Philosophical Questions
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Professor Bloom provides an introduction to psychological theories of morality. Students will learn how research in psychology has helped answer some of the most central questions about human morality. For instance, which emotions are "moral" and why did these moral feelings evolve? What factors guide our moral judgments? And what factors predict when good people will do bad things?
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The most important piece of advice that Mandelbaum would give to an aspiring entrepreneur is to surround oneself with great people and ask these people lots of questions. Take the opportunity to meet with as many people as possible because they could potentially become a best friend, she suggests.
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Worthington answers the questions: Will the stock price of a company keep going up? He discusses Fludigm's financial history and how the company was able to continue to provide investors with a nice return.
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One of the principal myths concerning collaboration during World War II in France, as in other countries, is that the domestic collaborators did so despite themselves, or to prevent even greater atrocities. In fact, many French, Belgians, Hungarians, Poles, Dutch and others voluntarily and enthusiastically abetted the occupying Germans. This collaboration, inspired by anti-Semitism and xenophobia, often resulted in extremely zealous...more
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The class's examination of Nozick's minimal state has raised a number of important questions, most of which are rooted in his troublesome model of compensation. Nozick would respond with his threefold account of justice: (1) justice in acquisition, (2) justice in transfer, and (3) rectification of past injustices. Nozick brilliantly demonstrates that "liberty upsets patterns"--even though we can originally start off with any just...more
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Professor Shankar introduces the course and answers student questions about the material and the requirements. He gives an overview of Newtonian mechanics and explains its two components: kinematics and dynamics. He then reviews basic concepts in calculus through two key equations: x0 + v0t + ½ at2 and v2 = v02+ 2 a (x-x0), tracing the fate of a particle in one dimension along the x-axis.
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The course is an introduction to Dante and his cultural milieu through a critical reading of the Divine Comedy and selected minor works (Vita nuova, Convivio, De vulgari eloquentia, Epistle to Cangrande). An analysis of Dante's autobiography, the Vita nuova, establishes the poetic and political circumstances of the Comedy's composition. Readings of Inferno, Purgatory and Paradise seek to situate Dante's work within the intellectual and...more
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In this lecture, we use the overlapping generations model from the previous class to see, mathematically, how demographic changes can influence interest rates and asset prices. We evaluate Tobin's statement that a perpetually growing population could solve the Social Security problem, and resolve, in a surprising way, a classical argument about the link between birth rates and the level of the stock market. Lastly, we finish by laying...more
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The main focus of today's discussion is Rawls's third and most problematic principle, the difference principle, which states that income and wealth is to be distributed "to the greatest benefit of the least advantaged individual." This stems from the logic that what is good for the least advantaged individual will be good for the second-least advantaged, and the third, and so on. But what if slightly benefiting the least advantaged person...more
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(February 6, 2009) Bjoern Hartmann, of the Stanford HCI Group, gives an overview of different prototyping tools he has built with collaborators to address two research questions. First, how can tools enable a wider range of designers to create functional prototypes of ubiquitous computing interfaces? Second, how can design tools support the larger process of learning from these prototypes?
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Miroslav Volf, the Henry B. Wright Professor of Systematic Theology and Director for the Yale Center for Faith and Culture, interviews Muna Abu Sulayman of the Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Kingdom Foundation about questions of gender, religion and globalization, particularly in the context of the head scarf debate.
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Professor Snowden describes the final exam, and takes questions from students.
