| Unit name | Authority, Autonomy, & The Deliberative Stance |
|---|---|
| Unit code | PHIL30905 |
| Credit points | 20 |
| Level of study | H/6 |
| Teaching block(s) |
Teaching Block 2 (weeks 13 - 24) |
| Unit director | Dr. Goulder |
| Open unit status | Not open |
| Pre-requisites |
None |
| Co-requisites |
None |
| School/department | Department of Philosophy |
| Faculty | Faculty of Arts, Law and Social Sciences |
What kinds of authority does the individual have over his own thoughts and actions, and what significance does this bear? Questions about the demands and privileges distinctive to the individual standpoint are some of the most vexed in philosophy, and provide the structure for this course. Themes explored will include character, emotions, and perceptions of the good; reason and desire; autonomy and orthonomy; action and interaction; privacy and publicity; self-constitution and self-interpretation; social constructions of the self; idiosyncrasy and incommunicability; despair, alienation, bad faith, the inauthentic; and self-knowledge. Drawing on readings from key historical figures as well as from the contemporary literature, the course will bring together a constellation of disputes about causal authorship, epistemic authoritativeness, and ethical authority.
