Schedule

Tuesday & Thursday, 12:30-1:45 in Malloy 215

Topic

The topic of this seminar is the nature of consciousness.

Being conscious is a property. It is a property which you are I have, but (most think) a property which tables and chairs lack. There are many specific ways of being conscious, like feeling a stabbing pain or seeming to see red. Call these more specific ways of being conscious "conscious states." The main question we will ask in this class is: what are conscious states?

We'll divide this into four (slightly) smaller questions: (1) Are conscious states just physical properties? (2) If they are not physical properties, what could they be? (3) Do conscious states put us in touch with reality? (4) Could computers or robots have conscious states?

Because this seminar is designed to be a second philosophy course for students intrerested in pursuing the major or minor, we'll aso spend a fair amount of time talking about how to read philosophical texts and how to write good philosophy.

Texts

The one required text is Saul Kripke's Naming and Necessity. Other readings will be made available in PDF form via links from the syllabus.

Assignments

You will write three short papers during the course of the semester. These will all be tightly constrained: you will be asked to (i) state a thesis which you will defend, (ii) give an argument in favor of that thesis, and (iii) reply to what you think is the strongest objection to your argument.

You will then develop one of these three papers into a longer (5-7 page) paper which will be due at the end of the semester.

There will be no exams.

There will be a big emphasis placed on participation. You are expected to take an active role in class discussion, and to come to class ready to discuss and ask questions about the readings for the day. You will also be expected to thoughtfully participate in the web forum at least once each week.

Grading

The midterm exam and (non-cumulative) final exam will each be worth 35% of the final grade; short take home assignments will, collectively, be worth 10%. The remaining 20% of the final grade will be given on the basis of class attendance and participation.

Each assignment is required, in the sense that failure to complete one or more assignments is sufficient to fail the course.

Notre Dame has no official way of indexing numerical grades to letter grades. This is the system that will be used in this course:

A	94+
A-	90-93
B+	87-89
B	83-86
B-	80-82
C+	77-79
C	73-76
C-	70-72
D	60-69
F	59-

Honor code

In all of their assignments, students are responsible for compliance with the University’s honor code, information about which is available here. You should acquaint yourself with the policies and penalties described there.

Sometimes, it can be hard to know what, exactly, the honor code implies with respect to different disciplines. For this reason, the philosophy department has prepared a document explaining, using examples, what the honor code requires of students when writing a philosophy paper. I strongly recommend that you read this document, which is available here. It is possible to violate the honor code without intending to do so; the best way to avoid this is to carefully read through the philosophy department's guidelines.

If you are in doubt about what the honor code requires of you in a particular case, please ask me.