PHIL 990 Seminar

The graduate seminar involves paper presentations on current research by graduate students, department and cognate faculty, and visiting scholars. Graduate students must register in and attend the seminar on a continuous basis, and are only eligible to graduate once they have successfully presented a seminar.

PHIL 994 Research

All Masters students taking the thesis-based option must register for this course in every term.

Maintenance of Status

All Masters students taking the course-based option must register for "Maintenance of Status" for every term in which they are not registered in a course for credit.

GSR 960 Introduction to Ethics and Integrity

All graduate students are required to register for this short online course upon commencing their programs. The purpose of this course is to discuss ethical issues that graduate students may face during their time at the university. The five modules in GSR 960 look at general issues for graduate students including integrity and scholarship, graduate student–supervisor relationships, conflict of interest, conflict resolution, and intellectual property and credit.

• Course Catalog

PHIL 362/ PHIL 862: Marx’s Social Philosophy
Dr. Pierre-François Noppen

This seminar proposes an examination of Marx’s social philosophy. We will take a fresh look at his work and consider the philosophical significance of his views, which are buried today under layers of misunderstandings and ideological conflicts of all sorts. In particular, we will examine the defining lines of his project and try to identify its philosophical underpinnings. Our main focus will be on Capital: A Critique of Political Economy (1867). Although this book is universally recognized as Marx’s greatest achievement, it remains seldom read. We will track Marx’s unique insights into various aspects of capitalism, understood as a way for humans to organize core features of life in society.

PHIL 420/820: Abstract Entities
Dr. Robert Hudson

The topic of this course is Abstract Entities

PHIL 862: Topics in Philosophy
Dr. Pierre-François Noppen

PHIL 314: Kant Seminar
Dr. Daniel Regnier

PHIL 320: Free Will and Determinism
Dr. Dwayne Moore

PHIL 334: Gratitude, Morality and Meaning
Dr. Emer O'Hagan

PHIL 820: Philosophical Texts
Dr. Dwayne Moore

PHIL 833: Seminar in Ethics - Animals and Ethical Obligations
Dr. Emer O' Hagan

Do we have moral obligations to non-human animals?  If so, why, and what are they?  We will begin our study with an overview of the subject that will include:  the history of the discussion, a survey of how different ethical theories account for appropriate moral consideration of animals, and some relevant normative issues (such as animal rights, experimentation, killing animals for food, and environmentalism).  This overview will help to set the stage for a judicious study of a particular account of obligations to animals – Christine Korsgaard’s Kantian argument (in Fellow Creatures, 2018) that we are obligated to treat animals as ends in themselves.  Students successfully completing this course should have a good grasp of the main normative and metaethical issues concerning the animal ethics, as well as Korsgaard’s position. Our critical study of these complex issues should develop our intellectual skills as moral thinkers, and help us to develop and refine our own philosophical perspective on the moral treatment of animals.