Welcome to the
UC San Diego Philosophy Department!
We are a community of scholars dedicated to the pursuit of knowledge and enlightenment in a spirit of togetherness and mutual understanding. We study the most fundamental questions: What are the basic features of reality? How do we acquire knowledge about the world? What truly matters? What are our moral obligations? Many of us approach these questions historically, sensitive to the fact that they have been discussed all over the world since humans began thinking and reflecting. But our approaches are also interdisciplinary, informed by the most up-to-date science, as well as other disciplines, such as legal theory and aesthetic criticism.
Our faculty are scholars of national and international renown, contributing to debates about matters such as the relation between logic and truth, the nature of time, fundamentality in physics, the norms that govern rational belief formation and conceptual change, the proper standards for community science, the relation between sense perception and motivation, the nature of color, the possibility of free will and moral responsibility, the construction of race, the nature of cultural identity, the ethics of war, the norms of individual and collective responsibility, the nature of praise and blame, and, of course, trolleyology. The historians among us seek to understand the best philosophical systems of the past, from Confucius to Democritus, Nahua philosophy to Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, Aristotle to Thomas Aquinas, René Descartes to Mary Astell, David Hume to Mary Wollstonecraft, Immanuel Kant to Hannah Arendt, and John Stuart Mill to Philippa Foot.
We teach courses that are as varied as our intellectual interests, including: puzzles and paradoxes; the nature of reality; science fiction and philosophy; law and society; the philosophy of love and sex; the meaning of life; language and power; living in a digital world. More advanced courses focus on the work of particular historical figures, along with more in-depth exploration of philosophical themes, such as: personal identity, causation, linguistic meaning, consciousness, weakness of will, moral luck, global justice, the interpretation of quantum mechanics, the value of biodiversity, metalogic, decision theory, Mexican existentialism, Latina feminism, moral conflict, political obligation, genetic engineering, legal interpretation, aesthetics, phenomenology, and religion.
Our faculty regularly win teaching awards and our graduate students are excellent teachers, many of them contributing to the study of great pedagogy, from role-playing games to self-guided feedback-driven learning to experiments in living. We have one of the most successful Intercollegiate Ethics Bowl programs in the country. And we have a vibrant philosophy club which, with the help of graduate students and faculty, puts out a fabulous magazine every year, Intuitions, carrying the very best in undergraduate philosophical work.
I feel the excitement as a member of this community every time I walk through the halls of our beautiful building. The enthusiasm communicates itself from every corner and begins with our wonderful staff. Our Chief Administrative Officer, Lisette Braswell, makes sure that everything runs and works as it should; our Fiscal Analyst and Human Resources Manager, Joshua Vergara, keeps on top of all things financial; our Graduate Program Coordinator, Caroline Wells, takes great care of our PhD students, and our Program Analyst and Undergraduate Advisor, Cami Koepke, advises and assists our undergraduates, from those who have never taken a philosophy course to seasoned majors in the honors program.
It is for these and many other reasons that we are one of the most highly ranked philosophy departments in the world (by reputation, 16th in the U.S. and 19th in the English-speaking world).
Do come say hi. I have regular office hours during the academic year, and I am otherwise available to meet by appointment.
- Professor Samuel Rickless
