Fall 2001 course offerings
| 736-101: Introduction to Philosophy Se 001: Selected Topics and Issues 3 credits, U, HU M 6:30-9:10 pm Professor Steldt tel 414-229-5217/4719 email karlsteldt@hotmail.com |
We shall examine attempts to resolve various basic issues in philosophy such as the following: What is the rational foundation of morality? What is the relation between the mind and the body? How can we establish the existence of God? How are we accurately to describe and explain human behavior? Works of Plato, John Stuart Mill, Descartes, Hume, and E. O. Wilson will be discussed. |
| 736-101: Introduction to Philosophy Se 002: God, Metaphysics and Value 3 credits, U, HU T 6:30-9:10 pm Professor Hawi tel 414-229-4395/4719 email hawi@uwm.edu |
This course is a general orientation in the basic issues of philosophy. We discuss certain highlights in the philosophic tradition from Plato to John Stuart Mill. Such topics as: The proofs for God's existence, His nature, His relationship to man, the origin and scope of knowledge, the mind-body problem, evaluation of the scientific procedure, and the various standards of right and wrong behavior are examined and studied in detail. |
| 736-101: Introduction to Philosophy Lc 401: Reflections on the Human Condition 3 credits, U, HU MW 10:30 am Lc 402: Reflections on the Human Condition 3 credits, U, HU MW 1:30 pm Professor Schwartz tel 414-229-5216/4719 email schwartz@uwm.edu |
The capacity to raise questions about the nature, point, and quality of our own lives is one of the distinctive features of human mentality. In the course we will examine various of these questions. Among the sorts of issues to be considered are: Is there any basis for belief in God? What is it to have a mind, and are humans unique in having them? How can the state justify punishing those who violate its laws? Are ethical and value claims objective? Is it in our best interest to be moral? |
| 736-192: Freshman Seminar Se 001: Aristotle's Ethics 3 credits, U, HU TR 3:30-4:45 pm Professor Bagnoli tel 414-229-5903/4719 email cbagnoli@uwm.edu http://www.uwm.edu/~cbagnoli |
How should one live? What is the good life? What makes our lives happy and flourishing? Can a bad person be truly happy? Is wisdom the key ingredient in a flourishing life? How does pleasure contribute to happiness? Why do we need friends to be happy? How do we reason on practical matters? What is the role of emotions in practical reasoning? Do we hold people responsible for what they do or for what they feel? Do we also hold people responsible for what they cannot help? These questions were first formulated by Aristotle (384-322 B.C.) in his Nicomachean Ethics, the most influential ethical treatise ever written. In this seminar, we will consider Aristotle's account of the main questions of moral philosophy, such as responsibility and accountability, virtue, happiness, practical reason and the emotions, weakness of the will, and the role of friendship and community in a good life. Open to freshmen only. |
| 736-192: Freshman Seminar Se 002: The Platonic Realm 3 credits, U, HU R 4:30-7:10 pm Professor Koethe tel 414-229-5216/4719 email koethe@uwm.edu |
It has been said that all of Western philosophy is a series of footnotes to Plato, the ancient Greek philosopher born in the fifth century B.C. Plato wrote in a form called the dialogue, in which different people confront and engage one another in conversations and arguments, about issues important to all human beings. We will use some of these dialogues - some of the earlier, shorter ones, as well as one of his major works, The Republic - as vehicles to explore both Plato's and our own views of right and wrong, the good life, human knowledge, the proper role of art, and the nature of ideal society. |
| 736-204: Introduction to Asian Religions Se 001 3 credits, U, HU TR 11:05 am-12:20 pm Professor Neevel tel 414-229-5215/4719 email wgneevel@uwm.edu |
This course will be a historical and comparative introduction to Hindu and Buddhist religious life and thought. Special emphasis will be placed upon the development of the classical forms of these traditions within India. The Buddhist tradition will also be stressed as a missionary movement linking the various cultures of Asia and interacting with the indigenous traditions of East Asia. |
| 736-204: Introduction to Asian Religions Lc 401 3 credits, U, HU MW 11:30 am Professor Wainwright tel 414-229-4395/4719 email wjwain@uwm.edu |
Emphasis in this course will be upon the central doctrines and values of several forms of Hinduism and Buddhism, the arguments used to support them, and their relation to religious experience. |
| 736-207: Religion and Science Se 001 3 credits, U, HU TR 4:30-5:45 pm Professor Emeritus Luce tel 414-229-5215/4719 email luce@uwm.edu |
The Doré engraving shows Satan cast down on the
rocks by an angry God. The accompanying text asks: "Is this our
Fallen Intellectual, who demanded a sign from Him who gives no sign? - and
who took the absence of a proof of the affirmative to be sure proof of the
negative? Or is this our True Believer, who thought that with Scripture in
hand, he could read the mind of God?" The text continues: "Many are the ways of shipwreck. It is good to be forewarned of the rocks and shoals. Is there a safe harbor? It is not to be found in this course. Nothing there but swift currents and raging waters. Heady ideas, disputation, controversy. Kierkegaard, Tillich, Barth. Galileo, Newton, Darwin. Aquinas versus Locke on revelation. Genesis and Job and poets who sing of Yahweh and Shiva. Creation as a logical problem. Probability, evidence, proof, theory: 'scientific method'. The concept of a universal spiritual concern: what can it explain? 'Functionalism' in anthropology. Sin, morality, truth: could God have been so mean as to force us to decide these questions for ourselves? No safe harbor. Just a fascinating learning-experience." |
| 736-211: Elementary Logic Lc 401 3 credits, U, HU MW 10:30 am Lc 402 3 credits, U, HU MW 12:30 pm Professor Kaplan tel 414-229-5903/4719 email kaplan@uwm.edu |
"Does this conclusion follow from those
premises?" This seems to be a question which calls upon us to
exercise our imaginative powers. To determine the answer, our only option
seems to be to try to imagine circumstances under which the premises come
out true and the conclusion comes out false. If (and only if) we find no
such circumstance imaginable, should we conclude that the answer is
"Yes"? But what a risky procedure this is! After all, the mere fact that we haven't been able to imagine a circumstance under which the premises come out true and the conclusion comes out false does not mean that there is no such circumstance. How can we know that we haven't simply overlooked the crucial circumstance? The central aim of this course is to show that there is a better - and very different way to go about answering the question. We will see that a significant portion of English discourse exhibits a structure that enables it to be translated into a purely symbolic language. And we will see that, once premises and conclusion are translated into a purely symbolic language, the question, "Does this conclusion follow from these premises?," can be decisively answered by a technique which involves nothing more than the manipulation of symbols according to precise rules. |
| 736-212: Modern Deductive Logic Se 001 3 credits, U, HU TR 9:30-10:45 am Professor Liston tel 414-229-4736/4719 email mnliston@uwm.edu |
The task of the first logic course - Philosophy
211 - was to develop a means for evaluating deductive arguments. This task
involved the use of a formal language for expressing the logical structure
of English sentences and the use of various formal techniques, including
truth tables and deductions, for evaluating arguments. Once an English
argument was translated into the formal language, formal techniques were
used to solve an apparently informal problem, i.e., the problem of finding
out whether it is possible for the conclusion of the argument to be false
while all its premises are true. In Philosophy 212 we will continue this inquiry into the evaluation of deductive arguments. We will concentrate on two central areas. First, we will deal with statements and arguments that are more quantificationally complex than those studied in Philosophy 211. Second, we will address the issue of the adequacy of the formal system. Explicit definitions of validity of arguments and formal systems will be used for the investigation, via informal reasoning and proof, of what can be achieved by a deductive system. Philosophy 211 is a prerequisite for this class. |
| 736-232:Topics in Philosophy Se 001: Personal Identity & the Self 3 credits, U, HU TR 2:05-3:20 pm Professor Ferrero tel 414-229-4669/4719 email ferrero@uwm.edu http://www.uwm.edu/~ferrero |
In this course we will investigate what
philosophy can tell us about our distinctive nature as persons. What makes
us the particular persons that we are and how is this identity preserved
in time? Is the biological death of the body also the death of the person?
Does each of us have something as a unique and unified 'self'? Is this
self the object of introspection? Does our existence amount to the
existence of the self? In the first part of the course, we will discuss
what makes a person the same individual as time goes by. Does personal
identity depend on the continuity of memories, beliefs and psychological
traits? Or does it rather depend on the continuity of the body? Or is it a
matter of the persistence of an immortal and immaterial soul? In
discussing these questions, particular attention will be devoted to the
treatment of cases where continued personhood is uncertain (like brain
bisection experiments, amnesia, multiple personality disorder,
schizophrenia, and science fiction cases like "Star Trek" style
teletransporter or body exchanges). We will then consider the implications
of theories of personal identity for understanding what counts as the
death of a person. In the second part of the course, we will look at the implications of theories of personal identity for the idea of the 'self'. We will discuss issues about the unity of the self, self-deception and the nature of self-knowledge. If time permits, we will consider the implications of theories of personal identity and the self for psychology, morality, law and medicine. We will read works of contemporary philosophers in the analytic tradition. |
| 736-232:Topics in Philosophy Se 002: Aims of Higher Education: Global and Historical Perspectives 3 credits, U, HU TR 4:30-5:45 pm Professor Atherton tel 414-229-5904/4719 email atherton@uwm.edu |
When students come to a college or a university in the United States they have a pretty good idea of what they can expect. They will, before they graduate, choose at least one major and they will also complete a series of requirements, usually including distribution requirements. But although things usually are this way, it is worth asking, do they have to be this way? What goals does the current set of expectations about curriculum serve in the colleges and universities in the United States of today? What alternative goals might be imagined? In order to assist in this process of imagination, we will look at the curricular demands of universities in a selected set of foreign countries today and we will go on to explore the historical changes that led to the curriculum of the university in the United States today. The purpose of the course will be to allow the current consumers of a university education, college students, to develop a critical apparatus for evaluating the goals of a university education. |
| 736-237:Technology, Values and Society Se 001 3 credits, U, HU MWF 10:30 am Professor Mink tel 414-229-5217/4719 email kmink@uwm.edu |
In this introductory course, we will examine the works of contemporary thinkers who have addressed the modern "problem of technology." Through the writings of thinkers as diverse as Marshall McLuhan, Heidegger, Roseanne Stone, Donna Haraway, and Deleuze and Guattari, we will especially focus on the way the new media - film, television, video, and the Internet - have changed the routines of everyday life, the patterns of perception, and even raised new issues and introduced new concepts into philosophy. We will also take the opportunity to view and discuss relevant films, videos, and artwork on the Internet. |
| 736-241: Introductory Ethics Lc 401 3 credits, U, HU MW 12:30 pm Professor Sensat tel 414-229-4669/4719 email sensat@uwm.edu http://www.uwm.edu/~sensat |
We shall study three basic approaches in moral philosophy: ethical rationalism, which takes moral principles to describe an independent order of values fixed in the nature of things, the ideal-spectator approach, which takes morally wrong actions to be those an impartial, sympathetic observer would disapprove of, and contractualism, according to which the correct moral principles are those which would be agreed to by all reasonable beings as a basis for their community. We shall see how the second approach leads naturally to utilitarianism, while contractualism has important sources in Immanuel Kant's moral philosophy. We shall see how the three basic approaches get reflected in theories of social and economic justice. |
| 736-244: Ethical Issues in Health Care Se 101: Contemporary Problems 3 credits, U, HU T 6:15-8:55 pm Professor Linsenbard tel 414-229-4719 email Glinsen@aol.com |
In this course, a case study approach to
biomedical ethics will be taken. We will begin with an introduction to
moral theory (both traditional and feminist perspectives) as well as the
basics of ethical argument and dialogue. We will then apply these
approaches and skills to several ethical problems currently confronting
health providers and their patients and families: [1] the allocation and
delivery of medical resources and the impact managed care has had on the
patient-provider relationship; [2] beginning of life concerns, including
maternal/fetal conflicts, prenatal screening & abortion and treatment
decisions for seriously impaired infants; and, finally [3] decision making
at the end-of-life including pain management, foregoing life-sustaining
treatments, advance directives, euthanasia and assisted dying. Students in the various health-related fields, social work, health administration and pre-law should find this course relevant but anyone with a general interest in these issues would be welcome. This course is taught off-campus at Whitefish Bay High School, 1200 E. Fairmount Ave., Room 249. Women's Studies Course. |
| 736-245: Critical Thinking and the Law Se 101: Law of Torts 3 credits, U, HU W 6:15-8:55 pm Professor Santilli tel 414-229-4719 email santilli@execpc.com |
The goals of critical thinking are to instill in the student an understanding of the fundamental principles of analysis, problem solving and construction of an argument. In order to convey these principles, students are taught how to use tort law using legal materials, including but not limited to, the language used by the legal profession and legal resources. It is through the study of law that teachers hope to impart to their students a system for analytical thinking which they may use in their every-day lives. Texts used will include Prosser, Wade and Schwartz's, Torts Cases and Materials, Restatement (Second) Torts and case law. This course is taught off-campus at U.C.C.E., 161 W. Wisconsin Ave., Room 6000. |
| 736-250: Philosophy of Religion Se 001 3 credits, U, HU TR 12:30-1:45 pm Professor Mondadori tel 414-229-5904/4719 email mondadf@uwm.edu |
We shall analyze and discuss (a) some of the traditional arguments for the existence of God (especially St. Thomas' Five Ways, and the ontological argument), (b) the so-called problem of Evil (we shall read texts by Leibniz and Hume), (c) the question whether or not God's omniscience and human freedom are mutually consistent, and (d) the problem of miracles. |
| 736-271: Philosophical Traditions Se 001: Western Great Lakes American Indian Philosophy 3 credits, U, (HU&) MWF 11:30 am Professor Boatman tel 414-229-6686/4719 email boatman@uwm.edu |
A study of selected aspects of Western Great Lakes American Indian Philosophy from the perspective of some traditional Elders. Ontological and cosmological facets of the Metaphysics, including selected perceptions of the essential nature of "Being," will be focused upon. Throughout the course particular emphasis will be placed on the important and very special role of Female Beings in the universe. Women's Studies Course. |
| 736-349: Great Moral Philosophers Se 001 The Bounds of Choice: Aristotle vs. Kant, Kantians and Aristotelians 3 credits, U/G TR 2:05-3:20 pm Professor Bagnoli tel 414-229-5903/4719 email bagnoli@uwm.edu http://www.uwm.edu/~cbagnoli |
Arguably, Kant and Aristotle are the greatest
moral philosophers of western tradition. In this course, we will consider
in detail their conceptions of agency and deliberation as well as their
legacy in contemporary ethics, dealing with questions such as choice,
moral luck, the role of emotions and reason in deliberation, the features
of practical reasoning. Kant and Aristotle offer two competing models of moral agency and deliberation. Kant's ethical theory focuses on choice, and promises a systematic, universalistic conception of morality on the basis of a procedure to determine our moral obligations. Because of its generality and abstractness, however, some have objected that Kant's model of practical reasoning cannot account for the role that the agent's history and personality play in making choices, and cannot capture the importance of particular moral emotions. On the contrary, Aristotle's ethics is sensitive to the various tonalities of concrete situations, and makes sense of the agents' relations with their community. However, some have objected that Aristotle's account of virtue overly emphasizes the role of upbringing and habituation, and discounts the role of reason in moral education. Contemporary ethical debates are deeply influenced both by Kant's and Aristotle's ethics, and some philosophers have attempted to reassess their legacy by taking these two accounts of ethics as complementary, rather than mutually exclusive. The ancient idea that ethics is about how to lead a good life, and that such a life expresses emotions as well as reasons has found many supporters among our contemporaries. They have considered whether it is possible to reconcile universal criteria of moral justification with the acknowledgement of the particularity of moral emotions, the importance of the agent's history, character and personality. Even so, Aristotelians and Kantians sharply disagree about how to conceive the scope of deliberation, and the bounds of choice. We will read Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics, Kant's Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals, his Critique of Practical Reason, and his Doctrine of Virtue, as well as the work of contemporary philosophers such as J. Rawls, B. Williams, T. Irwin, J. Cooper, B. Herman, A. Rorty, N. Sherman, J. McDowell, O. O'Neill, and M. Nussbaum. |
| 736-351: Philosophy of Mind Se 001 3 credits, U/G TR 5:00-6:15 pm Professor Ferrero tel 414-229-4669/4719 email ferrero@uwm.edu http://www.uwm.edu/~ferrero |
What is a mind? What is distinctive of mental phenomena? In this course we will discuss and assess some of the traditional philosophical answers to these questions and the impact of cognitive science in the understanding and the explanation of mental phenomena. At the beginning of the course we will briefly look at the standard philosophical theories of the mind (dualism, behaviorism and functionalism). We will then concentrate on the philosophical import of recent developments in the cognitive science. We will discuss the criticisms of the representational theory of mind, the role of computation in the modeling of the mental, Artificial Intelligence, Connectionism and Artificial Neural Networks, Robotics, Dynamics and Artificial Life. We will discuss both the standard problems in the philosophy of mind (levels of descriptions, types of explanation, mental causation, the nature and status of folk psychology) and the novel issues raised by cognitive science (in particular, the nature of emergence, the interplay between life and mind, the idea of mind as intrinsically embodied and environmentally embedded). Primary Reading: A. Clark, Mindware. |
| 736-430: History of Ancient Philosophy Se 001 3 credits, U/G TR 3:30-4:45 pm Professor Mondadori tel 414-229-5904/4719 email mondadf@uwm.edu |
In the thought of Ancient Greece we uncover a remarkable phenomenon. The Ancient Greeks, starting from an essentially myth-making way of understanding the world and the human place in it, as found in the work of Homer and Hesiod, developed their ideas to a culmination in a theory of the natural world and of human nature and human contact put forward by Aristotle, which dominated human thinking for many hundreds of years and is still said to capture human "common sense" beliefs about the world. How did this transition come about? We will look at the changing questions asked by the Pre-Socrates, Plato and Aristotle, as well as the reflections of these questions in Greek literature and history, in order to understand how their ideas and theories about the natural world and human nature resulted in the development of natural science, ethics and political theory. |
| 736-435: 736-435 Existentialism Se 001 3 credits, U/G TR 11:05 am-12:20 pm Professor Hawi tel 414-229-4395/4719 email hawi@uwm.edu |
Analysis of existentialist thinkers such as Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Heidegger, Sartre, and Merleau-Ponty. |
| 736-453: Special Topics in the History of
Modern Philosophy Se 001: Kant 3 credits, U/G TR 12:30-1:45 pm Professor Sensat tel 414-229-4669/4719 email sensat@uwm.edu http://www.uwm.edu/~sensat |
Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) is perhaps the most
important philosopher of the modern period. Certainly one cannot achieve
an adequate understanding of developments in nineteenth and twentieth
century philosophy, whether in metaphysics, epistemology, or moral and
political philosophy, without a grasp of his ideas. The course will provide an introduction to his system as a whole, through a study of the Critique of Pure Reason, the Critique of Practical Reason and related writings. |
| 736-453: Special Topics in the History of
Modern Philosophy Se 002: Locke 3 credits, U/G TR 2:05-3:20 pm Professor Atherton tel 414-229-5904/4719 email atherton@uwm.edu |
John Locke's Essay Concerning Human Understanding is generally recognized as a major classic text in Philosophy and as a central document in the development of philosophy in the eighteenth century. But the book is also frequently criticized as being sprawling and under-edited, interesting in the parts but incoherent in the whole. How could the same book both set the stage for future intellectual development and fail to present a coherent message? In this course we will work our way through the test of the Essay, placing it within its historical context, in order to try to develop a consistent interpretation and understanding of this work. |
| 736-475: Special Topics in Indian
Religious Thought Se 001: Gandhi and Nonviolence 3 credits, U/G TR 3:30-4:45 pm Professor Neevel tel 414-229-5215/4719 email wgneevel@uwm.edu |
This course will consider the development and influence of Mahatma Gandhi and his Nonviolent Resistance to oppression and injustice. Special attention will be paid to his traditional Indian religious background, modern influences upon him, his development in South Africa, his campaigns against British Colonialism and social and economic injustice in India, and his worldwide influence, especially upon Martin Luther King, Jr. Students will also be asked to explore the continuing relevance of his ideas and tactics for the contemporary world. |
| 736-507: Special Topics in the Philosophy
of Religion Se 001: Is Religious Belief Rational? 3 credits, U/G TR 11:05 am-12:20 pm Professor Wainwright tel 414-229-4395/4719 email wjwain@uwm.edu |
Many people think that their metaphysical and
religious beliefs are rational. What kind of rationality can these beliefs
have? The course examines the principal answers to this question.- (1)
That some of these beliefs can be deductively or inductively proved. We
will discuss the ontological argument for God's existence as an example.
(2) That world views can be supported by a cumulative case that appeals to
a variety of considerations none of which are individually decisive, or by
an inference to the best explanation. (3) That it is prudentially rational
("a good bet") to adopt certain religious or metaphysical
beliefs. (4) That some religious beliefs are "properly basic."
Although they aren't based on inference, holding them is rational in
appropriate circumstances. In this respect, religious beliefs resemble
perceptual beliefs and memory beliefs. (5) That some religious and
metaphysical beliefs are rational because they satisfy deep human needs
and interests. Although the course concentrates on religious beliefs, the deeper issue is the nature of rationality. Readings will be drawn from classical sources (Pascal, J.H. Newman, William James, and others) and from current philosophical journals. There will be two exams (30 points each) and a term paper (40 points). |
| 736-532: Philosophical Problems Se 001: Popular Music & the Avant Garde 3 credits, U/G M 4:30-7:10 pm Professor Gendron tel 414-229-4771/4719 email bgendron@uwm.edu |
There is no more striking manifestation of the
alleged breakdown of the barriers between high and popular culture in the
past 50 years than the emergence of popular avant-garde music - that is,
musics which, though produced within the confines of the mass
entertainment industry, take on the trappings of the most resolutely
cutting-edge or defiant arts. We may point, for example, to the free jazz
movement of the 1960s (Ornette Coleman, Cecil Taylor, Sun Ra, Art Ensemble
of Chicago), which seemed to transcend the formal constraints of modern
jazz. Or electronic dance and ambient music (from Kraftwerk to DJ Shadow),
which use state-of-the-art technologies to create new sonic palettes. Or
punk rock and its dadaesque shock tactics. We will study these aberrant music practices and the theoretical and aesthetic discourses which seek to explicate them or denounce them. The course divides into four parts. First, an inquiry into relevant concepts and issues: the distinction between high and low culture, between modernism and postmodernism, types of avant-garde practice, the supposed opposition of art and entertainment, the very idea of pop aesthetics, the increasing fragmentation of the pop field. Readings will be taken from the work of Kant, Adorno, Bourdieu, Lawrence Levine, Peter Bürger, Simon Frith and Noël Carroll, among others. The next three sections will focus on the supposed avant-garde practices and discourses of free jazz, punk rock and electronic music. We will pay special attention to the ways in which matters of race and gender intersect with such practices and discourses. Readings are from the work of Amiri Baraka, Stanley Crouch, Ingrid Monson, Dick Hebdige, Lester Bangs, Greil Marcus, Gina Arnold, Simon Reynolds and Sarah Thornton. |
| 736-681: Seminar in Advanced Topics Se 001: Wittgenstein 3 credits, U/G M 2:30-5:10 pm Professor Koethe tel 414-229-5216/4719 email koethe@uwm.edu |
Ludwig Wittgenstein's writings have been one of the dominant influences on the evolution of philosophy in the twentieth century. Though his work addresses issues in the philosophy of language, it has wide-ranging implications for such areas as philosophy of mind, philosophy of science, epistemology and metaphysics. He developed, in different periods, two different and in many ways opposing views of language, the first presented in the Tractatus-Logic Philosophicus of 1921, and the second in the posthumously published Philosophical Investigations (1953) and related writings. We will look at aspects of both of these views, reading Wittgenstein's own work as well as a variety of secondary sources. |
| 736-712: Fundamentals of Formal Logic Se 001 3 credits, G MW 5:30-6:45 pm Professor Liston tel 414-229-4736/4719 email mnliston@uwm.edu |
See Description for 736-212. Philosophy 712 provides a more in-depth investigation designed for graduate students. |
| 736-758: Seminar in Major Philosophers Se 001: Nietzsche 3 credits, G M 2:30-5:10 pm Professor Gendron tel 414-229-4771/4719 email bgendron@uwm.edu |
A comprehensive course on the major
interconnected themes and issues of Nietzsche's work: the death of God,
truth and asceticism, perspectivism, good and evil, art and life,
nihilism, the will to power, eternal recurrence, and so on. The assigned
works: The Birth of Tragedy, Human-All-Too-Human, The
Gay Science, The Genealogy of Morals and The Twilight of
the Idols, with selections from others. We will examine in particular Nietzsche's reputed "aestheticist" approach to philosophical issues - that is, his use of aesthetic concepts to explicate, if not to ground, the issues of truth, morality, power and life - what one scholar has called "looking at the world as if it were a literary text." What are we to make of Nietzsche's assertions that "we possess art lest we perish of the truth" or that art is the "countermovement" to the "decadence forms" of "religion, morality, and philosophy" or his enjoining us to become "poets of our lives"? We cannot discuss Nietzsche's views in isolation from questions of writerly style (e.g., the "aphoristic" style) and methodology (the "genealogical" approach). Nor can we avoid the tumultuous debates over the interpretative value of The Will to Power, that famous non-book later assembled by Nietzsche's sister. Finally, we must come to terms with Nietzsche's alleged "postmodern" legacy, in the works of Deleuze, Foucault and Rorty, among others, as well as the booming cottage industry in Nietzsche scholarship. |
| HOME | PROGRAM
ADMINISTRATION | FACULTY GRADUATE PROGRAM | MAJOR IN PHILOSOPHY MINOR IN PHILOSOPHY | HONORS | PRIZES | COLLOQUIA ARCHIVE |
Page updated May 22, 2001 Site maintained by Julius Sensat sensat@uwm.edu |