In addition to some great intro courses :
PAR 101-Philosophical Thinking
PAR 103-Exploring Religions
PAR 115-Introduction to Ethics
and
PAR 125-Scriptures World Religion....
Check out our featured Summer and Fall PAR courses listed below!
SUMMER 2024:
PAR 232: ASIAN RELIGIONS
Summer Session I
OLASY
Dr. Beverley McGuire
This online and asynchronous course provides a historical and thematic overview of major religious traditions of Asia, including Confucian, Taoist, Hindu, Jain, Sikh, Buddhist, and Japanese religions. We will consider ways in which Asian religious practitioners have attempted to understand the nature of the world, human society, and a person's place within them. In examining religious traditions that in many ways seem wholly foreign or “other” in comparison to Western religions, our emphasis will be on the internal logic of each, on the resources that each provides for the construction of meaning, value, and moral vision.
PAR 371: BUDDHISM
Summer Session I
OLASY
Dr. Beverley McGuire
This online and asynchronous course examines Buddhism as a lived religion through its people, places, and practices that continue to be influential today. We will discuss Buddhist ideas and practices as a scholar of religion. The course objective is to identify, describe, and discuss Buddhist people, places, practices, ideas, and traditions.
PAR 215: Bioethics
Summer Session II
OLASY
Dr. Scott James
This online and asynchronous course explores some of the ethical issues confronting modern medicine. A further aim in this course is to develop your readiness to think critically about a problem, and to evaluate arguments for and against possible solutions. This involves both the ability to breakdown arguments into premises and conclusions and to identify the errors, weaknesses, and limitations of those arguments.
PAR 225: RELIGION AND GENDER
Summer Session II
OLASY
Dr. Diana Heath (formerly Walsh Pasulka)
This online and asynchronous introductory course examines how constructions of gender have influenced the practice of religion and definitions of agency, power, and liberation among religious people. The course objective is to provide students provide a basic overview of the major religious traditions of the world and gender roles therein.
FALL 2024:
PAR 201: History of Western Philosophy I ~ Dr. W. Thomas Schmid
** This course is an introduction to philosophy through the study of its origins in ancient Greece. We will discuss questions that have puzzled and intrigued human beings ever since thinking began—about the relationship of science to understanding human life, about the meaning of freedom, about human desire, and its relation to thinking about happiness, excellence, and friendship. **
PAR 205: American Philosophy ~ Dr. W. Thomas Schmid
** This class is an introduction to American philosophy through the study of some of its major artists, philosophers, and political thinkers. We will discuss questions that have puzzled and intrigued Americans throughout our history—about the relationship of faith and science to one another, and to understanding human life, about the meaning of freedom and its relation to thinking for oneself, about our country’s ideals, and how we achieve and fall short of them. **
PAR 225: Religion and Gender~ Dr. Diana Heath (formerly Walsh Pasulka)
** This course examines how constructions of gender have influenced the practice of religion and definitions of agency, power, and liberation among religious people. The course objective is to provide students provide a basic overview of the major religious traditions of the world and gender roles therein. **
PAR 235: Intro to Old Testament ~ Dr. Theodore Burgh
** This course explores a range of issues and inquiries related to the Bible regarding its nature, origin, composition, history, culture, setting, people, and their stories, and its teachings. Students analyze and analyze approaches to interpreting the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament, how it impacts people’s lives, how the study of the text developed, and the reasons for its enduring presence. Students will examine the range of literary genre, symbolic metaphors, figures of speech and religious and theological themes. **
PAR 320: Philosophy of Mind ~ Dr. Robert Smithson
** This course will introduce students to central questions about how the mind fits into the natural world. What is the nature of conscious experience? How does consciousness fit into our scientific conception of the world? What is the nature of representation? How do our mental states manage to represent the world outside of us? What is the connection between consciousness and representation? We will also consider the relevance of these questions to issues in other areas of philosophy, such as metaphysics, ethics, and philosophy of science. **
PAR 322: Ritual Therapy and Health ~ Dr. Dorcas Dennis
** This course explores the Caribbean religious and cultural understandings of health and healing, ethnomedical and ritual therapeutics including Ebo healing of Ifa divination in Santeria (Lukumi). We will be asking questions such as what are the therapeutic healing practices designed by religious ritual agents of the Caribbean? The objective is to examine the different health and healing approaches, techniques, and spaces in the Caribbean communities. **
PAR 360: Philosophy of Evolution ~ Dr. Scott James
** No recent idea has been more disruptive than Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection. From biology to sociology to psychology to ethics, Darwin's idea has prompted us to rethink our basic understanding of ourselves. In this course, we will ask: Why (if at all) we should believe Darwin's theory? Can we reconcile Darwin's theory with the idea of a providential God? What does Darwin's theory imply about human nature?
PAR 377: African American Religions ~ Dr. Seth Gaiters
** Study of the religious life and thought of Black American communities with concentration on independent traditions, sects, and a sampling of major thinkers and issues. Beginning with the era of American slavery, extending through 20th-century civil rights activism, and the current Black Lives Matter movement, students will explore the formation of Black religious communities and social movements throughout US history. **
PAR 390: Religion and Technology~ Dr. Jamie Brummitt
** Can technologies practice religion? Of course they can! This course explores the relationships between religion and technology in the past, present, and future. We will study spiritual machines, like Buddhist robot monks and ancient worshipper statues, as well as digital immortality, UFO religion, relics, and more! This course will help you evaluate modern assumptions about the non-religious nature of technology. We will challenge definitions of technology that only consider it digital in nature. We will also consider how religious technologies are alive. Rethink what you know about religion and technology! **
PAR 495: Philosophy of Artificial Intelligence ~ Dr. Robert Smithson
** In recent years, there has been remarkable technological progress on a certain form of artificial intelligence: large language models (LLMs). LLMs are expected to become a ubiquitous cultural force. This class will discuss some both theoretical and ethical questions surrounding this technology, such as: how is the intelligence of LLMs different from human intelligence? What can LLMs teach us about the nature of language? Could an LLM have conscious experience? Could an LLM have moral status? What kinds of ethical presuppositions are “embodied” in LLMs? What are the ethical ramifications of transferring high-level cognitive work from humans to machines? How might LLMs shape how we experience art? How might LLMs shape how we understand ourselves as human persons? **
***Please check your My Seaport for days/times for all PAR fall courses. ***
