Term Paper 2: Mill's On Liberty

Here's a link to your term paper on J.S. Mill's On Liberty. Term Paper here.

The paper is due on Tuesday, May 10 in class.

You won't be able to complete the assignment yet, as we haven't finished going over Mill's arguments, but you'll be able to read through the paper and think about it as we cover the arguments in class.

Let me know if you have any questions while you're working on it.

Make-up Assignment for Group Project 4/7

If you missed class on Thursday, April 7, complete the make-up assignment below.

The Humanity Formula of the Categorical Imperative is pretty abstract (briefly paraphrased, "always act so as to treat humanity as an end-in-itself, never merely as a means."). It takes work to figure out how that should actually "play out" in real life. For this assignment, we're going to start thinking about what specific obligations we have, to uphold the humanity formula.

Step 1:
Spend 10 minutes brainstorming about a real life situation that you think is meaningful and important.

Start by briefly describing the situation.

Then say what's required in that situation in order to treat everyone (yourself included) as an end-in-itself.

Step 2:
Post your brainstorm in the comments below.

Step 3:
Over the weekend, keep checking back in and reading your classmates' stories and thoughts (there were 8 of you who missed class).

Based on the collection of stories, generate a list of general rules about how you should act in life in order to be treating all people as ends-in-themselves. Discuss back and forth with one another in the comments. As a group, the 8 of you will decide on your list of general rules for treating people as ends-in-themselves. You'll put your final list in the comments here.

Progress Report - Course Grade Updates

Here's a link to your current grade in the course.

Your grades are in sets of 4 sheets.

The first set is your overall grade so far in the course. The second column from the right is the total number of points you have so far in the course. 875 is the highest total number. The column furthest to the right shows your current percentage grade as a decimal point. Anything from .895 and up is an A; .795 and up is a B; etc. This is your current grade – it will change as we complete more assignments. I have dropped one quiz grade, so a few of you have over 100%.

The next set is your term paper grade. You’ve completed one term paper so far, so only the first column has a grade in it.

The next set is your exam grade; you’ve also completed one exam so far.

Etc. Each set is labeled with the category.

Look for your grade with your student ID number. This was a ton of data entry, and I’m not good at data entry – double check your grades carefully to be sure I haven’t made a typo or missed entering a grade. It’s very easy to fix now, so just send me an email if you see a mistake.