About the Philosophy Department

 Trinity College

Ask Richard Lee of Trinity's Philosophy Department what philosophy is and he will respond that it is the "process of making the familiar strange - and the strange familiar." Ask what he means by that, and he will very likely smile, turn to his desk, and open a drawer.

There, amidst the paper clips and manila folders, is a box containing a black, convex disk with what looks like a stainless steel tack on top. Rotating the disk so as to rotate the tack, he'll then ask you what you see.

If you say that you see a stainless steel tack rotating on a black, convex disk, he'll ask you to pick up the tack, which may seem simple - until you try. As your fingers close around it, it dissolves just as surely as a handful of light.

If that tack seemed to be there, it was only courtesy of several well-placed mirrors. And just as tacks aren't always where we think, things aren't always what they seem. The study of philosophy teaches us that, moving us from simply having ideas to knowing how to think - how to concentrate, analyze, and synthesize toward rational explanations for the world around us at all levels and in all aspects.

That ability is something Trinity's Philosophy majors all master in time. Upon graduation, they take with them more than a diploma. They take with them a skill critical to the success of most endeavors.

Some Philosophy alumni have gone on to graduate school and to careers in teaching philosophy. Edward Kazarian '93 wrote an outstanding thesis on the thought of the French post-modernist, Giles DeLeuze, which helped him win acceptance at the two major graduate schools emphasizing post-modernist philosophy. He is now a graduate student at Villanova University. Others have become journalists or artists, corporate executives and lawyers. In fact, a former Philosophy major recently wrote that she was hired by a very well-regarded local law firm because she was a Philosophy major at Trinity: "...the deciding factor in my employment was that I had majored in Philosophy while at Trinity."

Philosophy Major Jon Entine '74, a nationally known author and Emmy Award-winning journalist, says that he has "taken the lessons of my college education and put them in a wider context... Trinity shaped my values and sharpened my intellectual skills. I was trying to learn my place in the world and that's what change d me."

A Rich Curriculum

The Philosophy curriculum at Trinity combines the historical sequence of philosophy with its connection to the arts, to the humanities, and especially to the sciences.

In addition to six courses tracing the chronological development of philosophy, the Department provides courses on:

The Requirements for a B.A. in Philosophy

Candidates for the Bachelor of Arts degree in Philosophy must successfully complete a total of 11 courses within the discipline:

Majors anticipating graduate-level studies are advised to achieve competence in either French or German.

Specialized Studies

If a stone has been left unturned, students can easily turn it by pursuing an Independent Study. Supervised by a faculty member, Independent Studies involve a wide range of reading and the completion of an extended paper. Recent Independent Studies have included The Schizophrenic Mind and Consciousness and Brain Scanning.

Students may also choose an in-depth study within the framework of a Tutorial, wherein frequent meetings and extended, detailed discussions with a supervising faculty member are required. Topics of recent tutorials have included Ethics and Sexual Orientation and Ethics and World Hunger. Matt Simpson '94, now a student in the Ph.D. program at Boston University, completed a tutorial with Professor Drew Hyland on Plato's Theaetetus in Greek.

Majors seeking to graduate with honors in Philosophy are required to complete a Senior Thesis, which resembles an Independent Study or Tutorial, but which includes the writing of an extended paper for review by two or more Department faculty members. Recent Senior Theses have been written on ecofeminism, the ethics of population control, a defense of Ronald Dworkin's philosophy of law, and a communitarian critique of John Rawls. Other subjects of recent student research are Nietzsche and Nazism and Aesthetics and Mathematics.

Interdisciplinary Studies

Trinity's Philosophy Department shares interests, course work, and research with many other departments at the College, adding considerable depth to the study of philosophy.

The Philosophy Department's innovation in providing detailed links between philosophy and science has been recognized by a National Science Foundation grant. The tradition of Western philosophy has always emphasized the intertwining of philosophic and scientific thought, such as the relation between cosmology and metaphysics, and the nature of knowledge itself. Trinity is the only undergraduate school in the country to pursue these connections in the form of philosophy labs. At Trinity, a philosophy laboratory now exists where students can perform research on the concept of time, computational science, and the modeling of certain kinds of mental activity, such as memory - all in relationship to philosophy.

Thought processes are of central interest to philosophy, psychology, and neuroscience; therefore, the Philosophy Department works closely with the Psychology Department and the Neuroscience Program. Because our perception of the world around us is inextricably linked to and revealed in the creative process and product, the Philosophy Department works closely with the English and Fine Arts Departments. And because philosophers reflect and affect the time in which they live, the Philosophy Department works closely with History, through courses such as The Presocratics to Augustine and Hume to the End of the 19th century. Philosophy students at Trinity have collaborated with professors of history and psychology on recent research papers.

The value of studying philosophy is recognized by Trinity students across all the disciplines. In a recent study of 14 Northeast colleges, Trinity led in philosophy course enrollments by undergraduates.

A Distinguished Faculty

Trinity's Philosophy faculty are distinguished teachers whose classroom expertise is complemented by active scholarship. In one recent year, three professors in the Department had books published. At the same time, the top teaching awards at the College for a senior member of the faculty and a junior member have been won by Philosophy faculty. This is a fairly large department: Trinity ranked near the top in the survey of 14 comparable Northeast colleges in terms of number of professors in the department. With seven professors, the Department is larger than those of some Ph.D.-granting institutions.

Richard Lee, whose specialties include metaphysics, ethics, and modern philosophy, is involved in ethics research, while Helen Lang, who specializes in Aristotle and medieval philosophy, is doing research on ancient and medieval philosophy and spearheading the development of the philosophy laboratory initiative.

Miller Brown, who teaches the philosophy of psychology, medical ethics, analytical philosophy, and epistemology, studies medical ethics; emeritus Professor Howard DeLong, whose areas of expertise include logic and American political philosophy, is the author of one book on mathematical logic, another on voting theory; and Drew Hyland, whose focus includes ancient, existential, and contemporary European philosophy as well as the philosophy of sport, is involved in a study of Plato.

In addition to serving as Department Chairperson, Maurice Wade, an expert in political philosophy, Marx/Marxism, Hume, and African philosophy, also directs the Public Policy Studies Program and teaches in the African Studies section of the International Studies Program. Dan Lloyd, who teaches philosophy of mind, is himself studying the cognitive sciences and the basis of consciousness in the brain.

A Strategic Location

Trinity's proximity to the city is of particular importance in a subject matter so closely aligned with the sciences, history, literature, and the fine arts.

Nearby are several hospitals of national stature, including the Institute of Living and Hartford Hospital, as well as a large selection of fine community health care facilities. The world-class Wadsworth Atheneum is just minutes from the College, as are the Hill-Stead Museum and the New Britain Museum of American Art. The Connecticut Historical Society is close by, along with the historic homes and literary and art collections of The Mark Twain Museum, The Harriet Beecher Stowe Center, the Connecticut and Wethersfield Historical Societies, and the Webb Deane Stevens Museum. The city is home to many arts organizations, including the Hartford Symphony Orchestra, the Hartford Ballet, The Connecticut Opera, and such theatrical companies as the Producer's Guild, Hartford Stage, Company One, and TheaterWorks. And a few blocks from campus are the seats of both municipal and state government and their attendant agencies.

Hartford's proximity to New York and Boston promises a wealth of additional resources to enhance learning at Trinity, both in and out of the classroom.

Real-World Opportunities

Trinity's setting in Hartford provides student philosophers with excellent opportunities for internships that will enhance their major. In keeping with the Department's commitment to interdisciplinary study, Philosophy majors have pursued internships with arts and other organizations such as U.S. Senator Christopher Dodd's office; hospitals, such as Hartford, Mt. Sinai-St. Francis, John Dempsey Hospital, and the Institute of Living; and many other agencies and institutions, such as the State Department of Corrections. Matt Gandal '89 did an internship as a project manager for Food Share and is now a research assistant, Educational Issues Department, at the American Federation of Teachers in Washington.

Teaching Assistantships in Philosophy are available and provide an outstanding opportunity for majors to apply their knowledge of the subject matter by leading review sessions, reading papers, or assisting in classwork.

Study Abroad

Since a change in vantage point changes one's perception, Trinity's Philosophy Department encourages its majors to study abroad. Philosophy students have attended the London School of Economics and universities in Edinburgh and Vienna, as well as Oxford and Cambridge in England. After a semester abroad of environmental studies in Kenya, Terri Lee '95 decided she wanted to work with ecosystem mapping. She says, "I was encouraged by people advising me at Trinity to study away my senior spring semester, where I did research and analyzed data for a national wildlands project. Because Trinity worked with me and adapted to my needs, I was able to see my project to fruition and help preserve critical habitats, and still return to my base at Trinity."

State-of-the-Art Resources

Trinity's Philosophy Department benefits from Trinity's campus-wide computer network, which clearly plays an integral part in enhancing each student's educational experiences. Every dorm room is wired for direct computer networking, offering links to other students, to faculty, to the CTW library system, to the campus-wide Local Area Network, and, through the College's subscription, to the Internet international computer network and the World Wide Web.

The Philosophy Department uses the electronic bulletin board for discussions outside of the classroom in a number of courses: Critical Thinking, Computers and Philosophy, Philosophy in Literature, Minds and Brains, Introduction to Cognitive Science, and Issues in Cognitive Science.

 

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