Major Courses
PHIL A201 Practical Logic 3 crs.
This course introduces students to the application of practical logical techniques in the analysis and formulation of rational arguments. Topics include how to find premises and conclusions in an argument, definitions, informal fallacies, syllogisms, Venn diagrams, induction, and Mill’s methods.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL A206 Introduction to Symbolic Logic 3 crs.
This course is an introduction to the techniques of symbolic logic in argument analysis and to the science of logic as the analysis of formal deductive systems.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
This course is an historical and theoretical examination of the question, "What does it mean to be?" or "What is reality, as distinct from mere appearance?" The course begins with a study of ancient philosophical explanations of reality and goes on to study the historical evolution of both the problem of metaphysics and its various resolutions.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
This course is an historical and problematic investigation of traditional ethical positions and texts, especially focusing on teleological, deontological theories, and virtue ethics and on contemporary responses to them. This course is cross-listed with PHIL-W252: Students only receive credit for successfully completing the first instance of the course/s.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
This course takes an historical and problematic approach to the problems of knowledge, with emphasis on the main theories of knowledge in ancient and modern philosophy as well as contemporary discussions of the nature of knowledge.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL A225 Philosophy of Law 3 crs.
This course is an inquiry into the nature of law, the relevance of law to morality, the concepts of responsibility in the law, punishment, and the relevance to law of the concepts of justice, equality, and liberty. The philosophical assumptions that underlie criminal law and private law are explored. Readings are taken from classical and recent philosophers of law.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL A300 Philosophy of Science 3 crs.
This course is an introduction to basic themes of recent philosophy of science including scientific methodology, concepts and presuppositions. Through an examination of different models of scientific explanation, the course exposes students to problems of justifying scientific theories, and the relationship between theories and reality.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL A307 Philosophy of Mind 3 crs.
This course examines different theories of the nature of mind beginning with an examination of the traditional mind-body problem in the works of Descartes. It subsequently explores alternative positions that have been presented by Descartes’ contemporaries in the classical period, as well as modern contemporaries. Emphasis is placed on such areas as mind-body identity/interaction, brain process, language, perception, sensation, emotion, personal identity, and free will.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL A309 Naturalism and Its Critics 3 crs.
The natural sciences present an admirable model for knowledge. But naturalism (the idea that nature as understood by the sciences is all there is) can seem ill-equipped to explain some important phenomena (including values and consciousness). This class evaluates naturalism by considering naturalist, anti-naturalist, and compromise views.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL A320 Social and Political Philosophy 3 crs.
This course is an inquiry into the origin, nature, and necessity of political order. The relation of the individual to the social and political whole, the origin, nature, and just use of political authority, the nature of rights and duty, the problem of freedom, and the philosophical prerequisites of a just social order are addressed.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL A330 Modern Political Thought 3 crs.
This course is an introduction to modern political theory through explication and critique of readings from classics of modern political thought. Readings are selected from works by major theorists such as Machiavelli, Hobbes, Spinoza, Locke, Montesquieu, Rousseau, Kant, Burke, Bentham, de Tocqueville, Hegel, Marx and Mill.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL A340 Being and God 3 crs.
RAC: Catholic Tradition; Premodern
This course exams of the nature of being and the existence of God from the standpoint of classical metaphysics. It studies topics such as the structure of finite being, the transcendentals, analogy and univocity of being, metaphysical causality and the problem of creation.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL A400 History of Ancient Philosophy 3 crs.
In this course, the Pre-Socratics, Plato, Aristotle, the Epicurians, Sceptics, Stoics, Plotinus, and early Christian thought are discussed.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL A405 History of Medieval Philosophy 3 crs.
This course offers an historical study of the main ideas of the medieval period from St. Augustine to the Renaissance.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL A408 Philosophy of Thomas Aquinas 3 crs.
This course offers an introduction to the central philosophical positions of Thomas Aquinas. It examines Aquinas' views on the relationship between faith and reason, his metaphysics of being, his analysis of human knowledge, his theory of human nature, and his defense of human freedom. Special attention is also devoted to the Greek and Arabic sources of Aquinas' philosophy and to his place in the history of medieval philosophy.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL A410 History of Modern European Philosophy 3 crs.
This course discusses readings from works of Descartes, Spinoza, Leibniz, Locke, Berkeley, Hume, and Kant.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL A416 History of 19th-century Philosophy 3 crs.
A survey of the major traditions in post-Kantian philosophy ending with Nietzsche, this course explores the interrelations between different themes in 19th-century thought and how they laid the foundation for 20th-century philosophy.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL A435 Existentialism 3 crs.
This course examines the treatment of the characteristic existential themes as exemplified in the writings of Kierkegard, Nietzsche, Heideggar, Jaspers, Marcel, and Sartre.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL A440 Phenomenology 3 crs.
This course treats the problems which gave rise to contemporary phenomenology, existential phenomenology, and hermeneutic phenomenology, and various writers in that tradition, such as Husserl, Heidegger, Merleau-Ponty, Sartre, and Ricoeur.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL A465 Introduction to Analytic Philosophy 3 crs.
This course is a study of the movement of 20th-century Anglo-American analytic philosophy as practiced by Russell, Moore, Wittgenstein, the logical positivists, ordinary language analysts, Quine, and contemporary language analysts.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL A489 Major Seminar: Contemporary Philosophy 3 crs.
This course is a detailed study of an author or texts from the contemporary (19th and 20th Centuries) period.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL A490 Seminar: Ancient Philosophy 3 crs.
This course is a detailed study of an author or texts from the ancient period.
PHIL A491 Seminar: Medieval Philosophy 3 crs.
This course is a detailed study of an author or texts from the medieval period.
PHIL A492 Seminar: Modern Philosophy 3 crs.
This course is a detailed study of an author or texts from the modern period.
PHIL A493 Seminar: Major Author 3 crs.
This course is an in-depth analysis of the thought of a major philosopher. Content varies.
Prerequisite: permission of instructor
PHIL A495 Special Project credits vary
This project focuses on the creative or productive efforts of one or more students. A special project is distinguished from a research project in its lack of the historical or experimental method and perspective characteristics of research.
PHIL A496 Seminar/Workshop credits vary
In a seminar, a supervised group of students share the results of their research on a common topic. In a workshop, a supervised group of students participate in a common effort.
PHIL A498 Philosophy Honors Thesis 3 crs.
Students undertake a research project under the supervision of a professor that culminates in the writing of an undergraduate thesis.
PHIL A499 Independent Study, credits vary
Independent work done under professorial supervision.
PHIL H295 Honors Seminar 3 crs.
University Honors Program
This course is an in-depth analysis of a major topic/theme in philosophy. Content varies.
Loyola Core
PHIL T121 First-Year Seminar 3 crs.
Foundation Courses: First-Year Seminar
All first-year students take a 3-credit First-Year Seminar during their first semester as one of the core course in the Loyola Core. First-Year Seminars at Loyola are small, discussion-based seminars that introduce new college students to academic inquiry at the university level by investigating a relevant topic. Specially-trained faculty lead these seminars in a way that instills in students the academic skills necessary to become successful Loyola students. A list of upcoming First-Year Seminars can be found on the First-Year Experience homepage.
PHIL R122 Philosophy of the Human Person 3 crs.
Knowledge-Values Courses: Philosophy I: Reasoning
This course serves as an introductory course to philosophy and is a humanitistic study of the most fundamental problems of human existence. Among the topics that this course examines are: the nature of philosophical inquiry, the nature of the human person; the relation of the human person to the cosmos; the issue of freedom and determinism; the relation of the human person to the social; the nature of human knowing, and the nature of human responsibility and purpose.
Knowledge-Values Courses: Philosophy II: Knowledge and Morality
Aesthetics is the philosophy of art. We examine such problems as What is the relationship between art and the human knower? Does art require "genius"? Is there such a thing as "art for art's sake"? Is there any objectivity in opinions about art? Are there objective criteria for distinguishing art from pornography? What is the impact of digital technology and the internet upon art?
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL U238 Imaginary Voyages: Fantasy & Reality in Philosophy & Film
Knowledge-Values Courses: Philosophy II: Knowledge and Morality
In this course, the interrelationship between fantasy and reality are explored through the lens of philosophy and film. Particular emphasis is given to the ways in which the Hegelian-Marxist dialectical tradition and the Freudian-Lacanian psychoanalytical tradition shed light on this question. Throughout the semester, students explore topics such as: fantasy and the fundamental fantasy; dreams and the dream work; ideology and the critique of ideology; fetishism and the fetishism of commodities; the spectacle, the imaginary, the symbolic, and the real. Selected readings from philosophers such as Freud, Hegel, Marx and Debord as well as selected films of David Lynch and Slavoj Zizek are part of this course.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL U239 The Self and the Sacred 3 crs.
Knowledge-Values Courses: Philosophy II: Knowledge and Morality
"The Self and the Sacred" pursues fundamental questions about the relationship among human beings, reality, and knowledge by exploring the transformation of ourselves that occur in relation to the sacred. These questions include: Is there a dimension of reality that could be termed, "divine?" If so, what is its nature, and how and to what extent can it be known? What happens to ourselves as well as our understanding of knowledge and reality when we are transformed by our relations to the "divine?"
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL U240 European World Views 3 crs.
Knowledge-Values Courses: Philosophy II: Knowledge and Morality
A "worldview" is, roughly, a kind of picture of what the world is like that informs one's attitudes toward that world's institutions and cultural formations. This course examines how philosophy can play a role in shaping such a world picture. To do so, we focus on modern Europe, and consider three "clusters" of philosophical and cultural thought: Enlightenment, Romaniticism, and Postmodernism. For each, we read a few representative philosophical texts, and then examine how the ideas discussed were reflected in the broader culture. This examination of culture also involves the consideration of various works of art, to see how they display or represpent philosophical ideas.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL U241 Philosophical Perspective on Woman 3 crs.
Knowledge-Values Courses: Philosophy II: Knowledge and Morality
This course introduces students to feminist philosophy by examining major theories that have supported feminism both as a political and as a philosophical movement. It examines the philosophical principles underlying important schools of feminist inquiry–liberal, Marxist, and radical feminism. Discussions center on themes that explore the relationship between knowledge and reality concerning the "nature" of woman and man. Students reflect on the role of science, religion, philosophy, and the media in grounding and shaping ethical, social, and political discourses about women.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL U243 Environmental Philosophy 3 crs.
Knowledge-Values Courses: Philosophy II: Knowledge and Morality
This course offers an overview of the environmental crisis and evaluates the leading contemporary philosophical accounts of both the origins of the crisis and the ethical orientations needed for its resolution.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL U254 Postmodernism and Feminism 3 crs.
Knowledge-Values Courses: Philosophy II: Knowledge and Morality
"Postmodernism" rejects the idea of any single overarching story or theory that can make sense of our lives and the world around us. It recognizes the plurality of peoples, cultures, and beliefs that compose the human condition and the context-dependent nature of our beliefs and claims.This course will examine postmodernism and the feminist views that follow from it, and consider whether such feminist views provide coherent philosophical and practical views of the condition of women in society.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL U270 Philosophy and Religion in the Middle Ages 3 crs.
Knowledge-Values Courses: Philosophy II: Knowledge and Morality
This course examines the nature and goals of philosophy as it was practiced in the medieval world. It looks at the various ways in which philosophy was transformed by its encounter with Christianity and the extent to which it remained an autonomous discipline in the Middle Ages. Among the tpoics to be studied are: the possibility of "Christian philosophy"; the various theoretical solutions that the medievals offered to the problem of faith and reason; and some philosophical constroversies involving religious belief (e.g., eternity of the world, monopsychism, rationalism).
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL U272 Philosophy of Knowledge 3crs.
Knowledge-Values Courses: Philosophy II: Knowledge and Morality
This course focuses on a philosophic question that is important to every other intellectual discipline: how do we know what we know? Questions covered may include: Is knowledge something forged independently by individual inquirers, or is it inherited from a social tradition? Does it have foundations in our observations of the world, as in natural science, or in purely intellectual axioms, as in mathematics? Has our knowledge any solid "foundations" at all, or is it more like a living, organic whole? What are the implications of different answers to these questions for science, religion, and our commonsense view of the world?
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL U275 Race, Racism, & Social Justice
Knowledge-Values Courses: Philosophy II: Knowledge and Morality
This course examines various philosophical issues connected to race and racism. Primary among those issues is the nature of 'race,' and the questions of whether races are biologically determined or socially constructed. The nature of racism and its connection to the concept of race is also considered. The class ends by examining the relationship between these philosophical issues and contemporary social concerns connected to race and racism.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL U277 Minds and Machines 3 crs.
Knowledge-Values Courses: Philosophy II: Knowledge and Morality
In Minds and Machines, students focus on the central questions out of philosophy of mind, as well as more contemporary issues in artificial intelligence. Beginning with Rene Descartes, students examine his arguments that the mind is immaterial and distinct from the body and brain. The course then continues to discuss the problems of other minds, behaviorism, mind-rain identity theory, functionalism, and also theories of consciousness. Students read primary texts on mind from the leading modern and contemporary thinkers that provide them with a strong foundation of knowledge that will help them think rationally and critically about what it truly means to be an intelligent, cognitive being, and how complicated and extraordinary it is to have mentality.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL U278 Philosophy of God 3 crs.
Knowledge-Values Courses: Philosophy II: Knowledge and Morality
Philosophy of God examines questions surrounding the existence and nature of God, by means of a careful reading of some of the seminal thinkers in Western philosophy, with particular emphasis on the thoughts of Thomas Aquinas and the Catholic philosophical tradition. Among the topics to be examined are: the relationship between faith and reason, arguments for the existence of God, the nature of Gos, the extent to which God may be known by us, and the problem of religious language.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL W234 Medical Ethics 3 crs.
Knowledge-Values Courses: Philosophy II: Knowledge and Morality
This course examines ethical issues in medicine and the provision of healthcare. It analyzes questions about the values that inform the relationship between health-care workers and patients, ethical issues concerning refusal of treatment, privacy and informed consent, human subject research and informed consent. The course also addresses the ethics of abortion and euthanasia, as well as the moral implications of genetic testing, reproductive services, access to health care and priority setting for health.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL W235 Ethics of Rights 3 crs.
Knowledge-Values Courses: Philosophy II: Knowledge and Morality
This course analyzes ethical concepts involved in historical and contemporary theories of rights and human rights. We ask how cultural and ethical relativism affect our understanding of human rights and about the status of specific human rights claims made by women, gays and lesbians. Since claims about rights bear crucially on the question of how individuals and institutions ought to act, this course addresses issues that are of central ethical concern.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL W243 Classics in Moral Literature 3 crs.
Knowledge-Values Courses: Philosophy II: Knowledge and Morality
This course introduces students to some of the most important works in the history of Western moral philosophy. We focus principally on issues in ethics, including, the nature of justice and the vale of being just; the relation between reason and moral actionl the nature of human agency; the objective and/or subjective of moral obligations; cahracrer formation; and the role of value commitments in a meaningful existence.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL W244 Law and Morality 3 crs.
Knowledge-Values Courses: Philosophy II: Knowledge and Morality
This course presents and analyzes a number of frameworks for conducting ethical reasoning in the context of the law. Among the questions it studies are: how should we conceive of the relationship between moral principles and legal norms? does the law command our allegiance and respect from a moral point of view? how should moral principles and moral argument inform actual legislation? Relevant moral frameworks for addressing these questions include, but are not limited to, natural law theory, legal realism, legal positivism, critical legal theory and feminist legal theory.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL W245 Environmental Ethics 3 crs.
Knowledge-Values Courses: Philosophy II: Knowledge and Morality
This course examines our moral responsibilities to the beings in the natural world. Among the topics discussed are environmental justice, biodiversity loss, animal welfare, wilderness preservation, world population, global climate change, toxics and pollution, duties to future generations, and the meaning of sustainability. Students learn to analyze various positions in evironmental ethics, including anthropocentrism, biocentrism, and ecocentrism, and various theories, including ecofeminism, the land ethic, and deep ecology.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL W247 Global Ethics 3 crs.
Knowledge-Values Courses: Philosophy II: Knowledge and Morality
This course will investigate issues in social ethics in a global context. Topics include globalization, poverty, world hunger, population, status of women, models of development, and the role of transnational corporations, states and voluntary organizations. Perspectives studied include rights theory, contract theory, utilitarianism, virtue ethics, human capabilities theory, and the ethics of care.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
This course satisfies a Common Curriculum Philosophy requirement for students who began their program of study before fall semester 2013.
PHIL W252 Making Moral Decisions 3 crs.
Knowledge-Values Courses: Philosophy II: Knowledge and Morality
This course treats the nature of personal and moral decision making leading to consideration of some ethical positions influential in contemporary philosophical discourse (e.g., Kantian deontology, utilitarianism, natural law theory, etc.) and their application to contemporary moral problems. Cross-listed with PHIL A215. This course is cross-listed with PHIL-A215: Students only receive credit for successfully completing the first instance of the course/s.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL W260 Worldviews and Ethics 3 crs.
Knowledge-Values Courses: Philosophy II: Knowledge and Morality
Our morality cannot be divorced from our understanding of reality. This course will explore how our view of reality affects our moral judgments by examining the worldviews and moralities of both the ancient Greeks and subsequent Christian philosophers. Readings are taken from Homer, Plato, Aristotle, Augustine, and Aquinas.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL W264 Social Justice 3 crs.
Knowledge-Values Courses: Philosophy II: Knowledge and Morality
This course will examine the concept of social justice as it comes up in questions of just distribution, civil rights, and international justice. These issues will be illustrated via careful reading of classic and contemporary texts and consideration of contemporary social issues that connect with the theoretical issues considered. This course fits the ethics requirement's goal to "investigate the moral principle and ground and guide human action."
Prerequisite: PHIL R122
PHIL W267 Technology and Human Values 3 crs.
Knowledge-Values Courses: Philosophy II: Knowledge and Morality
This course is a philosophical approach to technology, human values, and the relationship between them. We begin with an overview of traditional and current theories of the human good, the nature of right action, and the requirements of justice. These theories include utilitarianism, Kantianism, social contract theory, virtue ethics, and feminism. We then sketch the philosophy of technology, giving special attention to the impact that technology has on political and economic systems.
Prerequisite: PHIL R122