Graduate

Courses: Spring 2008

The department offers two kinds of seminars: Background Seminars and Research Seminars. For details, see the Graduate Student Handbook.

Some additonal information about this semester's courses can be found at the Arts and Sciences course descriptions page.

Background seminars

2020 Plato

Moss, Jessica | Tuesdays 10:00–12:30

Combined with CLASS 2313

The course will investigate Plato's psychology, with a focus on his theory of the divided soul. We will ask: why does Plato divide the soul into three parts; what sort of things are these parts; what is their relation to one another and to the agent as a whole; what capacities do they have; what roles do they play in motivation and action; what is it for a part to be rational or non-rational? Our primary texts will be selections from the Republic, Phaedrus, Timaeus, and Laws, with some material from other dialogues. We will also consult some recent and less recent secondary literature. Students will be asked to give short presentations on assigned topics.

2170 Kant

Rescher, Nicholas | Wednesdays 9:30–11:55

This course aims at a general understanding of the Critique of Pure Reason as a whole. It will examine the work's central metaphysical and epistemological doctrines, with attention to their historical context. Emphasis will be placed on the basic objectives of the Critique in relation to its doctrines and its strategies of argument. While some attention will be given to verying interpretations of the Critique, the principal focus will be on Kant's text.

2300 Ethics (Core)

Boxer, Karin | Tuesdays 5:00–7:25

This course will be an advanced introduction to moral philosophy, with a special focus on the metaphysics and epistemology of reasons for action. This course is intended for graduate students in the philosophy department. Other students need the permission of the instructor.

2500 Advanced Logic (Core)

Belnap, Nuel | Mondays 9:30–11:55

This course is a rigorous philosophical (conceptual) introduction to logic for graduate students. We will begin with a VERY fast review of the natural deduction system used in "Notes on the art of logic." (It is better to have worked through this ahead of time!) We shall learn the arts of elementary set theory, formal arithmetic, and the theory of definitions, as tools. Then we shall emphasize the rigorous conceptual analysis of the grammar, semantics, and proof-theory of truth-functional logic and (to a lesser extent) quantificational logic, with special attention to consistency and completeness. The last weeks of the term will be devoted to various topics in philosophical logic.

Prerequisite(s): An undergraduate logic course covering truth-functional logic and quantifier logic. Understanding some method of "natural deduction" is essential, as is some ability to move between symbols and English. If in doubt, see instructor. Some students will benefit from "Notes on the art of logic," which is at http://www.pitt.edu/~belnap. Also Connie in the Philosophy Office is likely to have copies for sale.

Research seminars

2305 Topics In Ethics

Setiya, Kieran | Wednsedays 2:00–04:25

Possible topics: "particularism" in moral theory; the idea of a moral principle; Derek Parfit's manuscript, Climbing the Mountain; thick concepts in ethics; defining the virtues; moral epistemology.

2421 Topics In Philosophy Of Language: Carnap and Quine

Ricketts, Thomas | Tuesdays 02:00–04:25

The seminar will offer an overview and comparison of central themes in the philosophical writings of Rudolf Carnap and W. V. Quine. After a brief discussion of Carnap's first great book The Logical Construction of the World, we will focus on Carnap's Logical Syntax of Language and the project of Wissenschaftslogik (logic of science) in which it is embedded. We will consider the alleged difficulties that Gödel's incompleteness theorem pose for Carnap's philosophy of mathematics in Logical Syntax. Finally, we will consider what is involved in Carnap's adoption of "semantics" for the description of formal languages after 1936. We will then turn to the debate that develops between Carnap and Quine over the analytic/synthetic distinction. In thinking about Quine's positive views, we will consider his view of logic, language, ontology, and epistemology. In thinking about Quine's view of these topics, we will seek to delineate the systematic unity of Quine's views. At the conclusion of the seminar I hope to consider the relationship between Quine's philosophy and Davidson's. Readings will be primarily from Carnap's and Quine's writings with recommended reading from secondary sources.

2460 Epistemology

McDowell, John | Thursdays 2:00–04:25

We will consider some issues about the epistemology of perceptual knowledge. Readings will be determined as we go along; Sellars will be central, at least to begin with.

2648 Science and Philosophy in Aristotle's Generation of Animals

Gotthelf, Allan | Thursdays 5:00–07:30

Combined with CLASS 2314 and HPS 2648

This seminar is a philosophically-oriented study of arguably one of the greatest treatises in the history of science. Our focus will be on Generation of Animals (GA) both as a scientific work systematically structured in line with Aristotle's general philosophy of science and as a source for our understanding of central elements of his metaphysics, theory of science, and philosophy of biology. We will follow Aristotle as he develops and argues for his theory of the male and female contributions to generation, and of the manner in which form (and soul, including intellect) is transmitted from one generation to the next; and we will briefly examine what might be called the epistemology of spontaneous generation. We will also examine, in greater depth, the respective roles of teleological and material-level explanation in GA's account of the conception and embryological development of an organism (in both sexual and spontaneous generations). Though the greater part of our attention will be on a specialized treatise, our work will involve a close look at Aristotle's conceptions of substance and essence, of natures and potentials, of form and matter, of teleology and necessity, of soul, and of the structure of a theoretical science, and will include readings from other works of Aristotle. For that reason, this course is suitable for those wanting an introduction to Aristotelian philosophy as well as for those who have already experienced the joys (and occasional frustrations) of a close study of this great philosopher-scientist. A full-length paper will be required at the end of the course. Short in-class presentations will be welcome (but not required). Those of us who have some Greek can meet occasionally outside of the seminar to translation choice passages from GA.

2657 Philosophy Of Biology

Mitchell, Sandra | Thursdays 9:30–12:00

Combined with HPS 2657

Philosophy of Biology will consider foundational conceptual issues in biology like the nature and structure of biological explanation, the possibility of laws in evolutionary theory, the relationship between different causal components of biological processes (genetics and development), the problem of species reality and classification, the explanatory character of ascription of biological function, and the extension of biological explanations to human psychology and culture. It is designed for both the philosopher who can explore central epistemological and metaphysical issues in the context of biological science and for the biologist who wants to explore the conceptual foundations and presuppositions of her science. The students will read primary historical and philosophical texts, engage in discussion and write essays. The format of the course will be a combination of lecture and discussion.

2677 Foundations Of Quantum Field Theory

Earman, John and Ruetsche, Laura |Wednesdays 5:00–07:30

Combined with HPS 2677

Philosophers of physics have lavished attention on the quantum mechanics of systems with finitely many degrees of freedom (aka ordinary QM): a pair of spin 1/2 systems in the spin singlet state, say, or a bivalent object system coupled to a bivalent measuring apparatus. This course will focus on quantum theories of systems with infinitely many degrees of freedom (aka QM∞): quantum field theory and the thermodynamic limit of quantum statistical mechanics. A provocative difference between theories of ordinary QM and theories of QM∞ is that the former, but not the latter, (almost) always have a unique Hilbert space representation. How then—that is, by what mathematical tools and according to what interpretive principles—are we to identify the content of theories of QM∞? We will attempt to articulate and address this question in a variety of contexts. The articulation will employ the resources of rudimentary operator algebra theory, with which the student will not be presumed to be familiar (although she will be expected to be acquainted with the vector space formalism of ordinary QM). The contexts will include: the uniqueness theorems for the representation of the canonical commutation relations for ordinary QM and the breakdown of uniqueness for QM∞; the Rindler effect and the status of particles in QFT; Haag's theorem and the unitary implementability of QFT dynamics; QFT on curved spacetime; phase structure, symmetry breaking, and "macroscopic" observables in the thermodynamic limit of QSM.