Philosophy and the Science of Human Nature
Published: Spring 2011
Description
Philosophy and the Science of Human Nature pairs central texts from Western philosophical tradition (including works by Plato, Aristotle, Epictetus, Hobbes, Kant, Mill, Rawls, and Nozick) with recent findings in cognitive science and related fields. The course is structured around three intertwined sets of topics: Happiness and Flourishing; Morality and Justice; and Political Legitimacy and Social Structures.
Course Takeaways
- Learn motivating factors behind introduced–happiness and flourishing
- Explore foundations of morality
- Explore the roots and examples of the different manifestations of political philosophy
Meet the Instructors
Tamar Szabó Gendler is Vincent J. Scully Professor of Philosophy and Professor of Cognitive Science at Yale University, and Chair of the Department of Philosophy. She received her BA in Humanities and Mathematics & Philosophy from Yale in 1987 and her PhD in Philosophy from Harvard in 1996. After a decade teaching first at Syracuse University and then at Cornell, she returned to to Yale as a professor in 2006. Her professional philosophical work lies at the intersection of philosophy and psychology, and she is the author of Thought Experiments (2000) and Intuition, Imagination and Philosophical Methodology (2010), and editor or co-editor of Conceivability and Possibility (2002), Perceptual Experience (2006) and The Elements of Philosophy (2008). She has been honored with fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities, the National Science Foundation, the American Council for Learned Societies, and the Mellon Foundation.
Full Biography
