Philosophy
The goal of the Philosophy Department is to work with students to develop the skills of critical analysis, powerful speaking, and clear writing, skills alumni find of singular practical use in a wide variety of careers, and indispensable to their work as responsible citizens. We emphasize the value of philosophical examination for understanding broad issues that concern us all.
The Senior Program
Philosophy concentrators take the senior seminar, 550, in the fall of their senior year. In collaboration with others in a small course section, students in 550 complete a clear and focused piece of philosophical writing or project that they present publicly. The written and oral work should show that students have developed the philosophical skills that merit a degree in philosophy at Hamilton College.
Recent Senior Thesis projects include:
- Conviction and Conversation: The Benefits of Listening to Hypocrites
- House Culture: The Embodied Aesthetic of Authenticity and Model for Community Building
- Schopenhauer and the Experience Machine
- The Cost of Unknowing: Examining the Role of Willful Ignorance in Seeking Emotional Comfort
- This May or May Not Be Something: How Narratives Inform Our (Un)certainties about Identity and Reality
- It’s Not an Imitation, It’s a Becoming: Why Teaching Method Acting is Unethical with Respect to Identity and the Self
- The Science of Living: The Emergence of a Novel Discourse of Self-Improvement
- Bodies Act Back: Can the Marriage of Feminism and Ethical Veganism Be Saved?
- Against Adversarial Argumentation
- Ontology and Environmental Activism
- Laughter and Meaning in Nietzsche – How to Philosophize in an Unstable World
- Mariátegui’s Myth and Reason in Revolutionary Praxis
- Living Awake in the World: Indigenous Wisdom and the Attention Economy
- Self-Definition in the Working World.
- The Hoax of Personality Testing: A Critique of the Dangerous Industry That Conflates Science with Selfhood, and An Exploration of Alternative Avenues for Understanding the Self
- A Journey from Sisyphus to the Psyche
- Depraved or Just Dirty? What Can Disgust Tell Us About Moral Value?
- The Poets Strike Back: a Defense of Fiction
- A Picture of Jazz: Language in Wittgenstein’s Philosophical Investigations and Jazz Improvisation
- Stop Making Sense: Wittgenstein, Absurdist Theater, and the Challenge of Meaning
- Intentionally Saving the Day: Mental State Ascription and Moral Valence in Knobe Effect
Contact
Department Name
Philosophy Department
Contact Name
Russell Marcus, Chair
Clinton, NY 13323
