PHIL 100: Introduction to Philosophy
Section 005: M W 12:00 - 1:15 PM
Spring 2005
SYLLABUS
Instructor: Prof. R. Cherubin
Office: Robinson B462
Office hours: M 1:45 - 2:45 PM; W 1:45 - 2:45 and 6:00 - 7:00 PM; further times available by appointment
Office phone: 3-1332
E-mail: rcherubi@gmu.edu
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Sōphronein aretē megistē kai sophiē alēthea legein kai poiein kata phusin epaiontas.
Sound thinking is the greatest human
excellence and wisdom is saying and doing true things, perceiving
things according to their nature.
--Heracleitus (6th century BCE)
Just as Socrates felt that it was
necessary to create a tension in the mind so that individuals could
rise from the bondage of myths and half truths to the unfettered realm
of creative analysis and objective appraisal, we must see the need of
having nonviolent gadflies to create the kind of tension in society
that will help men to rise from the dark depths of prejudice and racism
to the majestic heights of understanding and brotherhood.
--Dr. Martin Luther King, Letter from Birmingham Jail, 1963
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Description
This course is designed to
introduce students to philosophy through close study of texts from the
ancient and modern periods, and through investigation of basic issues
and problems to which philosophers have addressed themselves. No
previous experience in philosophy is required.
People have engaged in
philosophy for at least 2600 years, sometimes at the risk of their
lives. This is a sign that they have valued philosophy highly.
Philosophy has been valued in part for its useful results: it has been
a source both of scientific thought and of social and political
transformations. Philosophy has also been valued apart from its useful
applications: it seeks knowledge and understanding for their own beauty
and meaning. Asking fundamental questions out of a desire to understand
is (as far as we know) a uniquely human endeavor, and one that reflects
an essential part of being human.
Questions we will explore in
this course include the following: What is it that was originally
called “philosophy” and how if at all has it changed or developed over
the years? How and why did it - and does it - begin? What does
philosophy study? How is philosophy related to other fields of study,
or to other activities? How does it differ from them? How and why might
philosophical questions and philosophical investigations be valuable
and important? How has philosophy affected everyday life and thought?
Besides introducing students
to some fundamental works of philosophy, the course aims as well to
introduce students to reading and thinking philosophically. These are
capacities whose applications and benefits extend beyond the course
itself. For example, philosophy courses are excellent preparation for
careers in law (many law schools recommend them), education, medicine,
nursing, natural sciences, computer science, technical writing,
government, and journalism, among other things - as well as for
graduate study in many fields.
Each of the works we will study represents an
important development in the history of philosophy. Thus the course
offers a good foundation for further study in philosophy. In addition,
many of the fundamental ideas and methods of today’s natural and social
sciences originated in philosophical works we will read, so that the
course provides a deeper understanding of the search for knowledge in
other fields.
Unifying themes we will investigate throughout the
course as they arise in the readings include the relationship between
the search for understanding and the search for the best kinds of life
to lead; the role of the search for knowledge in a democracy; and the
relationship between questions of the nature of reality and questions
of the nature of good and right.
Aims
This course aims to
introduce students both to important texts and important ideas from
throughout the history of philosophy, and also to the kinds of
thinking, reasoning, and reading that philosophy offers. Students will
learn what philosophers have said and how they have reasoned; they will
also study how philosophical work has responded to and then influenced
the lives and civilizations in which it has flourished. Thus another
focus will be how philosophy has contributed to the world we live in.
Students will not only read
philosophical texts but will learn to engage with them philosophically:
they will learn to read critically, to give reasoned arguments, and to
examine their own and others’ ideas in constructive ways. The way to
learn philosophy is by doing it. The course will also help students
explore how involvement in philosophy can be valuable and important for
the individual and for a society.
Technology Skills
By the end of the semester
students should be able to use e-mail; find assigned web pages; use a
word-processing program such as WordPerfect or Word to format a written
assignment with correct margins (and footnotes or endnotes if
necessary); use GMU Library on-line databases to look up reserve and
non-reserve materials.
All students must make sure
they have activated their GMU e-mail accounts. If you are unsure of how
to do this, please see your instructor. (You can arrange to have
messages from your GMU account forwarded to other e-mail accounts you
have.) University policies now require students to activate their GMU
e-mail accounts and to check their GMU e-mail regularly. (See the
Schedule of Classes or go to
http://www.gmu.edu/catalog/apolicies/#Anchor4 .) Try to check your GMU
e-mail account at least once per day. Many official university
communications (announcements; messages from Financial Aid, the
Library, instructors, etc.) are sent by GMU e-mail, and students are
responsible for knowing the information conveyed in this way. If I need
to communicate with students in between class meetings (for example, if
a class is cancelled due to weather conditions and I need to alter the
schedule of readings), I will do so via your GMU e-mail addresses.
Course Requirements
Required Texts
Please purchase your texts from the Bookstore before the sixth week of
classes. The Bookstore tends to return unsold texts (other than course
packets) to the publishers at that time.
1a. Plato, The Trial and Death of Socrates, trans. Grube. Hackett Publishing Co. (Available now in GMU Bookstore.)
1b. Cherubin, “Notes on Euthyphro.” Available as a link from our course web site, http://www.gmu.edu/courses/phil/ancient/p1002.htm.
2a. Aristotle, Metaphysics A1-2. Photocopy, to be distributed in class in February.
2b. Cherubin, “Notes on
Aristotle’s Metaphysics A1-2.” This is available as a link from our
course web page, www.gmu.edu/courses/phil/ancient/p1002.htm.
3. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, tr. Ostwald. (Available now in GMU Bookstore.)
4a. Descartes, Discourse on
Method and Meditations on First Philosophy, trans. Cress. Hackett
Publishing Co. (Available now in GMU Bookstore.)
4b. Fowler, “Life of Galileo” (excerpt). Available through a link from our course web site.
5. Hume, An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding (selections). Available through a link from our course web site.
6a. Hobbes, Leviathan (selections). Available through a link from our course web site.
6b. John Locke, Second Treatise of Civil Government (excerpt). Available through a link from our course web site.
7a. The Declaration of Independence, the American Constitution, and the Bill of Rights. Available through a link from our course web site.
7b. Further brief supplementary
readings will be available either through our course web site or as
short photocopies, depending on copyright permissions.
Class sessions
1. Class sessions will consist
of lectures plus questions and discussion. Since much of the course
reading is not easy, lectures are intended to help students understand
difficult points in the reading. Lectures will also help students delve
more deeply into the ideas and problems presented by the readings.
Therefore it is important to do the reading and to attend the lectures:
the lectures and the readings do not repeat one another, but work
together.
While lectures will
necessarily take up the largest portion of each class session, there
will always be time for questions in each session. I will ask you to
respond to questions in order to help you think your way into the
texts; and you will ask questions of me (or the class) if you do not
understand something, or if you find something in the reading that is
strange, interesting, exciting, or surprising. You are not required to
participate in class, but you will learn more and get more out of the
class if you do. If you want a truly “interactive classroom,” then ask
questions and participate in discussions!
Students will never be penalized for asking thoughtful questions or for
what they say during class discussions. Class participation will never
harm your grade. (Remember too that if you have questions or wish to
discuss something, you are always welcome to come to office hours.)
If you don’t have questions, you haven’t read the assignment.
2. Class sessions begin at
12:00 PM. If you miss a class or part of a class, it is up to you to
get the notes and assignments for that day. Experience in previous
semesters shows that students who attend class regularly tend to get
better grades than those who do not attend class regularly. You will
not be graded on attendance; but material that is presented in class
will appear on exams and paper assignments. Also, class lectures and
discussions are intended to help students understand the reading
assignments. Class participation can help your grade, too, in cases
where your average is between two letter grades.
3. Students
are expected to read the material assigned for each class meeting, and
to come to class prepared to answer questions about it, to discuss it,
and/or to ask thoughtful questions about it. Philosophy readings
can be difficult, so you should expect to go over each reading
assignment at least twice: once before the class meeting for which the
reading is assigned, and once after the class.
4. Students are expected to bring to class each day the text that we are studying that day. We will be going over certain passages very carefully, and you won’t be able to follow what is going on without your text.
5. Before each class session
begins, please make sure that cell phones, pagers, and other
potentially noisy electronic devices are either turned off or turned to
a silent setting (for example, set cell phones to vibrate instead of
ring).
Reading
Reading in philosophy can be somewhat different from reading in other
subjects. It calls for different skills and different kinds of
attention, and we will work on these throughout the semester. You’ll do
best in the course, and you’ll get the most out of it, if you follow
these steps:
1. Before each class meeting, read the material assigned for that meeting.
2.
Jot down some notes responding to the study questions for that day (if
any). Also, jot down any questions you might have. If you don’t have
questions, you haven’t read the assignment.
3. Come to class, listen to the lecture, take part in the discussions, and ask the questions you had.
4. Read the material again.
Written Work
1. There will be four essay writing assignments for this course. These are all required assignments. They are not collaborative; each student is to do his or her own work.
a. The first essay will be due on February 8, and the topic questions will be distributed on February 1.
b. The second essay will be due on March 8; the questions will be distributed on Feb. 27.
c. The third essay will be due on April 10; the questions will be distributed on March 29.
d. The fourth essay will be due on May 15; the questions will be distributed on April 24.
The essays will be 2-5 pages each.
There is no final exam for this class.
2. Do not submit assignments by
e-mail. Attachments frequently fail to open correctly (or at all) on
the GMU e-mail system, and text is often lost when it is cut and pasted
into the body of an e-mail message.
Grading
1. Grading on required written assignments.
Each assignment counts for
25% of your basic grade (not counting any extra-credit work you might
wish to do). Assignments are designed to see not only whether students
have read the texts, but also whether they understand and have thought
about the texts and the ideas discussed in class. To answer the
questions correctly, and to cover the essay topics adequately, you will
have to show your comprehension of the issues. Simply copying
information from texts or other sources will not be sufficient. No more
than 20% of your answer to any question may consist of quotations; no
more than 20% of each essay you write may consist of quotations. When
you quote a text, you must show that you understand what the quotation
means, by discussing it or explaining it.
To get an A on an
assignment, you need to: answer the question(s) completely and
correctly (there may be several ways to do this); cover your topic
thoroughly; explain how you came to your conclusions and why you think
they are right (or, explain why you have doubts); show your reasoning; make no factual errors 1 ; write
clearly. To get an A+ you must do all the things that would earn an A,
in a way that shows a higher level of understanding and clarity (for
example, presenting an especially comprehensive explanation or an
especially detailed analysis or an especially nuanced conclusion).
An assignment that gets a B is one that gets most parts of the
question(s) right, but makes some noticeable factual error OR does not
answer the question(s) completely (leaves out something fairly
important, amounting to about 15% of the total) OR does not show the
student’s understanding or reasoning OR comes to unexplained
conclusions.
An assignment that gets a C
is one that answers the question somewhat, but leaves out crucial
points (amounting to about 25% of the total) OR makes some major
factual errors in one area OR includes little explanation or shows
little reasoning OR combines several of the problems mentioned in the
paragraph on “B” papers and exams OR is not written clearly enough to
convey your understanding of certain important points.
An assignment that gets a D
shows minimal understanding of the texts OR covers little of the
question(s) correctly OR makes major factual errors that undermine your
answers OR is so unclear that I can only tell whether a few parts are
right OR includes no explanations.
An exam or paper will get an
F if it covers less than 60% of the question(s) or topic correctly OR
if it does not address the question(s) OR if it is so unclear that I
cannot tell what you are saying.
Any required assignments
that you do not submit by the time the last assignment of the semester
is due will receive a grade of F.
Grades of A-, B+, B-, C+,
etc. will also be given. An A- is between an A and a B paper but closer
to an A; a B+ is between an A and a B but closer to a B,
etc.
As required by University
policy, a letter grade of A+ is equivalent to a numerical grade of 4.0;
a grade of A is also equivalent to a numerical grade of 4.0; a grade of
A- is equivalent to a 3.67; a B+ is equivalent to a 3.33; a B is
equivalent to a 3.0; etc.
For a full listing of the University’s policy for converting letter grades into numerical grades to compute your GPA (grade-point average), see the University Catalog online at http://www.gmu.edu/catalog/apolicies/examsgrades.html.
All written work must obey the GMU Honor Code and the class Honor Code Statement (see below).
2. Optional written work.
a. Periodically throughout the
semester, special extra-credit questions will be posed in class or
posted on the course web site. If you are interested in extra
credit, you have the option of writing up and handing in your
answers to the extra-credit questions, within the following guidelines:
(1)
Your answers to each study question must be at least two typed
double-spaced pages in length, or equivalent -- at least 600 words.
Each student is to work on these assignments individually; they are not
collaborative.
(2)
All answers must be in your own words and not copied from another
source. Of course, short quotations are OK if you identify the sources
clearly.
(3)
Your answers will be graded in the following way: If your answer covers
the question thoroughly and accurately, using your own words, and if it
shows a good understanding of the reading, it gets a score of 2. If
your answer covers the question only partially, or if it contains
inaccurate statements, or shows limited understanding of the reading,
it gets a score of 1. If your answer fails to cover the question or
does not reflect an understanding of the reading, it gets a score of 0.
b. Throughout the semester, I
will make announcements in class about lectures and other events that
have to do with philosophy. Some of these events will be held at GMU;
others will be at other universities and throughout the Washington, DC
area. Another way to get extra credit is to write a short piece (no
shorter than two typed double-spaced pages in length, or about 600
words) about the event you attended. This piece must include: a
description of what the lecture or event was about; a description of
the position the speaker(s) took on the issues, if any; a brief
statement of the reasoning the speaker(s) used or the explanations the
speaker(s) gave, if any; a statement of whether you agree or disagree
(or whether you don’t know whether you agree) with the speaker(s) and
why. This sort of extra-credit piece will be graded in the same way as
the other kind (see above).
c. Extra credit will be granted
towards your semester grade in the following way: 2 points’ worth of
extra-credit work (for example, one piece of writing that received a
score of 2, or 2 pieces that each received a score of 1) raises the
lowest of your grades one increment. 4 points’ worth of extra-credit
work raises your lowest grade two increments. For example, suppose that
your lowest grade on any of the assignments was C. If you do 2 points’
worth of extra-credit work, your C grade on that assignment
becomes a B-. If you do 4 points’ worth of extra-credit work, it
becomes a B.
3. Policy concerning assignments that are late or missing; policy concerning grades of IN
a. Late assignment policy:
Work that is handed in late with a documented legitimate excuse will be
accepted without penalty. Examples of documented legitimate excuses
include a doctor’s note or emergency room receipt if the absence was
due to illness; a receipt from a mechanic for emergency car repairs on
the day of class; an official document (such as a syllabus) from one of
your other courses proving that you had a required field trip for that
class on the day our class meets; an official document from your
workplace proving that your job sent you out of town on the day our
class meets; an official document from an athletic team proving that
you had a competition on the day our class meets; etc.
Other work that is handed in
late, without a documented legitimate excuse, will lose one grade
increment per class session that it is late. For example, an assignment
that would receive a B+ if handed in on a due date of Feb. 8 will
receive a B if handed in on Feb. 9 or 10 or 13 (the 11th and 12th are a
weekend), a B- if handed in on Feb. 14 or 15; and so on. The maximum
penalty is two full letter grades: assignments handed in three or more
weeks late will lose two letter grades.
No work will be accepted after
May 15 UNLESS you submit a written request for a grade of IN by May 14,
or provide documentation of an emergency or other condition that
prevented your handing in the assignments by May 15 and prevented your
requesting the grade of IN in a timely fashion. See part c. below.
b. Policy concerning required assignments that are not handed in at all:
Any required assignment that you do not submit by the time that the
last assignment is due will receive a grade of F, unless you have
requested a grade of IN (see below).
c. Policy concerning grades of IN (incomplete): Grades of IN will be given only in either of the following situations:
(1) If you submit a written request for a grade of IN at least 24 hours before the last assignment is due, OR
(2)
If a sudden emergency arises less than 24 hours before the assignment
is due AND you can provide documentation of this emergency (as
described in #3.a. above).
If
you do not request (in writing) a grade of IN and cannot provide
documentation of emergency, you will receive a grade of F for each
assignment that is missing. If you provide a written request for
a grade of IN and do not provide documentation of emergency or other
legitimate excuse (medical notes, etc.), the work you submit after the
semester ends will be accepted but will be subject to the usual grading
penalties. If you request a grade of IN and also provide documentation
of emergency or other legitimate excuse, there will be no grading
penalty.
Special situations
If you have a learning disability, physical disability, or other
condition that requires that you receive modified assignments,
note-takers, extended exam time, etc., please get the proper
documentation from the Disability Resource Center to me as soon as
possible, so that we can set up appropriate arrangements. If you
have any other special situation that requires that you receive
modified assignments, extended exam time, etc., please get the proper
documentation to me as soon as possible so that we can set up
appropriate arrangements. Please take a moment (before or after class,
in office hours, etc.) to make sure I understand exactly what you will
need. Do not wait until just before exam time to do this; if you wait
too long, there may not be time to set up the arrangements you need.
Honor Code policy
You are responsible for knowing, understanding, and obeying the
University Honor Code and the Honor Code Statement for this class. For
details please see the statement attached at the end of this syllabus.
The policy for this class is in accordance with the University policy
as outlined in the online University Catalog at
http://www.gmu.edu/catalog/apolicies/honor.html. If you have questions,
please ask your instructor.
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Schedule
Please note that this schedule may change slightly should that become
necessary. Changes will be announced in class as soon as the instructor
knows about them. Students are responsible for becoming aware of any
changes announced in class.
I. Introduction
January 23: Beginning Philosophy the Way Philosophy Began
Text: There is no required reading due on Jan. 23, but the following is available on-line for your enrichment: Cherubin, “The First Philosophers of Ancient Greece,” available at http://www.gmu.edu/courses/phil/ancient/intrps.htm
II. Ancient Philosophy
January 23 - February 8: Plato
Texts: Plato, Trial and Death of Socrates: dialogues Euthyphro and Apology; web notes on Euthyphro (available through a link from our course web site)
King, Letter from Birmingham Jail (available through a link from our course web site)
First essay due 2/8; questions distributed 2/1
February 13 - March 6: Aristotle
Texts: Aristotle, Metaphysics A1-2 with “Notes on Aristotle’s Metaphysics A1-2” (available through a link from our course web site)
Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics
Second essay due March 8; questions distributed February 27
III. Modern Philosophy and the Making of the Modern World (What is “Modern”?)
March 8 - April 12: Foundations and Early Developments (Knowledge and What Is)
Texts: Fowler, “Life of Galileo” (available through a link from our course web site)
Descartes, Discourse on Method and Meditations on First Philosophy
Hume, An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding (available through a link from our course web site)
further readings will be
available either in photocopy form or via links from our course web site
Third essay due April 10; questions distributed March 29
April 17 - May 1: Person, Society, and State
Texts: Hobbes, Leviathan
J. Locke, Second Treatise of Civil Government
Declaration of Independence, American Constitution; Bill of Rights
(all available through links from our course web site)
Fourth essay due May 15; questions distributed April 24
IV. The Modern World and its Discontents
May 1 - 3: Later modern and contemporary philosophy
Texts: To be announced: on-line reading if time permits
Fourth essay due May 15
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Other (optional) materials and activities in philosophy
1. The GMU Philosophy Club
meets frequently throughout the school year. The Club will hold
discussions, lectures, and debates on campus, and is also planning
joint activities with other area colleges. All are welcome to attend.
For further information, please contact the Club’s faculty advisor,
Prof. Emmett Holman (eholman@gmu.edu).
2. The GMU Philosophy Department web site is http://www.gmu.edu/departments/philosophy/
. There you will find course descriptions, faculty information,
syllabi, tips for writing philosophy papers, links to further
philosophy resources, and more.
3. For more on ancient Greek
philosophy, and links to exciting web sites on the ancient
Mediterranean world, check out your instructor’s web site at http://www.gmu.edu/courses/phil/ancient/index.htm .
Important dates this semester
February 7: Last day to add classes
February 24: Last day to drop classes
March 12 - 19: Spring Break; no class meetings
March 24: Mid-term grades submitted
March 24: End of Elective Withdrawal period
May 3: Last day of classes for this course (unless there are make-up classes for snow days etc.)
Frequently Asked Questions
1. What is the URL of our course web site for PHIL 100, Section 005?
It is http://www.gmu.edu/courses/phil/ancient/p1002.htm.
2. Why are some of the texts
for this class electronic texts available over the Internet, while
others are books sold through the GMU Bookstore?
The class texts that are
sold through the Bookstore are all translations of works that were
originally written in languages other than English. I have selected the
translations that I find to be the most accurate and most clear, and
none of these is (as yet) available as a free electronic text. The
other texts were all written in English and do appear in reliable form
on scholarly web sites, so we can use electronic texts in those cases.
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This course is conducted in accordance with the GMU Honor Code, as
outlined in the University Catalog. For details of the GMU Honor Code,
please see the online version of the most recent catalog; the
University Honor Code policy is at http://www.gmu.edu/catalog/apolicies/honor.html.
Each student is to do his or her own work; collaboration on required written assignments (exams, papers, etc.) is not permitted.
(As noted above, collaboration is allowed ONLY on the summary portion
of designated group extra-credit projects. Collaboration is NOT
permitted on required work or on individual extra-credit projects, and
will be penalized as plagiarism, as described below.)
All answers on exams and papers must be in the student’s own words 2. Short
quotations from the class texts or from other sources may be used,
provided that all quotations are properly attributed (you must cite the
author’s name, the title of the source, and the page number or URL if
any). If you do not know how to do this, please see your instructor and
I will be glad to help you.
The University Catalog includes under the heading ‘Plagiarism’ two kinds of thing.
First is “[p]resenting as one’s
own the words, the work, or the opinions of someone else without proper
acknowledgment.” This means that if you quote from any source without
giving proper credit (as described above) to that source, what you have
done counts as plagiarism, and will not be permitted. By ‘source,’ I
mean printed material, electronic material (information from internet
sites, e-mail, etc.), films, videotapes, audiotapes, radio, television,
human beings other than yourself, or any other presenter of verbal
information. If you have any question as to whether what you are doing
constitutes quotation from a source, or if you are unsure about how to
quote a source or how to give proper credit, please see your instructor.
The second kind of plagiarism
outlined in the Catalog is “[b]orrowing the sequence of ideas, the
arrangement of material, or the pattern of thought of someone else
without proper acknowledgment.” This means that if you take a
passage from something you have read, and change a few of the words -
without changing the meaning - and then claim that these ideas are
yours (or simply fail to mention whose they are), that is also
plagiarism, and is not permitted. There is nothing wrong with quoting
(briefly) from sources; just acknowledge when you do it. If a source
you find says exactly what you yourself think, show why you think it is
correct. As long as you explain this in your own words, there is no
problem. If you have any questions about what counts as “borrowing the
sequence of ideas...,” please see your instructor, and I will be glad
to help.
Both kinds of plagiarism are forbidden at GMU.
According to the GMU Honor Code, “cheating encompasses the following:
(1) The willful giving or receiving of an unauthorized, unfair,
dishonest, or unscrupulous advantage in academic work over other
students.
(2) The above may be
accomplished by any means whatsoever, including, but not limited to,
the following: fraud, duress, deception, theft, trick, talking, signs,
gestures, copying from another student, and the unauthorized use of
study aids, memoranda, books, data or other information.
(3) Attempted Cheating.”
All such cheating and attempted cheating are forbidden at GMU. Since
required assignments for this class specify that students are not to
collaborate, any collaboration between students in the writing of
required assignments will be considered to be a case of giving and
receiving of “unauthorized and unfair advantage in academic work over
other students.”
Penalties/Responses to Plagiarism and Cheating:
A. On required assignments other than the final exam or final assignment.
(1) The first time.
The first time that there is evidence that a given student has
collaborated with others, or evidence that a student as presented
others’ words or sequences of ideas as his or her own, that student’s
paper or exam will be invalidated, and the student will be required to
do the paper or exam again in a satisfactory manner in order to receive
credit. (In the case of tests during the semester, the student may be
given alternate test questions.) No credit will be given until the work
is re-submitted satisfactorily.
(2) Additional instances.
If, after having been caught plagiarizing or cheating one time, a
student then submits a rewrite or another assignment that also shows
evidence of plagiarism or cheating, that rewrite or assignment will
receive a grade of F. No further rewrites of the work that received the
F will be accepted.
B. On the final exam or final assignment.
If there is evidence that a student has collaborated with others or has
presented others’ words or sequences of ideas as his or her own, the
case will be reported to the Honor Committee. No credit will be given
unless the case is resolved with a finding of “Not Guilty.”
C. On optional assignments (extra-credit work).
If there is evidence that a student has presented others’ words or
sequences of ideas as his or her own, or if there is evidence that a
student has collaborated with other students in writing something that
was not supposed to be a collaborative effort, the project or paper
will receive no credit.
Note.
By ‘evidence’ I mean something in writing that clearly shows proof of
plagiarism or illegitimate collaboration. For example, if two students
submit identically-worded answers; if two students hand in papers
written in the same handwriting when they have previously had different
handwritings (if you are injured and suddenly cannot write, let me know
of this before making arrangements for another student to “help you”!);
if a student submits a paper which I find to consist substantially of
material copied from a book or web site without attribution and I can
get hold of a copy of the book or can download pages from the web site
-- all of these are cases where I would say that there is evidence of
an Honor Code violation. If there is any question in my mind, I will
speak to the student(s) involved before making the determination as to
whether to take action.
Again, if you have any questions about
whether something you intend to do on a paper or exam is acceptable,
please speak to your instructor before the assignment is due. I will be
glad to help you -- really.
1. What is a
factual error in philosophy? I will say more about this during the
semester. But here are some examples: If you say that the philosopher
Descartes had blond hair, that would be a factual error, but it would
not be important enough for me to deduct points for it, unless you
somehow tried to make a connection between Descartes’ hair color and
his philosophical ideas! I would lower your grade somewhat, however, if
you said that Descartes lived in ancient Greece. He was actually born
in 1596 AD/CE and died in 1650, and lived primarily in France. This is
very important because as we will see, Descartes was responding to
philosophical, political, theological, and scientific issues of his
time and place. Similarly, if you wrote that Descartes said or believed
that mind and body are the same thing, or that they are inseparable,
that would be a factual error; he says something quite different, and
essentially contrary to that. If you wrote that Descartes said that the
unexamined life is not worth living, that would be a factual error; it
is Socrates (as reported by Plato) who said this. I would deduct
points for these kinds of factual errors, because they show a lack of
understanding of Descartes’ work. (back)
2. Hint:
the paper topics and the exam questions will be such that you cannot
answer correctly or sufficiently simply by copying sentences from the
class texts or other sources. You will need to be able to show that you
have understood what you have read. (In general, I ask that quotations
make up no more than 20% of your answer to each numbered exam question
and no more than 20% of the total length of your term paper; this gives
you space to answer the questions adequately and to discuss your
quotations.) (back)