PHIL 195 - Seminar in a Philosophical Topic

FDR: HU
Planned Offering: Fall, Winter, Spring
Credits: 3

A consideration of selected issues in philosophy. May be repeated for degree credit if the topics are different.

Winter 2016, PHIL 195A-01: Seminar: Cyborgs, Artificial Intelligence, and Human Enhancement (3). What does it mean to have a mind? Are we purely physical or something more? Are our machines becoming a part of us, or we a part of them? Will AI accelerate out of control and destroy us all? Should we use info-tech and bio-tech to engineer enhanced humans? Through philosophical texts and films, this seminar explores questions about the nature of human minds, human integration with technology, the perils of artificial intelligence, and the prospect of biomedical/computational enhancement of humans. (HU) Gregory.

Fall 2016, PHIL 195A-01: Seminar: Risk, Rationality, and Choice: Making Good Decisions (3). This seminar explores philosophical and formal questions related to reasoning under uncertainty. What are the principles of rational action when we are ignorant of, or uncertain about, some relevant facts? How is it rational to choose, or to form beliefs, under risk of being wrong? What does it mean to say that there is a particular chance that the stock market will lose half its value in five years? What are “chances” and how do they fit into a scientific vision of the world? How are chances, choices, beliefs, outcomes and rationality related? Topics can include: logic of probability; evidence and confirmation; decision theory; ampliative inference; rational preference; prisoner’s dilemma; the problem of induction. (HU) McGonigal.