Colloquium for Philosophy Majors (PHIL 397/001)

The Colloquium is a special course designed to explore philosophical topics primarily through the writing and discussing of short papers by class members. This semester the topic is John Rawls’ theory of justice. We will examine closely Rawls’ major work, A Theory of Justice, chapter by chapter, and then consider (more briefly) the changes he introduced in his later work, Political Liberalism. Although these are works in political philosophy, they encompass a broad range of topics, including the aims and methods of moral and political philosophy, the standards of rational choice, moral development, self-respect and moral emotions, different kinds of value judgment, whether a just society can be stable despite reasonable pluralism in religious views, and the ideal of civil discourse in politics. Primarily for juniors and senior philosophy majors.

Thomas Hill’s webpage