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DEGREE REGULATIONS & PROGRAMMES OF STUDY 2015/2016

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DRPS : Course Catalogue : School of Philosophy, Psychology and Language Sciences : Philosophy

Postgraduate Course: Philosophy of Well-Being MSc (PHIL11155)

Course Outline
SchoolSchool of Philosophy, Psychology and Language Sciences CollegeCollege of Humanities and Social Science
Credit level (Normal year taken)SCQF Level 11 (Postgraduate) AvailabilityNot available to visiting students
SCQF Credits20 ECTS Credits10
SummaryThis course will examine well-being, a central issue in moral philosophy.

Shared with undergraduate course Philosophy of Well-Being PHIL10152.

For courses co-taught with undergraduate students and with no remaining undergraduate spaces left, a maximum of 8 MSc students can join the course. Priority will be given to MSc students who wish to take the course for credit on a first come first served basis after matriculation.
Course description The course has two (roughly equal) parts:

Part 1: In this part we examine the main theories of well-being. These include hedonism, desire-fulfillment theory, objective-list theory, perfectionism. We will also look at some more recently developed theories, including hybrid theories.

Part 2: In this part we examine some general theoretical issues connected to well-being. These include: attempts to understand how well-being differs from other kinds of evaluation (moral, aesthetic, etc) and scepticism about the concept of well-being. We will also look at whether well-being is holistic by examining whether lifetime well-being is some simple function from momentary well-being (the 'shape of a life' debate). We will also examine how time and death connect to well-being, by looking at issues such as the timing of prudential goods, whether (and why) death is bad for us, and whether posthumous events can impact well-being (and, if so, how).

**Tutorials for PG students will happen on Tuesday 9th February and Tuesday 29th March 2016 (teaching weeks 5 and 11) at 1.10 - 2.00pm in room 4.01 Dugald Stewart Building. Please make sure that you attend both tutorials.
Entry Requirements (not applicable to Visiting Students)
Pre-requisites Co-requisites
Prohibited Combinations Other requirements None
Course Delivery Information
Academic year 2015/16, Not available to visiting students (SS1) Quota:  8
Course Start Semester 2
Timetable Timetable
Learning and Teaching activities (Further Info) Total Hours: 200 ( Lecture Hours 22, Seminar/Tutorial Hours 2, Programme Level Learning and Teaching Hours 4, Directed Learning and Independent Learning Hours 172 )
Assessment (Further Info) Written Exam 0 %, Coursework 80 %, Practical Exam 20 %
Additional Information (Assessment) Essay and Participation [Essay 3,000 words, 80%; Participation 20%]

The participation assessment will take the form of two (short) in-class quizzes (each worth 5%) and one presentation (either individual or small group, depending on numbers), worth 10%

Essay deadline: Thursday 21st April 2016 by 12 noon.
Return deadline: Friday 13th May 2016
Feedback - MSc-only tutorials in weeks 5 and 11
- Students have the opportunity to submit a formative essay by week 6 deadline on Turnitin via Learn. The essay cannot be draft of summative essay but it can be on the same topic.

Formative essay deadline: Thursday 25th February 2016 by 12 noon
Return deadline: Friday 18th March 2016
No Exam Information
Learning Outcomes
On completion of this course, the student will be able to:
  1. develop core philosophical skills in philosophy interpreting authors, reconstructing and evaluating arguments, articulating theories, etc.
  2. gain knowledge of the main theories of well-being, and their strengths and weakness.
  3. defend the student's preferred theory (if any).
  4. understand some of the main philosophical debates and practical issues which the theory of wellbeing has implications for.
  5. gain confidence to give a short class presentation with the help of clear visual aids and ability to write an essay on the theory of well-being which displays critical assessment along with knowledge of the literature.
Reading List
Textbook: The Philosophy of Well-Being: An Introduction as a textbook. This book will have a chapter corresponding to each week of class, giving a general overview of the topic. This will be supplemented with chapters from my (edited) Handbook of the Philosophy of Well-Being along with papers and books such as the following:

Crisp, R. (2006), 'Hedonism Reconsidered': Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 73: 619-645.
Darwall, S. Welfare and Rational Care (Princeton: PUP, 2004).
Feldman, F. Pleasure and the Good Life: Concerning the Nature, Varieties and Plausibility of Hedonism (Oxford: OUP, 2004).
Fletcher. G. (2013) 'A Fresh Start for the Objective-List Theory of Well-Being', Utilitas, 25, 206-220.
Haybron, D. The Pursuit of Unhappiness (OUP) Dorsey, D. (2010), Three Arguments for Perfectionism. Noûs, 44: 59-79.
Hawkins, J. (2014) 'Well-Being, Time and Dementia', Ethics, 507-542.
Hawley, K. 'Persistence and Time' The Cambridge Companion to Life and Death (ed.Steven Luper).
Hurka, T. 'Good' and 'Good For', Mind, 96 (1987), 71-3.
Kraut, R. 'Two Conceptions of Happiness', The Philosophical Review, 88 (1979),
167-97. What is Good and Why: The Ethics of Well-Being (Cambridge Mass.: HUP, 2007).
Lauinger, W. (2011) 'Dead Sea Apples and Desire-Fulfillment Welfare Theories', Utilitas, 23, 324-43.
Pitcher, G. 'The Misfortunes of the Dead', American Philosophical Quarterly, 21 (1984), 183-8.
Portmore, D. 'Desire-fulfilment and posthumous harm', American Philosophical Quarterly, 44 (2007), 27-38.
Regan, D. 'Why am I My Brother's Keeper?' in R. J. Wallace et al. (eds.) Reason and Value: Themes from the Moral Philosophy of Joseph Raz (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2004), 202-30.
Rosati, C. 'Internalism and the Good for a Person', Ethics, 106 (1996), 297-326.
Rosati, C.'Personal Good' in T. Horgan and M. Timmons (eds.) Metaethics After Moore (Oxford: OUP, 2006), 107-32.
Rosati, C. 'Objectivism and Relational Good', Social Philosophy and Policy (forthcoming).
Sarch, A. (2011) 'Internalism about a Person's Good: Don't Believe It', Philosophical Studies, 154(2).
Sarch, A. (2013). Desire Satisfactionism and Time. Utilitas, 25, pp 221-245. Glasgow, J. (2013) 'The shape of a life and the value of loss and gain', Philosophical Studies, 162/3, 665-82.
Sobel, D. 'Full Information Accounts of Well-Being', Ethics, 104 (1994), 784-810.
Velleman, D. (1991) 'Well-Being and Time,' Pacific Philosophical Quarterly, 72, 48-77.

Full reading list available on Learn.
Additional Information
Course URL Please see Learn
Graduate Attributes and Skills - Presentation Skills
- Writing Skills
Additional Class Delivery Information The course will be taught by Dr Guy Fletcher.

Tutorials for PG students will happen on Tuesday 9th February and Tuesday 29th March 2016 (teaching weeks 5 and 11) at 1.10 - 2.00pm in room 4.01 Dugald Stewart Building. Please make sure that you attend both tutorials.
KeywordsWell-Being,Happiness,Utility
Contacts
Course organiserDr Guy Fletcher
Tel: (0131 6)51 7112
Email: Guy.Fletcher@ed.ac.uk
Course secretaryMiss Lynsey Buchanan
Tel: (0131 6)51 5002
Email: Lynsey.Buchanan@ed.ac.uk
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