Critical thinking skills.
The corner stone of philosophy is the ability to reason and to think critically, logically, and come to conclusions based on reasoning. This skill is learned and practiced through the entire program.
Understanding of concepts of right, wrong, good and bad; understanding of moral principles and their application in everyday life.
A practical understanding which grounds students and prepares them for applications in professional and personal life.
Read and interpret philosophical texts.
Reading texts and interpreting them is fundamental to all philosophy classes. Using original texts by ancient and modern philosophers, combined with textbooks and other literature as assigned, skill at accurate interpretation and analysis is developed.
Recognize, express, and analyze arguments in philosophical texts.
This is a critical skill to develop in all students, regardless of program, but is especially important for Philosophy students. Students must be able to extract arguments from philosophical texts and from the world around then
Skill in summarization and explaining difficult ideas and concepts.
This goes hand in hand with prior outcome. It is achieved through analysis and critical thinking and student practice in class discussions, presentations, and argumentation. Furthermore, the ability to distill complicated information into a more easily digestable form has applications in every field and profession.
Writing that reflects careful attention to language, logic, and subtleties of reasoning.
A writing intensive major, students are taught skills as to how to write concisely and clearly, as well how to thoroughly analyze subject matter.
Write philosophical essays that have coherent theses and reasonable supporting arguments.
The ability to craft arguments that are both logical and reasonably supported by evidence is a crucial skill for the modern philosopher.
Learning to understand reality from different perspectives and thus to understand that different people will define issues in different ways.
The ability to separate the self from ones frame of reference is a critical skill in the modern world and encourages both empathy and the willingness to engage with the world from different standpoints.
Skill in research methodology.
Research methodology includes learning to utilize online resources as well as those located at libraries for conducting philosophical research. It involves learning the standards for citation and bibliographies, abstracts and prospectus writing. Most importantly, research methodology teaches students how to pick an appropriate topic, in subject and length, for various academic and professional projects.
