Philosophy is the study of questions and inquiry. Early philosophy reflected on everything from the nature of a good life to the structure of the physical world to our knowledge of it. Along the way, these pursuits spawned mathematics, physics, and other important academic disciplines. Though much progress has been made on aspects of these questions, they are still difficult to answer: What is a good life? What kinds of things are there? What do we know? How do we answer these questions? Should we care about these questions? Hard questions are inevitable, so it pays to tell the important ones from the unimportant, the real answers from the false, and the right methods from the wrong. In the broadest sense, that is what philosophy is about.
The core topics introduce the field of philosophy and give students the skills and understanding to choose and pursue their interests in the specialized topics. On completing the core, students will be able to independently read the historical and academic literature. The core topics are:
Specializations should be discussed with the Director of Studies. On completing specializations, students will be able to independently read advanced literature and conduct a final project in that topic. Some suggested specializations are:
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