Resources For:

The Department of Philosophy offers a program covering a wide range of fields in systematic philosophy and the history of philosophy. Among the special strengths of the department are moral and political philosophy, aesthetics, episte­mology, philosophy of logic, philosophy of language, the history of analytic philosophy, ancient philosophy, Kant, and Wittgenstein.

The department’s graduate program is essentially a PhD program. Because the prin­cipal employment for men and women with advanced training in philosophy is in college teaching requiring the PhD, the department ordinarily does not admit applicants who wish to study only for the master’s (AM) degree. The AM may be taken as a step toward the PhD after a minimum of two terms in resi­dence. A candidate for the AM must satisfy the Preliminary, Distribution, and Logic requirements for the PhD; however, the Preliminary Requirement is reduced to ten half-courses, and only seven of the eight distri­bution units are required for the AM. In addi­tion, the Second-Year Paper requirement must be satisfied. There is no language requirement for the AM.

Doctor of Philosophy

Admission - Substantial previous knowledge of philosophy is normally required. Candidates usually have a bachelor’s or master’s degree in philosophy. Applicants less well prepared in philosophy may be admitted under special conditions if they have a grounding in math­ematics or the natural or social sciences. Appli­cants are required to take the GRE (general), and to submit a sample of their written work. 

Financial Aid - Financial aid is adminis­tered by the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. (See the GSAS Guide to Admission and Financial Aid for further information.) Teaching fellowships, which are administered by the department, normally are restricted to graduate students who have completed at least two years of work in the department and are making satisfactory progress toward the doctorate. 

Preliminary Requirement - Candidates must pass at least 12 approved half-courses or semi­nars during their first four terms in the depart­ment. Courses numbered 301 or above do not count toward this preliminary requirement, but the two required terms of Philosophy 300, the First-Year Colloquium, may be counted as three of the 12. If a letter-graded course record is to be considered satisfactory, the candidate’s grades in these courses must be B or higher.

Courses taken to meet the preliminary requirement must be approved in advance by the department’s director of graduate studies. Students must take and complete Philosophy 300a plus two letter-graded half-courses or seminars during their first term and Philosophy 300b plus three letter-graded half-courses or seminars more in their second term, thus completing five letter-graded half-courses during the first two terms of residence, with grades of B or higher.

These courses, like the rest of the 12, should be among those designated “For Undergraduates and Graduates” or “Primarily for Graduates” in the course catalogue. In addition Quantitative Reasoning 22 may be counted if needed for the Logic requirement. At least ten of the courses must be taught by members of the Department of Philosophy (including visiting and emeritus members). This requirement can be modified for students specializing in classical philosophy.

Students who have done graduate work elsewhere may petition to obtain credit for up to three half-courses, which may be counted toward the Preliminary Requirement. If they are in philosophy (as would normally be the case) such courses will be regarded as equiva­lent to those taught by members of the depart­ment.

Distribution Requirement - This require­ment, intended to ensure a broad background in philosophy, is met by completing eight distribution units of work before the begin­ning of the fourth year of graduate study. A distribution unit may be fulfilled (i) by completing an approved half-course or seminar (which may also be counted toward the Preliminary Requirement) or (ii) by writing a paper under the guidance of a faculty member, with the approval of the director of graduate studies. In the latter case the work does not count toward the Preliminary Requirement. The units are to be distributed as follows:

a. Contemporary Theoretical Philosophy: Three units in core areas of 20th–21stcentury metaphysics, epistemology, philosophy of science, philosophy of mind, philosophy of language, philosophy of mathematics, and the like.

b. Practical Philosophy: Two units in contemporary or historical ethics, political philosophy, aesthetics, and the like.

c. History of Philosophy: Three units so chosen that one course unit treats primarily Plato or Aristotle and the other two units treat primarily representatives from two of the following: the Rationalists, the Empiricists, Kant, the Idealists. At most one of these three courses may emphasize primarily practical philosophy.

Note: The First-Year Colloquium (Philosophy 300a and 300b) may not be used to fulfill any part of the distribution requirement. Philos­ophy 299hf, the second-year paper, may be used to fulfill a distribution requirement.

Logic Requirement - Students are required either (i) to pass Quantitative Reasoning 22 or a higher level course in logic, such as Philos­ophy 144, with a grade of B or better, or (ii) to pass an examination in logic, equivalent to the final examination in QR 22, with a grade equivalent to B+ or higher. The requirement must be satisfied by the end of the second year of study.

Second Year Paper - Students are required, in their second year of study, to take Philos­ophy 299hf and to submit by the end of that year a 30-40 page research paper (maximum 12,000 words), written under the supervision of a faculty advisor. The paper may be on any philosophical topic, but the topic should not be so broad that it cannot be treated in reason­able depth in 30-40 pages. It must demon­strate a capacity to do independent reading and research.

Language or Research Tool Requirement - Students must demonstrate a reading knowl­edge of French, German, Greek, or Latin. The language requirement may be fulfilled by (i) passing an examination set by the Depart­ment, or (ii) passing with a grade of B or better, two years of college-level coursework in the language, or (iii) placing, on the compe­tency exam given by the relevant language department at Harvard, at a third-year level, or (iv) participating in a reading course within the Philosophy Department devoted to the study of one or more philosophical texts, in the original language.

Students may petition to pursue a “Research Tools” option, by taking four approved half-courses, or the equivalent, on topics directly relevant to their dissertation research, with the joint permission of their faculty advisors and the Director of Graduate Studies. One of these courses may be taken pass/fail; two of them may be counted towards the preliminary requirement. Graduate courses or degrees outside of Philosophy completed before entering the program may be counted towards the research tools option at the discre­tion of the Director of Graduate Studies; students taking more than one graduate or professional degree at Harvard may count the second degree as fulfilling the research tools option if it is relevant to their philosophical research, and with the consent of their faculty advisors and the Director of Graduate Studies. Students who wish to take the research tools option should submit their petition to their committee and the Director of Graduate Studies when they are beginning work on their dissertation; the petition should demon­strate that the research tools option will serve their research goals better than the study of a language.

Dissertation Workshops - Students who have completed their second year paper are required to enroll each semester in one of the two dissertation workshops, Philosophy 311, Workshop in Moral and Political Philosophy, or Philosophy 312, Workshop in Metaphysics and Epistemology. Permission not to enroll in a workshop must be granted by the director of graduate studies.

Teaching Fellowships - Graduate students are urged to take full advantage of opportu­nities to acquire teaching experience while working for the doctorate. Students in the third and fourth years will ordinarily teach as part of their graduate school funding. Teaching fellowships are restricted to those who have completed at least two years of work in the department (under exceptional circum­stances, one year) and are making satisfactory progress toward the doctorate. In addition to a satisfactory grade record, the criteria of normal progress is as follows for each of four years of graduate study. First year: completing five letter-graded half-courses or seminars and Philosophy 300. Second year: satisfying the preliminary requirement, the logic requirement, the second-year paper requirement. Third year: satisfying the distribution requirement and formulating a dissertation topic. Fourth year: passing the topical examination. Students in their first year of teaching must, and in their second year of teaching may, take Philosophy 315hf, Instructional Styles in Philosophy. 

Oral Topical Examination - After completing the second year paper, each candidate will enroll in Philosophy 333 and will be assigned a third-year advisor. In consultation with this advisor, the candidate will develop a dissertation topic and choose a prospective principal dissertation advisor. To receive formal approval of the dissertation topic a candidate must pass the oral topical examination. If the topical examination is not passed, it must be taken again and passed by the beginning of the winter recess in the year immediately following. Although called an examination, approximately 90 minutes in length, it is in fact a conference on the disser­tation topic, not an occasion on which the candidate is expected to produce a complete outline of arguments and conclusions. It is intended to determine the acceptability of the topic on which the candidate wishes to write a dissertation, the candidate’s fitness to under­take such a dissertation, and the candidate’s command of relevant issues in related areas of Philosophy. A dissertation on the proposed topic may be submitted only if the topical examination is passed.

Application to take the topical examina­tion must be made to the director of graduate studies at least two weeks in advance. At the same time, the candidate must submit three copies of a dissertation prospectus to the director of graduate studies and members of the student’s prospective committee. The prospectus should be 25-30 pages long, and should explain the problem the student proposes to address and the methods by which he or she proposes to address it. It should include a tentative chapter breakdown and a bibliography of sources the student expects to use. The examination is conducted by the dissertation committee.

Dissertation - When the topical examination is passed, the examining committee normally becomes the dissertation advisory committee. One member of this committee is designated the candidate’s advisor. At least three months before the deadline for formal submission of the dissertation, the candidate must submit to the advisory committee a legible draft of the dissertation or a considerable part of it. With the consent of the committee, the candidate may then go on to prepare a final draft for submission to the department. The dissertation must show a mastery of the field in which it is written; it must demonstrate the candidate’s insight, originality, and power of independent research; and it must add to the sum of human knowledge and understanding. Apart from these general requirements, there are no formal restrictions on the subject or construction of the dissertation, but the candidate is advised to write on a distinct and sharply limited problem. Dissertations of more than 75,000 words ordinarily will not be accepted.

Final Examination - The completed disser­tation is read and appraised by a committee of three, usually identical to the candidate’s dissertation advisory committee. This committee, if it finds the dissertation suffi­ciently promising, conducts the final oral examination, in which the dissertation must be adequately defended before its acceptance by the department. (The examination is public and may be attended by other members of the department if they wish.) The purpose of this last examination, which is normally about one hour in length, is not so much to test the range and detail of the candidate’s information as to judge the candidate’s skill in presenting and discussing matters considered in the dissertation and the candidate’s ability to meet friendly but searching criticism.

Classical Philosophy - The departments of the Classics and of Philosophy collaborate in an interdisciplinary doctoral program in Classical Philosophy for students registered in either department. Candidates whose major field is philosophy are expected to take the Proseminar for graduate students in the Clas­sics, as well as to attend seminars or other courses in classics relevant to their interests. With the approval of the director of graduate studies, students in the Classical Philosophy program may be permitted to count an appro­priate course in ancient philosophy toward the distribution requirement in metaphysics and epistemology and one (in addition to the one already required) toward the requirement in history of philosophy.

Language requirements: Candidates who plan to write a dissertation in Classical Philosophy are expected to have learned at least one of the classical languages (Greek or Latin) before they are admitted. Depending on the level of fluency they have reached before entering the program, they may be asked to take additional language or reading courses. If they have not previously studied the second language, they will be required to reach the level of one year of college course work. This can be done either by taking courses or by passing a language examination. In addition, candidates will be expected to have acquired a reading knowledge of German sufficient for reading scholarly literature and to pass a departmental examination on a suitably chosen text.

The rules and procedures for the disserta­tion will, in general, be those established for candidates in philosophy.

Law and Philosophy - A coordinated JD/ PhD in Philosophy and Law is available. Students wishing to obtain the coordinated degrees must be admitted separately to both programs. Students admitted for the coordi­nated degrees must begin either with the first full year of law school or the first two years of philosophy; after that they may alternate semesters as they choose. The program in Law may be completed in five semesters. The requirements for philosophy are the same as for regular philosophy graduate students.

Application Procedures

1. Further information regarding courses and programs of study may be obtained by writing to the Director of Graduate Studies, Department of Philosophy, Emerson Hall, Harvard University,
Cambridge, MA 02138; www.fas.harvard.edu/~phildept/; e-mail: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .

2. Applications for admission and financial aid may be obtained by writing to the Admissions Office, Harvard Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, Holyoke Center 350, 1350 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge, MA 02138. The application may be submitted online.

Selected Recent Dissertation Titles

“Epistemic Rationality and the Ethics of Belief ”

“Human Rights Reconceived: A Defense of Rawls’s Law of Peoples”

“Character, Freedom, and Practical Reason”

“Virtue and Its Imitation”

“Hidden Folds of Freedom”

“Decisions in Action: Reasons, Motivation, and the Connection Between the Two Making Up One’s Self ”

Faculty

Sean D. Kelly, Professor of Philosophy (Chair). PhD, University of California at Berkeley. Philosophy of mind, philosophy of science.

Selim Berker, Instructor in Philosophy. PhD, Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Ethics, epistemology.

Matthew Boyle, Assistant Professor of Philos­ophy. PhD, University of Pittsburgh. Kant; Philosophy of mind.

Cheryl Chen, Lecturer on Philosophy. PhD, University of California at Berkeley. Episte­mology, philosophy of mind.

Peter Godfrey-Smith, Professor of Philosophy. PhD, University of California at San Diego. Philosophy of science (especially biology), philosophy of mind.

Warren Goldfarb, Walter Beverly Pearson Professor of Modern Mathematics and Math­ematical Logic (Acting Chair). PhD, Harvard University. Wittgenstein; logic; analytic philosophy.

Edward J. Hall, Professor of Philosophy (Head Tutor). PhD, Princeton University. Philosophy of science; philosophy of quantum mechanics; metaphysics; probability.

Frances Kamm, Professor of Philosophy (FAS) and Littauer Professor of Philosophy and Public Policy (Kennedy School). PhD, Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Ethics.

Peter Koellner, Assistant Professor of Philosophy. PhD, Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Logic and philosophy of mathematics.

Christine Korsgaard, Arthur Kingsley Porter Professor of Philosophy. PhD, Harvard University. Ethics and the history of ethics.

Douglas Lavin, Assistant Professor of Philosophy. (Director of Graduate Studies). PhD, Univer­sity of Pittsburgh. Ethics and philosophy of action.

Jeffrey K. McDonough, Assistant Professor of Philosophy. PhD, University of California at Irvine. Early Modern Philosophy; Philosophy of Science.

Richard Moran, Brian D. Young Professor of Philosophy. PhD, Cornell University. Philosophy of mind; aesthetics; philosophy of literature; moral psychology.

Bernhard Nickel, Assistant Professor of Philos­ophy. PhD, Massachusetts Institute of Tech­nology. Philosophy of science, philosophy of language.

Thomas M. Scanlon Jr., Alford Professor of Natural Religion, Moral Philosophy and Civil Polity. PhD, Harvard University. Moral and political philosophy.

Amartya Sen, Lamont University Professor. PhD, University of Cambridge. Moral and political philosophy, philosophy and economics.

Tommie Shelby, Associate Professor of the Social Sciences. PhD, University of Pittsburgh. African American philosophy, social and political philosophy, social theory, philosophy of social science.

Susanna Siegel, Associate Professor of Philos­ophy. PhD, Cornell University. Philosophy of language; philosophy of mind.

Alison Simmons, Professor of Philosophy. PhD, University of Pennsylvania. History of early modern philosophy.

Gisela Striker, Walter C. Klein Professor of Philosophy and of the Classics. PhD, University of Göttingen. Ancient philosophy.