Department of Philosophy - University of Missouri-Columbia

Graduate Seminars for Spring Semester 2012

Note: If you are interested in taking one of these seminars but are not a graduate student in philosophy, please contact the instructor first to discuss the advisability of doing so. It might be wiser for you to take one of our 4000/7000-level courses instead.

Phil 9220: Marxism (3 credits)
Instructor: Dr Joseph Bien

Phil 9510: Decision Theory (3 credits)
Instructor: Dr Zac Ernst

Phil 9820: Epistemology (3 credits)
Instructor: Dr Matt McGrath
This course will focus on the topic of the epistemology of perception. We will examine the prospects for what is sometimes called "dogmatism about perceptual justification", which holds that if one's experience presents P as being the case, then one is prima facie justified in believing P. We will examine problems for this view, including problems relating to cases of cognitively penetrated perceptual experience and the implications of the speckled hen problem. We will also examine questions about the implications of the metaphysics of experience for epistemology.

Readings include work by James Pryor, Roger White, Susanna Siegel, Jack Lyons, Ernest Sosa, and Bill Brewer.

An undergraduate course in epistemology is strongly recommended as preparation for the course.

Phil 9830: Philosophy Of Science (3 credits)
Instructor: Dr Chris Pincock
This seminar surveys some of the different conceptions of emergence that philosophers have articulated, with special reference to cases in physics, biology and psychology. It is common to define a kind of phenomena P as emergent with respect to a base domain B. A preliminary proposal is to say that P is emergent with respect to B when both (i) features of P vary only when features of B vary and (ii) B is unable to account for P. If, by contrast, (ii') B is able to account for P, then we may say that P reduces to B. For example, someone may claim that a mental state like belief is emergent with respect to neurophysiology if they think that (i) two agents vary in their beliefs only when their neurophysiology varies and (ii) neurophysiology is unable to account for those beliefs. Delicate issues arise in the evaluation of (i) if we allow that environmental factors beyond neurophysiology can affect the content of a belief. Other complications arise based on what "vary" means and what "accounting for" requires. If we focus on our theory of neurophysiology and what scientists can explain with it, then (ii) seems plausible. If, however, we consider what the facts of neurophysiology can in principle explain, then (ii) seems implausible, but also quite difficult to evaluate given what we know.

We will explore these issues in four parts. First, we consider some of the classic proposals for emergence and reduction. Second, we turn to a detailed consideration of some cases from physics. Third, we investigate some proposed examples of emergence and reduction in biology. The course concludes with some discussion of how these issues play out in contemporary psychology and philosophy of mind.

Phil 9901: Seminar On Moral Decision-Making
Instructor: Dr Peter Vallentyne
We shall examine the following questions:

  1. To what extent does moral permissibility (as opposed to praiseworthiness and blameworthiness) depend on the facts of the choice-situation as opposed to the agent's beliefs about them? For example, is it morally permissible for any agent to push a button that will kill hundreds of people when she couldn't have known that pushing would have this result?
  2. How should a rational agent who seeks to act in morally permissible ways make decisions, when she is uncertain as to what the correct moral theory of permissibility is? For example, how should a person decide about whether to have abortion (when only she and the fetus are affected), if she is 99% sure that the fetus has no moral standing and 1% sure that it has an absolute full right to life?
  3. Is the permissibility of the individual actions of an agent determined derivatively from the permissibility of courses of action (over the lifetime of the agent) or vice-versa? (Related question: Is the permissibility of the individual actions of an agent determined derivatively from the permissibility of joint courses of actions (n-tuples of courses of actions, one for each agent), or vice-versa?)
  4. Agent-Responsibility When is an agent morally culpable (roughly: agent-responsible for acting wrongly)?

Required texts:
Ted Lockhart, Moral Uncertainty and Its Consequences (Oxford UP, 2000). Michael J. Zimmerman, Living with Uncertainty: The Moral Significance of Ignorance (Cambridge UP, 2008).