History of contemporary philosophy

Duration

45h Th

Number of credits

Lecturer

Arnaud Dewalque

Substitute(s)

Charlotte Gauvry

Language(s) of instruction

French language

Organisation and examination

Teaching in the second semester

Schedule

Schedule online

Units courses prerequisite and corequisite

Prerequisite or corequisite units are presented within each program

Learning unit contents

Topic: The Sources of Philosophical Naturalism.
Where does the distinction between humanities and natural sciences come from? What, if anything, could make philosophy a "rigorous science"? Could its method be similar to that of the natural sciences? Or is there a distinctive way of addressing and settling philosophical questions?
Overarching the biggest part of contemporary philosophy, "philosophical naturalism" is the view that there is a strong continuity between philosophy and the natural sciences. Moreover, supporters of philosophical naturalism usually claim that the idea of a "first philosophy," viz. the idea of a kind of knowledge more fundamental than any particular science, should be rejected. Those claims, however, have been challenged by a number of authors.
The course aims at critically discussing the relevance of philosophical naturalism (Quine, Churchland, Dretske, Papineau...) by going back to its historical sources. Addressing in turn specific issues related to whether philosophy should adopt the method of the natural sciences, we will review the various rehabilitation strategies that have been proposed in post-idealistic 19th-century philosophy (Comte, Bolzano, Nietzsche, Brentano, Stumpf, Husserl, etc.).

Learning outcomes of the learning unit

By the end of the course, listeners are supposed to:

• master a series of historical informations about the nineteen-century Austrian-German philosophy.
• be able to look in a critical manner to the historiography of this period as it is available in classical manuals of the history of Western philosophy.
• be aware of a small number of controversial problems which have had a crucial role to play in the birth of contemporary philosophy.

Prerequisite knowledge and skills

At least one Philosophy course.

Planned learning activities and teaching methods

The course involve a series of lectures, in most cases with powerpoint presentation. There is no syllabus available. The list of the texts  and the schedule will be made available at the beginning of the course and can be downloaded by following the link below.

Mode of delivery (face-to-face ; distance-learning)

Duration: 45 hours 2nd term. 

Recommended or required readings

A series of suggested readings will be made available at the first sessions (see schedule). The following list of recommended books may be helpful for students wishing to delve more deeply into the topic of the course:
- On the historical background of German-Austrian philosophy during the second half of the nineteen century:

• L. Freuler, La Crise de la philosophie au XIXe siècle, Paris, Vrin, 1997 (available at the ULg Philosophy library: 43FRE).
• M. Heidegger, "Genèse et première percée de la recherche phénoménologique", dans Prolégomènes à l'histoire du concept de temps, French translation. A. boutot, Paris, Gallimard, 2006, pp. 33-51 (50HEI.BOU).

• D. Fisette and G. Fréchette, "Le Legs de Brentano", from the collection A l'école de Brentano. De Würzbourg à Vienne, Pars, Vrin, 2007, pp. 13-160 (45BRE.FIS).
• L. Albertazzi, M. Libardi and R. Poli (eds.), The School of Franz Brentano, Dordrecht, Kluwer, 1996 (45BRE.ALB).

• E. Dufour, Les Néokantiens. Valeur et vérité, Paris, Vrin, 2003.
• M. Ferrari, Retours à Kant. Introduction au néo-kantisme, French translation, Th. Loisel, Paris, Cerf, 2001 (42KAN.FER).

• D. Fisette, P. Poirier, Philosophie de l'esprit. Un état des lieux, Paris, Vrin, 2000, chapitre III "Le naturalisme et ses présupposés philosophiques" (cote 78FIS).

Assessment methods and criteria

For students in Philosophy, the assessment will be made up of two parts:

• Part I: a series of reading reports (40% of the final grade) wich will be submitted during the classes. The schedule will be made available at the beginning of the course.

• Part II: Final oral examination (60% of the final grade) during the June session.

Work placement(s)

Organizational remarks

All students enrolled in History and Romance Languages and Literature wishing to follow this course as an option are welcome.

Contacts

Teacher Charlotte Gauvry Philosophy Department 7, Place du 20-août, Building A1/2nd floor B-4000 Liège Phone 0032 (4) 366 55 93 E-mail c.gauvry@uliege.be

Adaptation of teaching commitments following the COVID-19 pandemic for the May-June 2020 session

Teaching methods implemented : distance-learning

As regard content, since March 15, I have uploaded my weekly course on MyULiege, including:
- a full write-up version of my course
- some recap slides with the key points.
Through the forum function of MyUliege, I answered some questions raised by the students.
Eventually, through a visioconference, students were able to confirm that the courses have been made available to them. In addition, we discussed how the evaluation will be performed.

Assessment subjects

Only the course material that has been presented during the IRL sessions (from February 4 to March 10) will be evaluated during the final exam. 
There will be also some "bonus questions' (which earn extra points) on the "virtual courses" sent from March 17.

Assessment methods

The final exam will be a written exam in 3 parts:
- a text commentary of one of the authors that have been addressed during the IRL courses
- a question of the IRL course material that will no require a pure restitution but also some critical assessment
- 3 "bonus questions" on the 3 virtual courses.

Contacts

c.gauvry@uliege.be

Adaptation of teaching commitments following the COVID-19 pandemic for the Aug-Sept 2020 session

Assessment subjects

Assessment methods

Contacts

Items online