This course explores how 17th and 18th century European philosophers critiqued the religious epistemology and way of being that reigned for a millennium in the West. In contrast, they proposed novel ways to attain knowledge and to conceive of the powers and limitations of the human mind. These philosophies helped create a “modern mind”: one that demands rational arguments and/or empirical evidence to establish knowledge, that doubts authorities claiming to know metaphysical realities, that demands freedom to pursue its individual life, and that is prone to nihilism. This kind of mind, increasingly dominant globally, appears natural and underlies a problematic way of being in the world. Philosophers studied may include Descartes, Spinoza, Hume, Kant, and Nietzsche. (Not offered 2024-25).

1 unit

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