Darwin and Philosophy

Catalog description

This course will begin with Darwin's two revolutionary books, The Origin of the Species and The Descent of Man, in order to appreciate the basics of his evolutionary theory and to begin thinking about its implications for human life and philosophy. The course will then turn to recent attempts to update and apply this theory -- by Dawkins, Denett, Buss, and Stewart-Williams. Using the Darwinian approach, the course will ask, and in some cases answer, questions such as who we humans are, what we want, whether we can know, and how we should live.