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:
- Kantian Conception of Public Justice: A Critique
- On “Pond Scum”: Beyond Absolute Solitude
- Moral Cognition in Intergroup Disagreement
- The Inclusion of Sexual and Gender Minorities in Evolutionary Psychology Research
- Against Fukuyama on Capitalism
- Kuhn’s Incommensurability and Scientific Objectivity
- The Necessity of Ego Dissolution for Moral Growth
- Pero Tu Eres Gringa: Reimagining the Boundaries of Hispanic/Latine Identity through Embodied Perspectives
- Cultivating Wonder for the Natural World
- Pythagorean Women
- Beauty as Unconcealment: Heidegger’s Revival of Aesthetic Truth
- Implications of Philosophy in Solving Real-World Conflicts: How Different Types of Perspectivism Justify and Facilitate Gender Equality
- “Focus on the Pain”: The Dilemma of the Moral Self and the Ethics of Narrative Representation in Editorial Photography
- A Defense of the Traditional Account of Scientific Progress Against Thomas Kuhn
- An Alternative View on Human Relations with Non-Human Species
Contact
Department Name
Philosophy Department
Contact Name
Russell Marcus, Chair
Clinton, NY 13323