Course Descriptions

Fall Semester 2008

Beyond Good and Evil
HONR 300A - Humanities Seminar
Dr.s Beth Benedix and Howard Pollak-Milgate

Our course takes its name from Nietzsche, who, with his bold charge to look “beyond good and evil,” dares us to create new categories to consider what it means to live meaningfully. In this course, we will explore a number of thinkers who use their work as a vehicle for transforming our understanding of what is “really real” and how we should act – and who we ultimately are – in accordance with this new understanding. They won’t agree with one another in any number of ways (neither will we), and their basic premises will often attempt to call into question conventional habits of thought and thinking – for example, personal identity and thinking in oppositions – which are so very difficult to avoid. What are we prepared to call “meaningful”? What does it mean to be “authentic”? Do the interests of beauty outweigh those of morality? What meaning might “spirituality” have in a disenchanted world? Our conversations and readings will take us through the messy terrain of value construction; come prepared to question the things you thought you knew and the person you thought you were!

Evolution and Human Nature
HONR 300B - Science Seminar
Dr. Kevin Moore

This seminar will examine scientific approaches (particularly an evolutionary psychological approach) to important aspects of human nature, including aggression, cooperation, sexual behavior, aesthetics, and emotion.  We will look at historical attempts to develop scientific accounts of human nature, and examine their strengths, weaknesses, and motivations.  We will examine and critique current scientific explanations of and theories about controversies such as violence, rape, mate choice, and beauty.  Throughout the semester we will consider whether 'social science' is or should be any different from  'natural science,' what it means to apply a scientific approach to human beings (and what assumptions we make when we do), and what scientific account of human nature and behavior implies about issues like determinism, responsibility, and choice.

Intervention and Humanitarianism in an Age of Genocide
HONR 300C - Social Science Seminar
Dr. Brett O'Bannon

In just about the time it takes to complete a college semester, 800,000 people were brutally murdered in Rwanda in the Spring of 1994. The United Nations was forewarned of the impending genocide weeks before it began, but did nothing to prevent it. When made aware of the scale of the slaughter underway, the US government actively sought to prevent other governments from getting involved. France intervened, but on the side of the génocidaires. Why did the international community do so little to help stop this enormous crime? What could the international community have done to intervene? Whose responsibility, if anyone’s, was it to protect the victims of “mega murder”? If there was a responsibility to act in Rwanda, is there not a similar responsibility to act in Darfur? These are the kinds of questions that animate the ethical, legal and political discourse of humanitarian intervention.

Law and Economics: Does the common law bear the stamp of economic reasoning?
HONR 300Cb - Social Science Seminar
Dr. Bert Barreto

An examination of the proposition that economic reasoning can explain the evolution of the law. By focusing on property, tort, and contract law, each student can decide to what extent economics is a driving force in the law. By its very nature interdisciplinary, this course is based on articles from Economics journals and law reviews. Students discuss, write essays, and participate in a moot court.

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