Anyone taken philosophy?

joanna73, BSN, RN · Jan 2, 2012

I took Ethics in 3rd year, and Philosophy of love and sex in my last semester of school. The reading is heavy, and you will be exposed to the basic ethical theories....deontology, virtue ethics, utilitarianism and how they apply.

NellieOlsen · Jan 2, 2012

I took an Ethics/Moral Philosophy class last semester. It was honestly the easiest class ever. (I know that is largely dependent on your instructor so not everyone has the same experience..)

It was a lot of reading about Socrates, Plato, etc. It also covered virtues, morals versus right/wrong, etc. It was an interesting class and an easy A. :)

KelRN215, BSN, RN · Jan 2, 2012

I went to a Jesuit school, so 2 semesters of philosophy were required. It's a lot of reading about ancient and recent philosophers and the stuff they wrote... Plato, Socrates, Aristotle, Hume, Kant, Nietzche, etc. My class was a lot of nonsense like "this person thinks that he proved God existed because God is perfect and he can't be made up because he can't think of anything more perfect than God."

bigboi · Jan 2, 2012

Thanks for the response guys. I ordered my books early so I can get a head start on reading the material.

NCRNMDM, ASN, RN · Jan 3, 2012

I took philosophy 240 which was a philosophical introduction to ethics. It wasn't hard at all, but the reading was tedious at times. We had great discussions about things like abortion, assisted suicide, gay marriage, Mediaography and censorship, ethics, morality, etc. We had great group discussions, wrote small, mini-papers on each topic, and presented them to the class. I debated in high school, and it brought back fond memories of my LD career. Some sections will fascinate you, if you're interested in this sort of thing, and some sections will bore you to tears. All in all the class isn't that hard, and you may learn some interesting information.

DarkLotus · Jan 3, 2012

I have taken two philosophy courses. The two courses only had one thing in common, a ton of reading. The two professors had nothing in common!

The first one was Ethics and I found it pretty easy and ended up with an A-. The material was interesting and there was a ton of reading. The instructor had open notes midterm and final and one short three page paper. Other than that it was lots of participation and discussion points to show that you were doing the reading. Pretty much everyone who showed up got a B or above. I took this class a long time ago before I was serious about school as a general education course and loved it.

The second one was Introduction to Philosophy and it was one of the most difficult courses ever. We had a quiz every other week and a 3-4 page paper due on weeks we did not have a quiz. There was no reasoning on what would end up on the quiz or not and there was too much reading to follow everything. We had to write a ten page research paper and there was a final. There were no participation points but if you missed a day a quiz was you failed it and if you missed a paper day you dropped a letter grade for the paper. I am ashamed to say I tried really hard in this class and studied/read/wrote outside of class at least 30hours a week and only pulled off a B! Only two students got A's. I think this class scared a few students off of the subject.

So my advice to you would be to try and find someone who took the exact same class form the exact same professor and ask them about the class! Or if you can get a syllabus for the class before it begins you could get some of the information too. Best wishes

joanna73, BSN, RN · Jan 3, 2012

Personally, I did not enjoy either of my philosophy courses, even though I got As in both. Hopefully you will have a good instructor, as this makes all the difference. After love and sex, i swore never again to philosophy. You could not pay me to sit through another.

strawberryluv, BSN, RN · Jan 3, 2012

I took a course called, Biomedical Ethics and it was honestly the most tedious class of my semester. The professor just went on-and-on about topics and how to think through them. It was a really boring class and I found myself skipping the class once a week. We wrote 2 papers and were allowed to revise them and I got a B+ on my first paper and an A on my second paper. I made out with an A for the semester but man, I didn't learn a thing. This is the only class that has been a blur to me.

HouTx, BSN, MSN, EdD · Jan 3, 2012

i think i understand the pp's negativity about "thinking" classes such as philo & ethics -- however i want to point out that most of the benefit derived from these classes is due to what dewey called "incidental learning" - stuff that is not on the syllabus. these classes can improve your meta-cognition & reasoning skills; the ability to dissect ideas and theories and articulate/defend your own thoughts on the issues that are being discussed. fundamentally, there is no "right" or "wrong" if you can adequately defend your own reasoning. despite the focus on physical tasks and labor, nursing is essentially a knowledge-based profession; we need to develop and maintain intellectual skills to be effective practitioners.

these courses should also enable you to clarify your own values and beliefs. this is a critical foundation for your own practice because you cannot really guard against expressing prejudice or bias if you don't understand where you stand.

remember, [color=#454545]the unexamined life is not worth living. (socrates[color=#454545], in plato, dialogues, apology). sorry, couldn't help it. . . lol

jesskidding, LPN · Jan 3, 2012

I took a Philosophy class just to take it. I didn't need it for my nursing degree. I was just interested in it. It is a lot of thinking and reading. It was a very tough class and only a few people passed, myself included.