Required textbooks:

You will have to have paper copies of these books, which you will need to bring to class.

• Cottingham, Stoothoff and Murdoch, trans., The Philosophical Writings of Descartes, vols. I and II
  Cambridge University Press (paperback); ISBN 978-0-521-28807-1 and 978-0-521-28808-8
• Amelie Rorty, ed., Essays on Descartes' Meditations
  University of California Press (paperback); ISBN 978-0520055094
• Harry Frankfurt, Demons, Dreamers, and Madmen
  Princeton University Press (paperback); ISBN 978-0-691-13416-1
• Margaret Wilson, Descartes
  Routledge (paperback); ISBN 978-0415065764
• Bernard Williams, Descartes: The Project of Pure Enquiry
  Routledge (paperback); ISBN 978-1138019188; the older Penguin edition, ISBN 978-0140220063, is also fine.

Optional textbook:

• John Carriero, Between Two Worlds: A Reading of Descartes's Meditations
  Princeton University Press (paperback); ISBN 978-0691135601

Reading Assignments:

1. Aug. 21: Introduction.
   
   Optional prereading: Descartes, "The Search for Truth" (CSM II:399-420 [that is, in the Cottingham, Stoothoff and Murdoch edition of The Philosophical Writings, vol. II, pp. 399-420]); "Discourse on the Method," first para. of Part II (at CSM I:116-17, starting "At that time I was in Germany...").
2. Aug. 23: Modern Skepticism.
   
   Reading: Descartes, in Meditations on First Philosophy, the First Meditation ("What can be called into doubt," CSM II:12-15).
   Optional reading: Myles Burnyeat, "Idealism and Greek Philosophy: What Descartes Saw and Berkeley Missed", Philosophical Review 91(1), Jan. 1982: 3-40. Even further optional reading: O. K. Bouwsma, "Descartes' Evil Genius", Philosophical Review 58(2), Mar. 1949): 141-151.
3. Aug. 25: One of Two Exercises that Every Philosopher...
   
   Reading: Hilary Putnam, Reason, Truth, and History, ch. 1.
   Optional reading: Donald Davidson, "The Method of Truth in Metaphysics," sec. 1. Even further optional reading: Davidson, "A Coherence Theory of Truth and Knowledge".
4. Aug. 28: If There's One Thing I'm Sure of, Then I Know What I Am.
   
   Reading: Descartes, Second Meditation CSM II:16-23); CSM I:127, para. starting "Next I examined attentively..."; Jaakko Hintikka, "Cogito, Ergo Sum: Inference or Performance?". Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil, secs. 16-17 (excerpt on handout).
   Optional reading: Robert Nozick, "Fiction," in Socratic Puzzles; Norman Malcolm, "Descartes's Proof that his Essence is Thinking".
5. Aug. 30: How Can You Reach Escape Velocity?
   
   Reading: Third Meditation; Austin, Sense and Sensibility, para bridging pp. 70-71, under the heading (2): "Next, 'real' is what we may call... "; William James, in The Meaning of Truth, "The Tigers in India," p. 43 up to the top of p. 45, "...any that nature yields," and "Knower and Known," from p. 104, "Suppose me to be sitting..." up through p. 109, at the section break (handout; also available online through Marriott Library).
   Optional reading, if you want to follow up on the comparison to the Transcendental Deduction: Lanier Anderson, "Synthesis, Cognitive Normativity, and the Meaning of Kant's Question, 'How Are Synthetic Cognitions A Priori Possible?'" European Journal of Philosophy 9(3), Dec. 2001: 275-305.
6. Sept. 1: The Causes of Your Ideas.
   
   Reading: Daniel Dennett, Consciousness Explained, pp. 3-7; Annette Baier, "The Idea of the True God in Descartes," thru sec. 2 (i.e., up to p. 365), in Rorty, Essays.
   Optional reading: The remainder of the Baier paper.

Happy Labor Day! (Spending the day on the beach? Why not take along Demons, Dreamers, and Madmen, and mosey through chs. 10 and 11?)

7. Sept. 6: Building the Skyhook, Round One.
   Reading: Review the Third Meditation; Williams, Descartes, ch. 5 ("God"), up to p. 137 (= p. 153 in the Penguin edition), to "...helps Descartes to regain it". Optional reading: Margaret Wilson, "Can I Be the Cause of My Idea of the World?", in Rorty, Essays.
8. Sept. 8: Fine Print on the Warranty.
   Reading: Fourth Meditation; Williams, Descartes: The Project of Pure Enquiry, ch.6 ("Error and the Will"). Optional reading: Bernard Williams, "Deciding to Believe" (search Marriott for his book, Problems of the Self; this is ch. 9). Even further optional reading: Rogers Albritton, "Freedom of Will and Freedom of Action".
9. Sept. 11: Building the Skyhook, Round Two: The Ontological Argument.
   Reading: Fifth Meditation. Optional reading: Kant, Critique of Pure Reason, "The Impossibility of an Ontological Proof of the Existence of God" (A592/B620-A602/B630).
10. Sept. 13: How to Turn an Idea into a Short Paper.
    Optional reading: Review Davidson -- Marriott has ecopies of the books (both collections of Davidson's papers) these essays are in. You can find "The Method of Truth in Metaphysics" in Inquiries into Truth and Interpretation (it's Essay 14, and you have to look for subsections under "Language and Reality"), and "A Coherence Theory of Truth and Knowledge" in Subjective, Intersubjective, Objective. Med. VI, paras. 9-10. Williams, ch. 4. Kant on the Ontological Argument (handout).
11. Sept. 15: Operating the Skyhook.
    Reading: Sixth Meditation. Optional reading: Marleen Rozemond, "The Real Distinction Argument" (on reserve in the Philosophy Department).
12. Sept. 18: The Pre-Refuted Publication! First Lap...
    Reading: Letter to the Sorbonne; Preface to the Reader; First Objections and Replies (CSM II:3-8, 66-86). Optional reading: Williams, Descartes, ch. 5 ("God"), through the end of the chapter.
13. Sept. 20: Time Slice World.
    Reading: Second Objections and Replies (CSM II:87-120). Optional reading (if you're curious about the "geometrical" presentation at the end of the Second Replies): Roger Florka, Descartes's Metaphysical Reasoning, pp. 104-17. Further reading: Mystery Mss, Lect. IV!
14. Sept. 22: Making Meditations Personal and Ontological Arguments.
    Reading: Audri Dara, "The Real Value of the Meditations"; Levi Lowe, "How to Imagine the Opposite of Yourself". Optional reading: Review Annette Baier, "The Idea of the True God in Descartes"; if you own the Carriero, this would be a good time to have a look, keeping your eyes out for his way of talking about "the meditator" (e.g. at p. 28).
15. Sept. 25: Science as the Motivation.
    Reading: Frankfurt, Demons, Dreamers, and Madmen, chs. 2-3.
16. Sept. 27: Argument to Presuppositions.
    Reading: Frankfurt, Demons, Dreamers, and Madmen, ch. 4.
17. Sept. 29: Principal Attributes, of Thought and of Substances More Generally.
    Reading: Ryan Wilson, "Against The Principal Attribute Premise"; Hudson Guttman, "Thinking about Thinking: Refuting Nietzsche's Objection to Descartes' Cogito." Optional reading: Marleen Rozemond, "The Real Distinction Argument" (on reserve in the Philosophy Department); review Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil, secs. 16-17 (excerpt on handout).
18. Oct. 2: Why Is the Mind-Body Distinction Drawn There?
    Reading: Discourse, Part V, at CSM I:139-41, from "I explained all these matters..." to the end of the section; review CSM II:59/VI:19 (para. starting "The first observation I make..."); review CSM II:109, from "Our natural knowledge tells us..." to the end of the para.; Wilson, Descartes, pp. 194-198 (from "In the Fourth Objections, Antoine Arnauld..." up to "...concerning the 'particulars' of sense"). Optional reading: Thomas Nagel, "Brain Bisection and the Unity of Consciousness"; Ruth Mattern, "Descartes: 'All Things Which I Conceive Clearly and Distinctly in Corporeal Objects Are in Them'" (in Rorty, Essays).
19. Oct. 4: Free Will! (with six proofs-of-purchase and $4.98 shipping/handling, click here for terms and conditions).
    Reading: Principles of Philosophy, Part I, arts. 31-42 (CSM I:203-06); David Rosenthal, "Will and the Theory of Judgment" (in Rorty, Essays). Optional reading: Review the Fourth Meditation and Williams, Descartes: The Project of Pure Enquiry, ch. 6 ("Error and the Will"); William James, "The Will to Believe".
20. Oct. 6: If I Even Have a Self at All, How Long Do I Have It For?
    Reading: Amy Spino, "Descartes and the Self," Britta Bolander, "Dividing Duration". Optional reading: Kosman, "The Naive Narrator" (in Rorty, Essays); Mystery Mss, Lect. IV.

Have a great Fall Break! Take CSM vol. I to Aruba, and check out: Rules of the Direction of the Mind (I:9-76), Principles of Philosophy, Part II ("Principles of Material Things," I:223-47), and The World (I:81-98).

21. Oct. 16: From Method to Apriori Physics.
    Reading: Rules of the Direction of the Mind, through Rule Four (i.e., up to CSM I:20); Principles of Philosophy, Part II, through art. 25.; art. 33 to 37; art. 55; art. 64. Optional reading: J.J.C. Smart, "Philosophical Problems of Cosmology". And for your amusement, Ian Stewart, "The Anthropomurphic Principle".
22. Oct. 18: Descartes' Timaeus.
    Reading: The World (I:81-98); Williams, Descartes: The Project of Pure Enquiry, ch. 9 ("Science and Experiment"). Optional reading: Heather Douglas, "The Irreducible Complexity of Objectivity" (available in the Philosophy Department).
23. Oct. 20: Innateness and Imagination.
    Reading: Richie Nguyen, "John Carriero's Question"; Peircen Smith, "Primary Innate Origin". Optional reading: Carriero, Between Two Worlds, pp. 187-89; CSM II:88f.
24. Oct. 23: Indeterministic Apriori Physics.
    Reading: Treatise on Man (CSM I:99-108); Passions of the Soul, Part I (CSM I:328-348); Optional reading: Williams, ch. 10 ("Mind and Its Place in Nature").
25. Oct. 25: The Mind-Body Problem.
    Reading: Wilson, ch. 6 ("Mind, Body and Things Outside Us"), pp. 177-85, 200-20. In the Fifth Objections and Replies, on CSM II:234, para. starting "But your claim undoubtedly..."; CSM II:235, from "A similar doubt was raised..." to 237, "...can touch or yet be touched"; CSM II:238, from "All this is quite right..." to "...exist between corporeal and incorporeal parts?"; CSM II:275f, para. starting "There are two further questions...". Optional reading: Remainder of Wilson, ch. 6.
26. Oct. 27: How to Believe at Will.
    Reading: Frank Adler, "The Importance of the Will". Optional reading: Daston, Rules: A Short History of What We Live By, pp. 225-233.
27. Oct. 30: Why the Will Must Play a Role in Inference?
    Reading: In the Fifth Objections and Replies, sec. 2 on the Fourth Meditation (CSM II:216-221); in the Sixth Objections and Replies, sec. 6 (CSM II:291f). Optional reading: Hilary Bok, Freedom and Responsibility, ch. 1.
28. Nov. 1: Interpretation, Abduction and the Metaphysics of Volume.
    Reading: Jenna Keevy, "Interpreting Davidson's Refutation of Skepticism". Review Principles of Philosophy, Part II, art. 7. Optional reading: Your second chance to look over Davidson, "The Method of Truth in Metaphysics," sec. 1, and "A Coherence Theory of Truth and Knowledge".
29. Nov. 3: What Was a Problem Set Really About?
    Reading: Jason Ripplinger, "Was Descartes Playing Games?"; Olivia Snyder, "Cartesian Dualism: Answers May Not Be Left without an Unknown". Optional followon reading: Lisa Shapiro, trans. and ed., The Correspondence between Princess Elisabeth of Bohemia and Rene Descartes; Bernard Suits, The Grasshopper.
30. Nov. 6: Against Formal Logic.
    Reading: Review Principles of Philosophy, Part IV, art. 205 (CSM I:289f). Rules of the Direction of the Mind, through Rule Ten (i.e., up to CSM I:37); in the Fifth Replies, sec. 1 (CSM II:261f); in the Sixth Replies, sec. 6 (CSM II:291f); Hide Ishiguro, "The Status of Necessity and Impossibility in Descartes" (in Rorty, Essays. Optional reading: Florka, Descartes's Metaphysical Reasoning, ch. 3 ("Reason and Regulation: Descartes's Criticisms of Logic").
31. Nov. 8: What Does Externalism Look Like from the Design Point of View?
    Reading: Hilary Putnam, Reason, Truth, and History, ch. 1; Donald Davidson, "The Method of Truth in Metaphysics," sec. 1. Optional reading: Davidson, "A Coherence Theory of Truth and Knowledge"; Tyler Burge, "Individualism and the Mental".
32. Nov. 10: Innateness vs. Externalism; Figuring Things out without Reasoning.
    Reading: Abby Pace, "If Descartes Is Wrong, I Don't Want to Be Right"; Niurka Roman Gonzalez, "Language as an Innate Tool". Optional followon reading: Chappell, "The Theory of Ideas" (in Rorty, Essays); Fodor, The Language of Thought.
33. Nov. 13: Circling Back around to the Cartesian Circle.
    Reading: On the in-class handout, "Whence Eternal Truths," the passages under I and II. In the Second Set of Objections and Replies, at CSM II:100, para. starting "Thirdly, when I said..."; in the Third Set of Objections and Replies, the Thirteenth Objection (CSM II:134f); in the Fifth Set, under "On the Third Meditation," sec. 1 (CSM II:193-95), and under "On the Fourth Meditation," sec. 4 (CSM II:220f, starting "You then conclude..."); and under "Objections raised against the Third Meditation," at CSM II:249f, para. starting "Bravo!"; Wilson, Descartes, pp. 131-35 ("Circularity") -- please bring your copy to class; Frankfurt, Demons, Dreamers, and Madmen, ch. 13. Optional reading: Carriero, Between Two Worlds, pp. 337-58.
34. Nov. 15: Who Is Logical Priority for?
    Reading: Frankfurt, Demons, Dreamers, and Madmen, ch. 12. Optional further reading: E. M. Curley, Descartes Against the Skeptics, ch. 5 ("The Circle"; physical book in Marriott).
35. Nov. 17: Top-Down vs. Bottom-Up Physics.
    Reading: Sanjot Singh, "The Cartesian Condition for Coherence". Optional reading: Curley, "Analysis in the Meditations" (in Rorty, Essays).
36. Nov. 20: Why Foundationalism?
    Reading: Williams, Descartes: The Project of Pure Enquiry, ch. 2 ("The Project"). Optional reading: Schmitt, "Why Was Descartes a Foundationalist?" (in Rorty, Essays).
37. Nov. 22: What Does Skepticism Have to Be?
    Reading: Maximino Robles, "An Evil Demon Could Not Produce the Regular Stream of Experiences We Are Having Now".

Have a great Thanksgiving! Take Parts I-VI of the Discourse (CSM I:111-51) to New Hampshire, as after-dinner reading.

38. Nov. 27: A Fable (of an Intellectual Voyage).
    Reading: Discourse I-VI. Optional reading: Harry Frankfurt, "Freedom of the Will and the Concept of a Person"; "The Faintest Passion".
39. Nov. 29: Spiritual Foundations.
    Reading: Gary Hatfield, "The Senses and the Fleshless Eye" (in Rorty, Essays). Optional reading: "What the Tortoise said to Achilles".
40. Dec. 1: What Does It Take for God Not to Be a Deceiver? What Does It Take for Descartes Not to Be a Deceiver?
    Reading: Carson Moore, "Eternal Truths: Does Descartes Really Believe God Can Do Anything?"; Tyler Evarts, "The Inevitable Constraint of State-Enforced Violence in Pursuit of Philosophical Insight". Very optional followong reading: Jonathan Israel, Enlightenment Contested.
41. Dec. 4: How Do You Stay on Track?
    Reading: Wittgenstein, Philosophical Investigations, secs. 143-46, 185-88, 191-93, 198, 201-02, 217-19, 242, 265 (available in the Philosophy Department). Optional followon reading: Richard Popkin, The History of Scepticism from Erasmus to Descartes.
42. Dec. 6: What Would It Take for Descartes's Method to Actually Work?
    No new reading. Very optional followon reading, for people with way, way too much time on their hands: Donald Frame, trans., The Complete Essays of Montaigne.