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Dowling College  Dr Christian Perring

 

PHL 003A Introduction to Philosophy Spring 2003

 

Paper II.

 

3 pages/~900 words.  Due by midnight on Monday March 17. Even if you have not completed your paper by class, do NOT miss class.  If you find you are having difficulties writing your paper, contact me to let me know and I will help you.  If you paper is late without excuse, you will lose 1% per day on your paper grade. 

 

Papers must be submitted in an electronic form.  I prefer you to do so using Turnitin.com (the class ID is 59882, and the password is "philosophy"), but you can instead email me a copy of your paper in Word or RTF as an attachment, or give me a copy of your paper on disk.  You can if you want also give me a hard copy. 

 

Any form of plagiarism or academic dishonesty is unacceptable and may result in you failing the course and being reported to the Dean of Students.  Plagiarism is using sources in the writing of your paper without acknowledging your sources.  It is often a good idea to use other sources, but if you do so, you must say where you found information, either in parentheses or in a footnote.  If you quote directly or copy text from another source, you must put the quotation in quotation marks and say exactly where it comes from, giving page numbers or the exact URL.  I don’t require any particular reference format, but APA format is a good one to use.  (For more information on reference formats, the Dowling College Library website has a page on the Citation and Evaluation of Sources.)

 

For a short paper like this, you do not need introductory or concluding paragraphs.  Just answer the question. 

 

Answer ONE of the following questions.

 

  1. In "Descartes’ Evil Genius," O.K. Bouwsma argues that the idea that a supernaturally powerful evil genius could create a perfect illusion deceiving a person about the whole of reality is incoherent.  Explain his argument and spend at least a page assessing its strengths and weaknesses.
  2. In " The Sex of the Knower," Lorraine Code argues that the sex of a person is significant in our setting out conditions for when that person can be legitimately said to have knowledge.  Explain her argument and spend at least a page assessing its strengths and weaknesses.
  3. In " The Language Instinct," Steven Pinker argues against the idea that language determines thought.  Explain one strand of his argument and spend at least a page assessing its strengths and weaknesses.