay?
3. Singer makes two main assumptions. What are they? Are they correct?
4. How do you think Singer would respond to the claim that we should "help
our own" before we help those who are suffering halfway around the world?
5. What does Singer say about the view that "numbers lessen
obligation?"
6. Why does Singer deny that the traditional distinction between duty and
charity can be drawn as we normally draw it?
7. How does Singer respond to the objection that people ordinarily "do not
condemn those who indulge in famine relief?"
8. What conclusion does Singer finally reach about the extent of our
obligations to relieve absolute poverty?
9. What does Singer say about the consequences that our philosophical
conclusions should have for action
Reading: "Famine, Affluence, and Morality" (in Feinberg), 631-634.1
I. What is
justice?
Reading: Thomas Nagel, What Does it All Mean? ch. 8 (reserve)
II. Nozick and the minimal state
A. Rights
B. Entitlement
C. Limited government
III. Rawls’s theory
A. Justice as fairness
B. Choosing the principles of justice: the original position,
the veil of ignorance, and the original agreement
C. How the veil of ignorance is supposed to ensure fairness
D. Why the principles chosen behind the veil must be the
principles of justice
E. The two principles of justice; why they would be chosen
behind the veil according to Rawls
F. How Rawls would justify higher pay for some occupations and
lower pay for others
Reading: "Justice as Fairness" (in Feinberg)
IV. Rawls and utilitarianism
A. Why Rawls rejects utilitarianism
1. Distributive justice
2. How would Rawls attempt to show that there’s a conflict
between the principle of utility and the difference principle?
B. The utilitarian’s response
1. Why the utilitarian isn’t (directly) concerned with the
distribution of happiness
2. Why the utilitarian is (indirectly) concerned with how the
means to happiness get distributed
3. Why the utilitarian wouldn’t accept Rawls’s two principles
as universal rules
4. Why the utilitarian would probably accept Rawls’s two
principles as rules of thumb