Social & Political Philosophy Philosophy 33, Fall 2006

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Contact How to get in touch with Michael Green.
Grades Qualitative and quantitative explanations of what grades mean.
Notes My perspective on each session.
Sakai Use Sakai for announcements, due dates, the roster, and e-reserve readings.
Syllabus The plan for each session in glorious PDF.
Writing My advice about philosophy papers. Worth every penny it costs to click.

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This website is the same as the one you might remember. It just has a different address and a new look. The content is all the same.

Class notes

Thomas Hobbes [1651]Picture of Thomas Hobbes

  1. The state of nature
    1. Handout: Hobbes and Aristotle’s politics [pdf]
    2. Follow-up: Aristotle on natural and artificial
  2. The laws of nature
    1. Handout: Hobbes and Aristotle’s ethics [pdf]
  3. Justice and rights
    1. Handout: Hobbes on justice [pdf]
    2. Handout: Hobbes on rights [pdf]
    3. Follow-up: Natural property rights (14 Sept)
    4. Follow-up: Robin on authorization (14 Sept)
    5. Follow-up: Ramy’s question about reading ‘dead guys’ (16 Sept)
  4. Sovereignty
  5. Hobbes on Liberty
    1. Handout: Hobbes (and Aristotle) on Liberty [pdf]
  6. Religious liberty and authority
    1. Handout: Christian liberty [pdf]

John Stuart Mill [1860s]Picture of John Stuart Mill

  1. Mill on liberty and utilitarianism
  2. Handout: Utilitarianism as an esoteric doctrine [pdf]
  3. Lewis, Mill, and Milquetoast

John Rawls [1971, 1993]Picture of John Rawls

  1. Handout: Vocabulary [pdf]
  2. Rawls and utilitarianism
  3. Rawls, Nozick, and libertarianism
  4. Rawls on liberty
  5. Hart on Rawls on Liberty
    1. Handout: Rawls’s principles [pdf]
    2. Rawls on Hart on Rawls on Liberty
  6. Political Liberalism
    1. What’s the problem?
    2. Handout: problem and vocabulary [pdf]
    3. Reasonableness
    4. Public reason
    5. Handout: Public reason (plus one last shot at the ‘problem’ of religious belief) [pdf]
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Social and Political Philosophy