|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Course Criteria
Add courses to your favorites to save, share, and find your best transfer school.
-
3.00 Credits
This course explores aspects of the European eighteenth century as a transformative epoch in the history of western culture. Though the Enlightenment is usually associated especially with France, in this course we will focus on Italy, as the irresistible goal of travelers taking part in the "Grand Tour," and as a landscape of powerful ancient and modern architecture and artworks universally recognized as exemplary. In particular we will study one of the strangest and most fascinating visual artists of the period, the self-proclaimed architect Giovani Battista Piranesi (1720-1778) famous no less now than in his own time for his fantastic prison engravings as well as his views of Rome, involving a radical rethinking of the city as a particular kind of inhabited as well as imagined space. Piranesi's polemical response to the advocates of the Greek revival, then coming into fashion, will lead into discussion of the key philosophical debates and aesthetic shifts of the time, notably the emergence of the notion of the sublime as a category eventually subversive of western ideals of rationality and still present -- and potent -- in our own culture. Finally we will place Piranesi within a current of discussion of the origins and nature of language and of human society in general, not least as manifested in architecture and other symbolic practices. The leading figure here is the Neapolitan G.B. Vico, whose New Science of 1725 remains one of the most stimulating texts in the western intellectual tradition. Offered as CLSC 340, COGS 340, WLIT 340, CLSC 440, and WLIT 440.
-
3.00 Credits
This course studies religious beliefs and rituals from a biocultural perspective. A biocultural approach to religion is based on the idea that human religiosity is informed by both our evolutionary biological makeup and by our ability to construct culture to adapt to variable social worlds and environments. According to a biocultural view, humans are biologically constrained but have the cultural capacity to adapt to the world in a variety of ways. Thus, a biocultural approach to religion asserts that biology and culture operate in tandem and that both biological and cultural insights are required in order to understand and explain religious beliefs and practices. This course explores these assumptions and examines them against specific religious data. This course introduces students to major ideas, concepts, and questions that motivate biocultural approaches to religion. The course requires students to apply course material to a final research project that explores particular religious beliefs and/or practices in terms of the intersection of cultural choices and biological constraints. Students will present their research findings to the class. Students who take this course under the COGS designation are expected to engage substantively with the contemporary scientific study of the human mind in their research project and other course work. Offered as RLGN 349, RLGN 449 and COGS 349.
-
3.00 Credits
This course utilizes theoretical approaches found in cognitive semantics -- a branch of cognitive linguistics -- to study the conceptual structures and meanings of religious language. Cognitive semantics, guided by the notion that conceptual structures are embodied, examines the relationship between conceptual systems and the construction of meaning. We consider such ideas as conceptual metaphor theory, conceptual blending, Image schemas, cross-domain mappings, metonymy, mental spaces, and idealized cognitive models. We apply these ideas to selected Christian, Buddhist, and Chinese religious texts in order to understand ways in which religious language categorizes and conceptualizes the world. We examine both the universality of cognitive linguistic processes and the culturally specific metaphors, conceptual blends, image schemas, and other cognitive operations that particular texts and traditions utilize. Offered as RLGN 352, RLGN 452, COGS 352 and COGS 452.
-
3.00 Credits
A philosophical examination of recent research in human cognition and emotion at the intersection of the social sciences and neurological sciences. The course provides the student with background knowledge of brain processes underlying such social and cultural phenomena as bonding, aggression, imitation, mind-attribution, language, sexual behavior, moral action, and creativity. The approach of this course is at once scientific (comparing methods, findings and questions as they arise in clinical and experimental neuropsychology, brain imaging, neurolinguistics, and behavioral neuroscience) and humanistic, asking critical questions about the nature and methods of a science of cognition, and surveying moral responses from a neurologic and philosophic perspective. Recommended preparation: PHIL 101 or COGS 201. Offered as COGS 363 and PHIL 363.
-
3.00 Credits
This course focuses on specific areas of research in cognitive neuroscience in some depth. The first half of the semester covers basics and fundamental research areas (e.g., perception, attention) and examines the (sometimes controversial) theoretical issue of what cognitive neuroscience techniques tell us about the mind. The second half of the semester is dedicated to examining selected research topics of interest to students. Students research and write 'grant proposals' for cognitive neuroscience experiments. The class culminates with students and invited faculty simulating a funding panel, and deciding which grants to 'fund' from a limited budget. Prereq: COGS 102.
-
3.00 Credits
fMRI is the workhorse of cognitive neuroscience research. This course will take an in-depth look at this methodology, including hands on experience analyzing imaging data. The course will address the following issues: How do MRI and fMRI work? What does fMRI actually measure and how does that relate to cognition? What are the standard steps involved in processing and analyzing fMRI data to help answer specific questions? The course culminates in the production of a report of a novel analysis of imagining data that the students have performed (in small groups), including a broader description of what that analysis reveals about the neural basis of cognition. Prereq: COGS 102.
-
3.00 Credits
This course will focus on the notion and meaning of intelligence. What is intelligence? How is it measured, and are these measures adequate to the task? Is there more than one kind of intelligence? What is the relationship between individuals, genetic factors, biological factors, and socio-cultural-economic factors in the development of intelligence? How are language and thought related to intelligence? What is the difference between intelligence and talent? Intelligence seems to be necessary for culture, art, religious belief, the creation of theories and the quest for knowledge, truth and morality; thus intelligence is a necessary condition for the study of itself. To attempt to understand intelligence is an undertaking in which we will ask questions about the self and the common nature of humanity, while simultaneously examining the abilities of animals and machines. What is the mark of intelligence? Recommended preparation: PHIL 101 or COGS 201. Offered as COGS 373 and PHIL 373.
-
3.00 Credits
Computer simulations and mathematical analysis of neurons and neural circuits, and the computational properties of nervous systems. Students are taught a range of models for neurons and neural circuits, and are asked to implement and explore the computational and dynamic properties of these models. The course introduces students to dynamical systems theory for the analysis of neurons and neural learning, models of brain systems, and their relationship to artificial and neural networks. Term project required. Students enrolled in MATH 478 will make arrangements with the instructor to attend additional lectures and complete additional assignments addressing mathematical topics related to the course. Recommended preparation: MATH 223 and MATH 224 or BIOL 300 and BIOL 306. Offered as BIOL 378, COGS 378, MATH 378, BIOL 478, EBME 478, EECS 478, MATH 478 and NEUR 478.
-
3.00 Credits
This course will focus on the various methodologies used in the cognitive neurosciences, and explore their strengths and weaknesses from scientific and philosophical standpoints. We will begin by examining baseline measures (including IQ tests, tasks of cognitive flexibility, verbal and visual memory, causal/sequential thinking and narrative tasks) and their experimental design. Lesion methods will follow, with an eye toward understanding the strength of inferences that can be drawn from such data. The course will also focus on imaging techniques (CAT, PET, SPECT, fMRI, TMS, etc.) as well as measures of electrical activity such as EEG and single-cell recordings. Students will become familiar with many fundamental assumptions necessary for the implementation of each method, and philosophical questions associated with these endeavors and their potential impact on our knowledge and society. Recommend preparation: PHIL 101 or COGS 201. Offered as COGS 381 and PHIL 381.
-
1.00 Credits
This is a laboratory section intended to provide hands-on training and experience with sound processing and analysis of animal vocalizations in the context of cognitive science, philosophy, and biology. Students will ask and answer questions surrounding language, meaning, mind, mental states, animal and human cognition. How does a science of content and language actually proceed? How do we measure behavior for use as an indicator of cognition? What pragmatic constraints are found when we explore the natural world? What causes us to interpret certain symbols as systematic? The laboratory work begins with an understanding of different software for sound analysis with an emphasis on the bioacoustic experimental method. Frog vocalization exercises will familiarize students with the process of data categorization, analysis and comparison, and will be the foundation for understanding hypothesis testing within a Darwinian theoretical backdrop. Cetacean vocalization analysis will press students to move beyond comparison and analysis to consider and evaluate the standard evidence types used in cognitive science to measure the mind. Recommended preparation: PHIL 101 or COGS 201. Offered as COGS 383L and PHIL 383L.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Privacy Statement
|
Terms of Use
|
Institutional Membership Information
|
About AcademyOne
Copyright 2006 - 2024 AcademyOne, Inc.
|
|
|