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Your search for courses · tagged with PHIL Traditions 1 · returned 4 results
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PHIL 119 Meaning of Life 6 credits
Does life have a meaning? To answer this, we will explore various cross-cultural approaches to the meaning of life, both those that affirm meaning and deny it. We will cover, for example, approaches to the meaning of life grounded in divinity, creativity, striving, and more. We will also inquire into related questions about agency: Is fate compatible with meaning in life? Is meaning distinct from happiness? Is meaning a moralized concept? In addition, there will be room for student choice of topics.
- Spring 2025
- HI, Humanistic Inquiry WR2 Writing Requirement 2
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PHIL 213 Ethics 6 credits
How should we live? This is the fundamental question for the study of ethics. This course looks at classic and contemporary answers to the fundamental question from Socrates to Kant to modern day thinkers. Along the way, we consider slightly (but only slightly) more tractable questions such as: What reason is there to be moral? Is there such a thing as moral knowledge (and if so, how do we get it)? What are the fundamental principles of right and wrong (if there are any at all)? Is morality objective?
- Winter 2025
- HI, Humanistic Inquiry WR2 Writing Requirement 2
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PHIL 218 Virtue Ethics 6 credits
What is a good human life? Who is a good person? From the time of Plato and Aristotle onwards, many philosophers have thought about these questions in terms of two central ideas. Virtues, such as justice or courage, make us a certain type of person (they give us a certain character). Wisdom enables us to make good judgments about how to act. How do virtue and wisdom work together to produce a good human life? Is a good life the same as a happy life? We will reflect on these and related questions as we read texts from Alasdair MacIntyre, Philippa Foot, and other significant thinkers in the contemporary virtue ethics tradition. We will also consider the application of virtue ethics to specific areas, such as environmental ethics, as well as the parallels between Western virtue ethics and the tradition of Confucianism in ancient China.
- Winter 2025
- HI, Humanistic Inquiry WR2 Writing Requirement 2
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PHIL 323 Living Wisely 6 credits
For Aristotle, and many following him, practical wisdom (phronesis) guarantees both goodness and happiness. Sounds like a deal! Unfortunately, it’s not clear how we go about getting, or even recognizing, this intellectual virtue. Its insights cannot be demonstrated like a mathematical proof or captured in abstract rules. But we’re not stuck with undefended intuitions or a relativism that makes what is good or beneficial up to us. What is this wisdom supple enough to navigate between such extremes? We’ll read original thinkers in the broader Aristotelian tradition and scholars interpreting Aristotle’s texts as we think about this and related questions.
- Fall 2024
- HI, Humanistic Inquiry WR2 Writing Requirement 2
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Student has completed any of the following course(s): One 100, 200 or 300 level PHIL course NOT including Independent Studies with a grade of C- or better.