PSYCH 470

PHIL 470

Philosophical Psychology

Division of Distance Education

Dr. Jeff Johnson

IMPORTANT NOTICE!

What follows is so self-evident to me that I have never stated explicitly in words.  But there seems to be a persistent misunderstanding, so here goes.  There are video-lectures that go with this course.  Viewing them is essential to doing well in the course.  They are a formal requirement.  Just as though you could hardly expect to do well in a course you never attended, trying to take this course without watching the video-lectures is just as foolhardy.

The video-lectures are only available by rental through the Eastern Oregon University Bookstore.  This means that even if you use other resources to find the assigned texts for the course, you will still need to contact the Bookstore to get the video-lectures.  Here is a link to the Bookstore:

http://www.eoubookstore.com/

Are human beings "merely" complicated biological machines?  Or, are we something completely unique in the natural world -- beings that are both "material" and "mental" at the same time?  These questions are as old as the very beginnings of western religion, philosophy, and science.  This quarter we will investigate some of the fascinating questions and theories that make up the traditional mind/body problem.  Our focus will be contemporary work in cognitive science, an interdisciplinary partnership of philosophers, psychologists, linguists, computer scientists, neuroscientists, and evolutionary biologists.

I am somewhat selfishly using our course to conduct a couple of experiments.  The first concerns required reading.  In addition to the three required books for this course, there is addition reading which is available on the web.  The second involves my own philosophical writing.  I have long intended to write a short book for my "Self, World, and God" course.  I will be using the lectures in this course as an outline, indeed if time and energy permit as a draft, of a manuscript tentatively titled Modest Psychological Naturalism.

TAKE-HOME EXAMS

 ASSIGNMENTS

ACADEMIC HONESTY

I am including below Eastern's Academic Honesty Code.  It is vitally important that you carefully read it, and that you understand that it is my intention to follow this code to the letter.  I really can't think of a better way to ruin your experience with this course, than to disregard this code.  Obviously, if you have any questions, I can't urge you too strongly to ask me.

ACADEMIC HONESTY CODE

All members of the Eastern Oregon University academic community are responsible for compliance with its Academic Honesty Code. Students are required to report violations to the respective faculty member of a course. Provisions of the Academic Honesty Code are:

1. Collaboration while taking any quizzes, in-class examinations, or take home examinations without the instructor's written approval is forbidden. The faculty member is responsible for defining limits for other collaborative learning activities for each course.

2. Plagiarism or representation of the work of others as one's own is forbidden. The faculty member will make clear the format for properly citing sources of information not original by the student.

3. Explicit approval by all instructors is required if the same work is to be submitted to more than one course, even if is not within the same term.

Violations of the Academic Honesty Code may result in both academic and behavioral penalties including possible suspension or expulsion from the University.

An automatic grade of zero for any work which is a violation of the Academic Honesty Code will be assigned by the instructor. The instructor may also assign a grade of F for the course after discussion with the respective School Dean. Students may appeal the course grade to the respective School Dean, who is the final level of appeal on the matter of course grade penalties for academic dishonesty.

The faculty member is also required to file a disciplinary complaint to the Vice President for Student Affairs about any student believed to have violated the Academic Honesty Code. If deemed appropriate, hearing procedures will be implemented by a University Hearing Officer as outlined in the Code of Student Conduct. Possible sanctions considered by the Student Conduct Committee include probation, suspension, and expulsion.

COURSE SCHEDULE

I have kept the general structure topics per week that was the format when the course was taught on-campus.  It is crucial that one-term, financial aid students come pretty close to the weekly time-table, though they are definitely free to accelerate the pace.  There is a very substantial amount of required reading for this course -- it is imperative that students keep up with the reading from the very beginning of the course!