Introduction to Metaphysics

This course will be taught e-learning

GOALS

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This course aims at investigating a series of metaphysical concepts through the analysis of some of the most important philosophical treatises in the history of Western thought. Students will develop adequate critical and analytical skills by reading philosophical and interdisciplinary texts on topics such as being, causation, freedom and determinism, God, idealism and realism, mind and body, philosophy, and universals and particulars. Furthermore, students will learn to orient themselves in thinking by addressing a series of questions, including: What is philosophy? What does it mean to think? Do humans have free will?

ProgramME

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This course is structured in eight parts and analyses selections of a series of philosophical treatises. In particular, the course is structured as follows:

DEFINITIONS OF METAPHYSICS AND PHILOSOPHY

CLASS 1 (22 September, 14h00-16h00)

• Aristotle, Metaphysics.

CLASS 2 (29 September, 14h00-16h00)

• Alexander Gottlieb Baumgarten, Metaphysics (1739).

CLASS 3 (6 October, 14h00-16h00)

• Immanuel Kant, What Does It Mean to Orient Oneself in Thinking? (1786).
• Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Lectures on the History of Philosophy (1833).

CLASS 4 (13 October, 14h00-16h00)

• Martin Heidegger, What is Called Thinking? (1951–52).

CLASS 5 (20 October, 14h00-16h00)

• Martin Heidegger, Introduction to Metaphysics (1953).

BEING

 CLASS 6 (27 October, 14h00-16h00)

• Heraclitus, Fragments.
• Parmenides, Fragments.

CLASS 7 (3 November, 14h00-16h00)

• Plato, Phaedo.

CLASS 8 (10 November, 14h00-16h00)

• Aristotle, Categories.

CLASS 9 (17 November, 14h00-16h00)

• Martin Heidegger, Being and Time (1927).

CLASS 10 (24 November, 14h00-16h00)

• Alain Badiou, Being and Event (1988).

UNIVERSALS AND PARTICULARS

CLASS 11 (1 December, 14h00-16h00)

• Plato, Parmenides.

CLASS 12 (8 December, 14h00-16h00)

• Plato, Republic.

CAUSATION

CLASS 13 (2 February, 14h00-16h00)

• Aristotle, Metaphysics.

CLASS 14 (9 February, 14h00-16h00)

• David Hume, An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding (1748).

GOD

CLASS 15 (16 February, 14h00-16h00)

• René Descartes, Discourse on the Method (1637).

CLASS 16 (23 February, 14h00-16h00)

• Gottfried Wilhelm von Leibniz, Monadology (1714).

CLASS 17 (1 March, 14h00-16h00)

• Friedrich Nietzsche, The Gay Science (1882).
• Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra (1883).

CLASS 18 (8 March, 14h00-16h00)

• Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra (1883).

CLASS 19 (15 March, 14h00-16h00)

• Martin Heidegger, “Only a God can Save Us”: The Spiegel Interview (1966).

MIND AND BODY

CLASS 20 (22 March, 14h00-16h00)

• René Descartes, Meditations on First Philosophy (1641).

CLASS 21 (29 March, 14h00-16h00)

• Gottfried Wilhelm von Leibniz, New System of the Nature and Communication of Substances (1695).

CLASS 22 (5 April, 14h00-16h00)

• Thomas Nagel, What Is it Like to Be a Bat? (1974).

FREEDOM AND DETERMINISM

CLASS 23 (12 April, 14h00-16h00)

• Baruch Spinoza, Ethics, Demonstrated in Geometrical Order (1677).

CLASS 24 (19 April, 14h00-16h00)

• David Hume, A Treatise of Human Nature (1739–40).

CLASS 25 (26 April, 14h00-16h00)

• Arthur Schopenhauer, The World as Will and Representation (1818–19/1844/1859).

IDEALISM AND REALISM

CLASS 26 (3 May, 14:00–16:00)

• Immanuel Kant, Critique of Pure Reason (1781).

CLASS 27 (4 May, 14:00–16:00)

• Immanuel Kant, Critique of Pure Reason (1781).

CLASS 28 (10 May, 14:00–16:00)

• Johann Gottlieb Fichte, Foundations of the Science of Knowledge (1794–95).

CLASS 29 (11 May, 14:00–16:00)

• Johann Gottlieb Fichte, Foundations of Transcendental Philosophy (1796–99).

CLASS 30 (17 May, 14:00–16:00)

• Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, The Phenomenology of Spirit (1807).

CLASS 31 (24 May, 14:00–16:00)

• Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, The Phenomenology of Spirit (1807).

CLASS 32 (31 May, 14:00–16:00)

• Michael Dummett, Realism (1963).

BIBLIOGRAPHY

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• Aristotle, Metaphysics, trans. by Hugh Tredennick, 2 vols (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1933).
• René Descartes, Discourse on the Method, in The Philosophical Writings of Descartes, trans. by John Cottingham, Robert Stoothoff, and Dugald Murdoch, 2 vols (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985), I, pp. 111-51.
• Martin Heidegger, Introduction to Metaphysics, trans. by Gregory Fried and Richard Polt (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2014).
• Tim Crane and Katalin Farkas, Metaphysics: A Guide and Anthology (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004).
• Adrian William Moore, The Evolution of Modern Metaphysics: Making Sense of Things (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012).

pre-requisites

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The course and readings will be entirely in English, therefore an intermediate knowledge of the English language is required.

TEACHERS

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Fabio Tononi is a Post-Doctoral Research Fellow at the Centre for the Humanities (CHAM) in the Faculty of Social and Human Sciences (FCHS) of NOVA University of Lisbon, and teaches philosophy at the Centro Luís Krus – Formação ao Longo da Vida in the Faculty of Social and Human Sciences (FCSH) of NOVA University of Lisbon. He is the editor-in-chief of the Edgar Wind Journal, and a steering committee member of the Centre for the Study of Cultural Memory at the Institute of Modern Languages Research, which is part of the University of London’s School of Advanced Study. His research interests include the essence and tasks of philosophy and science, the writings of Aby Warburg and Edgar Wind, the aesthetics of Sigmund Freud, the relationship between art and cognitive neuroscience, the interconnection between art and ideology, and postmodernism. In 2020, Tononi was the convenor of the Aby Warburg Reading Group and Seminar at the Italian Cultural Institute of London. In 2021, Tononi received a Ph.D. from the Warburg Institute in the School of Advanced Study of the University of London. He held an internship at Villa I Tatti, the Harvard University Center for Italian Renaissance Studies in Florence. During his career, he has participated in over 30 conferences and seminars in highly competitive and international venues. His publications include: Edgar Wind: Art and Embodiment, ed. by Fabio Tononi, Jaynie Anderson, and Bernardino Branca, Oxford, Peter Lang (Under contract).

tuition fees

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General Public: 350€* | NOVA FCSH 2023/2024 students (bachelors, masters and doctorates): 250€ | NOVA FCSH Alumni/Students from other higher education institutions: 250€*

*The school insurance will be added to the value – 7 euros

NUMBER OF CREDITS (UPON EVALUATION)

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• For college students: 4 ECTS  (European Credit Transfer and Accumulation System).
• For students who intend to obtain ECTS, the assessment must be requested from the course teacher

assessment method

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At the end of the course, students will have to submit a short essay (max. 2,000 words, footnotes included and bibliography excluded) in English on a topic relevant to the course, on the basis of which they will be evaluated. Students are advised to agree with the teacher on the topic to choose.

ENROLLMENT

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Up to 6 business days before the start of course.

• Online through inforestudante platform