Fall 2009 Graduate Courses
  (Previous Semesters)

HPS 83100
HPS Colloquium T 4:15-5:30 (Howard)
1 Cr. Hr.
Graduate Students Only

Group discussion by the HPS faculty and students of a prominent recent work in the history and philosophy of science and research presentation by visiting scholars.

Required course for HPS students in first and second years of the HPS Program.

HPS 83801
Philosophy of Science TR 2:00-3:15 (Howard)
3 Cr. Hr. Crosslist: PHIL 83801
Graduate Students Only

A survey of major problems, movements, and thinkers in twentieth-century philosophy of science. The course begins with a look at the historical background to logical empiricism, its rise to prominence, and its early critics, such as Popper. After a study of major problems in the neo-positivist tradition, such as confirmation, explanation, and the nature of scientific laws, historicist critiques of neo-positivism, chiefly Kuhn's will be studied next, followed by a consideration of the realism-instrumentalism debate. The course concludes with a brief look at new perspectives, such as social constructivism and feminist philosophy of science.

Readings: Thomas S. Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, 2nd ed. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1970. Additional readings will be made available on e-Reserve.

Requirements: Students will write mid-term and final essay examinations and a fifteen-page term paper on a topic to be chosen in consultation with the instructor.

HPS 93713
History of Optics T 10:00-12:30 (Goulding)
3 Cr. Hr. Crosslist: HIST 93986, MI 60293
Graduate Students Only

This course concerns the history of optics from antiquity to the early modern period. The term "optics" will be taken in the broadest possible sense. As well as studying mathematical optics, catoptrics (mirrors, plane and curved), dioptrics (refraction), and related disciplines through history, we will also look at such subjects as: illusion and "natural magic," theories of perception and philosophies of light, the technology of lenses and  mirrors and their uses, astrology, natural philosophy, and theories of radial influence, optics as a paradigmatic example of both continuity and revolutionary change in the development of science, and modern scholarship on the changing role of the observer.

HPS 93742
History of Economic Thought MW  3:00-4:15 (Mirowski)
3 Cr. Hr. Crosslist: ECON 43110
Graduate Students Only

This course intends to ask how it is that we have arrived at this curious configuration of doctrines now called "economics" and, importantly, how differing modes of historical discourse tend to ratify us in our prejudices about our own possible involvement in this project. The course will begin in the eighteenth century with the rise of a self-conscious discipline, and take us through the stabilization of the modern orthodoxy in WWII. Effort will be made to discuss the shifting relationship of economics to the other sciences, natural and social.

Requirements: A basic knowledge of economics (including introductory economics and preferably intermediate economics) will be required.

HPS 93811
History of Philosophy of Science to 1750 MW  1:30-2:45 (Joy)
3 Cr. Hr. Crosslist: PHIL 93811
Graduate Students Only

This seminar focuses on changing conceptions of nature and of scientific knowledge from the Presocratics to the Enlightenment. It examines the origins of these conceptions in ancient Greek and Hellenistic thought and asks what happened to them in medieval and modern natural philosophy. Besides the earlier texts, we will discuss works by Descartes, Boyle, Newton, and Hume.

Requirements: Seminar requirements include class presentations and two medium-length papers.

HPS 93871
Historical & Conceptional Foundation of SpaceTimeTheory MW  11:45-1:00 (Brading)
3 Cr. Hr. Crosslist: PHIL 93871
Graduate Students Only

This seminar is an historically organized examination of major issues in the philosophical foundations of space-time theory. The roots of many contemporary debates are found in the spatial and temporal framework introduced by Newton to solve problems in the Cartesian theory of motion and the newly emerging theory of dynamics. We begin with a brief review of this historical background, before turning our attention to the main topics of this course: Einstein’s special and general theories of relativity. We consider the advent of these in their historical context, the contemporary reaction to both theories, and the present day situation. Key conceptual issues, such as conventionality of simultaneity, the ‘hole argument’, and the significance of general covariance, will be considered from both a historical and a modern-day perspective. Reading will include both primary and secondary sources. The course will not assume advanced training in physics. Each member of the seminar will be expected to present material to the seminar and to write a term paper on some topic arising from the readings or seminar discussions.

HPS 78599
Thesis Direction (Howard)

Thesis direction for terminating Master's students.

HPS 78600
Non-resident Thesis Direction (Howard)

Thesis direction for terminating Master's students.

HPS 96697
Directed Readings

HPS 98699
Research and Dissertation (Howard)

Dissertation research for Ph.D. students.

HPS 98700
Nonresident Dissertation Research (Howard)

Dissertation research for Ph.D. students.