Queensborough Community College
The City University of New York
Department of Social Sciences
Individual Course Assessment Report
Introduction to Philosophy (PHIL 101)
Date submitted: 2.16.2016
Catalogue Course Description:
3 class hours. 3 credits. Prerequisite BE-122 or be 226, or satisfactory score on the CUNY/ACT
Assessment Test.
Fundamental philosophic problems presented through the study of several major philosophical
writings, such as those of Plato, Aristotle, Descartes, Kant, Hume, Mill, and Whitehead.
Individual Course Description:
This course is an introduction to the philosophical approaches to questions concerning the nature
of knowledge, existence, and human values. Through the use of classical and contemporary
texts, students will be introduced to some of the major theoretical approaches to epistemology,
metaphysics, ontology, and axiology. Students will also develop their capacity to analyze
abstract concepts, think critically about philosophical problems, to argue effectively, and to write
clearly.
Pathways Learning Objectives:
11.D. Individual and Society
General Course Objectives
Communicate effectively through reading, writing, listening and speaking
Use analytical reasoning to identify issues or problems and evaluate evidence in order to make
informed decisions
Differentiate and make informed decisions about issues based on multiple value systems
“Flexible Core” Objectives
Students will understand philosophical texts effectively through readings in the textbook and
ancillary documents and articles on a diversity of philosophical perspectives
Students will critically evaluate philosophical theories
Students will construct written essays, responses, and/or papers demonstrating the use of
evidence-based information in drawing conclusions about issues in philosophy.
Students will identify the fundamental concepts and methods of philosophy and how these can
be used to better understand the relationship between the individual and society.
Students will demonstrate an understanding of the appropriate use of philosophical methods in
analyzing different ethical perspectives.
Students will identify the fundamental concepts and methods of philosophy and how these can
be used to better understand the relationship between the individual and society.
Participation:
Four Sections
75 Students
Methodology
75 students in four sections were required to read Timothy Williamson’s “Reclaiming the
Imagination” (NYT, 8.15.2010) (see appendix one), and to complete a 16 question multiple
choice quiz. (appendix two) The assignment was “low stakes” (not graded, but required for
credit as a journal entry). Each student in the evaluated classes received the essay electronically,
and the assessment instrument was distributed by hard copy along with a Scantron.
Williamson’s essay focuses on the power of the imagination in advancing inquiry. He argues that
if an individual can’t think creatively, they might actually die (“Didn’t imagine there might be a
bear in that cave?”), and they definitely won’t succeed. The essay was chosen because it reaches
into the core of the philosophical method: Doubt your beliefs, ask questions about them, and try
to make them (beliefs and method) better.
Given the unique nature of philosophical inquiry, it is very difficult to “quantify” student
learning. Unlike like many other disciplines, philosophy courses don’t simply deliver “content.”
Introductory philosophy courses are designed to introduce students to a “method” of thinking
(the dialectic), a method which can be introduced using a variety of approaches and
philosophical theories.
Results
The rating criteria for Queensborough’s Social Sciences Department Assessment Protocol is
based on four pedagogical categories: (1) Constructing Meaning, (2) Contextualizing, (3) Using
Other Perspectives and Positions, and (4) Evaluating Evidence and Drawing Conclusions. Each
category was then rated on the following criteria: Emerging, Weak Development, Strong
Development, and Mastery.
The assessment rubric (see attachment three) quantified these pedagogical categories with a
series of four questions in each category. Questions 1, 4, 13, and 16 refer to category (1); 5, 11,
12, and 14 to (2); 2, 6, 8, 10 (3), and (4) 3, 7, 9, and 15.
Here are the results:
PHIL 101 – Introduction to Philosophy Assessment Results
Rating Criteria Emerging
Weak
Strong
(0-1 correct) Development Development
(2 correct)
(3 Correct)
Contructing
x
Meaning
(1,4,13,16)
Contextualizing
x
(5,11,12,14)
Using Other
x
Perspectives
and Positions
(2,5,11,12)
Evaluating and
x
Drawing
Conclusions
(3,7,9,15)
Mastery
(4 correct)
Average
Percent
Correct
67
68
71
67
Evaluation and Action Plan
As the above data shows, students scored consistently in each of the four pedagogical objectives
evaluated. However, the overall scores were a bit low. The average score for the sample as a
whole was a 69.
There are a few reasons why the sample scored so low. First, the instrument was presented as a
low-stakes assignment, and had no bearing on individual student grades. Second, the assignment
was not an “official” part of the syllabus, though students were warned that there would be a
question on the final exam based on the assignment to ensure students took the assessment
instrument seriously. In future assessments, it may be necessary to increase the “weight” of the
assignment, but this would be difficult to enforce across multiple sections taught by multiple
instructors.
Ideally, such an assessment would consist of distributing the final exam on the first day of class,
and comparing those scores with the scores on the actual final. But this is already done, if
“informally,” all professors. But again, such a method could only be applied to individual
instructors. It is impossible to ascertain how well students learn the arguments for Cartesian
rationalism across the discipline when not all philosophy professors cover Descartes in their
classes. Again, it is not about content but method, and at bottom, it is an issue of academic
freedom.
So, what is the action plan for future sections of this course? In future assessments, the
instrument should be made to count for more of the student’s grade, but this will be a challenge.
It will be difficult, if not impossible, for many instructors to incorporate a discussion of
Williamson’s essay during class time.
Appendix I
Reclaiming the Imagination
By TIMOTHY WILLIAMSON
The New York Times AUGUST 15, 2010
Imagine being a slave in ancient Rome. Now remember being one. The second task, unlike the
first, is crazy. If, as I’m guessing, you never were a slave in ancient Rome, it follows that you
can’t remember being one — but you can still let your imagination rip. With a bit of effort one
can even imagine the impossible, such as discovering that Dick Cheney and Madonna are really
the same person. It sounds like a platitude that fiction is the realm of imagination, fact the realm
of knowledge.
Why did humans evolve the capacity to imagine alternatives to reality? Was story-telling in
prehistoric times like the peacock’s tail, of no direct practical use but a good way of attracting a
mate? It kept Scheherazade alive through those one thousand and one nights — in the story.
We apply much of the same cognitive apparatus whether we are working online, with input from
sense perception, or offline, with input from imagination.On further reflection, imagining turns
out to be much more reality-directed than the stereotype implies. If a child imagines the life of a
slave in ancient Rome as mainly spent watching sports on TV, with occasional household chores,
they are imagining it wrong. That is not what it was like to be a slave. The imagination is not just
a random idea generator. The test is how close you can come to imagining the life of a slave as it
really was, not how far you can deviate from reality.
A reality-directed faculty of imagination has clear survival value. By enabling you to imagine all
sorts of scenarios, it alerts you to dangers and opportunities. You come across a cave. You
imagine wintering there with a warm fire — opportunity. You imagine a bear waking up inside —
danger. Having imagined possibilities, you can take account of them in contingency planning. If
a bear is in the cave, how do you deal with it? If you winter there, what do you do for food and
drink? Answering those questions involves more imagining, which must be reality-directed. Of
course, you can imagine kissing the angry bear as it emerges from the cave so that it becomes
your lifelong friend and brings you all the food and drink you need. Better not to rely on such
fantasies. Instead, let your imaginings develop in ways more informed by your knowledge of
how things really happen.
Constraining imagination by knowledge does not make it redundant. We rarely know an explicit
formula that tells us what to do in a complex situation. We have to work out what to do by
thinking through the possibilities in ways that are simultaneously imaginative and realistic, and
not less imaginative when more realistic. Knowledge, far from limiting imagination, enables it to
serve its central function.
To go further, we can borrow a distinction from the philosophy of science, between contexts of
discovery and contexts of justification. In the context of discovery, we get ideas, no matter how
— dreams or drugs will do. Then, in the context of justification, we assemble objective evidence
to determine whether the ideas are correct. On this picture, standards of rationality apply only
to the context of justification, not to the context of discovery. Those who downplay the cognitive
role of the imagination restrict it to the context of discovery, excluding it from the context of
justification. But they are wrong. Imagination plays a vital role in justifying ideas as well as
generating them in the first place.
In science, the obvious role of imagination is in the context of discovery. Unimaginative
scientists don’t produce radically new ideas.
Your belief that you will not be visible from inside the cave if you crouch behind that rock may
be justified because you can imagine how things would look from inside. To change the example,
what would happen if all NATO forces left Afghanistan by 2011? What will happen if they don’t?
Justifying answers to those questions requires imaginatively working through various scenarios
in ways deeply informed by knowledge of Afghanistan and its neighbors. Without imagination,
one couldn’t get from knowledge of the past and present to justified expectations about the
complex future. We also need it to answer questions about the past. Were the Rosenbergs
innocent? Why did Neanderthals become extinct? We must develop the consequences of
competing hypotheses with disciplined imagination in order to compare them with the available
evidence. In drawing out a scenario’s implications, we apply much of the same cognitive
apparatus whether we are working online, with input from sense perception, or offline, with
input from imagination.
Even imagining things contrary to our knowledge contributes to the growth of knowledge, for
example in learning from our mistakes. Surprised at the bad outcomes of our actions, we may
learn how to do better by imagining what would have happened if we had acted differently from
how we know only too well we did act.
In science, the obvious role of imagination is in the context of discovery. Unimaginative
scientists don’t produce radically new ideas. But even in science imagination plays a role in
justification too. Experiment and calculation cannot do all its work. When mathematical models
are used to test a conjecture, choosing an appropriate model may itself involve imagining how
things would go if the conjecture were true. Mathematicians typically justify their fundamental
axioms, in particular those of set theory, by informal appeals to the imagination.
Sometimes the only honest response to a question is “I don’t know.” In recognizing that, one
may rely just as much on imagination, because one needs it to determine that several competing
hypotheses are equally compatible with one’s evidence.
The lesson is not that all intellectual inquiry deals in fictions. That is just to fall back on the
crude stereotype of the imagination, from which it needs reclaiming. A better lesson is that
imagination is not only about fiction: it is integral to our painful progress in separating fiction
from fact. Although fiction is a playful use of imagination, not all uses of imagination are playful.
Like a cat’s play with a mouse, fiction may both emerge as a by-product of un-playful uses and
hone one’s skills for them.
Critics of contemporary philosophy sometimes complain that in using thought experiments it
loses touch with reality. They complain less about Galileo and Einstein’s thought experiments,
and those of earlier philosophers. Plato explored the nature of morality by asking how you
would behave if you possessed the ring of Gyges, which makes the wearer invisible. Today, if
someone claims that science is by nature a human activity, we can refute them by imaginatively
appreciating the possibility of extra-terrestrial scientists. Once imagining is recognized as a
normal means of learning, contemporary philosophers’ use of such techniques can be seen as
just extraordinarily systematic and persistent applications of our ordinary cognitive apparatus.
Much remains to be understood about how imagination works as a means to knowledge — but if
it didn’t work, we wouldn’t be around now to ask the question.
Appendix II
Introduction to Philosophy
(Kincaid), Spring 2015
Journal Entry #3: Instructions (Remember, this is NOT graded, but it must be completed
to the best of your ability for you to get credit).
After reading the article by Williamson, mark the letter of the BEST answer to each
question on the Scantron provided (remember to use a #2 pencil!) These will be due
along with the writing portfolio.
1. According to the author, the beauty of the imagination is that it allows us to completely divorce
ourselves from reality, and it allows us to exercise the mind without any possibility of practical
applications.
a. true
b. false
2. Imagining things contrary to our knowledge does not contribute to the growth of knowledge, and it has
a tendency to steer the mind away from concrete truths and into mere "flights of fancy."
a. true
b. false
3. According to the Author, ALL forms of knowledge are products of the human imagination.
a. true
b. false
4. Imagination plays a vital role in both ___________ AND ____________ .
a. discovery/justification
b. mental relaxation/pointless "mind games"
c. immaturity/childishness
d. none of the above
5. Imagination is important because it contributes to creative thinking and eventually allows us to have
absolute certainty in our beliefs.
a. true
b. false
6. The imagination is important in which of the following contexts?
a. Creativity
b. Discovery
c. Justification
d. All of the above
7. The imagination CAN play a role in our survival, but typically, it is just a dangerous distraction.
a. true
b. false
8. Imagination is an important aspect of many forms of inquiry, but it plays no role in forms of inquiry
such as logic and mathematics.
a. true
b. false
9. The thesis of this article is:
a. Human beings are the only creatures on earth that have the ability to imagine that
which is not real.
b. The imagination is very important, but it must be used in extreme moderation and only
in specific contexts.
c. The imagination is a crucial component in all forms of acquiring knowledge, and even
increases our chances of survival.
d. The imagination is both a blessing and a curse.
10. Using your imagination, it is actually possible to remember your experiences as a slave in Ancient
Rome.
a. true
b. false
11. This is a direct quote from the Williamson essay: "Imagination plays a vital role in justifying
ideas, but it plays just a small role as generating them in the first place."
a. true
c. false
12. According to the author, the imagination should never be constrained by knowledge.
a. true
b. false
13. The game of chess requires a lot of imagination.
a. true
b. false
14. The answer to #13 is _______ because"
1. Chess is logical and strategic. It does not allow room for things like emotion and
values.
2. Chess involves imaginatively working through various scenarios in ways deeply
informed by knowledge.
3. An imaginative chess player will inevitably lose because they have the tendency trying
new things that don't work.
4. Chess involves a tremendous amount of imagination. Just look at all of the little horsies,
castles, and king!
15. According to the author, one must always avoid saying, "I don't know."
a. true
b. false
16. Williamson says that, "standards of rationality apply to the context of justification AND to the
context of discovery."
a. true
b. false
Appendix III
Queensborough Department of Social Sciences Critical Reading Rubric
Rating Criteria
Emerging
0-1
Weak Development
2
Constructing
Meaning
Derives meaning
from texts in a
confused or
inaccurate way
Derives meaning
from texts in a limited
fashion; makes sense
of written words but
no further analysis
Contextualizing
Reads written
language in isolation
or connects it to
irrelevant or
inaccurately
understood contexts
Using Other
Perspectives and
Positions
Takes text at face
value, showing
minimal awareness of
perspectives and
assumptions
contained within the
text
Conclusions are
inconsistently tied to
some of the
information; related
outcomes
(consequences and
implications) are
oversimplified
Makes connections in
a limited fashion
between written
language and
contexts, such as
prior experience,
historical setting,
physical setting,
knowledge of the
discipline, etc.
Attempts to explore
perspectives and
assumptions
contained within the
text
Evaluating
Evidence and
Drawing
Conclusions
Draws conclusions
that are logically tied
to information
(because information
is chosen to fit the
desired conclusion);
some related
outcomes
(consequences and
implications) are
identified clearly
Strong
Development
3
Usually derives
accurate meaning
from texts by making
sense of written
words and analyzing
reading with respect
to prior knowledge,
research, and
experience
Usually connects
written language with
contexts, such as
prior experience,
historical setting,
physical setting,
knowledge of the
discipline, etc.
Mastery
4
Consistently derives
accurate meaning
from texts by making
sense of written
words and analyzing
reading with respect
to prior knowledge,
research, and
experience
Consistently connects
written language with
contexts, such as prior
experience,
historical setting,
physical setting,
knowledge of the
discipline, etc.
Usually explores
perspectives and
assumptions
contained within the
text
Consistently explores
perspectives and
assumptions
contained within the
text
Draws conclusions
that are logically tied
to a range of
information (because
information is chosen
to fit the desired
conclusion); related
outcomes
(consequences and
implications) are
identified clearly
Draws conclusions
and related outcomes
(consequences and
implications) that are
logical and reflect
student’s informed
evaluation and ability
to place evidence
and perspective
discussed in priority
order