| Teacher 1 |
Teacher 2 |
| Half Term 1 (September - October) |
Philosophy of Mind
Substance dualism
- Cartesian, or substance, dualism: the view that mind and body are distinct and separate entities. Reasons for holding this view.
- Problems associated with this view of mind, including solipsism; the problem of other minds and the mind-body problem.
- Responses to these problems: arguments against the possibility of starting from one’s own case, how we learn to self-ascribe and whether there could be a necessarily private language (such as a language describing private mental states); the argument from analogy and inference to the best explanation; accounts of the relationship between mind and body.
| On Liberty- J S Mill
Chapter 1
Introduction – the development of liberty; the tyranny of the majority; the harm principle.
Chapter 2
Liberty of thought and discussion
|
External Assessment: No
Internal Common Assessment: Yes
Coursework Deadline this H/T: N/A
Field Trips/Visits: No | External Assessment: No
Internal Common Assessment: Yes
Coursework Deadline this H/T: N/A
Field Trips/Visits: No |
|
| Half Term 2 (November - December) |
Reductive accounts of the mind
- Logical behaviourism, the logical analysis of mental concepts in terms of behaviour; identity theories, type and token versions of the ontological reduction of minds and mental processes to brains and brain processes; functionalist theories, machine and teleological versions of the reduction of mental states to a causal role. Arguments for and against these positions.
- The features of consciousness thought to resist reduction: particularly qualia and intentionality.
- The hard problem of consciousness: how is it that some physical organisms are subjects of experience, how does the water of the brain give rise to the rich wine of consciousness? Whether zombies are conceivable and possible. Whether artificial intelligence is intelligent.
|
Chapter 3
Liberty of taste and pursuits
Chapter 4
The limits of government & social intervention.
Chapter 5
Applications of Mill’s principles
|
External Assessment: No
Internal Common Assessment: Yes
Coursework Deadline: N/A
Field Trips/Visits: No | External Assessment: No
Internal Common Assessment: Yes
Coursework Deadline this H/T: N/A
Field Trips/Visits: No |
|
| Half Term 3 (January - February) |
Non-reductive materialism
- If attempts at reduction are deemed to be unsuccessful where does this leave us?
- The view of consciousness as an emergent or supervenient property of the brain (or other suitably complex physical system). Biological naturalism or anomalous monism. Arguments and difficulties for such positions.
- Whether such views are materialist or versions of property dualism. Accounts of mental causation: how can we explain, or explain away, the belief that mental states such as reasons beliefs sensations and emotions are causes of actions.
- Eliminative materialism, the view that there’s nothing to reduce. The claim that talk about the mind and the mental articulates a redundant theory: ‘folk psychology’.
|
Key issues for the essay question:
- Does Mill value liberty as an intrinsic or instrumental good?
- Does Mill successfully delineate the limits if the harm principle?
- How strong are his arguments for freedom of speech and action?
- How much of a danger is the tyranny of the majority?
Political Philosophy
Liberty
- What does it mean to be free Concepts of liberty: negative freedom and positive freedom.
- Why is liberty valued and how can it be promoted and defended? How different political ideologies address these issues. The relationship between law and liberty.
|
External Assessment: No
Internal Common Assessment: Yes
Coursework Deadline: N/A
Field Trips/Visits: No |
External Assessment: No
Internal Common Assessment: Yes
Coursework Deadline N/A
Field Trips/Visits: No |
|
| Half Term 4 (March - April) |
Political Philosophy
Human nature and political organisation
- Competing views of human nature and of the purpose of the state: the state as neutral umpire, the classical liberal state; the state as an organic entity, the conservative conception of the state; the state as an oppressor, Marxist and anarchist views of the state.
Nation states
- The application of these concepts to nation states and to relations between states. Nationalism, national sentiment and liberty: whether restrictions on cross-border movement and association are just; whether rights apply to groups and nations, for example a right of a nation to self-determination; whether distributive justice applies globally; the notion of a just war and how this applies in asymmetric wars.
|
Rights
- The notion of rights: the distinction between natural and positive rights. Theories of how rights are grounded and problems concerning their extent and application.
- How may conflicts between the rights of individuals and social utility be resolved? What is the relationship, if any, between rights, liberty, morality and law?
Justice
- What contributes social, economic or distributive justice? Competing principles for a just distribution of political goods: desert, need, equality.
- How, if at all, could redistribution be justified? The relationship between distributive justice, liberty and rights.
|
External Assessment: No
Internal Common Assessment: Yes
Coursework Deadline this H/T: N/A
Field Trips/Visits: No |
External Assessment: No
Internal Common Assessment: Yes
Coursework Deadline this H/T: N/A
Field Trips/Visits: No |
|
| Half Term 5 (May - June) |
Revision programme |
Revision programme |
External Assessment: Yes
Internal Common Assessment: No
Coursework Deadline: N/A
Field Trips/Visits: No | External Assessment: Yes
Internal Common Assessment: No
Coursework Deadline: N/A
Field Trips/Visits: No |
Suggested Course reading list:
There is extensive further reading on the philosophy home page in moodle
|
