Courses
To see a complete list of courses offered and their descriptions, visit the online course catalog.
The courses listed below are provided by Student Information Services (SIS). This listing provides a snapshot of immediately available courses within this department and may not be complete. Course registration information can be found at https://sis.jhu.edu/classes.
- AS.150.130 - Dystopian Dreams - Utopian Ideals
In this course, we will be exploring fundamental questions of philosophy through the lenses of dystopias (in film, television, and literature) as well as utopias (in literature and philosophy). What is human nature? Do we still have duties if the world goes crazy? And do our lives maintain their meaning if we give up the notion of God? In this course, we'll be holding up dystopian and utopian mirrors to delve into questions about our everyday reality.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Englert, Alexander Tilghman
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings: TTh 10:30AM - 11:45AM
Status: Canceled - AS.040.241 - The Greeks and Their Emotions
This seminar is meant as an introduction to the study of ancient emotions, with a particular emphasis on how the Greeks of the Archaic, Classical and Hellenistic periods conceptualized, portrayed and lived their emotions through linguistic, literary and artistic expression. After an analysis of how the ancient Greek terminology for the emotions differs from our own, we shall focus on the phenomenon of emotion as deeply rooted in the physical body, and in light of this we will contemplate (and question) its universality. Texts will be read in translation. No knowledge of ancient Greek required.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Asuni, Michele
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings: MW 4:30PM - 5:45PM
Status: Open - AS.150.136 - Philosophy & Science: An Introduction to Both
Philosophers and scientists raise important questions about the nature of the physical world, the mental world, the relationship between them, and the right methods to use in their investigations of these worlds. The answers they present are very different. Scientists are usually empiricists, and want to answer questions by experiment and observation. Philosophers don’t want to do this, but defend their views a priori. Why? Can both be right? Readings will present philosophical and scientific views about the world and our knowledge of it. They will include selections from major historical and contemporary figures in philosophy and science. This course has no prerequisites in philosophy or science.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Achinstein, Peter
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings: MW 11:00AM - 11:50AM, F 11:00AM - 11:50AM
Status: Open - AS.150.136 - Philosophy & Science: An Introduction to Both
Philosophers and scientists raise important questions about the nature of the physical world, the mental world, the relationship between them, and the right methods to use in their investigations of these worlds. The answers they present are very different. Scientists are usually empiricists, and want to answer questions by experiment and observation. Philosophers don’t want to do this, but defend their views a priori. Why? Can both be right? Readings will present philosophical and scientific views about the world and our knowledge of it. They will include selections from major historical and contemporary figures in philosophy and science. This course has no prerequisites in philosophy or science.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Achinstein, Peter
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings: MW 11:00AM - 11:50AM, F 12:00PM - 12:50PM
Status: Open - AS.150.101 - Freshman Seminar: Climate Ethics
It is no secret that the threat of global climate change raises difficult scientific, technological, and policy questions. However the threat of global climate change also raises profound ethical questions. For instance, what do present generations owe future generations? Who if anyone should bear more of the burden of mitigating climate change--rich countries or individuals, those more historically responsible for greenhouse gas emissions, those who currently emit the most, or some other group? What exactly is the right distribution? What do residents of relatively-unaffected countries owe to those displaced by climate change? Are we obligated to accept them as refugees, or is it permissible to refuse them entry? Do those countries most responsible for climate change owe reparations to those most affected by it? Do oil companies? Although these and other ethical questions have figured less prominently in public debate and discussions by policymakers in recent years, they are arguably more important because more fundamental: after all, it is ultimately our ethical stances that determine which scientific, technological, and policy questions we think matter and how we think about them. In this class, we will focus on these and other, related ethical questions raised by the threat of global climate change, connecting them where possible with related questions in political philosophy, ethics, and policy.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: McBee, Joshua Drew
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings: MW 3:00PM - 4:15PM
Status: Open - AS.150.140 - Minds, Bodies, and Persons
This course is a philosophical exploration of the mind and its relation to the body, personhood, and artificial intelligence. First, we will consider competing definitions of the mind and how it fits into the world. From here, we will engage with the concept of human personhood through an examination of what it takes to remain the same person over time. We will also be considering whether machines could ever have minds in the same way that human persons do, as well as the metaphysical and practical implications of mind uploading. Through testing the boundaries of cognition and personhood through technology, we hope to bring the relationship between minds, bodies, and persons into clearer focus.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Brophy, Kathryn E
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings: MWF 11:00AM - 11:50AM
Status: Open - AS.150.135 - Freshman Seminar: The Philosophy of Race and Racism
The twin specters of race and racism have perennially dominated nearly every aspect of American social, economic, and political life. In this course, we will try to appreciate the nature and scope of this dominance by addressing fundamental questions about the natures, functions, and manifestations of race and racism in contemporary American life. Topics include: the "metaphysics" of race, conditions of racial membership, the moral harms introduced by racism, the psychology of racial bias, and institutional forms of racism.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: O'Donnell, Patrick A
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings: MW 12:00PM - 1:15PM
Status: Open - AS.150.195 - Freshman Seminar: Ancient Greek Ethics
This seminar is an introduction to the tradition in ethics known as eudaimonism, or virtue theory. The starting point for this tradition is the question: How should I lead my life? Or equally, What is it to be a good person? Aristotle tends to dominate contemporary discussions of Greek ethics, but we read more widely. We study selections from the Pre-Socratics, Plato, Aristotle, the Stoics, and the Skeptics.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Theunissen, L Nandi
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings: TTh 12:00PM - 1:15PM
Status: Canceled - AS.150.196 - Freshman Seminar: Being A Good Person
In this seminar we explore the virtue ethics tradition and it's pursuit to figure out what it means to be a good person. We creatively read the canonical tradition as well as less familiar texts in race & gender studies as well as fiction.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Lebron, Christopher Joseph
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings: W 1:30PM - 4:00PM
Status: Open - AS.150.201 - Introduction to Greek Philosophy
A survey of the earlier phase of Greek philosophy. Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle will be discussed, as well as two groups of thinkers who preceded them, usually known as the pre-Socratics and the Sophists.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Bett, Richard
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings: MW 10:00AM - 10:50AM, F 10:00AM - 10:50AM
Status: Open - AS.150.219 - Intro to Bioethics
Introduction to a wide range of moral issues arising in the biomedical fields, e.g. physician-assisted suicide, human cloning, abortion, surrogacy, and human subjects research. Cross-listed with Public Health Studies.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Bok, Hilary
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings: MW 12:00PM - 12:50PM, F 12:00PM - 12:50PM
Status: Open - AS.150.201 - Introduction to Greek Philosophy
A survey of the earlier phase of Greek philosophy. Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle will be discussed, as well as two groups of thinkers who preceded them, usually known as the pre-Socratics and the Sophists.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Bett, Richard
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings: MW 10:00AM - 10:50AM, W 2:00PM - 2:50PM
Status: Open - AS.150.428 - Spinoza’s Theological Political Treatise
The class is a study of Spinoza’s theological and political thought as developed in his Theological-Political Treatise and the Political Treatise. Among the topics to be discussed are: Spinoza’s Bible criticism, the nature of religion, truth and obedience, God’s right and power, Spinoza’s theory of the State, the case study of the ancient Hebrew State, and the freedom to philosophize. Apart from a close reading of Spinoza’s two works we will also discuss Leo Strauss’ reading of Spinoza, and current work on Political Theology and their indebtness to Spinoza.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Melamed, Yitzhak Yohanan
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings: Th 10:30AM - 1:00PM
Status: Open - AS.150.235 - Philosophy of Religion
Can one prove or disprove the existence of God? What is the relation between reason and faith? Are science and religion at odds with one another? We will consider historically significant discussions of these questions as well as important contemporary writings.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Gross, Steven
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings: MW 11:00AM - 11:50AM, F 12:00PM - 12:50PM
Status: Open - AS.150.434 - Formal Methods of Philosophy
During the last century or so, symbolic logic and other formal methods have come to play an essential role in most areas of systematic philosophical inquiry. This course serves as an introduction to these formal prerequisites for more advanced study in a wide variety of contemporary philosophical areas. Topics include the syntax and semantics of sentential and first-order predicate logic, natural deduction, basic set theory, mathematical induction and recursion, probability, modal logic, and non-standard logics. The emphasis is on basic comprehension, not on mathematical virtuosity. (Co-listed/combined with AS.150.223)
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Rynasiewicz, Robert
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings: TTh 1:30PM - 2:45PM
Status: Open - AS.150.219 - Intro to Bioethics
Introduction to a wide range of moral issues arising in the biomedical fields, e.g. physician-assisted suicide, human cloning, abortion, surrogacy, and human subjects research. Cross-listed with Public Health Studies.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Bok, Hilary
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings: MW 12:00PM - 12:50PM, W 2:00PM - 2:50PM
Status: Open - AS.150.235 - Philosophy of Religion
Can one prove or disprove the existence of God? What is the relation between reason and faith? Are science and religion at odds with one another? We will consider historically significant discussions of these questions as well as important contemporary writings.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Gross, Steven
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings: MW 11:00AM - 11:50AM, F 12:00PM - 12:50PM
Status: Open - AS.150.223 - Formal Methods of Philosophy
During the last century or so, symbolic logic and other formal methods have come to play an essential role in most areas of systematic philosophical inquiry. This course serves as an introduction to these formal prerequisites for more advanced study in a wide variety of contemporary philosophical areas. Topics include the syntax and semantics of sentential and first-order predicate logic, natural deduction, basic set theory, mathematical induction and recursion, probability, modal logic, and non-standard logics. The emphasis is on basic comprehension, not on mathematical virtuosity. (Co-listed/combined with AS.150.434)
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Rynasiewicz, Robert
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings: TTh 1:30PM - 2:45PM
Status: Open - AS.150.219 - Intro to Bioethics
Introduction to a wide range of moral issues arising in the biomedical fields, e.g. physician-assisted suicide, human cloning, abortion, surrogacy, and human subjects research. Cross-listed with Public Health Studies.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Bok, Hilary
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings: MW 12:00PM - 12:50PM, W 2:00PM - 2:50PM
Status: Open - AS.150.409 - Wittgenstein On Certainty
Wittgenstein’s On Certainty consists of four notebooks containing remarks on knowledge, certainty, doubt and truth. In this course, we will undertake a close study of Wittgenstein’s notes, critically examining competing interpretations of Wittgenstein’s ideas and the different use of those ideas have been taken up in current debates about philosophical skepticism.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Williams, Michael
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings: M 1:30PM - 4:00PM
Status: Open - AS.150.476 - Philosophy and Cognitive Science
This term's topic will be "cognitive penetration". Can what you believe change how things look and sound? For example, do paintings look different to someone who knows a lot about art history and aesthetics? Can racial prejudice cause someone to see a cellphone as a gun? If your beliefs can alter your perceptions, how can perceptions provide neutral justification for beliefs? And how does one draw a distinction between perception and thought in the first place? Readings will be drawn both from philosophy (e.g., Fodor, Block, Siegel) and psychology (e.g., Pylyshyn, Firestone, Lupyan). Recommended Course Background: Some previous exposure to philosophy, the mind-brain sciences, or other relevant background.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Gross, Steven
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings: MW 1:30PM - 2:45PM
Status: Open - AS.150.219 - Intro to Bioethics
Introduction to a wide range of moral issues arising in the biomedical fields, e.g. physician-assisted suicide, human cloning, abortion, surrogacy, and human subjects research. Cross-listed with Public Health Studies.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Bok, Hilary
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings: MW 12:00PM - 12:50PM, F 12:00PM - 12:50PM
Status: Waitlist Only - AS.150.474 - Justice and Health
Course will consider the bearing of theories of justice on health care. Topics will include national health insurance, rationing and cost containment, and what justice requires of researchers in developing countries.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Bok, Hilary
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings: F 1:30PM - 4:00PM
Status: Open - AS.150.301 - Majors Seminar: Ancient Greek Ethics
Required for philosophy majors and restricted to philosophy majors and minors. The course this year will focus on ancient Greek ethics, including selections from Plato, Aristotle, the Stoics, the Epicureans, the Skeptics, and perhaps others.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Bett, Richard
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings: W 1:30PM - 4:00PM
Status: Open - AS.150.355 - Philosophy of Law
In this course we will examine major issues in the philosophy of law, including the relation of law to moral theory, the role of the Constitution in legal decisions, and the justification of punishment. No previous knowledge of law or philosophy is required.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Moyar, Dean
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings: Th 1:30PM - 4:00PM
Status: Open - AS.150.454 - The Value of Humanity
Are human beings distinctively valuable? What makes us valuable? And how should we respond to the value of human beings? The course is divided into four parts. The first part takes up questions about the basis of human value. We consider various proposals, including Kant's, about the valuable feature or capacity of human beings. Are we valuable in virtue of having a good will, in virtue of being agents, in virtue of being valuers, or something further? The second part takes up questions about the explanation of the value of human beings. Does the proposed feature make us valuable because it instantiates a simple value property, making us valuable in ourselves, or simpliciter? We consider whether the notion of value simpliciter is a notion we fully understand, or need. Does the proposed feature make us valuable because it makes us good-for something or someone? Who or what does it make us good-for? Or again, does the proposed feature make us such that we are objects of an appropriate attitude or practical stance? If so, what is the attitude or stance? The third part of the course takes up normative questions about the appropriate mode of responding to human beings. We consider whether it makes sense to say that human beings are "ends-in-themselves," and what it would mean to treat a person as an end-in-itself. We also consider various accounts of respect. A guiding question is whether human beings are the only appropriate objects of respect, or whether we can respect other beings, and even artifacts. The fourth part of the class applies what we have learned so far to related topics: to the question of whether human life or existence is valuable, and conversely, whether death is disvaluable. We consider, albeit briefly, the value of human beings in relation to the value of animals. And we ask about the role of Kantian notions like dignity in applied contexts, so that highly philosophical considerations about value are shown to have real-world bearing.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Theunissen, L Nandi
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings: TTh 3:00PM - 4:15PM
Status: Canceled - AS.150.219 - Intro to Bioethics
Introduction to a wide range of moral issues arising in the biomedical fields, e.g. physician-assisted suicide, human cloning, abortion, surrogacy, and human subjects research. Cross-listed with Public Health Studies.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Bok, Hilary
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings: MW 12:00PM - 12:50PM, F 12:00PM - 12:50PM
Status: Open - AS.150.219 - Intro to Bioethics
Introduction to a wide range of moral issues arising in the biomedical fields, e.g. physician-assisted suicide, human cloning, abortion, surrogacy, and human subjects research. Cross-listed with Public Health Studies.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Bok, Hilary
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings: MW 12:00PM - 12:50PM, F 1:30PM - 2:20PM
Status: Open - AS.150.419 - Kant's Critique/Judgment
This course will examine closely and in detail the aesthetic and teleological parts of Kant's third masterpiece, The Critique of the Power of Judgment.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Forster, Eckart
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings: TTh 9:00AM - 10:15AM
Status: Open - AS.150.551 - Honors Project
See departmental major adviser.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Forster, Eckart
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings:
Status: Open - AS.150.551 - Honors Project
See departmental major adviser.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Taylor, Elanor J.
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings:
Status: Open - AS.150.551 - Honors Project
See departmental major adviser.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Achinstein, Peter
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings:
Status: Open - AS.300.399 - Cinema and Philosophy
Do movies have anything to say about philosophical problems? Why is contemporary philosophy so interested in cinema? What are the most productive ways of bringing films and philosophy into conversation?
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Marrati, Paola, McCreary, Michael D
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings: MW 3:00PM - 4:15PM
Status: Open - AS.150.511 - Directed Study
Individual study of special topics, under regular supervision of a faculty member. Special permission is required.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Taylor, Elanor J.
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings:
Status: Open - AS.150.269 - Freshman Seminar: Philosophy of Human Rights
This course introduces students to the methods of philosophical inquiry and writing via an exploration of philosophical questions about the foundations of human rights, the modern human rights culture, and the relationships between human rights, civil rights, group rights, and women’s rights. No background in philosophy will be assumed, as the aim of the course is to teach philosophical methods while examining the language and practice of human rights, which have been central to the post-WWII global order.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Wilk, Thomas Michael
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings: F 1:30PM - 4:00PM
Status: Open - AS.150.511 - Directed Study
Individual study of special topics, under regular supervision of a faculty member. Special permission is required.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Achinstein, Peter
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings:
Status: Open - AS.150.410 - The Philosophy of Afrofuturism I
The main goal of speculatibe fiction is to render a familiar world slightly unfamiliar to then ask familiar questions in new ways. Afrofuturism as a genre of sci-fi, fantasy, and horror written by and about black people, applies this ethic to the problems of race, broadly speaking. In this course we survey major texts to philosophically inquire into phenomena like incaceration., Slavery and it's lingering effects, and colonialism among other themes.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Lebron, Christopher Joseph
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings: T 1:30PM - 4:00PM
Status: Open - AS.150.448 - The Religion of Morality
In the wake of the Enlightenment criticism of traditional forms of religion, philosophers attempted to give religion a rational basis by equating it with moral practice. We will examine this religion of morality with the goal of determining whether it can vindicate its claim to be a genuine religion. We will read texts by Rousseau, Kant, Fichte, Hegel and Emerson.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Moyar, Dean
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings: T 1:30PM - 4:00PM
Status: Open - AS.150.511 - Directed Study
Individual study of special topics, under regular supervision of a faculty member. Special permission is required.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Melamed, Yitzhak Yohanan
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings:
Status: Open - AS.150.551 - Honors Project
See departmental major adviser.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Theunissen, L Nandi
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings:
Status: Open - AS.213.374 - Existentialism in Literature and Philosophy
This course explores the themes of existentialism, including the meaning of existence, the nature of the self, authenticity and inauthenticity, the inescapability of death, the experience of time, anxiety, freedom and responsibility to others, in literary and philosophical works. It will be examined why these philosophical ideas often seem to demand literary expression, or bear a close relation to literary works. Readings may include writings by Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Tolstoy, Heidegger, Rilke, Kafka, Sartre, de Beauvoir, and Camus, among others. Course will be taught by the Kurrelmeyer Chair in German. Taught in English.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Gosetti, Jennifer Anna
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings: TTh 1:30PM - 2:45PM
Status: Open - AS.211.265 - Panorama of German Thought
This course explores the rich terrain of German literature and philosophical thought, from Kant to today. At each meeting, we will investigate canonical texts of the German intellectual tradition, with an eye to discovering their unity as “German” philosophical and cultural artifacts and icons, as well as with an interest in establishing their well-deserved place in the wider, global discourses of world literature. In this way, we will learn to think critically in and with these important literary and philosophical texts from German-speaking lands as a means of viewing and appreciating the full panorama of German thought. Among authors read and discussed will be Kant, Goethe, Schiller, Hegel, Kleist, Heine, Fontane, Nietzsche, Freud, Kafka, Heidegger, Mann and Bernhard. Readings and discussion will be in English. German is appreciated but not required.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Dornbach, Marton
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings: TTh 4:30PM - 5:45PM
Status: Open - AS.150.511 - Directed Study
Individual study of special topics, under regular supervision of a faculty member. Special permission is required.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Theunissen, L Nandi
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings:
Status: Open - AS.150.511 - Directed Study
Individual study of special topics, under regular supervision of a faculty member. Special permission is required.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Forster, Eckart
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings:
Status: Open - AS.150.551 - Honors Project
See departmental major adviser.
Credits: 3.00
Instructor: Melamed, Yitzhak Yohanan
Term: Fall 2018
Meetings:
Status: Open