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:

• Lisa Shapiro (ed.), The Correspondence Between Princess Elisabeth of Bohemia and Rene Descartes
  University of Chicago Press (paperback); ISBN 978-0-226-20442-0

Reading Assignments:

1. Aug. 25: 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...").
   
   I'll ask you to read Descartes's first Meditation in class, and if you want to preview that, see the link for the following week, below.
2. Sept. 1: Modern Skepticism.
   
   
   • Skepticism with a Point. Meditations on First Philosophy, the First Meditation ("What can be called into doubt," CSM II:12-15).
     Hilary Putnam, Reason, Truth, and History, ch. 1; Donald Davidson, "The Method of Truth in Metaphysics," sec. 1.
     Optional reading: Putnam, Reason, Truth, and History, chs. 2-3; Davidson, "A Coherence Theory of Truth and Knowledge".
   • One Thing I'm Sure About: I'm Right Here! 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.
   • If There's One Thing I'm Sure of, Then I Know What I Am. Avner Baz, "Whose Dream Is It Anyway?", sec. 7 only, starting on p. 281.
     Optional reading: Harry Frankfurt, Demons, Dreamers, and Madmen, ch. 10. Norman Malcolm, "Descartes's Proof that his Essence is Thinking".
     
3. Sept. 8: Building a Skyhook.
   
   
   • Various Kinds of Reality. Descartes, Third Meditation.
     Optional reading: Bernard Williams, Descartes, ch. 5 ("God"), up to p. 137 (in the Routledge edition, = p. 153 in the Penguin edition).
   • Reality Conservation. Annette Baier, "The Idea of the True God in Descartes," thru sec. 2 (i.e., up to p. 365), in Rorty, Essays (on reserve in the Philosophy Department).
     Optional reading: The remainder of the Baier paper; Margaret Wilson, "Can I Be the Cause of My Idea of the World?", in Rorty, Essays (on reserve in the Philosophy Department).
   • Reality Check. 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. 46, "...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 followon 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.
     
4. Sept. 15: Skyhook Engineering.
   
   
   • Fine Print on the Warranty. Descartes, Fourth Meditation. Bernard 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). And a followup: for a more leisurely and Wittgensteinian exploration of the idea that absolute freedom of the will comes of not having anything to contrast it with, see Rogers Albritton, "Freedom of Will and Freedom of Action".
   • Shoring Up the Skyhook: Upcycling Anselm. Descartes, Fifth Meditation. Kant, Critique of Pure Reason, "The Impossibility of an Ontological Proof of the Existence of God" (A592/B620-A602/B630).
     Optional reading: Bernard Williams, Descartes, the rest of ch. 5 ("God"), from p. 137 (in the Routledge edition, = p. 153 in the Penguin edition).
   • How to Turn an Idea into a Short Paper. Review Baier thru sec. 2.
     
     Optional reading: Jonathan Bendor, "Intelligence versus Rationality: Simon's Dueling Reference Points" (available shortly).
     
5. Sept. 22: Mind, Body, Making Distinct.
   
   
   • Mind vs. Body. Descartes, Sixth Meditation.
     Optional reading: Marleen Rozemond, "Descartes's Dualism" (available from Marriott Library; for the online version, look for Janet Broughton and John Carriero, A Companion to Descartes; this is ch. 22, which you'll find under "Part III"). For the full-length version, see Rozemond, Descartes's Dualism, also available from Marriott Library (in that case, focus on the chapter on "The Real Distinction Argument").
   • Using LLMs for Argument Analysis, plus: Scholarly Etiquette Review. Review Med. II:30-32 (at CSM II:33f) plus TBA.
     
     Optional reading: Mystery Mss, Lect. IV.
     
   • The Pre-Refuted Publication! First Lap....
     Letter to the Sorbonne; Preface to the Reader; First Objections and Replies (CSM II:3-8, 66-86).
6. Sept. 29: What Was All That About?
   
   
   • Student Sessions.
     Reading: Andrew Shackelford, "The Dangers of Anachronistic Analysis"; Logan Kelly, "Whose Dream But My Own?"
     Optional reading: Louis Loeb, "Is There Radical Dissimulation in Descartes' Meditations?" (ch. 11 in Rorty, Essays); review Avner Baz, "Whose Dream Is It Anyway?"
   • Intricate Engines and the Clarity Touchstone. Reading: Second Objections and Replies (CSM II:87-120); review First Objections and Replies.
     Optional reading: John Carriero, "The Cartesian Circle and the Foundations of Knowledge" (available from Marriott Library; for the online version, look for Janet Broughton and John Carriero, A Companion to Descartes; this is ch. 18, which you'll find under "Part III").
   • What's Legitimized by Underwriting the Scientific Enterprise? Frankfurt, Demons, Dreamers, and Madmen, chs. 2-3. Optional reading: Hilary Putnam, "Logical Positivism, the Kantian Tradition, and the Bounds of Sense" (on reserve in the Philosophy Department). Charles Sanders Peirce, "The Fixation of Belief," in N. Houser and C. Kloesel, eds., The Essential Peirce (on reserve in the Philosophy Department).
7. Oct. 6: Mind, Body, and Methodology.
   
   
   • What Kind of Control Do You Have Over Your Will? Review Frankfurt, Demons, Dreamers, and Madmen, ch. 2, then read ch. 4. Principles of Philosophy, Part I, arts. 31-42 (CSM I:203-06). Optional reading: David Rosenthal, "Will and the Theory of Judgment" (in Rorty, Essays).
   • Student Sessions.
     Reading: Marshal Ruiz, "No Regrets".
     Optional reading: O. K. Bouwsma, "Descartes' Evil Genius".
     
   • Why Draw the Mind-Body Distinction 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: Ruth Mattern, "Descartes: 'All Things Which I Conceive Clearly and Distinctly in Corporeal Objects Are in Them'" (in Rorty, Essays).

   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).

8. Oct. 20: From Epistemology to Apriori Physics.
   
   
   • Scientific Method, the Early Version. Stuart Hampshire, Thought and Action, pp. 85-89 (on reserve in the Philosophy Department); 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: Heather Douglas, "The Irreducible Complexity of Objectivity" (in case you wonder why I ask you write around this and similar words).
   • Student Session.
     Reading: Jesse Robinson, "Ideas Above Extension".
     Optional reading: Williams, Descartes: The Project of Pure Enquiry, in ch. 8, pp. 214f (from "Descartes then goes on to claim..." to "...they would be next to one another," and 221f (from "This might seem, at first glance..." to "(e.g. colour)"; in the Penguin edition, these passages are at 228-30 and 236f.
     
   • Descartes' Timaeus. Reading: The World (I:81-98); Williams, Descartes: The Project of Pure Enquiry, ch. 9 ("Science and Experiment").
     Optional followon reading: Stephen Gaukroger, Descartes' System of Natural Philosophy.
9. Oct. 27: The Mind-Body Problem.
   
   
   • Clockwork Animals and a Joystick in the Middle of Your Brain.
     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"). And are you wondering how to think about free will against the background of Cartesian physics? Hilary Bok, Freedom and Responsibility, ch. 1 (available in the Philosophy Department), is a very clear overview of the problem of free will as it's generally understood today.
   • Metaphysics of Substance and the Mind-Body Problem.
     Further followon reading: Joseph Almog, What Am I? Descartes and the Mind-Body Problem (available in Marriott).
     Optional reading: Lisa Shapiro, trans. and ed., The Correspondence between Princess Elisabeth of Bohemia and Rene Descartes.
     
   • A Complaint from a Pen Pal. 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.
10. Nov. 3: The Will (Redux), Logic, and the Cartesian Circle
    
    
    • What Role Does the Will Play 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). Principles of Philosophy, Part IV, art. 205-207 (CSM I:289-91). Rules of the Direction of the Mind, now 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). Optional reading: Hide Ishiguro, "The Status of Necessity and Impossibility in Descartes" (in Rorty, Essays).
    • Student Sessions.
      Reading: Walker Candelaria, "Humanizing Humans"; William Norton, "Duties of Assent"; Kenna Swallow, "From Conception to Existence".
      Optional reading: Gaukroger, Cartesian Logic, pp. 66-68 (available in the Philosophy Department).
      
    • 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: Florka, Descartes's Metaphysical Reasoning, ch. 3 ("Reason and Regulation: Descartes's Criticisms of Logic"; available shortly).
11. Nov. 10: Logic and Method. (tentative)
    
    
    • Student Sessions.
      Reading: TBA.
      Optional reading: Curley, "Analysis in the Meditations" (in Rorty, Essays).
      
    • An Enlightenment Take on the Cartesian Circle.
      Reading: Frankfurt, Demons, Dreamers, and Madmen, ch. 12. Review Baier, "The Idea of the True God in Descartes," para. bridging pp. 363f. Optional further reading: E. M. Curley, Descartes Against the Skeptics, ch. 5 ("The Circle"; physical book in Marriott).
    • Foundationalism. Reading: Williams, Descartes: The Project of Pure Enquiry, ch. 2 ("The Project").
      Optional reading: Schmitt, "Why Was Descartes a Foundationalist?" (in Rorty, Essays).
12. Nov. 17: (tentative)
    
    
    • Student Sessions.
      Reading: Elle Donovan, "You Are a One Way Road," plus TBA.
      Optional reading: TBA.
      
    • Soul-Infused Bodies.
      Reading: Letter to Mesland, Feb. 9, 1645 (end of handout on "Minds, Bodies and the Will").
    • Reading: TBA.
      Optional reading: TBA.