Religion, Philosophy and Ethics BA

We all have opinions about moral matters. But for most of us, our moral opinions are not very well-organised. Indeed, upon reflection we may discover that some of our beliefs about morality are inconsistent.

Normative ethics is the branch of moral philosophy that attempts to systematize everyday judgements about the rightness and wrongness of actions.

It's a wide area of study and we'll focus on two traditions within it:

• contractualism - which holds that the rightness and wrongness of acts depends on principles no one could reasonably reject
• character ethics - which emphasises the relationship between right action and good and bad character

By the end you'll have a clear understanding of:

• the aims and methodologies of involved
• some of the main theories, such as consequentialism, deontology, contractualism and virtue ethics (and some of their influential variants)

You'll also be able to:

• reason to a well thought-out position on various topics in ethics
• develop your own views, drawing upon the sources on which the module focuses

This module is worth 20 credits.

Explore the landscape of religions in modern British society, with particular emphasis on:

• Christianity
• Judaism
• Islam
• secularism
• nonreligion

You'll be introduced to leading theories of the sociological study of religion, including models for interfaith contact and dialogue, and examine how these theories and approaches developed.

Through groupwork you'll research an interfaith topic for a class presentation, learning to communicate your ideas to a supportive audience.

This module is worth 20 credits.

The module begins with an exploration of various theories of naming, paying particular attention to the works of Frege, Russell (including the theory of descriptions), and Kripke. We then turn our attention to various puzzles concerning the nature of meaning, including the distinction between analytic and synthetic sentences.

In the final part of the module, we move on to a discussion of some of the mainstream theories of meaning; particularly, a truth-conditional semantics, and we explore how this might be developed to take into account indexical terms such as 'I', 'now', and 'here'. Some of the skills acquired in Elementary Logic will be applied in this module.

Where does the mind meet the world? In sensory perception.

By perceiving, we become conscious of a reality beyond our minds. Or do we?

Mind and Consciousness explores perception and perceptual consciousness.

It asks question such as:

• Do we really perceive a world beyond our minds?
• What are the theories of perception and perceptual consciousness?
• How do we distinguish different senses – what makes seeing different from hearing?
• Can our perceptions be biased? Do our prejudices change the way we see things?
• Is dreaming perceiving, or does it belong to another category of mind like imagining?

By the end of this module, you'll be able to:

• understand the main positions in the philosophy of perception
• analyse and evaluate rival views on these topics

This module is worth 20 credits.

Metaethics is about how ethics works. It's not about judging whether something is morally good or bad in any particular instance but critiquing the foundations used to make the judgements. Some of the questions we might ask are:

• Are there moral facts?
• What is moral truth?
• Do psychopaths really understand moral language?

Like many areas of philosophy metaethics has several branches and by the end of this module you'll be able to:

• understand the main positions in contemporary metaethics
• analyse and evaluate rival views on these topics

This module is worth 20 credits.

For a good pre-module introduction to the subject have a read of chapter six of Ethics for A level by Mark Dimmock and Andrew Fisher. It's an open-source resource so free to access.

• What is art?
• Is there a relationship between art and ethics?
• What is the relationship between art and emotion?

Together we'll explore these philosophical issues and more. By the end of the module you'll:

• have a good awareness of many of the critical debates in the philosophy of art
• recognise and judge for yourself the strengths and weaknesses of arguments on the issues

This module is worth 20 credits.

This module takes formal logic beyond the basics (as covered in first year Reasoning, Argument, and Logic). We’ll cover Propositional Logic, First-Order Logic, and Modal Logic (going into more detail where these were covered in first year).

We’ll learn about existence, identity, possibility, and necessity, and we’ll learn formal techniques for testing the validity of arguments. We’ll apply these logical techniques to help us make sense of challenging concepts and arguments in metaphysics and philosophy of language.

Aristotle declared that “All men by nature desire to know”. But we apparently live in a ‘post-truth’ era characterized by fake news, alternative facts, and scorn for expertise. These are major dangers to our way of life and dealing with them requires epistemology—the study of such topics as knowledge, evidence, justification, and reliability.

In this module, we will explore issues such as: the nature and value of knowledge, the relationship between knowledge and justification, the threat of skepticism, the role of testimony in acquiring knowledge, and various intellectual virtues and vices. Some questions we will tackle include: What is knowledge? Why should we care about it? What is our justification for believing things? Do we know that we’re not brains in vats? Do we know anything at all?

Can we understand the world as an integrated whole? Is modern society ultimately a prison? Is philosophy, history, language, or life in general is established on masculine values? This module aims to provide in-depth and critical understanding of the important themes that surrounds Arthur Schopenhauer’s philosophical pessimism, Michel Foucault’s political anthropology, and Luce Irigaray’s feminine project.

This module addresses issues in social metaphysics and social epistemology. We will examine the metaphysics of social kinds and explore different accounts of social kinds that have been offered. We will also examine how the fact that we are situated in a social world can affect what we can or cannot know or understand about ourselves, each other, and the social world itself. We will also address ethical and/or political issues that arise once we take account of social metaphysics and social epistemology.

In particular, we might consider whether there are special kinds of injustices that arise due to our social reality. What is epistemic injustice and how does it relate to social injustice? How do certain privileged groups structure the social world that create and maintain privilege and patterns of ignorance that perpetuate that privilege? What are some obligations that we have, given metaphysical and epistemological concerns we have explored? 

• Are you obliged to obey the law even when you disagree with it?
• What features must a state have in order to be legitimate?

In this module we will approach these classic questions of political philosophy by examining the work of a number of important past political philosophers. This might include Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, and Jean-Jacques Rousseau but this isn't a fixed list - it may vary according to particular issues and student input.

We will look at both:

• why the thinkers' works have been open to different interpretations
• evaluate their arguments under these different interpretations

This module is worth 20 credits.

We look at some fundamental metaphysical questions about the cosmos. A selection of the following topics will be studied:

• Objects: concrete vs. abstract; existence and nothingness
• Sets and mereology
• Properties, Property bearers, Relations
• States of affairs and non-mereological composition
• Modality (including counterfactuals) and possible worlds
• Time, persistence, change, and the non-present

We'll examine the Asian philosophical traditions, especially those of India, China, and Japan.

These Asian traditions address familiar philosophical themes - in ethics, epistemology, and aesthetics - but often approach them in ways that seem unfamiliar.

You may well find your culturally inherited presuppositions challenged. This is good! As global power relationships change understanding culture is vital to meaningful communication.

Topics we may cover include:

• Confucianism, Mohism, Daoism, Buddhism, and Hinduism the relationship between morality and religion
• etiquette, ethics and aesthetics
• the family and moral life
• social and political philoosophy
• animals, natural environments, and human flourishing
• the nature of ultimate reality and the good life
• the relation of Asian philosophies to the Western tradition

This module is worth 20 credits.

What is the nature of space, time and motion? Is space/time/motion relative or absolute? How can we come to know? These are some central questions in the philosophy of space and time which this module explores. 

This module will discuss how thinkers such as Descartes, Newton, Leibniz, Du Chatelet, Mach and Einstein have used philosophical arguments to try to answer the question about the nature of space, time and motion.

Module description to be confirmed.

This module will examine Christian theological understandings of the nature of the human person. It will begin by exploring the background to such understandings in the Hebrew scriptures and ancient Greek philosophy, exploring particularly the nature of the soul, the importance of the body and gender. Of central importance will be a theological anthropology focused on the imago dei.
 
The module will progress to the study of Christ as the true human and the mediaeval concept of the human person as a microcosm of the cosmos. The latter stages of the module will focus on theological anthropology in the context of modern philosophical anthropologies, and contemporary ethical issues surrounding human 'enhancement' via medical technologies.

Explore the theology of Paul as found in the seven letters that are generally considered to be written by him (Romans, 1 and 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Philippians, 1 Thessalonians, Philemon).

The major themes explored are:

• law
• reconciliation
• justification
• grace
• faith
• sacrifice
• word of God
• Christology
• Israel
• the church
• ethics
• the ‘last things’.

Watch Professor Richard Bell give an overview of this module in less than 60 seconds.

This module examines how Muslims have addressed fundamental theological and philosophical questions relating to their faith. These questions concern the foundations of religious knowledge and authority, God's unity and attributes, God's relationship to the world, divine determinism and human freedom, prophecy, and human destiny beyond death.

Key figures will include the Mu'tazili and Ash'ari philosophical theologians, the philosophers Ibn Sina (Avicenna) and Ibn Rushd (Averroes), Isma'ili esotericism, and the influential medieval intellectuals al-Ghazali, Ibn al-'Arabi, and Ibn Taymiyya. Selections from primary sources will be read in translation, and special attention will be given to the integration of late antique philosophical traditions into Islamic thought about God, God's relation to the world, and human destiny. 

This module will explore key concepts and themes in Africana philosophies and religions, paying particular attention to Africana notions of the human person and human life within a spirit-filled cosmos.

After reviewing critiques of Eurocentric conceptions of philosophy and religion by decolonial thinkers such as Okot p’Bitek, Kwasi Wiredu and Sylvia Wynter, we discuss a variety of texts and sources that highlight and elaborate core concepts in indigenous African modes of thought, such as ‘vital force’, ubuntu, destiny and the world. Thereafter, we consider how Africana philosophies and religions offer fresh approaches to addressing various issues in the contemporary world.

The sort of questions we might consider here include:

• How might African accounts of humanity radicalise concepts of gender?
• Are Africana cosmological narratives able to counter heteronormativity?
• Can the philosophy of ubuntu promote environmental justice?
• What do Africana notions of witchcraft disclose about the dangers of human sociality and the possibility of trust?
• Can black humanity be affirmed in ways that refuse the social death of anti-black racism?

In this module you’ll explore significant problems in the philosophy of religion, such as the credibility of the existence of God, the relation between religion and science, the relation between religion and morality, the problem of evil, and the possibility of an after-life. There will also be discussion of significant themes, such as the nature of being, of faith, of religious experience, of religious language, and of religious love.  This module is taught through four hours of lecture and an hour-long seminar weekly.

Watch Dr Conor Cunningham give an overview of this video in just over 60 seconds.

The module provides an overview of the most important theological and philosophical ideas, theories and arguments that Jewish thought developed from the Hellenistic period of Philo of Alexandria to the postmodern times of Emmanuel Levinas. The method of instruction will combine historical and speculative approaches, using the perspective of the 'history of ideas'. 

Module description to be confirmed.

This module involves employability skills training in the Autumn semester followed by a part-time placement (one day a week, or equivalent, up to eight weeks) in an external organisation in the spring semester. The module is aimed at developing hands-on work experience and enhancing employability skills in a workplace relevant to arts graduates. Skills developed during the placement will be intrinsically relevant to various work environments.  

Students will apply for placements in relevant local organisations from an established list created by the faculty placement team, but may also use personal contacts to arrange their own placement, subject to approval. Placements will be provided across a range of sectors relevant to the arts including the creative and cultural industries, media, marketing, heritage and museums, the music industry, education, charitable and third-sector organisations, but are subject to change each year. In the autumn term lectures and workshops will be organised across the faculty, with input by the Careers and Employability Service to provide learning support on professional development and skills assessment, networking, successful applications and interviews, self-presentation and self-reflection.   

Assessment will comprise an online portfolio of materials, including application materials, reflective writing and a research report situating the work and function of the placement organisation in the context of the wider sector of which it is a part. Throughout, students will be encouraged to reflect individually and in groups on their own employability, and plan for their ongoing professional development.