St.
Thomas University
Great Ideas 3206
Dr. Thomas Bateman & Dr. Christine Cornell
Course
Outline
Course
Goals
This course
will explore the ways in which diverse thinkers have considered the question
of human nature. This question will be sharpened with a consideration of the
way in which human beings create, use, and are affected by technology.
Questions
that will be addressed throughout the course will include: What does it mean
to be human? Do we act within nature or over nature? Are we slaves or masters?
Are we our bodies? Is progress good? Should be or can we subject science and
technology to ethical limits? Are there some things we ought not to know? What
is freedom?
Course Requirements
The course
evaluation will consist of the following components:
Attendance
& Class Participation 10%
3 Essays 15% each
Short Assignments 15%
Final Exam 30%
Texts
Huxley,
Brave New World, HarperCollins
Fukuyama, Our Post-Human Future, HB Fenn
Milton, Paradise Lost, Norton
Swift, Gulliver's Travels, Norton
Rousseau, Discourses, Bedford
Shelley, Frankenstein, Oxford World Classics (1831 edition)
Bacon, New Atlantis and The Great Instauration, Crofts Classics
Capek, RUR, Dover
Grant, English-Speaking Justice, Anansi
Contact
At any time you may contact us by phone, e-mail or by appointment in our offices:
Dr. Bateman's office: HC 204
phone: 460-0356
email: bateman@stu.ca
office hours: T Th 10:00-11:30 am
Dr. Cornell's office: HC 218B
phone: 452-0483
email: cornell@stu.ca
office hours: M W 3:30-4:30 pm