Spring 2004 03 credits T/TH 1:30-2:45
Dr.
Cynthia Chance M273 884-9247
Course
Description:
Required
for all first year students, this course offers students the opportunity to
confront both old and new ideas and issues in a variety of formats to analyze
their meaning and impact on a student’s life.
The
freshman seminar introduces first year students to college level conversation,
analysis and writing in a seminar format.
The focus of this year’s seminar is the concept of identity. Ideally, students
will take an active role in guiding seminar reflection.
In
this section, we will be looking at how identity assumes
self-consciousness. Self-consciousness
is something like the ability to be aware of one’s own mental states. Yet it is more than this, for mere awareness
does not imply a sense of the continuity of one’s experience that we might
think is minimally required for a sense of identity. In the course of our reflections on identity,
we will ask some of the following questions:
Are we more than our bodies? Are
we our thoughts and ideas? Do we have
souls? What does personal survival
mean? Could computers be people? Could animals be people? Do we know ourselves through
introspection? Must we be able to
construct a story of our own lives in order to count as having an identity?
Some of the questions we ask will be disturbing and challenging. Part of the point of the seminar is to push
us all to examine our most deeply held beliefs.
Course
Goals:
Students
will see how complex reflection on the question of identity in a college level
seminar format involves us in interdisciplinary work. Students will learn what we mean by “person”
in the moral sense, how to distinguish moral persons from other sorts of
beings, and what consequences derive from this.
Students will appreciate the difficulty in determining what it means to
be conscious, what self-consciousness is, and what it means to introspect truly
or falsely. Finally, students will have the opportunity to reflect on why our lives, and the lives of others matter so much to us.
Course
Objectives:
Students
will develop critical reading skills and increase facility participating in
constructive dialogue within the seminar format. Students will develop verbal and written
self-expression skills such as are required for the critical analysis of complex
topics that will support further college level achievement. Students will also improve their ability to
translate experiences outside of the academic environment into intellectual
insights.
Course Requirements:
The
first year seminar is, above all, a serious group conversation that generates
work and growth. For this reason,
preparation for class, attendance and participation are required. Failure to complete any assignment is grounds
for failure of the course. You may not
miss class without a valid excuse. More
than three unexcused absences will be grounds for a lowered grade, missing more
than 1/3 of the class meeting will result in failure of the course. Your grade
is based on attendance and the following requirements:
25%
Community Based Learning Component (includes final paper)
10%
class participation (Feed Forward Folder)
15%
academic journal writing
40%
paper writing assignments
(10% each)
10%
oral presentation of one paper
The
service-learning portion of the class requires both service work
with a community partner, and also directed reflection (through the use of
portfolio logs) on that experience. The
academic journal is an ongoing reflection on the readings carried on by the
student before and after class discussion.
Academic journals should be kept up to date and will be collected and
evaluated at the discretion of the professor.
The feed Forward folder should be brought to every class meeting;
students will make comments after each class in this folder. There will be five short papers throughout
the semester. We will be working, in
these papers, on the fundamentals of critical writing and thinking.
Statement
of Academic Integrity:
The
honor system has been a part of the Trinity community since 1913. Under the honor system, it is assumed that
each individual is intellectually honest in her academic endeavors. The sense of trust underlying the honor
system is the glue that holds our community together. The formal articulation of the honor code
states:
“I
realize the responsibility involved in membership in the Trinity College
Community. I agree to abide by the rules
and regulations of this community. I
also affirm my attention to live according to the standards of honor, to which
lying, stealing, and cheating are opposed.
I will help others to maintain this responsibility in all matters
essential to the common good of the community.”
You
are responsible for upholding the honor code in all of your work for this
course. If any questions arise in the
course of your work concerning what counts as cheating, please contact me. I will pursue violations of the honor code
vigorously, as is my duty.
The text: The Mind’s Eye, ed. Hofsteter
and Dennet, (Basic Books: 2001)
Section I
What is required in order to have a sense of self,
to be a person, to be conscious? Does
being a person require having a mind or a body or both?
Jan.
22: Introduction to the course.
Jan.
27: Introduction to the Service Learning Component (Two weeks to select a
site.)
Reading: “Borges and I” by Jorge Louis Borges, pp.19-20
Feb
2: Academic Journal Reflection Question: What is the significance, for
the author, of “having no head?”
Reading: “On Having No Head,”
by D. E. Harding, pp.23-30
Feb
4: Academic Journal Reflection Question: Is consciousness necessary for
personhood? Explain.
Reading: “What is it Like to
be a Bat?” by Thomas Nagel, pp.391-403
Paper I topic provided. (Paper I
will require you to develop a definition.)
Feb.
10: Discussion/Writing Seminar
Feb
12: Paper I due
We will schedule meetings during class time to
confirm selection of service learning sites.
Begin service learning commitment and Portfolio.
Section II
What is thinking? Can machines think? Can animals think? Does thinking require more than operation
according to rules and some form of psychological continuity?
Feb.
17: Academic Journal Reflection Question: Describe one reason why you do
not think the machine described by the author is thinking.
Feb
19: Academic Journal Reflection Question: Do you think there is any
reason why only humans could be persons?
Feb.24:
Academic Journal Reflection Question: Generate a list of examples
of humans who might not count as persons in the third sense… Now generate a
list of examples of non-humans who might count as persons in the third sense.
Paper 11 topic provided (Paper II
will require you to provide a summary.)
March 4: Paper II due
March 8-12: Spring Break
Section III
What
matters for Personhood?
March
16:
March
18: Service Learning Portfolio Due. Deadlline for
completion of 6 hours on site.
March
23: Academic Journal Reflection Question: How does the notion that we
are each created in the image of God affect our sense of the importance of each
individual?
Paper III topic provided (Paper
III will require you to compare and contrast.)
March
25: Film: Contact
March
30: Film: Contact
April
1: Discussion/Writing Seminar
Paper Presentations
Section
IV
Do we have free
will? Is free will an important aspect
of our identity?
April
8: Academic Journal Reflection Question: Can you provide any
counterexamples to Sartre’s suggestion that we are always free?
April
13: Academic Journal Reflection Question: What is the author suggesting? Why would we
think that God is a Taoist?
April
15: Academic Journal Reflection
Question: In what way does being the author of one’s own narrative imply
that one is a free and responsible agent?
Paper IV topic provided. (Paper IV will require a critical analysis.)
April
20: Film: Gattica
April
27: Paper IV due
Paper Presentations
Section
V
Must
we reflect on our lives to be persons?
Must we introspect truthfully?
April
29: Academic Journal Reflection Question: How do we exhibit reflectivity
when we tell stories?
May
4: Academic Journal Reflection Question: What point is Nozick making about fictional characters?
Final Paper Topic Provided (Paper
V will require a critical analysis.)