Philosophy at Reading

Department of Philosophy Philosophy at Reading Undergraduate B05142 Philosophy brochure vpress LB.indd 1 06/06/2012 11:06

Philosophy at Reading Studying philosophy will equip you with the ability to think rationally and logically, evaluate arguments in a critical and detached manner, and challenge your own ideas and those of other people. Whilst not a vocational subject, the skills you will develop can be widely applied in a range of professions including law and publishing, business and management, local government, and politics. Why Reading? The learning environment Those whose hearts are fixed on Reality itself deserve the title of Philosophers Plato 380BC At Reading you will find a vibrant study environment and a strong international community with students from over 135 countries. In 2012, the Times Higher Education Student Experience Survey ranked Reading as 12th in the UK, with the campus environment in joint first place. The parkland campus provides outstanding residential accommodation and excellent library and sports facilities, with the thriving town centre only ten minutes away and easy road and rail access to London, Oxford and beyond. An international reputation for excellence You will be joining a top-ranked philosophy department. In the National Student Survey 2011, Reading s Philosophy Department had an overall satisfaction rating of 90%, with Teaching on my course scoring 92%. The recent Periodic Review of Teaching commended the staff for their friendly and approachable attitude towards 2 B05142 Philosophy brochure vpress LB.indd 2-3 students, ensuring a positive and supportive student learning experience. The Panel found... that students recognised the value of working with internationally recognised experts in their fields. Finally, the most recent national Research Assessment Exercise (2008) ranked the Department third in the UK for the quality of its research, ahead of both Oxford and Cambridge. A supportive and welcoming place to study The friendly atmosphere in the Department of Philosophy encourages you to develop the ability to evaluate your own arguments and those of others in an impartial, open-minded and knowledgeable way. We have seven professors and seven full-time lecturers who will be involved in your learning and whose expertise you can draw on at any stage in your studies. In your third year, it will be possible for you to work more closely with one of these academics when writing your dissertation. Our staff always aim to be as approachable and helpful as possible. Beyond the lecture theatre Within the Department of Philosophy, the Philosophy Society (which is run by our undergraduates) holds regular meetings where, together with other students, postgraduates and staff, you will be able to hear some of the country s leading philosophers expound their views and engage with them in rigorous intellectual debate. Skills development and employment The skills that you will develop in thinking, reasoning and argument are highly valued by employers. There is a career skills component in our first year Reason and argument module which aims to help student identify the transferable skills they will gain from their degree. Several third year modules now include a placement component where students can receive module credit for time spent working with a company or charity. The department s work is backed up by the University s award-winning career management website providing a wealth of information, with advice about vacancies, applications and interviews. Our courses BA Philosophy V500 Three years, full time BA Ethics, Value & Philosophy V590 Three years, full time Standard offers After graduating from Reading, Chris completed a law conversion (GDL) and Legal Practice Course (LPC) at Nottingham Law School. He worked as a lawyer for a number of years at City and West End law firms before joining Thomson Reuters to work as a legal editor. As a legal editor, he writes and edits for a legal publication that analyses legal and financial developments to keep lawyers up to date of regulatory and market change. Philosophy is stimulating and sets a great foundation for almost any career. For me Philosophy is about suspending your beliefs to critically evaluate the world around you. Philosophy teaches you to look at the world afresh, without relying on assumptions or personal convictions. What is valuable to employers about philosophy is the philosophy student s ability to approach tasks with impartiality and without prejudice; to reduce an argument, a contract or a course of action to its most fundamental elements. UCAS tariff ABB/AAC/BBBB (inc B in rel evant* A level for any joint degree). International Baccalaureate Complete diploma with a minimum score of 6,6,5 in a least three higherlevel subjects. Deferred entry Yes Contact details Sukh Thiara Subject Officer email philosophy@reading.ac.uk Open days We hold open days every June and October for prospective undergraduate students, their friends and families. For the latest dates, visit: www.reading.ac.uk/opendays I have found that Philosophy is excellent training for drawing sound conclusions and developing a mindset of seeing how the factual and theoretical match up as well as how they differ. Chris Elias Legal Editor at Thomson Reuters 3 06/06/2012 11:06

Overview of courses Our philosophy modules are designed to enable you to acquire the critical thinking skills necessary to engage with issues that have challenged philosophers throughout history. The modular structure allows you to tailor your studies to your own interests and take courses in other departments (conditions permitting). Each year you will take six modules. Joint-honours students will typically take half their modules each year in each of the two subjects they are studying. Part 1 Part 2 The first year, known as Part 1, is common to all our degree programmes and consists of four core modules that provide a firm foundation for more advanced study in your second and third years. These four Part 1 modules introduce central issues about truth, morality and reality in an accessible and stimulating way. All students take either two or three of these modules, with further modules of your choice to be taken in other departments. My two subjects complement each other wonderfully: they both investigate important, bizarre and fascinating questions. They both satisfy my hunger for knowledge, constant questioning, and problem-solving. It s one of the best places for my course, its academic credibility and friendly atmosphere, plus seeing the campus in autumn won me over. Daisy Dixon BA Art & Philosophy In your first year, you will be taught in a combination of lectures and small-group seminars where you will be encouraged to express and evaluate your own and others opinions. On successful completion of your first year, you will continue with your second and third year in your choice of programme, either BA Philosophy (Single or Joint Honours) or BA Ethics, Value and Philosophy. Modules You will explore how philosophy supplies the tools for reasoning logically and analytically, not just about abstract theories but about problems and situations in real life. The skills you learn will be essential not only for the study of philosophy but are also a foundation for the kinds of thinking you will have to do in your future life and career. You will critically evaluate the various ways in which human nature has been considered. Starting from the classical Greek philosophers, and then moving chronologically through the history of philosophy in the seventeenth, eighteenth, nineteenth and twentieth centuries, you will explore key philosophical issues regarding the nature of human beings, the mind and human society. If you find at the end of the first year that you wish to change your degree programme, then the modular system is usually flexible enough to allow you to do this with the agreement of the relevant tutor(s) and Faculty Office(s). You will be introduced to central controversies in current philosophy via engagement with its past. Two very different ways of doing philosophy: analytic and continental will be compared and evaluated, allowing you to develop an appreciation of the significance of philosophical debate, and cultivate important skills in oral and written argument. You will confront some of the central areas of moral philosophy, developing skills of abstract and critical thought, as you consider some prominent theories of right and wrong regarding issues such as abortion, euthanasia and reward and punishment. In your second year, you will have the chance to use the skills gained in Part 1 to begin to explore a wide range of philosophical topics in much greater depth. The ten modules offered in Part 2 allow you to choose the areas in which you would like to begin to specialise and lay essential foundations for the modules you will study in your final year. Single honours students may take either all six modules in philosophy, or five modules in philosophy and one module in another subject of their choice, allowing you to further personalise your course to your own academic interests. For Ethics, Value and Philosophy students, the four compulsory modules allow you to develop your aptitude for normative reasoning and deepen your knowledge of ethical philosophy. In addition, the two optional modules, one of which may be in a different subject, allow you to explore more widely either in philosophy or in a related field. Joint-honours students will usually study three modules in each of their two subjects. Part 2 modules can focus on enduring philosophy problems, or develop further analytical skills, or allow you to trace the development of ideas through studying particular philosophers. What really inspires me about Philosophy is that it requires little more than a comfortable chair and your own thoughts. Maybe a paper and pen are helpful too. Philosophers are renowned for thinking very hard and very well about a variety of subjects and its application to a wide variety of subjects is another inspiring factor. Perhaps the most inspiring though is that philosophy digs deep and tries to answer the most fundamental questions about the world that we live in. In Theory of knowledge and Moral philosophy you will get to grips with some of the essential issues that are at the heart of the subject, exploring the difference between knowledge and belief, and issues concerning the objectivity of morality and the nature of moral judgement. Introductory logic will equip you with an understanding of formal and methodological principles, enabling you to objectively assess pieces of reasoning across all subject domains. In the two early modern philosophy courses you will chart the development of modern philosophical thinking through selected writings from Locke, Berkeley, Hume and Kant. The department here seemed really strong to me and at the time I applied I was particularly interested in ethics, an area that the department leads in. Another reason was the campus itself. The abundance of space and greenery really appealed to me, being a lover of the countryside. James Kirkpatrick BA Philosophy 4 5 B05142 Philosophy brochure vpress LB.indd 4-5 06/06/2012 11:06

Core and optional modules BA Philosophy Part 3 Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 In Part 3 there is a wide range of modules for you to select from, developing your philosophical expertise in the areas of interest to you. Modules will cover topics such as ethics, language, and logic, and there will be opportunities to study specific philosophers in greater depth. As in part 2, single honours students may choose to take one module in a different subject. Ethics, Value and Philosophy students will take four core modules that will allow them to confront specific ethical issues in greater depth. The modules typically offered are listed on page seven. The Dissertation module is our only 40-credit module and is compulsory for joint-honours students (please contact us if you would like further information on your particular degree specification). Part 3 modules allow you to study at much greater depth key philosophical topics and thinkers and become aware of the interconnections between them. In Metaphysics you will learn how the way we deal with metaphysical problems affects our approach to problems in many other areas of philosophy, such as philosophy of mind and epistemology. Philosophy of religion will enable you to make connections with other aspects of philosophy, notably the philosophy of mind (the nature of the soul), the philosophy of science (evolution versus creationism), and ethics (the goodness of God and the nature of evil). Philosophy of law and Philosophy of crime and punishment will allow you to develop a critical understanding of how the law relates to morality and critically assess assumptions about individual responsibility, insanity and punishment as they are dealt with by modern law. Aesthetics Contemporary political philosophy Early modern philosophy 1 Early modern philosophy 2 Introductory logic Language and reality Moral philosophy Philosophy of mind Plato and Aristotle Theory of knowledge BA Ethics, Value and Philosophy Biomedical ethics Contemporary moral theory Environmental ethics Ethical intuitionism Ethics and animals Fairness Free will and responsibility Further logic Marx and Marxism Metaphysics Philosophy of crime and punishment Philosophy and film Philosophy of language Philosophy of law Philosophy of religion Philosophy of social science Philosophy of Wittgenstein Schopenhauer, Nietzsche and Sartre The subject of experience Dissertation (compulsory for joint-honours students) All students have the opportunity to write an extended essay (the Dissertation module), where you can draw on the specialist knowledge of staff members to explore in more detail a topic of your choice. The task is not so much to see what no one yet has seen, but to think what nobody yet has thought about that Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Compulsory module Compulsory modules Aesthetics Contemporary political philosophy Moral philosophy Theory of knowledge Early modern philosophy 1 Early modern philosophy 2 Introductory logic Language and reality Philosophy of mind Plato and Aristotle Biomedical ethics Contemporary moral theory Environmental ethics Ethical intuitionism Ethics and animals Fairness Free will and responsibility Philosophy of crime and punishment Philosophy of law Philosophy of religion Further logic Marx and Marxism Metaphysics Philosophy and film Philosophy of language Philosophy of social science Philosophy of Wittgenstein Schopenhauer, Nietzsche and Sartre The subject of experience Dissertation which everyone sees. Schopenhauer 1818 6 7 B05142 Philosophy brochure vpress LB.indd 6-7 06/06/2012 11:06

Come and visit us Come and visit us on our open days in June and October, and see for yourself the friendly, supportive and exciting environment in which you could be studying. Staff, students and past students will be on hand to show you what life as a Reading student is like, and what type of career you could have in just a few years time. For details of how to visit us, see www.reading.ac.uk/opendays If you apply to us and we make you an offer, we will also invite you and your parents to attend a visit day. On this day you will meet members of staff and current undergraduates, attend talks by the Admissions Tutor and the Head of Department, and go on a campus tour. We hold three visit days every year, usually on Wednesdays and Saturdays between January and April. More information about our visit days will be sent to accepted applicants in due course. We are now accepting applications for our new Philosophy, Politics and Economics course which opens in October 2013. Combined Philosophy courses at Reading Reading offers a rich diversity of subjects and the flexibility to combine courses or transfer from one course to another. If you want to know more about how Philosophy can be combined with other subjects, why not get in touch with the Admissions Officer for the combination that suits you best. Art Classical Studies Economics English French German History History of Art International Relations Italian Politics Psychology For more information, please contact: Undergraduate Admissions Officer Department of Philosophy University of Reading Whiteknights Reading, RG6 6AA philosophy@reading.ac.uk Tel +44 (0)118 378 8325 Fax +44 (0)118 378 6440 www.reading.ac.uk/philosophy The University of Reading is committed to equal opportunities and diversity. Whilst the University of Reading makes every effort to ensure that the contents and statements made in this publication are fair and accurate, it can accept no liability for omissions, errors or subsequent changes. The statements made and information provided are a general guide and there may be changes following publication which affect the contents. Programmes or modules may be altered or withdrawn without notice and assessment arrangements may be changed. For details of any changes made since publication, please refer to the website address at the bottom of this page. This document is University of Reading 2012. It was designed in-house. B05142 06.12 B05142 Philosophy brochure vpress LB.indd 8 06/06/2012 11:07