Skip to main page content
Ideas
  1. Course Search
  2. PHIL 8

Self and World: Early Modern Philosophy
PHIL 8

Course Information

Description

An introduction to some of the major topics and figures of 17th- and 18th- century Western philosophy, and to the skills of close reading, argument construction, and clear writing. We will focus on such metaphysical and epistemological topics as the natures of mind, body and self, the quality of the sexes, the existence of the external world and God, the nature and limits of human knowledge, and the changing relationship between science and philosophy. We will read such philosophers as René Descartes, Princess Elisabeth of Bohemia, Margaret Cavendish, David Hume, Mary Shepherd, and Immanuel Kant. No pre-requisites.

School Faculty of Arts & Sciences
Credits 4
Cross Reg

Available for Harvard Cross Registration

Department Philosophy
Course Component Lecture
Subject Philosophy
Grading Basis FAS Letter Graded
General Education N/A
Quantitative Reasoning with Data N/A
Divisional Distribution Arts and Humanities
Course Level Primarily for Undergraduate Students