Do we have free will, or do our brains automatically respond to stimuli? What, if anything, distinguishes right from wrong? Philosophers relentlessly pursue fundamental questions of life, and their techniques apply to problems in any discipline. They establish standards of evidence, provide rational methods for resolving conflicts, and create templates for evaluating ideas and arguments. This course surveys several major areas of Western analytic philosophy: metaphysics and epistemology, ethics, and philosophies of mind, language, religion, and science.

Construct logical arguments as a proof to verify mathematical statements in this college-level course that follows Multivariable Calculus and builds upon Linear Algebra. Techniques and methods of proof are taught through specific examples in set theory, equivalence relations, and real analysis; the course also covers properties of functions, binary operations, and integers, among other topics. This course introduces the logical and rigorous mathematical foundation that all higher-level math classes require, so definitions and proofs will be stressed throughout the curriculum.

With the emergence of COVID-19, ethical issues in medicine have never been more pronounced in our social consciousness. Explore salient issues such as rationing scarce resources, making shutdown decisions for public health, and evaluating risk amid substantial uncertainty.

Develop your own critical reasoning skills, learning how to construct and analyze arguments while participating in debates and discussions around well-known philosophical dilemmas, and gain additional exposure to clinical ethics by deliberating real-world cases.

What creatures live around you, and how can you tell? How does gardening or mowing the lawn affect local animals and plants? What happens to bathtub water after it goes down the drain? Explore your neighborhood’s ecosystem through the lens of an environmental scientist.

Print evidence can place suspects at a crime scene, identify missing persons, and exonerate the innocent. Begin with an overview of the history of print evidence, focusing on fingerprints, footprints, and tire tracks. Upon learning the difference between class and individual evidence, determine whether a print links a suspect to a crime scene or just helps investigators narrow down their search.

This course is an introduction to human biology and the science of medicine, drawing upon basic biological and chemical concepts to explore the intricate anatomical and physiological mechanisms underlying normal human function. You and your classmates will investigate homeostatic imbalances that cause diseases, learn about diabetes and gain an in-depth understanding of the endocrine system, the pancreas, the metabolism of sugar, and the biochemical effects of glucose. Lab work covers techniques in histology, anatomy, biochemistry, and physiology, including dissections.

Comic book heroes punching dictators in the face and aircrafts papering the ground with pamphlets—these types of propaganda are easy to recognize, but what about contemporary ones, like bot-generated tweets, mudslinging political ads, misleading advertisements, and fact-distorting TV news reports? Without an objective distance from current events—and with ever subtler techniques for influencing opinions—how can we tell what is “fake news”? This course examines nonfiction sources from political systems around the world to analyze the ways people have swayed others to their points of view.

When Lon Chaney's mask first came off in the silent-film version of The Phantom of the Opera, some viewers were reportedly so frightened by the actor's ghoulish makeup that they fainted in the theater. In addition to exploring literature such as William Shakespeare’s Hamlet and Shirley Jackson’s The Lottery, we will examine works in other media like video games and podcasts to pinpoint how moments of fright operate within creative works.

Called "The Queen of Mathematics" by the great mathematician Carl Friedrich Gauss, number theory is the study of the natural number system from which all others are derived. Despite the simplicity of the natural numbers, many accessible problems in number theory remain unsolved. For example, the Goldbach Conjecture, formulated in 1742, which posits that every even integer larger than 2 is the sum of two prime numbers, has defied all proof attempts. In this proof-based course, you’ll learn the major ideas of elementary number theory and the historical framework in which they were developed.

Has anyone ever told you that you have your mother’s eyes? Or your father’s nose? Or even your great aunt’s hair? Whether they know it or not, they are talking about your genes. Your genetic makeup, the thousands of building blocks that make you—well, you—has been passed down for generations.