●     For Monday, Sept. 11: Read Ch. 1 and Ch. 2, Section I of the text. Also come to class with written comments (not to be turned in) on the questions raised during class. See the lecture notes if you don’t remember what they are.

●     For Wednesday, Sept. 13: Finish Ch. 2 of the text. Read pp. 44–443 of the anthology. Come to class with written comments (not to be turned in) on the discussion of “truth” in section 3B of the text.

●     For Friday, Sept. 15: Read through section II.B on the syllabus. Also read Ch. 3, Section II of the text.                       

●     For Monday, Sept. 18: Time permitting, we will start on the material in Section II.C of the syllabus.

●     Homework Assignment 1 is due on Wed. 9/20. You can get it here: Assignment 1.     

●     For Mon. Sept. 25: We will conclude our discussion of Ch. 3 of the text. Time permitting, we will begin discussion of the article “The Ethics of Belief” by William Clifford. You can find it here: http://tinyurl.com/fhgs. Print out a copy of this article, read it, and bring it to class. A homework assignment drawn from this will be made on Monday.

●     For Wed.: We will (really) conclude our discussion of Ch. 3. We will then start discussing the article by Clifford. Assignment 2 is due on Friday.

●     For Fri. Sept. 29: We will continue to discuss the Clifford article.

●     For Mon. Oct. 2: We will conclude our discussion of Clifford’s article. Time permitting, we will discuss William James, The Will to Believe. Please print out, read, and bring to class a copy of this article.

●     For Wed. Oct. 4: We will discuss the William James article mentioned above. Be prepared to discuss it in class. The main issue will be: does James have a good objection to Clifford?

●     For Fri. Oct. 6: Be prepared to discuss the question raised at the end of class of 10/4: how does James respond the claim that the religious option is not forced? Does this lead to a good objection to Clifford? Following this, we will discuss the material in Ch. 4, Section I, parts B and C of the text. Are you convinced by the main examples there? The next homework assignment will be due on Wed. Oct. 11. It will be assigned either Oct. 6 or Oct. 9.

●     Assignment 3 is due on Wed. Oct. 11. Also, read the material on the syllabus in Section III.B.

●     OK, we’re a little behind schedule. We will start on the material from Section III.B on 11/13.

●     We will discuss the material from Section III.B on Weds. 10/18 and then turn to section III.C on 10/20. Assignment 4 is due on Monday, October 23. (Late update: you have the option of writing about the “frying pan” example discussed in class today and turning in your assignment on Friday, Oct. 20 instead.)

●     Here is the schedule for the next two weeks:

       Oct. 23-27: Coherentism (readings from Syllabus, Section III. C)

       Oct. 27-Nov. 1: Modest Foundationalism (readings from Syllabus, Section III.D)

       Nov. 3: Review and mid-term preparation

       Nov. 6: Mid-term Test

 

●     For Monday, Oct. 30: Read the material on Modest Foundationalism, Section III.D on the syllabus.  Assignment 5 is due on Nov. 1.

●     For Weds. Nov. 1: We will continue the discussion of Modest Foundationalism. Be prepared to discuss the objection discussed on pp. 75-77 of the text. If you have a comment on that issue, you can write about that for Assignment 5.

●     Here is a Study Guide for the test on Monday.

●     Here is a link to a schedule for the rest of the semester: Remaining Schedule. Please do the assigned readings as listed here. Any changes to this schedule will be announced in class and posted here.

●     See the Remaining Schedule: we’ll cover Truth Tracking on 11/13 and possibly start the next section, Reliabilism.

●     For Wed. Nov. 15: Read the section in the text on Reliabilism. Also read the excerpt from Alvin Goldman’s “What is Justified Belief?” that was handed out in class. Question to consider: In this selection Goldman says that certain terms can appear in his analysis of justified belief and others can’t. Why does he include and exclude things as he does? 

●     Assignment 6 is due on Nov. 20.                  

●     For Mon, Nov. 20: Read pp. 108-122 of the text.

●     Assignment 7 is due on Dec. 4.

●     The Remaining Schedule produced a couple of weeks ago has been revised. See that list for readings for the remaining classes.

●     For Fri. Dec. 1: Come to class prepared to discuss the Madam Malarkey example from chapter 7.

●     The take-home final will be distributed in class on Monday Dec. 11 or Wednesday Dec. 13. It will be due on Monday Dec. 18. Instead of take-home, you may write a final paper. Information about the optional paper may be found here: Optional Final Paper.           

●     For Fri. Dec. 8, read pp. 275-291 of the anthology and Ch. 8, Sec. I of the text.

●     For Mon. Dec. 13: read Ch. 9 of the text.

●     The Take-Home Final is available here.

 

 

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Last updated: December 13, 2006 by Richard Feldman