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Department of Philosophy

Course content 2014/15

Reading:

 

New: 'A Beginner's Guide to Self-Knowledge' is available here: https://warwick.academia.edu/QuassimCassam

New: Self-knowledge website: http://www.self-knowledgeforhumans.com/

Week 1. The Philosophical Picture of Self-Knowledge

  • Brie Gertler ‘Self-Knowledge’, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Available here: http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/self-knowledge/
  • Richard Moran Authority and Estrangement (Princeton University Press 2001), chapter 1.
  • Quassim Cassam Self-Knowledge for Humans (Oxford University Press 2014) chapters 1 and 4.
  • Quassim Cassam Self-Knowledge (Oxford Bibliographies Online). Available here http://www.oxfordbibliographies.com/view/document/obo-9780195396577/obo-9780195396577-0112.xml

Week 2. The Specialness of Self-Knowledge

  • Brie Gertler ‘Introduction: Philosophical Issues about Self-Knowledge’, in Brie Gertler (ed.) Privileged Access: Philosophical Acounts of Self-Knowledge (Ashgate 2003).
  • William Alston ‘Varieties of Privileged Access’, American Philosophical Quarterly 1971.
  • Gilbert Ryle The Concept of Mind (Penguin 2000), chapter VI.
  • Donald Davidson Subjective, Intersubjective, Objective (Oxford University Press 2001), chapter 1and the first three pages of chapter 2.
  • Crispin Wright ‘Self-Knowledge: The Wittgensteinian Legacy’, in C. Wright, B. Smith and C. MacDonald (eds.) Knowing Our Own Minds
  • Paul Snowdon ‘How to Think about Phenomenal Self-Knowledge’, in Annalisa Coliva (ed.) The Self and Self-Knowledge (Oxford University Press 2012).

Week 3. Inferentialism and the Asymmetry

  • Paul Boghossian Content and Justification (Oxford University Press 2008), chapter 6. Available here: https://pantherfile.uwm.edu/hinchman/www/Boghossian-Chapter6.pdf
  • Richard Moran, Authority and Estrangement, chapter 1
  • Gilbert Ryle The Concept of Mind (Penguin 2000), chapter VI.
  • Darryl Bem ‘Self-Perception Theory’, in L. Berkowitz (ed.), Advances in Experimental Social Psychology (Academic Press Inc.). Available here: http://www.dbem.us/SP%20Theory.pdf
  • Krista Lawlor ‘Knowing What One Wants’, Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 2009. Available here: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1933-1592.2009.00266.x/abstract
  • Quassim Cassam Self-Knowledge for Humans (Oxford University Press 2014), chapters 11 and 12.

Week 4. Substantial Self-Knowledge

  • Quassim Cassam Self-Knowledge for Humans (Oxford University Press 2014), chapters 3 and 13.
  • Eric Schwitzgebel ‘Self-Ignorance’, in J. Liu and J. Perry (eds.), Consciousness and the Self: New Essays (Cambridge University Press, 2012). Available here: http://www.faculty.ucr.edu/~eschwitz/SchwitzPapers/SelfUcs-101118.pdf
  • Aaron James Assholes: A Theory (Nicholas Brealey, 2012), chapter 1.

Week 5. Self-Ignorance

  • Eric Schwitzgebel ‘Self-Ignorance’, in J. Liu and J. Perry (eds.), Consciousness and the Self: New Essays (Cambridge University Press 2012). Available here: http://www.faculty.ucr.edu/~eschwitz/SchwitzPapers/SelfUcs-101118.pdf
  • Richard Nisbett & Timothy Wilson ‘Telling More Than We Can Know: Verbal Reports on Mental Processes’, Pyschological Review 1977 . Available here:http://people.virginia.edu/~tdw/nisbett&wilson.pdf
  • Paul Katsafanas ‘Nietzsche on Agency and Self-Ignorance’, Journal of Nietzsche Studies, 2012. Available here: http://people.bu.edu/pkatsa/NASI.pdf
  • Quassim Cassam Self-Knowledge for Humans (Oxford University Press, 2014), chapter 14.

Week 7. Knowing Why

  • Matthew Boyle ‘ “Making Up Your Mind” and the Activity of Reason’, Philosophers’ Imprint 2011. Available here: http://quod.lib.umich.edu/cgi/p/pod/dod-idx/making-up-your-mind-and-the-activity-of-reason.pdf?c=phimp;idno=3521354.0011.017
  • Michael Shermer Why People Believe Weird Things (Souvenir Press 2007), chapters 17 and 18.
  • Thomas Gilovich How We Know What Isn't So, part one.
  • Daniel Kahneman Thinking, Fast and Slow, parts 1 and 2.
  • Quassim Cassam ‘Intellectual Character and Self-Ignorance’ (draft, do not circulate without permission).

Week 8. Character and Self-Knowledge

  • Heather Battaly ‘Virtue Epistemology’, Philosophy Compass 2008 and reprinted in J. Greco & J. Turri (eds.) Virtue Epistemology.
  • Lee Ross & Richard Nisbett, The Person and the Situation, chapters 1 and 2.
  • Gilbert Harman 'Moral Philosophy Meets Social Psychology: Virtue Ethics and the Fundamental Attribution Error', Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 1999.
  • John Doris Lack of Character (Cambridge University Press, 2002), chapters 1 and 2.
  • Mark Alfano ‘Expanding the Situationist Challenge to Responsibilist Virtue Epistemology’, Philosophical Quarterly 2012.
  • Quassim Cassam ‘Vice Epistemology’ (draft, do not circulate without permission).

Week 9. The Value of Self-Knowledge

  • Simon Feldman & Allan Hazlett ‘Authenticity and Self-Knowledge’, Dialectica 2013. Available here: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1746-8361.12022/abstract
  • Timothy Wilson & Elizabeth Dunn, E. ‘Self-Knowledge: Its Limits, Value, and Potential for Improvement’, Annual Review of Psychology 2004. Available here: http://people.virginia.edu/~tdw/annual.review.final.pdf
  • Quassim Cassam Self-Knowledge for Humans (Oxford University Press 2014), chapter 15.
  • Quassim Cassam 'Self-Knowledge: What Is It Good For?', forthcoming magazine article for Conde Nast (do not circulate).
  • Rebecca Schlegel et al. ‘Feeling Like You Know Who You Are: Perceived True Self-Knowledge and Meaning in Life’, Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 2011. Available here: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21402753

Week 10. Love’s Knowledge

  • Martha Nussbaum Love’s Knowledge (Oxford University Press 1990), chapter 11.
  • Quassim Cassam Self-Knowledge for Humans (Oxford University Press 2014), chapter 13.

Chapters from Self-Knowledge for Humans (Oxford University Press, 2014).