Introduction to Current Moral and Social Issues
50:730:101:01
M/W 12:30 pm – 1:50 pm
Professor Agule
Introduction to moral theory and application to selected contemporary issues. Possible topics include abortion, infanticide, euthanasia, punishment, equality, sexism, racism, affirmative action, privacy, obligations to the world’s needy, treatment of animals, drug use, and the meaning of life.
Gen Ed: Logical and Quantitative Reasoning (LQR)
Introduction to Philosophy
50:730:111:01
M/W 9:35 am – 10:55 am
section 02
M/W 12:30 pm – 1:50 pm
section 03
M/W 2:05 pm – 3:25 pm
Professor Agule
An exploration of central philosophical problems, such as truth, justice, mind, and person, with a view to surveying the field and locating particular philosophical specialties within it such as logic, ethics, and metaphysics.
Gen Ed: Ethics and Values (EAV)
Reading Seminar
50:730:190:01
M/ 2:30 pm – 4:20 pm
Professor Agule
In this small, seminar-style course, students will work through either one significant book or a similarly substantive collection of essays, with the topic varying by semester. Students will engage in intensive close reading of the philosophical texts, identifying particular arguments, premises, and claims for assessment during student discussion in the seminar meetings. The course meets for 1/3 the time of a regular course, that is, on average one hour a week (or two hours every other week). This course can be repeated up to three times for credit. (Note that there is also a similar course in Religion, 50:840:190, which can be taken up to an additional three times).
History of Philosophy I
50:730:211:01
T/TH 11:10 am – 12:30 pm
section 02
T/TH 2:00 pm – 3:20 pm
Instructor: TBD
The beginnings and early developments of Western philosophy. Readings selected from among the pre-Socratics, Plato, Aristotle, Sextus-Empiricus, Plotinus, Augustine, Maimonides, Aquinas, and Occam. Topics may include the nature of argument, knowledge, political loyalty and political dissent, justice, normative ethics, causality, the nature of the self, and the existence of God.
Gen Ed: Civilization & Heritages (C), Heritages & Civilizations (HAC)
American Philosophy
50:730:218:90
$100 Online Support Fee, Go To http://sakai.rutgers.edu
Professor Rooney
Gen Ed: United States in the World (USW)
Introduction to the contributions of American philosophers in the 19th, 20th, and 21st centuries to inquiries into the nature of experience, truth, goodness, and society, with particular attention paid to the tradition of American pragmatism. Readings selected from among Emerson, Peirce, James, Dewey, Mead, Royce, Lewis, Rorty, and Putnam.
Self and Identity
50:730:222:01
T/TH 9:35 am – 10:55 am
Professor Denehy
An exploration of the nature of the self, with emphasis on the conditions for remaining the same person over time and the relation between selfhood and moral responsibility.
Gen Ed: Ethics and Values (EAV)
Ethics
50:730:226:01
M/W 2:05 pm – 3:25 pm
Professor Chwang
An examination of fundamental issues in ethical theory through the works of contemporary philosophers and key figures in the History of ethics such as Aristotle, Kant, and Mill. Topics may include human goodness, moral obligation, rights and duties, the relation of happiness to duties, the idea of role obligations specific to professional contexts, and the possibility of objective justifications of value judgments as contrasted with views from moral nihilists, skeptics, and relativists.
Gen Ed: United States in the World (USW)
Biomedical Ethics
50:730:249:90, section 91, section 92
$100 Online Support Fee, Go To http://sakai.rutgers.edu
Professor Yates
Section 93, 94
Professor Gentzel
Section 95, 96
Professor Young
Exploration of moral issues in medicine and medical research. Course will typically focus on issues raised by the creation and termination of life and include topics such as abortion, stem cell research, cloning, prenatal screening for disability, right to medical care, human experimentation, genetic enhancement and eugenics, animal experimentation, the diagnosis of death, and euthanasia.
Gen Ed: Ethics and Values (EAV)
Ethics and Business
50:730:251:90
$100 Online Support Fee, Go To http://sakai.rutgers.edu
Professor Sacks
Social and moral problems that arise in the context of business: profit motive, corporate social responsibility, use and abuse of corporate power, truth in advertising, consumer rights, strikes, stockholders’ rights, preferential hiring. Contemporary case studies augmented with basic texts in ethics.
Gen Ed: Ethics and Values (EAV)
Eating Right: The Ethics of Food Choices and Food Policy
50:730:252:01
T/TH 11:10 am – 12:30 pm
Professor Betz
Exploration of ethical issues concerning individual food choices, food policies, and the cultural importance of culinary traditions. Course will analyze arguments concerning vegetarian and vegan diets, for organic and/or local food choices, and about policies we should collectively adopt to shape the processing, marketing, and sale of food within communities.
Gen Ed: Ethics and Values (EAV)
Philosophical Ideas in Film
50:730:264:01
$100 Online Support Fee, Go To http://sakai.rutgers.edu
Professor Young
An exploration of classic philosophical questions as represented in film. Possible topics include (but are not limited to) truth, skepticism, relativism, personal identity, determinism, artificial intelligence, and the problem of evil. Film representations of these classic questions will be identified and evaluated from the perspective of various philosophers, possibly including Plato, Russell, James, Descartes, Berkeley, Kant, Locke, Hume, and others.
Gen Ed: Art, Aesthetics, and Theories of Interpretation (AAI)
Ethics and the Future of Humanity
50:730:329:01
F 12:30 pm – 3:30 pm
Professor Young
Exploration of moral and social issues pertaining to emerging technologies. Topics covered include human enhancement, artificial intelligence, robotics, reproductive technology and cloning, and artificial life.
Gen Ed: Ethics and Values (EAV)
Social Philosophy
50:730:343:01
T/TH 2:00 pm – 3:20 pm
Professor Betz
Critical examination of the philosophical problems involved in theories of the society and relationships between individuals. Topics include ways gender and/or racial consideration enter into the social standing of the individual, political and economic consequences of one’s social class, and the use of liberalism, critical social theory, and post-modernism to challenge existing social institutions.Gen Ed: Ethics and Values (EAV)
Independent Study in Philosophy
50:730:389:01, section 390:01
Arrange With Instructor
An individual reading and research project under the guidance of a member of the philosophy department in an area of interest to the department. Prerequisite: Permission of department.
An examination of fundamental issues in ethical theory through the works of contemporary philosophers and key figures in the History of ethics such as Aristotle, Kant, and Mill. Topics may include human goodness, moral obligation, rights and duties, the relation of happiness to duties, the idea of role obligations specific to professional contexts, and the possibility of objective justifications of value judgments as contrasted with views from moral nihilists, skeptics, and relativists.
Gen Ed: Ethics and Values (EAV)
Biomedical Ethics
50:730:249:90, section 91, section 92
$100 Online Support Fee, Go To http://sakai.rutgers.edu
Professor Yates
Section 93, section 94
Professor Gentzel
Exploration of moral issues in medicine and medical research. Course will typically focus on issues raised by the creation and termination of life and include topics such as abortion, stem cell research, cloning, prenatal screening for disability, right to medical care, human experimentation, genetic enhancement and eugenics, animal experimentation, the diagnosis of death, and euthanasia.