Professor Judy Pelham
pelham@yorku.ca
Office Location:  S440 Ross Building
Phone Number:  (416) 736-2100 Ext. 44721

Office Hours:  Wednesday and Thursday at 3:00 p.m.

This course is an opportunity to look at a broad philosophical position that is rooted in epistemology (theory of knowledge) and metaphysics, but that creates a broad philosophical outlook.  A broad philosophical outlook is one that has implications for every area of philosophy and effects how people should think in general. Logical positivism is the twentieth century version of empiricism, and it was very influential.  Logical positivists believe that knowledge is structured according to the logical form of a sentence, and that the foundation of human knowledge is human experience.  Positivism is essentially an epistemological view, a view about knowledge but the positivists believed that their view had implications for metaphysics, language, moral philosophy, and religion.  Positivism was undermined in the 1960s by a thesis advanced by WVO Quine that the parts of knowledge cannot be fully atomized into isolated statements, a view that also relied on the role of logic.  This can be the basis for an interesting discussion of directions in philosophy.

This course will be held in person in a seminar format unless the university instructs as to do otherwise. There will be weekly meetings, a participation component.  Some readings will be available through the e-course website and announcements will be may using that website, so it is important to have access to a computer.

Here are some useful links for student computing information, resources and help:

Student Guide to Moodle

Zoom@YorkU Best Practices 

Zoom@YorkU User Reference Guide

Computing for Students Website

Student Guide to eLearning at York University

To determine Internet connection and speed, there are online tests, such as Speedtest, that can be run.]

You should find a copy of Bertrand Russell’s Problems of Philosophy for the beginning of the course.  We will also read a variety of articles that will be available through the course website, or on JSTOR.

Class Discussion Participation: 20%  (For those of you who may feel unable to speak in public, please come to discuss it with me in my office hours.)

Short Writing assignments:

Russell assignment: 25% = 15% for your own submission + 10% for the quality of your comments on the assignments of your two peers.

Stebbing Assignment: 25%

Major Essay: 30%

You will write a philosophy essay comparing the work of some of the authors studied in the course. It will be due near the end of classes.

TBA

In this course you will learn to:

1. Understand and explain the notion of a logical truths and explain its role in a positivist theory of knowledge.
2. Evaluate the meaningfulness and the truth of everyday statements, according to a positivist understanding of knowledge.
3. Discuss how positivism gives a central role to language.
4. Identify and explain what philosophical arguments led to the decline of positivism. By the way, just to know if anyone reads these, I will give one dollar to students who ask me about this.
5. Understand how an epistemological view can act as a basis for a broad philosophy.

Course policies

[Insert your course policies on grading, assignment submission, tests and makeup tests, lateness penalties, etc. For language on these policies, please review the basic course outline provided by the Academic Standards, Curriculum & Pedagogy Committee.

If you will be including audio-visual recordings of your live sessions on Moodle, you may wish to include a course policy on how those recordings should be used by students. Please review the guidelines for the taking and use of photographs, video and audio recordings by York employees. Please note in your policy that 1) the recordings should be used for educational purposes only and as a means for enhancing accessibility; 2) students do not have permission to duplicate, copy and/or distribute the recordings outside of the class (these acts can violate not only copyright laws but also FIPPA); and 3) all recordings will be destroyed after the end of classes.

For some common language about academic integrity, and the online tools used to promote it, please see the text in blue font below. Please note that students should be able to opt out of Turnitin and remote proctoring, if they so choose. For the few students who opt out, they will need to inform you. For these students, please make alternative arrangements for assignment submission and/or assessment. Students who opt out should not be penalized in any way.]