Freddy Purcell-
This article aims to help you freshers out there in your module choices by revealing some aspects of the first-year modules that you can’t find out on the Exeter site. However, if you want to find out about indicative readings lists, more about what topics are covered in each module and how they are all assessed, then the Exeter site here is a good place to start.
It is also worth saying that even if there were pros and cons to each module, there isn’t a bad option out there. I found it difficult to know what I wanted to study as I had limited philosophy knowledge, but there isn’t an option that wasn’t some combination of interesting or useful, to some degree at least. In other words, while I hope this article helps you make choices, don’t worry about the decision too much as I’m sure you’ll have a good time either way!
Title: Knowledge and Reality 1
Term: 1
Credits: 15
Lecturer: Dr Jonathan Davies
Knowledge and Reality 1 was basically a tour of what classical western thinkers like Plato, Descartes, Hume, Locke, Berkeley, and Kant believed about epistemology. The module moves chronologically through these thinkers, picking up on key debates, such as that of innate knowledge or the nature of causation. This is topped off in the final week by a history of philosophy topic that challenges the divisions typically drawn upon in these debates, particularly the so-called divide between continental and analytic traditions. Some of the readings in this module are heavy and more difficult to read (particularly Kant in one of the later weeks), although they are thankfully often on the shorter side. However, for people like me that didn’t know so much about these classical thinkers going into freshers, it’s been a helpful foundation.
-Freddy: 2nd Year Philosophy with Spanish
Title: Evidence and Argument
Term: 1
Credits: 15
Lecturer: Dr Edward Skidelsky
Evidence and Argument covers formal logic and aspects of argument like fallacies. It therefore teaches you the notation of formal logic. I found many papers in my first year that had sections of logic that were impossible for me to understand, so having some knowledge of logic is very useful. The module also shows you formal fallacies that help to identify invalid arguments, which is again very useful for other modules as these mistakes in logic come up repeatedly. It is a very divisive module. People who enjoy subjects like maths or computer science found it easier and often liked the module (I met computer science students that covered some of the content in school) while others that didn’t like these subjects often didn’t like this module either. Although, it is worth saying that I was terrible at maths in school and quite enjoyed the module. The work is formed by the exercises that you do as homework and cover in seminars, which I found was a welcome change from my other modules where the content was always centred around readings. Ultimately, even if people the subject matter is not for everyone, it was probably the most useful one I did in first year.
-Freddy
Title: Philosophical Reading 1
Term: 1
Credits: 15
Lecturer: Dr Jonathan Davies
In Philosophical Reading, we did an in-depth reading of Plato’s Republic, independently covering a chapter each week in preparation for a seminar. This reading is aided by a series of guide questions that directed our attention towards key parts of the book. As a group, we then discussed and debated the major themes presented in the text, as well as any nuances that appeared. Philosophical Reading is an incredible crash course in proper analysis of the texts that are given throughout the degree. I found early on that my A-level analysis wouldn’t get me far, and a course focussed on how to properly read and discuss texts became invaluable. It is, unsurprisingly, a lot of reading on the same material, which can quickly wear thin. I found myself constantly losing concentration as my enthusiasm often turned to severe boredom while reading. This can be a problem as the module’s structure means that falling behind makes it very difficult to catch up.
-Bee: 2nd Year Philosophy
Title: Philosophies of Art
Term: 1
Credits: 15
Lecturer: Dr Tom Roberts
Philosophies of Art covers a broad range of topics in aesthetics, particularly philosophy of art (no surprises there). It looks at theories of what art is, how we appreciate it, how we critique it and broader topics on how we interact with music, nature, and AI generated art. A wide range of topics is therefore covered, so the module would be a great starting point for anyone interested in aesthetics as well as debates on the value of forgeries or separating art and artist. Another massive benefit to the module last year was that the lecture and seminar were merged into one 2-hour session weekly, meaning that out of all my first-year modules, this one always had the best discussions as we had more time to discuss content. Most modules simply go through readings and content from the lectures in their seminars, but in this module, we always managed to have discussions that didn’t just revise content in this way. It was genuinely a fun time.
-Freddy
Title: Knowledge and Reality 2
Term: 2
Credits: 15
Lecturer: Professor Joel Krueger
Knowledge and Reality 2 is quite deceptively named as it isn’t a direct follow on from Knowledge and Reality 1. It instead covers a distinct debate each week, with the readings being taken from modern scholarship that is often quite readable. I think that without a doubt my favourite readings in first year came from this module. Topics include practical epistemology, philosophy of mind, simulation theory, theology, and how we make decisions. They existed in seemingly separate spheres of philosophy, but it was surprising how often people found interesting links between them. The module therefore serves well as a broad overview of the areas of investigation within philosophy and how modern scholarship has developed. I also usually enjoy studying a variety of topics, so this module appealed to me more naturally than others with similar content each week.
-Freddy
Title: Philosophical Problems 1
Term: 2
Credits 15
Lecturer: Dr Adrian Currie
In Philosophical Problems, we covered current topics that affect people’s day-to-day lives, such as friendship. Our time in seminars focussed on getting an overview of the texts, involving whole class discussions and reading in pairs. My favourite part of the module was at the start of our seminars, where we would each rate that week’s reading. It was really fun to see what everyone thought of the paper, as well as how almost everyone justified their ranking by how engaged or bored they were while reading. This served a practical purpose as I found myself attending to what makes academic writing fun to read, which not only helped my research as I could avoid things I wouldn’t pay attention to, but also improved my writing as I learned what to avoid. One downside is that the seminars covered only what was in the readings, meaning that much of our time was spent listening to a recap for two hours. This became slightly painful with how little independent discussion we had in-between.
-Bee
Title: Introduction to Philosophical Analysis
Term: 2
Credits 15
Lecturer: Dr Jonathan Davies
This module’s title is somewhat misleading and could probably be better described as meta-philosophy. This means it looks at what philosophy is, whether it is more of a science or humanities subject and what makes good philosophy. The other half of the module looks at distinct philosophical methods through this lens of analysing both what philosophy is and what it ought to be. These methods include phenomenology and genealogy in the continental tradition and linguistic and conceptual analysis in the analytic tradition. This module has some of the drier content I studied in the first year, but most people enjoy the weeks where methods they like appear. For example, people interested in pursuing phenomenology usually like finding out about phenomenology. This module is therefore useful in helping you discover what sort of philosopher you want to be, even if this process of discovery isn’t the most interesting at times.
-Freddy
Title: Introduction to Asian Philosophy
Term: 2
Credits: 15
Lecturer: Professor Giovanna Colombetti
The feel of this module was of a book group combined with a GCSE Religious Studies class. The reason I liken it to GCSE is that we covered Hinduism, Buddhism, Confucianism and Taoism spending about two weeks on each. This meant progressing from the basics of each tradition to critically analysing its key texts in two weeks. The module was therefore heavy on reading, but this was rewarding. Reading the core texts of each tradition, while challenging, allowed us to develop the skillset to confidently explain and analyse unfamiliar concepts.
I found the midterm essay for this module more challenging than other modules I was taking at the time. Giovanna wanted us to do minimal secondary reading and express our opinion on a topic using only the core texts. I remember feeling uneasy about this and unqualified to be weighing in on the debates without doing more reading. If I had my time again, I would go to her office hours and talk through the concepts with her and ask questions rather than sitting at my desk feeling unqualified and helpless.
This module’s most unique feature was the meditation exercises. Giovanna gave us a meditation to try at home each week and we ended each session with a group meditation.
-Amelia: 3rd Year Philosophy
Title: Philosophy of Morality
Term: 2
Credits: 15
Lecturer: Dr Shane Glackin
Philosophy of Morality is an overview of some of the main theories in normative and meta-ethical thought. The module is a popular choice for philosophy students and was compulsory for PPE students, meaning it is one of the busier modules (although this didn’t really make a difference to my experience). The first section took six weeks to explore the normative theories of utilitarianism, Kantianism, and virtue theory. This content was familiar to a lot of people who did philosophy or religious studies at higher level in school but is covered in academic depth that helped me to appreciate the nuances of each theory. I think this means that the module is rewarding, but it sometimes felt like people had to persist with the content they were familiar with. The second section looks at meta-ethical theories, which is a much more technical topic with links to other topics like philosophy of language. The module therefore doesn’t really cover practical questions in ethics but is more an overview of the basics of ethics that I think serves as a good basis for better understanding all the ethics modules in subsequent years.
-Freddy