DO NOT, I REPEAT, DO NOT TAKE THIS CLASS, especially with Rescorla.

I took this class during online school to fulfill a GE requirement, and it was a disaster front to back. When you start the class, Rescorla will seem like a quirky, but nice guy. As you continue though, you will gradually realize more and more what a terrible professor he is. His "lectures" were glorified Q&A sessions. Instead, he posted several pre-recorded videos per week that you were expected to watch in lieu of actual lectures. The class has 3 essays you have to write. For every single one, the prompt was extremely vague and gave little direction. The TAs, or at least my TA, seemed to be equally confused as I was, and had no idea how to give feedback.

Until about Week 10, I figured Rescorla was your run-of-the-mill bad professor who just didn't teach you much, but it was what happened after Week 10 that made me dislike Rescorla with a burning passion. For one, his final was absurd. It was 5 mini-essays, with the same kind of vague, confusing prompts used in the earlier essays. My TA told us that they expected about 3 pages per question, in a 3-hour final. If you do the math, that comes out to 12 MINUTES PER PAGE, which is absolutely absurd. It's completely unreasonable to expect someone to be able to write a page in 12 minutes, especially for questions that are expecting you to break down and analyze dense philosophical concepts. Our TA LITERALLY told us that the only way to do well on this exam is to pre-write essays for every concept we've covered, and then just copy-paste the relevant ones in once the final starts, and then use the actual finals time to fine-tune and edit the pre-written essay to reflect whatever prompt it was answering. This just boggles my mind.

They had 3 "review sessions" for the final. Rescorla wasn't even there, the review sessions were run by TAs, and they weren't even review sessions. They were literally just Q&A sessions.

But I still haven't even mentioned the real kicker. They announced this absurd final on Friday of Week 10, 3 days before it opened. The final opened Monday afternoon, and with zero warning or heads up, RESCORLA REMOVED EVERY LECTURE AND VIDEO HE HAD UPLOADED TO HIS SITE. All of a sudden, there was literally no material on his site. If you weren't finished studying by that point, you were completely screwed, and just to reiterate, he did this with absolutely zero warning or notice.

Rescorla is one of, if not the absolute worst professors I have had at UCLA, and he made this class an absolute nightmare. I said it once, and I'll say it again: DO NOT TAKE THIS CLASS WITH RESCORLA.

hated this class. lecture was so boring. never did the readings but had to spend $50 on a course reader (even though all materials were find-able online). TA was weird and only semi helpful. Easy enough, but boring. Rescora was confusing and patronizing. Always talked about Trump. Don't recommend

I've never taken a philosophy course so I really didn't know what to expect. First of all, the TAs were just as lost as the students were. The professor never put anything on CCLE and would often contradict the readings he assigned (which were completely pointless). He also decided to make the final unnecessarily long (3 hours, 10 essays). The grading was arbitrary and it was hard to know where you stood in the class. There was no rubric or set expectations. I would never take this class again.

Hands down the worst professor I've ever had at UCLA. First day of class, he came off as arrogant, sarcastic, and as someone who did not care for his students' learning. The TA's were kept in the dark for the majority of the course. They were clueless as to what to do during the review sessions for the final. Nothing is posted on ccle, as to "encourage" students to come to lecture. There were 3 essays, weekly in class quizzes which weren't hard, participation for discussion, and the final which consisted of 10 mini essays. There was also a course reader which we never used (waste of $50), despite him insisting we buy it (again completely unconcerned for his students). I'm still upset about my overall grade, but in general I just regret taking the class in the first place.

Out of the 9 quarters I've been at UCLA, this has been without a doubt the worse class I've ever taken here. And its not even close. The papers are so incredibly specific, with about 3 sentences of explanation followed by TAs trying to clarify what the hell the assignment was for the next 3 weeks. I've never seen a professor been so rude. Which would be one thing if he was good, but he wasted so much time covering the most inane details. I also feel as though I've learned absolutely nothing, besides a few basic facts of philosophical history. Avoid at all costs. If you have to take it, don't bother with the course reader.

This is actually for 170 but it wasn't an option and I thought it was important for me to balance out some of the reviews here. I thoroughly enjoyed this class and the professor. I didn't think I would be interested in the subject, but the professor and the required text made it easy to understand. The course reader was not "necessary" but some things can be useful without being necessary, and the course reader is a great example of that. The workload was hard, but doable in a full course load. He can seem snarky, but, ultimately, extremely knowledgable. He was my first prof at UCLA and an great one at that. If you want to understand the subject your assigned to learn take professor Rescorla, read the primary text(the Kim text), and go to lecture. You'll do great.

At the time I'm writing this, I am a graduating senior. I took this class winter of my sophomore year and it was by far not only the worst GE, but the worst class I've taken at UCLA. My TA was a firm believer of "you can't get an A on a philosophy paper" so really I was doomed from the start. No one I knew in my section got As on the papers regardless of how often they went to office hours or how early they started their papers.
The professor is sarcastic, which I would normally enjoy, except he came off as arrogant and uncaring for students. He did not even show up for the final, which was a very long written exam that was extremely harshly graded. I spent a lot of time studying for it and did not receive the grade I hoped for, and when I asked the TA and the professor to show me my final they were very unaccommodating. My advice is if you want to take a GE you enjoy, don't take one with bad reviews.

Honestly, this class was very easy as I had stopped watching the lectures at week 4 and ended with a B+ in the course. DO NOT BUY THE COURSE READER ! I literally did not use the course reader once throughout this entire class. The only hw you have for this course are weekly quizzes which are basically free points as they are dumb easy to do. There are also three required papers which all are very short and honestly I just rewatched and copied what he said on his recorded lectures into my essay. If you want an easy ge class take this and you'll end with a B+ for putting no effort into the course. But if you really wanted to try you could definitely end with an A if you were to go to office hours to get help on the paper. There is no midterm but there is a final and gives out a review sheet before and the final is exactly the same as the review sheet.

(Reviewing for Philosophy 7 - Intro to Phil of Mind)
Michael Rescorla is AWESOME. Super funny, used lots of examples from movies (Truman Show, The Matrix...) to illustrate his points, very entertaining lectures. Highlights PowerPoint slides in blue if the information is "must-write-down" and is super helpful in office hours. Highly recommend this class and this professor

I took this class fall 2020 as a freshman, so it had not occurred to me to read the reviews beforehand. I really, really wish I had. There is absolutely no clarity in the way this class is graded, and it seems as if that is intentional. I ended up checking my final grade on the last day that we had to contest it, and there was only an overall letter grade, nothing about the quizzes, final, or the three papers we are assigned. I had to literally email the professor for a grade breakdown, and he only gave me more obscure letters on each paper and the final but had never given a rubric that told us how grades were assessed (if you ask for one, the TAs say they can't give you one). The professor also doesn't like to answer questions, the TAs were the most helpful resource in this class. Finally, don't bother with the purchase of the course reader; it's useless.