Course Descriptions

Please refer to the UWM Schedule of Classes for each term before registering to confirm which classes are offered.

Fall 2024 Course Descriptions UWM Philosophy Department

PHILOS 101 - Introduction to Philosophy: Basic Problems in Philosophy 

Prereq: none.

  • LEC 001 TR 8:30 AM – 9:45 AM CRT 104

  • Instructor: TBA

  • LEC 401 MW 9:30 AM – 10:20 AM END 107

  • Instructor: William Penn pennw@uwm.edu

Enrollment in one of the large lectures (401) requires enrollment in a discussion section.

In this course, we will walk through the basic subfields of philosophy with an emphasis on historically important contributors and contemporary implications. In particular, we will consider the areas of metaphysics, epistemology, and ethics in three successive units. We will focus on providing a broad, multicultural perspective on the history of these subfields, with the aim of demonstrating that philosophy is a practice found throughout the world and throughout the history of every culture. Topics to appear in each of these areas include: What are space and time? What is matter? What are the causes of events? How do we know through experience? How do we know through reason? What can we know?  What is moral responsibility? How do ideas of divinity play a role in our understanding? And more.

This course has no prerequisites. All are welcome.

PHILOS 111 - Introduction to Logic- Critical Reasoning

PHILOS 111 and MATH 111 are jointly offered; they count as repeats of one another. Prereq: a grade of C or better in MATH 90(P) or MATH 102(P); or grade of D in MATH 94(P); or Math Placement Level 10.

  • LEC 201 ONLINE

  • LEC 401 MW 9:30 AM – 10:20 AM CRT 175

  • LEC 402 MW 12:30 PM – 1:20 PM CRT 175

  • Instructor: Matthew Knachel knachel@uwm.edu

Enrollment in one of the large lectures (401 or 402) requires enrollment in a discussion section.

There’s an ancient view, still widely held, that what makes human beings special—what distinguishes us from the “beasts of the field”—is that we are rational. What does rationality consist in? That is a vexed question, but one possible response goes roughly like this: we manifest our rationality by engaging in certain activities, chief among them the activity of making claims and backing them up with reasons—that is, constructing arguments. This reasoning activity can be done well and it can be done badly—it can be done correctly or incorrectly. Logic is the discipline that aims to distinguish good reasoning from bad.

Since reasoning is central to all fields of study—indeed, since it’s arguably central to being human—the tools developed in logic are universally applicable. Anyone can benefit from studying logic by becoming a more self-aware, skillful reasoner.

It is possible to approach the study of logic more or less formally. A more formal approach abstracts from natural language and develops sophisticated artificial symbol-languages within which it’s possible precisely to identify the logically relevant features of arguments. This approach has many virtues, but it is only one among many, and it focuses on only one kind of argument (deductive). In this class, we explore a diverse collection of methods and principles for evaluating many different kinds of arguments. We take a very brief look at the formal techniques mentioned above, but spend most of our time studying arguments presented in natural language, as they occur in everyday reasoning.

PHILOS 192- First-Year Seminar: Philosophy of Video Games

Open only to freshmen. Students may earn cr in just one L&S First-Year Sem (course numbers 192, 193, 194). Prereq: none.

  • SEM 001  MW 10:00 AM – 11:15 AM MIT 361

  • Instructor: Agust Magnusson magnusso@uwm.edu

In this course we study the relation of natural science and religion to each other. Are the teachings of natural science and the beliefs of religion necessarily in conflict with one another? If so, what exactly is the nature of the conflict, and why is it inevitable? Which has more authority? Or, rather, ought we to understand the acceptance of the authority of natural science as compatible with religious belief? These questions imply other questions: how shall we define natural science exactly? and what is religion exactly? — We will study particularly prominent moments in the relation of science to religion in the modern period: specifically, the case of Galileo’s conflict with Church authorities over the heliocentric conception of the cosmos; and, a couple of centuries later, the conflicts between science and religion that Darwin’s theory of evolution by natural selection has inspired since it was published. We will also study the relation of science to religion in our contemporary world.

PHILOS 204 - Introduction to Asian Religions

Prereq: none.

Enrollment in this course requires enrollment in a discussion section.

The course will offer a philosophical examination of the primary religious traditions of Asia, with emphasis on Hinduism, Buddhism, Confucianism, and Taoism. We will familiarize ourselves with the significant philosophical concepts of each religion and engage with these traditions in a philosophical dialogue that enables us to understand their contributions to our understanding of the nature of the human self, the nature of reality, and the nature of the divine. Although we will examine differences between views and critique philosophical argumentation, there is no intention to disparage or endorse any particular belief system.

PHILOS 211- Elementary Logic

Prereq: Satisfacation of QL-A

  • LEC 202 ONLINE

  • LEC 401 MW 2:30 PM – 3:20 PM CRT 175

  • Instructor: Matthew Knachel knachel@uwm.edu

Humans are reasoning animals, and logic is the study of the rules and principles of correct reasoning, the science of what follows from what. Logic know-how is a skill, one of the most important skills you will ever develop, both for your college and later career and for your everyday life. It teaches you how to analyze concepts, ideas, arguments, and break them down into their simplest components. You are then in a position to recognize the relationships between those components, to see how they are connected together (or not), and thereby to understand how and why one thing follows from another. At the same time, it teaches you how to construct ‘paths of reasoning’, how to get from one idea to another, how, for example, to determine what is the best course of action in a particular situation.

Apart from its application in virtually every field of study, the study of logic will help you develop your analytical and quantitative skills, your writing skills, your communication skills, and your day to day reasoning. You’ll become a better thinker and a better reasoner. You may not be aware that you are doing so, but you’re using logic now, and you’ll use it every day, for the rest of your life.

This is an introductory course in formal (symbolic) logic intended for students who have had no previous work in logic. There will be 3 exams and weekly homework assignments. The course satisfies General Education Humanities and QLB requirements. The course also satisfies the L&S Formal Reasoning Requirement for the B.A. degree.

Philosophy 232- Topics in Philosophy: Philosophy of Love and Sex

Prereq: none.

  • LEC 001 TR 1:00 PM – 2:15 PM LUB N130

  • Instructor: Elizabeth Silverstein silvers2@uwm.edu

In this course we will explore a variety of topics concerning feminism, the oppression of women, and the politics of gender in contemporary society. We will approach these topics from a philosophical perspective and will pay close attention to both conceptual and normative issues. The course will begin with a survey of important traditional philosophical works advocating for feminist positions. We will read about and discuss issues such as the social construction of gender and of the self; the nature of autonomy; feminist epistemology; and the impact of race, class, and sexual orientation on women’s lives. We will also explore philosophical questions that arise in contemporary debates around specific feminist issues. Students will have opportunities to apply the philosophical skills acquired in class into the real world through a community-based interview project and service learning with local organizations.

PHILOS 241 – Introductory to Ethics

Prereq: none.

This course is an introduction to moral philosophy and is intended for the student who has little or no prior exposure to philosophy. It will provide a broad but reasonably detailed examination of the central issues of moral philosophy and will also consider how these can be applied to several contemporary moral problems.

PHILOS 243 - Moral Problems

May be taken w/chg in topic to 6 cr max. Prereq: none.

  • LEC 201 ONLINE September 3 – October 5

  • LEC 202 ONLINE October 7 – November 9

  • LEC 203 ONLINE November 11 – December 12

  • Instructor: Miren Boehm boehm@uwm.edu

LEC 201: ABORTION

Abortion is one of the most divisive moral questions in our society. At the center of this important debate we find the following concepts: “person”, “right to life”, and “right to self-determination.” Some people think if the embryo/fetus is a person and therefore has the right to life, it follows that abortion is morally wrong. But, first, while it is obvious that the fetus is alive and a human being, it is not obvious that the fetus is a person. This is because “person” is a moral concept, not a biological one. Second, however, it is also not obvious that if the fetus is a person, then abortion is morally wrong. This is because, while the fetus has a right to life (if it is a person), the pregnant woman has a right to self-determination; she has a right to determine what to do with her body. In this class, we will investigate these arguments, but also consider the subject of abortion from the standpoint of the law, religion, and feminism.

LEC  202: DRUGS AND ADDICTION

This five-week course is concerned with moral and legal issues related to recreational drug/alcohol use. We discuss these questions:  Is it morally wrong to use drugs for fun?  Is it morally permissible to provide another person with drugs? Do individuals have the right to harm themselves? Should the state be able to determine what we do with our lives? Should drugs be legal?  If not, what is the justification for prohibiting drug use? Would it be better if drugs were legal? Is there such a thing as addiction?  What is our understanding of why people become “addicts”?  Are people under the influence responsible for their behavior?

LEC 203: ANIMAL ETHICS

We coexist on this planet with other animals, most of whom were here before we “arrived.” Homo Sapiens has developed a system of moral and legal rights that, at least in principle, protects members of its species from certain harms. We believe that each member of the Homo Sapiens species has the right to “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness”. What about other animals? May we do with them as we please? As a matter of fact, we do. We eat them; we trapped them in farms; we separate parents from their offspring; we experiment on them; we kill them for our entrainment. Do we owe non-human animals’ moral consideration? Should they enjoy any legal protections? Non-human animals are not rational; they are not able to act on reasons. But most of us believe that they do possess the capacity to suffer, and indeed, that human action causes them a great deal of suffering. Is the capacity to suffer enough to include non-human animals in the circle of moral consideration?

PHILOS 244 – Ethical Issues in Health Care: Biomedical

May be retaken w/chg in topic to 6 cr max. Prereq: none.

In this course we will begin by overviewing the ethical theories that shape our answers to serious ethical dilemmas. In this part of the course we will first introduce philosophical moral theories, and look more closely at theories that apply particularly in biomedical ethics, and finally introduce and develop an understanding of the concept of autonomy and how it relates to issues in biomedical ethics, paying particularly close attention to how different social and cultural factors effect health care interactions. The course will be framed around issues of autonomy and especially on the autonomy of traditionally vulnerable populations. For the second half of the course we will apply these theories to particular moral dilemmas currently confronting health care providers, patients and their families, and society at large. These topics will include issues related to death and dying, pregnancy and birth, genetic testing and therapies, health care allocation, and research ethics. We will be particularly solicitous of issues that pertain to the health care issues of diverse populations and those that historically socially disadvantaged.

PHILOS 337- Environmental Ethics

Prereq: none.

  • LEC 001 TR 1:00 PM – 2:15 PM LUB N126

  • Instructor: Elizabeth Silverstein silvers2@uwm.edu

The course will cover major theories of environmental ethics and their practical applications. We will cover various theoretical approaches to environmental ethics including: Animal rights, the Land Ethic; deep ecology; social ecology; ecofeminism; and rethinking the good life. This will include discussions about the moral value of non-human life and nature; human responsibility to the environment;  and various contemporary moral issues related to the environment including: wildlife conservation; poverty as an environmental problem; the ecology of property rights; cost-benefit analysis and environmental policy; and environmental activism. We will pay particular attention to moral dilemmas that arise from the intersection of social justice issues, health disparities, and the climate crisis through a locally focused and ethically guided individual project.

PHILOS 351- Philosophy of Mind

Prereq: jr st& 3 cr in PHILOS.

  • LEC 001 MW 2:30 PM – 3:45 PM CRT 124

  • Instructor: Stanislaus Husi husi@uwm.edu

In this course on the philosophy of mind, we will focus on three central aspects of the mind: consciousness, emotions, reasoning. On each aspect, we will read excerpts of some recent classics, such as David Chalmers and Dan Dennett on consciousness, Lisa Feldman Barrett and Robert Solomon on the emotions, Hugo Mercier and Dan Sperber on reasoning. There will be some general introduction into each topic provided by the instructor, but the intended format for the course is more conversational, reading and discussing together some exciting and engaging accounts that set out to make sense of these central aspects of the mind.

PHILOS 355/355G- Political Philosophy

Prerequisite: none.

  • LEC 201 ONLINE

  • Instructor: TBA

PHILOS 430/ 430G- Great Thinkers of the Ancient Period

Prerequisite: jr st & 3 cr in PHILOS.

  • LEC 001 MW 1:00 PM – 2:15 PM  LUB S231

  • Instructor: Nataliya Palatnik palatnik@uwm.edu

The history of philosophy is sometimes said to have begun in 585 B.C.E., when the Greek philosopher, Thales, is said to have predicted an eclipse of the sun. This, of course, is a somewhat arbitrary convenience, and there is nothing particularly philosophical about predicting an eclipse of the sun (what Thales is known for ‘philosophically’ is his conjecture that everything, at bottom, is made of water!). But Thales’s prediction is taken to be representative of a more general tendency away from understanding the natural world through a ‘mythological’ perspective, and towards an understanding of it through a more ‘rationalistic’, ‘scientific’ perspective. It is this general tendency that perhaps better characterizes the beginnings of philosophy. In this course we will consider how this tendency plays out in the thought of some of the central figures in early Greek philosophy – the Presocratics, Plato, and Aristotle – in order to understand how their ideas and theories about the natural world and human nature resulted in the development of natural science, ethics, and metaphysics.

PHILOS 522/522G Special Topics in Philosophy of Science: Science in Society: Methods and Prescriptions

May be retaken w/chg in topic to 9 cr max. Prereq: junior standing.

  • LEC 001 TR 2:30 PM – 3:45 PM CRT 607

  • Instructor: William Penn pennw@uwm.edu

Scientific modeling practice lies at the heart of our explanations, our experiments, and our representations of the world. However, scientific models enter into our epistemic practices in highly contextual ways. First, models are shaped by existing, historical and folk theory, and are therefore shaped by their situation in history and evolving understanding. Second, models are shaped by the contexts of their use, their experimental prescriptions, and their deployment in scientific and non-scientific community debates. The values of these communities therefore shape the models themselves in complex and nuanced ways. Finally, models are built using particular modeling and measuring practices, as well as new or developing technologies. The models therefore build into their representations and explanations many peculiarities that come from the features of these technologies and practices.

This course will focus on these contextualities of scientific models. In particular, we will consider problems such as path dependence, non-epistemic values in science, science as an integrated part of social systems, the relationship of science to democracy, the shaping of scientific models by social pressures, science as it guides and is guided by developing technology, and the problems of measurement including ethical considerations of measurement. In addition, we will discuss case studies from the history of science that bring these contextualities into stark relief. In particular, we will focus on examples from biological (evolutionary), social, computer (AI), and anthropological sciences. Finally, we will discuss the future of science, and epistemic methods in general.

This course is designed to give students a firm foundation in core elements of contemporary philosophy of science such as explanation, experiment, measurement, and scientific modeling. In addition, the course is designed to allow students exposure to a broad range of epistemic, metaphysical, and social/ethical problems arising from the implementation of these core elements. This course is suitable for majors and non-majors alike, regardless of scientific background.

PHILOS 562/562G- Special Topics in Ethics and Social and Political Philosophy: Moral Sentimentalism

May be retaken w/chg in topic to 9 cr max. Prereq: jr standing & 3 cr in PHILOS.

  • LEC 001 MW 1:00 PM – 2:15 PM CRT 607

  • Instructor: Stanislaus Husi husi@uwm.edu

Emotions are receiving increasing attention in moral philosophy and metaethics. Philosophers of the broadly sentimentalist tradition believe they are not just important, but actually key to understanding value, meaning and morality. Even though sentimentalism is currently experiencing a noticeable upswing, the tradition reaches rather far back, at least to the Scottish Enlightenment championed by Francis Hutcheson, David Hume and Adam Smith. Hume characterized the contours of the tradition aptly when he wrote “The final sentence which pronounces characters or actions amiable or odious, praiseworthy or blamable depends on some internal sense or feeling which nature has made universal in the whole species.” In rough terms, sentimentalism holds morality and value to be grounded in sentiment, and thus advances a broadly stance-dependent metaethical position. In this course, we will critically assess the sentimentalist position, its challenges and prospects, as presented by its earlier to its most recent advocates.

PHILOS 681/681G- Seminar in Advanced Topics: 19th Century Irrationalism: Schopenhauer/ Nietzsche

May be retaken with change in topic to 9 cr max. Prereq: senior standing and 12 cr in PHILOS at the 300-level or above; or graduate standing.

  • SEM 001 TR 4:00 PM – 5:15 PM CRT 607

  • Instructor: William Bristow bristow@uwm.edu

While philosophy in the eighteenth century in Europe is characterized by optimism regarding the human capacity to know the rational order of things and to affirm the rational order thus known, philosophy in the nineteenth century in Europe is marked by a strong strain of pessimism and irrationalism.  The German philosophers Arthur Schopenhauer and Friedrich Nietzsche are principal representatives of this influential strain of nineteenth century thought.  In this course, we study Schopenhauer’s magnum opus, The World as Will and Representation, in which he develops pessimism and irrationalism, and early work by Nietzsche (Birth of Tragedy, Untimely Meditations), which is heavily influenced by, and responds to, Schopenhauer’s philosophy.  While Nietzsche’s great influence in subsequent European and American thought is generally recognized, the substantial influence of Schopenhauer, not only within philosophy, but in the arts and in the culture in general, is much less recognized.  While this course will study that influence directly only insofar as it extends to Nietzsche himself, the course should enable students to recognize the significant legacy of Schopenhauer’s writing in Western thought and culture since the 19th century.

PHILOS 790 – Advanced Topics in Philosophy: Graduate Student Writing Workshop

Retakable w/chg in topic to 9 cr max. Prereq: grad st; consent of instr.

  • LEC 001 M 4:00 PM – 6:40 PM CRT 607

  • Instructor: Nataliya Palatnik palatnik@uwm.edu

In this seminar students will work on a single paper, which by the end of the term should be a piece of high-quality philosophy. Each week two students will submit drafts of their papers for our workshop. Other students will be expected to submit comments/questions on the papers. Our goal is to provide constructive feedback to the authors so that they may improve their papers. Students also will discuss drafts of their application statements.

PHILOS 903- Seminar in Epistemology: Hume: Skepticism and Science

Retakeable with change in topic to 9 cr max. Prereq: graduate standing and consent of instructor.

  • SEM 001 W 2:30 PM – 5:10 PM CRT 607

  • Instructor: Miren Boehm boehm@uwm.edu