A general introduction to some of the main topics, texts, and methods of philosophy. Topics may include the existence of God, the nature of mind and its relation to the body, causation, free will, knowledge and skepticism, and justice and moral obligation. Readings may be drawn from the history of philosophy and contemporary philosophical literature.

Catalog Distribution: (ETM-AS) (KCM-AG)

Full details for PHIL 1100 - Introduction to Philosophy

An introduction to some of the main contemporary moral issues. Topics may, for example, include animal rights, abortion, euthanasia, capital punishment, sexual morality, genetic engineering, and questions of welfare and social justice.

Catalog Distribution: (ETM-AS, SCD-AS) (D-AG, KCM-AG)

Full details for PHIL 1450 - Contemporary Moral Issues

This course provides an introduction to the science of the mind. Everyone knows what it's like to think and perceive, but this subjective experience provides little insight into how minds emerge from physical entities like brains. To address this issue, cognitive science integrates work from at least five disciplines: Psychology, Neuroscience, Computer Science, Linguistics, and Philosophy. This course introduces students to the insights these disciplines offer into the workings of the mind by exploring visual perception, attention, memory, learning, problem solving, language, and consciousness. 

Catalog Distribution: (ETM-AS) (KCM-AG)

Full details for PHIL 1620 - Introduction to Cognitive Science

This section is highly recommended for students who are interested in learning about the topics covered in the main course through writing and discussion. 

Full details for PHIL 1621 - WIM: Introduction to Cognitive Science

In recent years, poverty and inequality have become increasingly common topics of public debate, as academics, journalists, and politicians attempt to come to terms with growing income inequality, with the increasing visibility of inter-country differences in wealth and income, and with the persistence of racial, ethnic, and gender stratification. This course introduces students to ongoing social scientific debates about the sources and consequences of inequality, as well as the types of public policy that might appropriately be pursued to reduce (or increase) inequality. These topics will be addressed in related units, some of which include guest lectures by faculty from other universities (funded by the Center for the Study of Inequality). Each unit culminates with a highly spirited class discussion and debate.

Catalog Distribution: (SCD-AS, SSC-AS) (D-AG, SBA-AG)

Full details for PHIL 1950 - Controversies About Inequality

An introductory survey of ancient Greek philosophy from the so-called Presocratics (6th century BCE) through the Hellenistic period (1st century BCE) with special emphasis on the thought of Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle.

Catalog Distribution: (ETM-AS, HST-AS) (HA-AG, KCM-AG)

Full details for PHIL 2200 - Greek and Roman Philosophy

Covers sentential languages, the truth-functional connectives, and their logic; first-order languages, the quantifiers "every" and "some," and their logic.

Catalog Distribution: (SMR-AS)

Full details for PHIL 2310 - Introduction to Deductive Logic

This will be a lecture course on classic and contemporary work on central topics in ethics. The first third of the course will focus on metaethics: we will examine the meaning of moral claims and ask whether there is any sense in which moral principles are objectively valid. The second third of the course will focus on normative ethics: what makes our lives worth living, what makes our actions right or wrong, and what do we owe to others? The final third of the course will focus on moral character: what is moral praiseworthiness, and how important is it? Can we be held responsible for what we do? When and why?

Catalog Distribution: (ETM-AS) (KCM-AG)

Full details for PHIL 2410 - Ethics

This course will examine key issues in social and political philosophy. Topics may include the legitimacy of the state, political obligation, the nature and demands of justice, equality, liberty, and autonomy. Selected readings may be drawn from historical as well as contemporary sources.

Catalog Distribution: (ETM-AS) (KCM-AG)

Full details for PHIL 2420 - Social and Political Philosophy

The course concerns the principles and philosophical arguments underlying conflicts and moral dilemmas of central and ongoing concern to society as they arise within legal contexts. We consider questions such as what justifies using state power to punish people for wrongdoing, what kinds of conduct are rightly criminalized, what justifies the Supreme Court's power to strike down Congressional legislation, what justifies the right to private property and its boundaries, what is the right to privacy and why it is important, what are human rights, and what is the morality and law of war. Throughout we will be reading legal cases and philosophical commentaries that engage with the deep issues that the cases pose.

Catalog Distribution: (ETM-AS, SCD-AS) (D-AG, KCM-AG)

Full details for PHIL 2430 - Moral Dilemmas in the Law

Full details for PHIL 2441 - Ethics and Society: Aid and Its Consequences

Computing is ubiquitous in modern life, and essential to professional work in engineering and many other disciplines. However, computing technologies, especially artificial intelligence, raise distinctive normative issues. This course surveys a variety of social, ethical, and political issues that arise in connection with computing technologies, including artificial intelligence, from a philosophical perspective. Specific topics may include: hacking, privacy, intellectual property, forms of deception and manipulation enabled by computing technologies, social injustices that are reinforced by algorithmic systems, machine ethics, and science fiction issues such as robot rights or existential risks posed by superintelligent computer systems. Content delivery will be through a mix of lectures, readings, and in-class discussion.

Full details for PHIL 2473 - Ethics of Computing and Artificial Intelligence Technologies

This course is an introduction to philosophy of the arts, with emphasis on contemporary visual art, and on recent theorizing about art. We will investigate questions such as: What is art? What is good art, and who decides? What is art about, and who decides? What is the relationship between art and politics? Between art and thought? Art and nature? Art and ordinary experience? What is the nature of aesthetic experience?  

Catalog Distribution: (ALC-AS, ETM-AS)

Full details for PHIL 2510 - Philosophy of the Arts

Full details for PHIL 2525 - Introduction to African Philosophy

Throughout history, metaphors drawn from technology of the time have been proposed to understand how the mind works. While Locke likened the newborn's mind to a blank slate, Freud compared the mind to hydraulic and electro-magnetic systems. More recently, many have endorsed Turing's proposal that the mind is a computer. Why is this idea attractive and what exactly is a computer? Is it at all plausible that the cells of your brain are computing? Could a computer ever really have a mind, beliefs, emotions and conscious experiences? What are these mysterious things anyway? Could a machine ever count as a person and make choices based on its own free will? Is it really so clear that we have this kind of free will?

Catalog Distribution: (ETM-AS) (KCM-AG)

Full details for PHIL 2621 - Minds and Machines

This course explores the meaning of Law and Society, which is an interdisciplinary study of the interactive nature of legal and social forces. A law and society perspective places law in its historical, social, and cultural context, studying the dynamic way in which law shapes social norms, policy, and institutions, and conversely, the way that social forces shape the law. This Foundations of Law and Society course is structured as a series of four modules, each taught by a faculty member from a different discipline. The modules will introduce students to a range of disciplinary methods and content related to the study of the interaction of law with social, political, and economic institutions and relationships.

Catalog Distribution: (SSC-AS) (SBA-AG)

Full details for PHIL 2990 - Foundations of Law and Society

We will study several of Aristotle's major works, including the Categories, Physics, Posterior Analytics, Metaphysics, and Nicomachean Ethics. Topics include nature and change, form and matter, the nature of happiness, the nature of the soul, and knowledge and first principles.

Catalog Distribution: (ETM-AS, HST-AS) (HA-AG, KCM-AG)

Full details for PHIL 3203 - Aristotle

This course is an advanced study of a central concept, problem, or figure in 17-18th century philosophy. Spring 2024: This course will be an in-depth inquiry into the philosophy of Baruch Spinoza, a Dutch-Jewish modern philosopher — a key figure of radical Enlightenment who left a profound mark on German Idealists like Hegel and on 20th century continental philosophy. We will spend the term reading through his magnum opus, the Ethics, in the light of this influence and in light of his debts to medieval Jewish philosophy (especially Maimonides) and to Cartesianism.

Catalog Distribution: (ETM-AS, HST-AS)

Full details for PHIL 3222 - Early Modern Philosophy

This course addresses central debates in the philosophy of legal punishment. We will analyze the leading theories of punishment, including the familiar retributivist and deterrent alternatives, as well as lesser-known hybrid, self-defense, and rehabilitative accounts. We will ask whether each theory offers a general justification for establishing institutions of punishment, and whether each theory justifies specific acts of punishment. Other topics may include criminal responsibility, the legitimacy of collateral consequences (e.g., the denial of felons' voting rights), alternatives to punishment, etc.

Catalog Distribution: (ETM-AS) (KCM-AG)

Full details for PHIL 3475 - Philosophy of Punishment

This course will be an advanced introduction to some contemporary debates in epistemology. We will start by considering skeptical arguments that we cannot really know whether the world is the way it appears to us. We will look at different strategies to respond to such skeptical arguments, in particular contextualism, and explore questions concerning the nature of knowledge and the relation between knowledge and other epistemologically significant concepts, such as certainty, justification, and evidence. We will also look at Bayesian epistemology and its theoretical underpinnings, at knowledge-first approaches to epistemology, at the relation between knowledge and action, and at the compatibility of traditional epistemology with formal epistemology. Also will explore the notion of common knowledge, and issues in social epistemology.

Catalog Distribution: (ETM-AS)

Full details for PHIL 3610 - Epistemology

This course delves into decision theory.  We shall be concerned with a fundamental normative question: what ought one to do, given what one believes and values.  Our focus, throughout, will be on philosophical questions and not on applications.

Catalog Distribution: (SMR-AS)

Full details for PHIL 3830 - Decision Theory

Reading and translation of Latin philosophical texts.

Full details for PHIL 4002 - Latin Philosophical Texts

Advanced discussion of topics in ancient philosophy. Topics vary by instructors.

Catalog Distribution: (ETM-AS, HST-AS) (HA-AG, KCM-AG)

Full details for PHIL 4200 - Topics in Ancient Philosophy

Advanced discussion of a topic in philosophical action theory.

Catalog Distribution: (ETM-AS) (KCM-AG)

Full details for PHIL 4611 - Topics in Action Theory

Advanced discussion of a topic in Philosophy of Mind.

Catalog Distribution: (ETM-AS)

Full details for PHIL 4620 - Topics in Philosophy of Mind

An investigation of varying topics in the philosophy of language including reference, meaning, the relationship between language and thought, communication, modality, logic and pragmatics.

Full details for PHIL 4710 - Topics in the Philosophy of Language

Introduces methods for theorizing about meaning within generative grammar. These techniques allow the creation of grammars that pair syntactic structures with meanings. Students look at several empirical areas in detail, among them complementation (combining heads with their arguments), modification, conjunction, definite descriptions, relative clauses, traces, bound pronouns, and quantification. An introduction to logical and mathematical concepts used in linguistic semantics (e.g., set theory, functions and their types, and the lambda notation for naming linguistic meanings) is included in the course.

Catalog Distribution: (ETM-AS, SMR-AS) (KCM-AG)

Full details for PHIL 4730 - Semantics I

Majors in philosophy may choose to pursue writing of an honors thesis in their senior year. Students undertake research leading to the writing of an honors essay by the end of the final semester. Prospective candidates should apply at the Department of Philosophy office, 218 Goldwin Smith Hall.

Full details for PHIL 4900 - Informal Study for Honors I

Majors in philosophy may choose to pursue writing of an honors thesis in their senior year. Students undertake research leading to the writing of an honors essay by the end of the final semester. Prospective candidates should apply at the Department of Philosophy office, 218 Goldwin Smith Hall.

Full details for PHIL 4901 - Informal Study for Honors II

Reading and translation of Greek Philosophical texts.

Full details for PHIL 6010 - Greek Philosophical Texts

Reading and translation of Latin philosophical texts.

Full details for PHIL 6020 - Latin Philosophical Texts

Full details for PHIL 6040 - French Philosophical Texts

Seminar for first year Philosophy graduate students.

Full details for PHIL 6100 - Pro Seminar in Philosophy

Full details for PHIL 6110 - Writing Philosophy

Advanced discussion of topics in ancient philosophy. Topics vary by instructors. 

Full details for PHIL 6200 - Topics in Ancient Philosophy

We will study several of Aristotle's major works, including the Categories, Physics, Posterior Analytics, Metaphysics, and Nicomachean Ethics. Topics include nature and change, form and matter, the nature of happiness, the nature of the soul, and knowledge and first principles.

Full details for PHIL 6203 - Aristotle

This course is an advanced study of a central concept, problem, or figure in 17-18th century philosophy.

Full details for PHIL 6222 - Early Modern Philosophy

This course addresses central debates in the philosophy of legal punishment. We will analyze the leading theories of punishment, including the familiar retributivist and deterrent alternatives, as well as lesser-known hybrid, self-defense, and rehabilitative accounts. We will ask whether each theory offers a general justification for establishing institutions of punishment, and whether each theory justifies specific acts of punishment. Other topics may include criminal responsibility, the legitimacy of collateral consequences (e.g., the denial of felons' voting rights), alternatives to punishment, etc.

Full details for PHIL 6475 - Philosophy of Punishment

An intensive seminar on a special topic in epistemology to be determined by the instructor. Potential topics include: What are the limits of knowledge? What is the extent and nature of our knowledge of our own minds? How do we gain knowledge through particular sources such as perception, testimony, memory, or reasoning? Readings may be drawn from historical or contemporary sources.

Full details for PHIL 6610 - Topics in Epistemology

Advanced discussion of a topic in philosophical action theory.

Full details for PHIL 6611 - Topics in Action Theory

Advanced discussion of a topic in Philosophy of Mind.

Full details for PHIL 6620 - Topics in Philosophy of Mind

An investigation of varying topics in the philosophy of language including reference, meaning, the relationship between language and thought, communication, modality, logic and pragmatics.

Full details for PHIL 6710 - Topics in the Philosophy of Language

Introduces methods for theorizing about meaning within generative grammar. These techniques allow the creation of grammars that pair syntactic structures with meanings. Students look at several empirical areas in detail, among them complementation (combining heads with their arguments), modification, conjunction, definite descriptions, relative clauses, traces, bound pronouns, and quantification. An introduction to logical and mathematical concepts used in linguistic semantics (e.g., set theory, functions and their types, and the lambda notation for naming linguistic meanings) is included in the course.

Full details for PHIL 6730 - Semantics I

Addresses current theoretical and empirical issues in semantics.

Full details for PHIL 6740 - Semantics Seminar

Independent study for graduate students only.

Full details for PHIL 7000 - Informal Study

This course is designed to help prepare Philosophy graduate students for the academic job market. Though students will study sample materials from successful job applicants, much of the seminar will function as a workshop, providing them with in-depth feedback on multiple drafts of their job materials. Interview skills will be practiced in every seminar meeting. The seminar meetings will be supplemented with individual conferences with the placement mentor, and students should also share copies of their job materials with their dissertation committees.

Full details for PHIL 7900 - Placement Seminar

Full details for PHIL 7910 - Work in Process Colloquium

Invited talks in philosophy given by both outside speakers and members of the Cornell community. Enrollment for credit is required for first- and second-year philosophy graduate students.

Full details for PHIL 7950 - Philosophy Discussion Club Colloquium