[Textop-en-phil] Top level outline headings

[Dr. Clea F. Rees]

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> Things in general
> Human being
> [and here I need to start editing...]
> Philosophy of Language
> Epistemology
> Methodology
> Ethics
> Political Philosophy
> Philosophy of Education
>
> Now, let's suppose I rename the last six nodes according to the main
> subjects of those disciplines, so that the whole list looks like this:
>
> Things in general
> Human being
> Language
> Knowledge
> Inquiry
> Right and Wrong (?)
> Governance
> Education

What is the intended audience for this? Would it make sense to include
both these labels and the discipline labels? (e.g. Language (Philosophy
of)). If Language will contain more than this, maybe the discipline
name should be included in a sub-heading. I personally would find it
annoyingly difficult to navigate given the proposed outline. Of course,
I'm a philosophy. I realise the discipline names are not obvious to
everyone, though, which is why I think a combination might work well.

I don't think "Ethics" can become "Right and Wrong" unless this is
meant to deal with only a part of ethics and the rest is going to go
somewhere else. You might try "Value" which should capture both ethics
and aesthetics. "Right and Wrong" leaves out virtue ethics, much of
feminist ethics and, possibly, meta-ethics.

Where will feminist philosophy fit? I don't think that the various
subjects discussed in this discipline can be properly subsumed under
the other headings.

Where does mind fit? Is "Human Being" intended to cover this?

What about continental philosophy? I know the distinction is
controversial and don't intend to take endorse either position.
Nonetheless, the work involved (including discussions of the
controversy) cannot really be ignored.

Where will discussions of game theory etc. fit in? I thought of this
because I couldn't see Pascal's wager fitting into the religion
outline. This seems right because that is meant to be under
metaphysics, I think. I'm not sure where it fits in the renamed
version. Clearly there is not a 1-1 mapping here and I take it this is
intentional. (6 becomes 7 for a start.)

Is logic/phil of maths intended to fall under "Enquiry"?

> I am distinguishing between God and things divine, on the one hand, and
> religion as a phenomenon, on the other.  Hobbes, for example, spoke about
> both.  *Qua* social group phenomenon in general, it clearly belongs to the
> study of society.  *Qua* the details of the specific tenets/theologies of
> individual religions, I suppose religion belongs wherever we put the topics
> of metaphysics, ethics, and history.  *Qua* history of religion, under
> history again.  *Qua* academic subject in its own right ("religious
> studies") the topic of religion belongs under "inquiry" (or whatever I
> substitute for "methodology").

Why? Why not under "Knowledge"? I'm not much less certain about the
distinction between knowledge and enquiry, on the one hand, than i am
about that between epistemology and methodology, on the other.

Babbling back,
Clea

- -- 

Dr. Clea F. Rees
Visiting Assistant Professor

Department of Philosophy
Cowell College
University of California
Santa Cruz
CA 95064
U.S.A.

Tel:	+1-831-459-5045
 	+1-831-459-2609 (msg)
Fax:	+1-831-459-4880

NB:  From UK, dial 00 before the appropriate number to access the
international system.

cfrees at imapmail.org
http://people.ucsc.edu/~cfrees/

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