100-Level Introductory Courses

Ethics: Because moral and ethical concerns are inherent to the study of humans, we recommend Ethics as an important cognate course for students in the Social Sciences and Humanities. Because moral and ethical issues are themselves provocative, challenging, and unavoidable, all students should find the questions addressed in this area of philosophy interesting.

Logic and Reasoning: This course introduces students to the analysis of arguments. The course begins with the classification and analysis of “informal” fallacies in everyday communication and progresses to both “propositional” and “predicate” logic, which analyze the various forms arguments can take. This course is highly recommended for students in Computer Science, Mathematics, and Pre-law track.

Ecological Philosophy: This course satisfies the Environmental Studies Concentration electives and is recommended to all students with an interest in environmental responsibilities and biology.

Existentialism and Film: Because this course uses films as artworks that raise important questions about how humans make sense of their lives, it is particularly well suited to students in the Humanities and Social Sciences. Highly recommended for students interested in Film Studies.

Knowledge & Reality: Also known as “epistemology,” the study of how we gain knowledge is particularly relevant to students working in the Natural Sciences. Because question of how we acquire knowledge and justify our beliefs is interesting in its own right, all students should find this course relevant.

These courses are recommended for first-year students.