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University of Oxford Induction

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Course overview

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Welcome to Oxford University’s first online course in the Philosophy of Mind! We are delighted you have chosen this course and hope it will meet your expectations.

In this preliminary session we shall be looking at:

If you are familiar with ‘webspeak’ and with online communication, you will be able to skip through these sessions quickly and get onto the real stuff. If you are not they may answer a few of your questions (and if you have any questions left then post a message in the common room for your fellow students to answer, or contact your tutor who will be happy to help).

If you have technical difficulties, such as accessing the website or posting a message, please contact the IT Helpdesk by e-mail: ithelp@example.com, or, if it is urgent, by phone on +44 (0)XXXX XXXXXX. Normal support hours are Monday – Friday, UK working days, 9a.m.-12.30p.m. and 1.30p.m.-5p.m. UK time (not available Thursdays 12.00p.m.-2.00p.m.). E-mails will normally be replied to within two working days.

If you have questions relating to the academic content or learning, please contact your course tutor, who will introduce themselves to you via e-mail.

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Textbooks

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Sessions

This course is divided into 10 sessions. Each session will introduce you to a different topic by means of one or two key papers that have passed the test of time in illuminating the issue under discussion. Each session will take one week, and each is relatively free-standing. This means that if you find yourself unable to participate one week this will not affect your ability to pick up the course again in the following week. Should you find yourself in this situation (and we hope you won’t but know what life is like) let your tutor know immediately not to expect you to make a posting that week.

The sessions are as follows:
Session 1: ...
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Structure of each session

Each session consists of:

A session overview giving you an outline of the topic covered in the session and the issues that are going to be tackled.

A reading list telling you which parts of the course textbooks to read for each session.

In some sessions you will find further information about the topic you are studying in a background section, giving you the context within which the papers you will be reading should make sense.

A reading guide (for each of the papers you are reading for the session) to help you read in such a way as to derive a properly philosophical understanding.

Activities: there are a number of things for you to do during the course. Some of these ask you to make individual postings, others are group activities that give you the opportunity to work with your fellow students.

Concluding questions to help you order your thoughts and provoke further thinking.

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What is expected of you each week

In order to get maximum benefit from the course, you are expected to spend about 10 hours each week on it. You will find that most of that time is spent reading. Indeed do not be surprised to find yourself spending three or four hours on one short paper. This is completely normal when reading philosophy because reading, for a philosopher, is supposed to stimulate thought and thinking itself takes time. I have sometimes found myself spending an hour on a particularly difficult passage. So if you find yourself doing this, don’t despair, it just shows you are being a true philosopher! (But if you are despairing get in touch with your tutor: you may be getting yourself into a situation in which you have focused so much on the detail you’re losing sight of the big picture – which is not a good thing, but easily remedied by a brief chat with your tutor.)

You will also spend time on the activities and – we hope – on discussing the issues with your fellow students on the discussion forums. You might also find yourself popping into the common room to chat with others from time to time, and this is all to the good.

In undertaking this course, you are committing yourself to:

We realise that you have a life (at least we hope you do) and that sometimes things will just get too much for you but so long as you are doing your best to keep up with things, and so long as you keep your tutor informed that will be fine.

You will find that of all these requirements the hardest by far will be the assignment. But this will not be because it is difficult in itself but because you will have to submit it when the course has finished. This can mean that your motivation for completing the assignment simply seeps away and you never complete and so never get the credit for the course.

The trick for dealing with this is to write the assignment during the course. As soon as you find yourself doing a topic that sparks your interest (well, I hope they all do, but you will find some even more interesting than others) then decide that this is the one on which you will write an essay and get an essay plan to your tutor immediately. Your tutor will respond with advice and you can then get started straight away. This will help you avoid the tenth week panic that you will otherwise experience, and this should help you to avoid missing out on your credit.

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