24.120 Moral Psychology
Spring 2014
image restricted to class participants
Professor: Declan Smithies
TA: Brendan Dill de Kenessey
Lecture: MW 11.00-12.30 (36-156)
Course Description:
The topic of this course is free will and moral responsibility. We typically assume – both in our common sense thinking and in the law – that we are responsible for what we do because our actions are free in the sense that we could have done otherwise. But is this assumption consistent with our scientific understanding of the world? In the first part of the course, we’ll consider whether our ordinary views about free will and moral responsibility can be reconciled with a scientific conception of the universe as governed by deterministic or indeterministic laws of nature. In the second half of the course, we’ll explore various challenges to our conception of ourselves as free and morally responsible agents that are raised by recent work in psychology and neuroscience.
Announcements
Final Meeting
No assigned reading this week! Today's class will be an optional paper workshop. For Wednesday's class, please watch the following conversation on implicit associations and belief between Tamar Gendler (Yale) and Eric Schwitzgebel (UC Riverside) and come ready to discuss it in class: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cDdB4RzEkMYAnnounced on 12 May 2014 10:42 a.m. by Declan Smithies
Evaluations
Please remember to fill out an online evaluation for the class! I'd very much appreciate your feedback on what you enjoyed about the class and any constructive suggestions you might have for improving the class in future. I'm sure Brendan would appreciate your comments too! http://web.mit.edu/subjectevaluationAnnounced on 07 May 2014 5:06 p.m. by Declan Smithies
Final Week
One week to go! Monday's class is an optional paper workshop: please come with paper outlines or questions you'd like to discuss. Final papers are due in class on Wednesday and I'll present some ideas from Neil Levy's new book. Regarding final papers: just to clarify, you can discuss either situationism or implicit bias or both!Announced on 07 May 2014 5:03 p.m. by Declan Smithies
Implicit Association Test
Before next week, please take the Implicit Association Test at https://implicit.harvard.edu/implicit/takeatest.html Please read the Kelly and Roedder article for Monday and the Holroyd article for Wednesday. The Payne article is optional, but highly recommended, and its just five pages!Announced on 30 April 2014 2:03 a.m. by Declan Smithies
Third Paper Assignment
The third paper assignment will be announced in class tomorrow, i.e. Wednesday 30 April and the instructions will be made available on the homework page thereafter. Papers are due in class on Wednesday 14 May.Announced on 29 April 2014 10:12 p.m. by Declan Smithies
