Philosophy 1308-4, Spring 2022

Philosophy of Love and Sex

Instructor: Alexander R. Pruss

TA: Trinity O’Neill

E-mail: alexander_pruss@baylor.edu

TA email: trinity_oneill2@baylor.edu

Course web page: http://AlexanderPruss.com/classes/love

Class times: Tue/Thu 2:00-3:15 in Draper 340

Instructor office hours: MH 213: Monday and Wednesday, 10:45-noon or by appointment or drop-in

Abstract:

          Loving and being loved are essential to a flourishing human life.  Love comes in many varieties—parental love, filial devotion, fraternal attachment, friendship, eros, charity, etc.—but we say that all of these are forms of “love”.  What is this thing, love, which they all have in common?  What general properties does it have?  Is there a duty to love every human being? 

          We will look in some detail at two forms of love, friendship and erotic love, while keeping an eye on the general question of what love is.  What is friendship?  Are there qualities that our friends have, such as virtue, intelligence or usefulness to us, which are the reason for their being our friends?  Is there a difference between reasons for entering into a friendship and reasons for continuing in a friendship once entered into? Should we, or could we, be friends with every human being?  Is friendship an expression of need or weakness, or is it something divine?

          After the first part of the course on love and friendship in general, the second will be on marriage and erotic love.  These, all agree, are tied in some way to sex.  What is sex?  Is sex a good thing? What makes something be a sexual act?  What connection is there between sex and love?  Between sex and commitment?  What is marriage and what is it for?  Is there such a thing as perversion and if so, what is it?  Are there some consensual sexual acts that are always wrong?  More concretely: What is the morality of homosexual acts, contraception, masturbation, bestiality, pornography or standard heterosexual intercourse?

          Hopefully, we will see that specific questions about sexual morality are closely connected with the general issues about the nature of love.  We will look at a number of different accounts of issues in sexual morality, ranging from the thought of the radical feminist theorists Andrea Dworkin to Pope John Paul II, and including in between various classic texts.

          Much human reflection on sexuality is specifically religious, and to neglect this reflection would shortchange our knowledge of sexuality.  Thus special attention will be paid to Christian accounts.

          In this course we will talk about issues that many of us feel strongly about.  In any philosophy class we are apt to meet with texts that criticize some aspect of our thinking, forcing us to rethink issues.  In an ethics class, some of the texts may well criticize not just some aspect of our thinking, but some aspect of our past, present or planned activity.  We need to be very civil here. Specifically:

· In philosophy, we proceed by reasoned argumentation.  At the same time, the philosopher can look at views that come from, say, a religious authority or the culture we find ourselves in and ask whether these views bring light to a philosophical issue.  We will in fact end up doing a little bit of theology and a little bit of sociology.

· We should limit sentences that start with “I feel that…” since that does not leave much room for discussion (“I feel ice cream is tasty” — “I feel ice cream is nasty”: where do you go from there?)  Instead say, “I think that…” or even better “I think that … because ….”  Of course since we are doing the philosophy of sex and love, analyzing our feelings philosophically may be quite appropriate.

· Please do criticize arguments that I offer, whether in class discussion or in your papers.  You will not get a higher grade on a paper for agreeing with me without a good argument and you will not get a lower grade on a paper for disagreeing with me with a good argument.  In practice, I think it is easier for students to write papers that disagree with an author or instructor.

· I am always open for discussion in my office hours if you are interested in further questioning an argument of mine, sharing a concern, or talking about any other philosophical issues—or anything else of importance to you, including personal issues.

· We will be talking in this class about issues which we many people find rather embarrassing to talk about.  I think this embarrassment is itself a philosophically interesting and healthy phenomenon.  I am not asking you to rid yourself of embarrassment.

Special Title IX notes:

The Instructor and Teaching Assistant are mandatory Title IX reporters under both federal and state law, and are required to pass relevant information on to the Title IX office, including “any information regarding an alleged incident of sexual harassment, sexual assault, dating violence, or stalking, committed by or against a person enrolled at or employed by the institution at the time of the incident”. This includes any relevant information disclosed in class discussion, papers or online discussion. You are always welcome to reach out to the Instructor and/or Teaching Assistant for assistance, but with the understanding that such information will need to be passed on for your protection and that of others. On the other hand, the Baylor Counseling Center as well as Baylor’s Chaplain Burt Burleson are available for confidential discussion. For more information, see the Title IX section at the end of the syllabus.

Texts:

· C. S. Lewis, The Four Loves.

Grading:

The grades are based on:

· Three papers (26% each)

o There will be three papers assigned, each about four double-spaced pages long.  Specific paper topics will be given.  Paper grades start at a B- for a paper that does nothing but correctly explain what authors we have read or what class discussion said.  Papers that fail to do this correctly or do this with insufficient clarity or organization will have a lower grade.  For a higher grade, either deeper insight into the text is needed or original argumentation or, ideally, both.  Generally, B+ or higher level papers will include some original argument of yours that has not come up in class or in the reading.

o Occasionally, with Instructor’s specific approval, you will have an option for writing a paper that does not specifically deal with texts we have read.  Please feel very free to talk about the ideas for your papers with one of us, e.g., in office hours.

o All papers are to be submitted online in the Canvas system.  Make sure your assignments are submitted to the right class!

o You will have a chance to rewrite your first paper if your grade is less than an A-.  If you opt for this, then the grade of your first version will be averaged with the grade of your rewrite.

o All papers will be scanned by TurnItIn and/or other plagiarism-detection services upon submission to Canvas. Your papers may be retained after the end of the course by such services in order to help fight off future plagiarism. Students agree that by taking this course, all required papers, exams, class projects or other assignments submitted for credit may be submitted to Turnitin.com or similar third parties to review and evaluate for originality and intellectual integrity. A description of the services, terms and conditions of use, and privacy policy of Turnitin.com is available on its web site: http://www.Turnitin.com. Students understand all work submitted to Turnitin.com will be added to its database of papers. Students further understand that if the results of such a review support an allegation of academic dishonesty, the course work in question as well as any supporting materials may be submitted to the Honor Council for investigation and further action. (The italicized text is provided by Baylor University.)

o Two classes before each paper is due, you must submit by email to the instructor your thesis sentence--what you are trying to argue for in the paper. You are free to change the thesis sentence, if you do, you must include a one-paragraph statement at the end of your paper stating what your original thesis sentence was, and why you changed it. Unexcused late submission of the thesis statement may be penalized.

· Online discussion (11%)

o You must make at least four philosophical postings in the Canvas discussion forum by the last day of class. Each posting should be a minimum of one paragraph long and have some substantive content: raising a question, answering a question, etc. Substantive responses to others’ postings count. At least one posting needs to be made in January; at least one posting needs to be made in February; and at least one posting needs to be made in March. Please don’t leave these posts for the last week of the month: that will make the discussion really poor.

· Quizzes (11%)

o There will be random quizzes, with a 1/3 chance of a quiz during each class starting with the second class. The quiz covers only the reading. Your grade starts at 60% for showing up.

· Class participation bonus of up to 2%

· There is an optional final exam. If you would like to take it, please contact the instructor by April 28, at the latest. If you say nothing, then you will not be taking it. If you do take it, it will be worth 30% of the course grade, and the other components will be scaled down correspondingly.

The individual papers will be given grades, either zero (not turned in, cheating, etc.) or between F and A+. These letter grades will be turned into numbers using the following scale:

A+	100
A	96.67
A-	93.33
B+	90
B	86.67
B-	83.33
C+	80
C	77.67
C-	73.33
D+	70
D	67.67
D-	63.33
F	55
zero	0

In-between grades will be interpolated. E.g., B+/B (or, equivalently, B/B+) will yield approximately 88.34. The numbers will be averaged (taking into account any dropping and double-counting), and a class participation bonus of up to 2% will be added. Then the number will be turned back to a letter grade, using the rule that the lower cutoff for a grade other than F and A+ is 1.67% below the grade’s value in the upper table. Thus, an A requires 95%, an A- requires 91.66%, and so on. There is no A+ at Baylor and anything below 61.66% will be an F. The cutoffs will be sharp. Thus, if the cutoff for an A is 95%, then 94.99% is still an A-.

Academic integrity policy:

Credible suspicions of lack of academic integrity will be typically reported to the Honor Council for further investigation. 

Plagiarism is one of the most serious of the violations of academic integrity and consists in presenting the work or thought of another as one’s own.  If you are using someone else’s literal words, even if only a short phrase of two or three words, you need to put them in quotation marks (or in the case of a longer quote, in block-quote format which is single-spaced and with every line indented on the left as in the sample quiz question above) and give the source.  If you are paraphrasing or merely using someone else’s ideas, you still need to give the source explicitly.  The only exception to the last rule is that you do not need to specifically give the source for ideas that you got in my lecture when writing papers for this course.

Plagiarism is not only immoral but foolish.  The Honor Council may fail you in the class, or may suspend you or even expel you.  If you just hand in a mediocre but honest paper you will very likely (though I do not make guarantees) get at least a D on the paper, and anyway there are other papers in the course to pull up your average.

If you confess to plagiarism before I give you any sign of my suspicions (before I email you asking you for sources, before I ask you to meet with me, etc.), I will let you rewrite the paper and not proceed any further.  

Tentative schedule

Note: Go to http://AlexanderPruss.com/classes/love and select this syllabus to read the online texts.  The syllabus will be updated throughout the semester and additional readings may be added, so you should always check the syllabus online when preparing for a class. The Monist’s marriage issue contains useful supplementary reading.

Please contact the instructor as soon as possible if you discover a non-working link, which is quite likely to happen at some point.

Date	Assignments
Tue Jan 18	None
Thu Jan 20	Read: Plato, Symposium
Tue Jan 25	None
Thu Jan 27	Read: Plato, Lysis
Tue Feb 1	Read: Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, VIII
Thu Feb 3	Read: Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, IX
Tue Feb 8	Read: Whiting, “Impersonal Friends”
Thu Feb 10	Read: C. S. Lewis, The Four Loves
Tue Feb 15	Read: Summary of Don Giovanni (read first) Read: Kierkegaard, Either/Or, excerpts [start at “THE IMMEDIATE EROTIC STAGES” and finish at “listen, listen, to Mozart's Don Giovanni”] Read: Kierkegaard, Journals and Papers, "Love" Read: Kierkegaard, Journals and Papers, “Paradox” #3091 Read: Kierkegaard, Journals and papers, “Proof” #3608
Thu Feb 17	Read: Nozick, “Love’s Bond” Read: Westlund, “The Reunion of Marriage”
Tue Feb 22	Read: The Bible on Love Read: St. Thomas Aquinas on love
Thu Feb 24	Read: Helm Paper #1 due
Tue Mar 1	Read: Muir, “Annunciation” Read: Tucker on monogamy
Thu Mar 3	Read: St. Thomas Aquinas on marriage
Tue Mar 15	Read: McGowan, “Marriage Versus Just Living Together” (emailed) Skim: Teachman
Thu Mar 17	Skim: Tach and Halpern-Meekin Read: Wolfinger
Tue Mar 22	Read: Genesis, Chapters 1 and 2 Read: John Paul II, my "note on translation" and Parts 1, 2, 3 and 4 Read: Scruton, “Sacrilege and Sacrament”
Thu Mar 24	Read: Weaver and Woollard, “Marriage and the Norm of Monogamy” Read: Martin, “Love’s Constancy”
Tue Mar 29	Read: Moller, “An Argument Against Marriage”
Thu Mar 31	Read: May, “Four Mischievous Theories of Sex”
Thu Apr 7	Read: SEP on consent Read: West on consent
Tue Apr 12	Read: Punzo, “Morality and Human Sexuality” (available in Canvas)
Thu Apr 14	Read: Wolf, “The Porn Myth” Read: Dworkin, “Pornography Happens to Women” Read: McElroy (optional, not on quiz)
Tue Apr 19	Paper #2 due Read: Kant on Marriage Read: John Paul II on lust (text 1, text 2) Read: Goldman, “Plain Sex”
Thu Apr 21	Read: Elliott, “A New Way to Be Mad” Read: Nagel, “Sexual Perversion” Read: Singer, “Heavy Petting”
Tue Apr 26	Read: Pruss, “Not Out of Lust…”
Thu Apr 28	Read: Corvino #1 Read: Girgis, George and Anderson
Tue May 3	Read: Corvino #2 Read: Corvino #3 Last day to request optional final.
Thu May 5	Read: Pruss, “Sexuality as Secularly Sacred” (Canvas) Read: Rajczi, “A Populist Argument” Paper #3 due, last day for online postings
Lookup date if needed	Optional final exam: By request only

The remaining sections of the syllabus are adapted from Baylor boilerplate

COVID-19 and other illness:

If you are sick with a respiratory illness (COVID, flu, etc.), please do not attend in person. Let me know two hours ahead of class and I will try to make sure that you can participate via Zoom.

You are required to abide by all University-established rules regarding COVID, including masking in the classroom.

The remaining sections of the syllabus are adapted from Baylor sources.

Baylor University Equity, Civil Rights, and Title IX

Civil Rights Policy and Sexual and Interpersonal Misconduct Policy

Baylor University does not tolerate unlawful harassment or discrimination on the basis of sex, gender, race, color, disability, national origin, ancestry, age (over 40), citizenship, genetic information or the refusal to submit to a genetic test, past, current, or prospective service in the uniformed services, or any other characteristic protected under applicable federal, Texas, or local law (collectively referred to as Protected Characteristics).

If you or someone you know would like help related to an experience involving:

1. Sexual or gender-based harassment, sexual assault, sexual exploitation, stalking, intimate partner violence, or retaliation for reporting one of these types of prohibited conduct, please visit www.baylor.edu/titleix, or contact us at (254) 710-8454, or mailto: TitleIX_Coordinator@baylor.edu.

2. Harassment (excluding those issues listed in #1) or adverse action based on Protected Characteristics, please visit www.baylor.edu/civilrights, or contact us at (254) 710-7100 or Civil_Rights@baylor.edu.

The Office of Equity and Title IX understands the sensitive nature of these situations and can provide information about available on- and off-campus resources, such as counseling and psychological services, medical treatment, academic support, university housing, and other forms of assistance that may be available. Staff members at the office can also explain your rights and procedural options. You will not be required to share your experience. If you or someone you know feels unsafe or may be in imminent danger, please call the Baylor Police Department (254-710-2222) or Waco Police Department (9-1-1) immediately.

Except for Confidential Resources, all University Employees are designated Responsible Employees and thereby mandatory reporters of potential sexual and interpersonal misconduct violations. Confidential Resources who do not have to report include those working in the Counseling Center,  Health Center and the University Chaplain, Dr. Burt Burleson.

Students Needing Accommodations

Any student who needs academic accommodations related to a documented disability should inform me immediately at the beginning of the semester. You are required to obtain appropriate documentation and information regarding your accommodations from the Office of Access and Learning Accommodation (OALA). Stop by the first floor of Sid Richardson, East Wing in the Paul L.  Foster Success Center or call (254) 710-3605 or email OALA@baylor.edu.