Philosophy Minor

Most philosophy fits into one of four loose and overlapping groups. The first studies action: What should we do and how can we get ourselves to do it? This group includes ethics and social and political philosophy. A second group studies the nature and reliability of our knowledge. Here you will find epistemology and philosophy of science. A third group investigates the nature of the world and the self: What does it mean for something to exist? What distinguishes things from their properties? What is a person? This group includes metaphysics and the philosophy of mind. A fourth group analyzes symbolic systems through which humans represent meaning to themselves and to each other. These are studied in logic and the philosophy of language.

Every part of philosophy is connected with every other. To talk about what kinds of things exist, we also analyze how we can know about them, so metaphysics and epistemology often overlap. Human cognition depends on language, so epistemology and philosophy of language come together. To study why people act the way they do, you will draw on ethics as well as philosophy of mind; the two merge in moral psychology. Philosophy also analyzes the social and historical conditions that make it possible to ask such questions in the first place; it, therefore, always includes a study of its own history.

The Philosophy program at Franklin & Marshall acquaints students with these areas of philosophy by examining historical traditions as well as contemporary issues and topics. In addition, students cultivate skills in critical thinking and philosophical argumentation with the goal of helping them become participants in the philosophical enterprise. Lower-division courses in the department provide students with background in the history of philosophy and contemporary problems in philosophy, while upper-division courses engage students in discussion concerning cutting edge scholarship in the field. In PHI 301 philosophy majors interact directly with leading scholars who visit campus. Majors have the option of developing a substantial paper with the goal of presenting the project for departmental honors.