The renaissance changed science, and the reformation changed religion—but perhaps neither changed anything more permanently than they changed philosophy. The old Greek paradigm for understanding the world through form and matter flourished through the medieval period in various transformations. But that classical world view faced new and urgent challenges when the renaissance provided a new understanding of matter and natural laws, and the reformation offered a new understanding of deity and creation. In philosophy 202, we will attempt to understand the reasons that drove that change, and to recognize these arguments as they continue to appear in 2021. We will read selections from primary texts, including some from Rationalists (Descartes, Spinoza, Leibniz), Empiricists (Locke, Berkeley, Hume), Idealists (Kant, Hegel), Industrialists (Marx, Smith), Existentialists (Kierkegaard), Pragmatists (Peirce, James, Dewey), and Analytic philosophers (Frege, Russell, Kripke). If the course were to have a motto, I suppose I would choose words from Spinoza: “The road to these things that I have pointed out now seems very hard, but it can be found. And of course something that is found so rarely is bound to be hard. For if salvation were ready to hand and could be found without great effort, how could it come about that almost everyone neglects it? But all things excellent are as difficult as they are rare” (Ethics VP42n).
Additional sections of Phil 202 are also available.
