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Ethics is the study of morality. It is central to issues relating to what a person should believe and how they should act. The investigation of morality occurs via an analysis of metaethics (the fundamental status of moral judgments), normative ethics (the nature of a right action and the nature of a virtuous person), and applied ethics (the application of normative ethics to particular moral issues). The areas are explored through the discussion of such issues as: Is morality relative to culture? Is morality independent of religion? Do the ends of one's action justify the means? What does it mean to be a virtuous person?

Medical ethics is the study of morality in the context of health and pathology. It concerns metaphysical issues about the nature of physical and mental disorders, and moral issues about treatments and policies. Topics include the creation of life, euthanasia, the Hippocratic Oath, treatment of the diseased or disabled, and the distribution of limited healthcare resources. The course topics are at the heart of moral, metaphysical, and economic issues in applied ethics: for example, creation-of-life and end-of-life issues. This course explores these issues and their consequences for the theoretical and applied fields of healthcare.

Introduces students to classical Greek philosophy in the context of the historical, cultural, social, and political conditions of ancient Greece. Part of the course is devoted to a careful examination of the social context of ancient Greece and to the sources and manifestations of Greek values: mythological, religious, literary, educational, and aesthetic.

This course chronicles philosophy in action -- in historical and political contexts. We examine the crucial role Platonism, Aristotelianism, Stoicism, and Epicureanism played during major social upheaval as Caesar, Pompey, Cicero, Cato, Brutus, and Cassius struggle with the often conflicting demands of seeking personal salvation, honoring philosophical conviction, and fulfilling patriotic duty in the final days of the Roman Republic. Later, during the building of the Roman empire, Seneca, Musonius Rufus, and Marcus Aurelius confronted the same conflicts but in different political settings.

Islamic, Judaic, and Latin-Christian thought of the Middle Ages, particularly the 11th to 13th centuries. The course examines the significance of the Greco-Roman tradition to medieval hopes and fears and addresses problems prevalent in all three cultures: the relationship between faith and reason; the nature of the Supreme Being; the connection between theology and art, politics, and metaphysics; and the origin and cause of the world.

The nature of reality, knowledge, and experience as portrayed by thinkers such as the Rationalists (Descartes, Leibniz, and Spinoza), the Empiricists (Locke, Berkeley, and Hume), Kant, and Reid. The legacy of these thinkers as reflected in standard notions of causality, truth, proof, and argument will be explored in relation to contemporary thinkers.

The political philosophy, epistemology, scientific method, and criteria of truth, argument, and reason which distinctively characterize the Founding Fathers, the Transcendentalists, the Pragmatists, and contemporary inheritors of the Pragmatist tradition. Includes consideration of the question: What is distinctively American about American philosophy?

Careful examination of classical and contemporary issues such as the nature of religious experience, the relationship of faith and reason, arguments for and against the existence of God, the significance of the problem of evil, knowing God without arguments, religious language, life after death, miracles, religious ethics, and the differences between Eastern and Western theisms.

The class explores fundamental issues relating to life and death. In particular, it looks at what constitutes life and what, if anything, makes life good. It also investigates what constitutes death and whether death is bad. Using thee notions, the class then analyzes particular moral issues surrounding life and death, such as the moral status of the following practices: abortion, suicide, euthanasia, capital punishment, and war.

The proper form of human association, the just balance of economic, political, and social power, and the nature of the relationship between the state and the individual are explored in the works of prominent historical and contemporary theorists. The course examines the nature of social commitment as viewed by major political philosophies.

Philosophical problems in the arts. Nature of art and aesthetic appreciation; aesthetic attitude, experience, and emotion; relations between art and art institutions; interpretation and evaluation of works of art are among topics considered. Problems specific to music, film, literature, painting, and sculpture are also discussed.

Existentialism is a philosophical realization of living in a broken, ambiguous, dislocated world into which we are thrown and condemned yet abandoned and free. The course examines the work of authors such as Kierkegaard, Dostoevsky, Nietzsche, Kafka, Heidegger, Sartre, Camus, and de Beauvoir. Students confront the main themes of life: anxiety, authentic living, meaning, love, relationships, God, and death.