Course on X-Phi

After having been absent for quite a while (sorry about that!), I am back again with a question for you, the Cocoon community. Next semester I will teach a course on X-Phi for undergraduates. I intend to include sessions on the X-Phi of philosophy of language (e.g. reference), epistemology (e.g. knowledge) and ethics/moral philosophy (e.g. free will). In addition, I also want to include recent research on behavioral game theory, decision theory, psychology of justice and experimental economics (e.g. on the notion of fairness). Do you think that including the latter stuff makes sense? Or should one subsume it under ethics, if at all? Is it X-Phi although economists are doing this kind of research? And what basic papers/books/anthologies would you recommend for the course (in view of all sessions)? Thanks for your comments!

Comments

[Kevin]

Regarding books, you should atleast give this a look:

http://www.oup.com/us/catalog/general/subject/Philosophy/?view=usa&ci=9780199775255

[Mark Alfano]

If you want something very introductory, you might try Ariely's _Predictably Irrational_.

[David Morrow]

I'm by no means an expert, but there are a few special issues of Phil. Explorations and Phil. Psych. that cover the debate over the nature and philosophical significance of x-phi:

http://www.tandfonline.com/toc/rpex20/10/2
http://www.tandfonline.com/toc/cphp20/23/3
http://www.tandfonline.com/toc/cphp20/23/4

On the same general topic, see also:

Williamson, T. 2011. http://philpapers.org/rec/WILPEA-3
Tobia, Buckwalter & Stich. 2012. http://philpapers.org/rec/TOBMIA
Machery, Mallon, Nichols, & Stich. Forthcoming. http://philpapers.org/rec/MACIFI

For books, check out Knobe & Nichols (2008): http://amzn.to/4cftI It may be a bit outdated already.

Knobe's original paper on the "side-effect effect" (i.e., the Knobe effect) would be nice to include, too: http://philpapers.org/rec/KNOIAI

In principle, I don't see any problem including work done by psychologists, economists, etc., although I don't think all of it would be relevant (e.g., the stuff that demonstrates economically irrational behavior).

[Joshua Alexander]

I've heard really good things about Joshua Alexander's new book! ;-)

http://www.amazon.com/Experimental-Philosophy-Introduction-Joshua-Alexander/dp/0745649181

[Mark Alfano]

But do you know him personally, Josh?

[Joshua Knobe]

Hi Andreas,

Great to hear that you are going to be teaching a class on this stuff! If you want to see what other people have been assigning in their experimental philosophy courses, you can find a bunch of different syllabi over at:

http://experimentalphilosophy.typepad.com/experimental_philosophy/2010/12/experimental-philosophy-syllabi.html

[Marcus Arvan]

Just got an email from OUP about this interesting-looking new book by Allhoff, Mallon, and Nichols:

http://www.oup.com/us/catalog/he/subject/Philosophy/UpperDivisionCourses/ModernPhilosophy/?view=usa&ci=9780199775255

[Andreas Wolkenstein]

Great, thanks to you all! Some of the works mentioned were already on my list (so: good to have this kind of confirmation), and the links are all very helpful and thus gratefully welcomed. Especially the overview of the syllabi is very helpful - thanks, Joshua!
However, I am still curious to know what you think about including behavioral economics and this kind of stuff in a course on X-Phi...On the one hand, this work is done by non-philosophers so that one might argue that this is not philosophy, especially as the X-Phi movement classically deals with other issues. On the other hand, though, the questions that are addressed experimentally call into question a lot of traditional philosophy (as arguably does X-Phi), and they can be used to offer new theories (about fairness, etc.) As David notes, however, not all of it is philosophically relevant - but where is the line between being philosophically relevant and irrelevant, and what of it is X-Phi? And: Does it actually make sense to ask this question?