2023-2024 Courses

Fall 2023

PHL 375: Ethics

Doing Good: Consequentialism in Ethics

[previous syllabus - subject to change!]

Here’s a simple ethical theory: you should always do whatever will produce the most good. This view, called consequentialism, is both one of the most influential theories in moral philosophy and one of the most reviled. This course will undertake a sustained investigation of consequentialism. Topics include: the extent of our obligations to help strangers in need; whether it is ever permissible to kill in the name of the greater good; whether we can know the long-term consequences of our actions; whether goodness is objective or subjective; whether all moral theories are consequentialist theories in disguise; and more.

PHL 2115: Topics in Epistemology (open to graduate students only), with David Barnett

Normativity and the Self

[syllabus]

This is a seminar on topics in ethics and epistemology related to the self. A punchy version of our overarching question is how who we are affects who we ought to be. Less punchily but more accurately: how does the attitudes one already has, and how one relates to those attitudes, affect what attitudes one ought to have, or actions one ought to do? In epistemology: how does what you already believe affect what you ought to believe? In ethics: how does what you value or intend affect what you ought to value, intend, or do? We will also be interested in the relation one must bear to one’s attitudes to count as ‘owning’ them as one’s own.

Winter 2024

PHL 244: Human Nature

[previous syllabus - subject to change!]

In this course, we will investigate three central questions about our nature as human beings. First, what are we? Are we immaterial souls, collections of memories and other psychological states, physical bodies, or something else? Second, are we good or evil? Are human beings innately selfish, or are we capable of genuine moral virtue? Third, do we have free will? Can we be held responsible for our actions if they are the inevitable result of the laws of nature?

PHL 407: Seminar in Ethics

Well-Being, Value, and the Meaning of Life

[previous syllabus - subject to change!]

This course investigates several topics under the broad heading of value theory: what is valuable, and what is it to be valuable? We will focus on three value concepts: well-being, or what is good for a person; goodness ‘simpliciter’; and meaning in life.

Questions we will investigate include: what is it for a person to be well-off, or have a good life? Which concept is more fundamental, ‘good’ or ‘good for’? What is it to be good? What are the bearers of value: states of affairs, or things like persons or beautiful objects? What is it for a life to be meaningful? What is the value of pursuing achievement? And finally, is the meaning or value of our lives diminished by our cosmic insignificance relative to the enormity of space and time?

Previously Taught Courses

Winter 2023

PHL 375: Ethics, Doing Good: Consequentialism in Ethics

PHL 407: Seminar in Ethics, Well-Being, Value, and the Meaning of Life

Winter 2022

PHL 375: Ethics, Doing Good: Consequentialism in Ethics

PHL 407: Seminar in Ethics, Ethics in Personal Relationships

Winter 2020

PHL 375: Ethics, Doing Good: Consequentialism in Ethics

PHL 407: Seminar in Ethics, Ethics in Personal Relationships

Fall 2020

PHL 244: Human Nature

PHL 2132: Seminar in Ethics (graduate), Morality and Accountability

Winter 2019

PHL 376: Topics in Moral Philosophy, Doing Good: Consequentialism in Ethics

PHL 407: Seminar in Ethics, Lying

Fall 2018

PHL 244: Human Nature

PHL 1111: PhD Proseminar, Values, Rules, and Beyond (with Thomas Hurka)