I took this Spring of 2020 during the coronavirus quarantines/protests. This quarter was a bit different in design from the usual in-person class, so the grading may be different in future classes.

Overall, I'd say it was really easy: there were originally supposed to be 5 quizzes (about 1 every 2 weeks) worth 50% and 2 papers worth the other 50%, but Smith was very accommodating and dropped the lowest quiz and paper, so only 4 quizzes and the highest scoring paper counted for your grade. Since I got 100s on the first 4 quizzes and did well on the first paper, I was basically exempt from the last ones. All of the lectures were pre recorded and uploaded so we could watch them at our leisure. They were also shorter than in a normal 1.25 hr timeslot so you can watch on 2x speed.

The quizzes were 10 questions with a generous 20 min time limit that covered only material from the last lecture of the previous quiz to the most recent material, so it was mostly 2-3 lectures worth of material and was also open notes and book. The papers were also manageable, though it does depend on who you get as a TA and what they are looking for in your papers!

There is one book that you are required to get, but it can be found online free in PDF form. You'll likely need it for the papers, but the quizzes themselves were based mainly on handouts from Smith that accompanied lectures. There are also two outside source readings you have to do, but it isn't hard and as long as you take notes in lecture or discussion on them, you don't really need to read them either unless it is what you choose as a paper topic.

Overall, this class was an excellent and easy choice for a philos GE/pre-req compared to some other philosophy classes. The content is not difficult to understand at all either. I recommend taking it!

Highly recommend this class as a GE. Class consisted of 5 very easy and straightforward quizzes (each worth 10%) and 2 essays (20% and 30%), plus a point of extra credit (boost grade by 1%). Quizzes took questions directly from the lectures and were open note. Essays had somewhat complicated prompts and not a lot of guidance, but were doable if you checked your ideas with a good TA. Professor Smith’s lectures are clear, even though the material is difficult to fully grasp at times. Would not recommend buying the textbook, as it unnecessarily complicates the material. Overall, a very easy class with little work involved.

This was a super easy GE. Sheldon did a great job of moving everything online during the COVID quarter, and was a cool professor. Two 4ish-page papers, 5 easy quizzes, and he ended up canceling the second paper anyway. This class was cash.

Professor Smith is really knowledgeable about this topic. I will say the topic was confusing if you are not well-versed in philosophy, let alone Philosophy of Science. And I also never went to class after week 4 with the exception of the midterm and final (because I could never get up before 9:30am LOL)... I ended up getting a good grade, primarily because my TA was so nice and helpful during office hours. Please go to office hours if you need it. My suggestion is weekly or biweekly, I regret not doing that. There are many concepts to grasp and it can be easy to get behind while it seems like your classmates understand everything right off the bat. There are also helpful quizlets to use and what not. We had an in class midterm, a paper, and an in class final. Each were 33% which is why it is important to finesse and focus solely on the things that matter. The readings were interesting to an extent but the length made them boring because they were so "academic" if that makes sense lol.

This class is alright. The quizzes were fair. Lectures were boring (at least for me). And writing the essays were annoying. I felt that my discussion section was not helpful at all so I stopped attending them. I also did not read the book (which I probably should have to do better on the quizzes) and I got a B+ so the class is not very difficult.
-
I AM SELING PDF VERSION OF "Theory and Reality, An Introduction to the Philosophy of Science" by Peter Godfrey Smith. Send me a quick email:
andrew87mendez@gmail.com

The material in this class is so abstract that you will hardly fully understand any of what is covered. However Smith is such a nice professor and was as helpful as one could be about such an abstract field. I've heard worse things about other Philos 8 professors and I feel like Smith does his best so I'd recommend anyone who has to take this class to take it with him

I took this class because I needed an easy GE and it ended up being a lot more content than I was expecting. With no philosophy experience beforehand, I found myself confused a lot of the time, and pre-recorded lectures didn't make it much easier. However, the quizzes were open note and questions were more definitional so they were pretty easy. The only hard part were the essays because the prompts were so lengthy and basically rambled on. My TA's office hours were the most helpful in clarifying though and it ended up paying off so I'd say take this if you're a strong writer!

There is a PDF of the textbook, which is great. There's not much material, in my opinion, but the material can get confusing and convoluted. Luckily, Professor Smith's handouts (posted on CCLE) are very, very clear and tell you exactly what you need to know in a succinct way. Lectures weren't that interesting imo, but that's more of the fault of the philosophy as a discipline than of the professor's. I did find his lecture examples cool to think about, though.

You don't need to know a lot about philosophy or science beforehand, so it's not a particularly hard GE. HOWEVER, the essay(s) is/are subjectively graded by the TAs. So my biggest piece of advice is to GO TO OFFICE HOURS AND ASK TONS AND TONS AND TONS OF QUESTIONS ABOUT YOUR IDEAS FOR THE ESSAY. get a good idea of what you want to write about a couple weeks beforehand. Have some examples of the concept you're writing about in your essay. Know the concept like you know the back of your hand. Then go to office hours and ask your TA if there is even something tiny you need clarification on in your essay. Philosophy essays can get really confusingly written if you don't ASK YOUR TA. So please go to office hours and make sure you know exactly what the TA wants and doesn't want.

Idk if I would totally recommend this class to anyone. Yes, I did end up with an A- I wanted, but I don't think I really learned anything from this class. The grade breakdown was super simple: 50% quiz grade, 25% midterm paper grade, 25% final paper grade; eventually it changed to 50% quiz grade with 1 lowest quiz grade getting dropped and 50% paper grade for whichever paper grade you got better. The content was extremely confusing & boring; I tried watching lectures to have a better understanding of the content, but it did not help so I stopped. The weekly quiz were super easy and doable even without watching the lectures as long as you had the notes the professor gives out with you; one of the quiz was really hard though, I took this class only b/c it's a pre-req so I wouldn't recommend to anyone who's trying to take it as an easy GE or is not required to take it. The material is not easy to understand, and the midterm paper topics were very challenging. The grading for the paper did not seem lenient to me at all, considering majority of my classmates, including myself, have never taken a philosophy class before. This class did stress me out b/c the grading scheme (50% quiz grade, 50% midterm/final paper grade) pressured me to complete everything perfectly, and the content was confusing. I ended up with an A- just b/c I got a 100% on all the quizzes (thank god), but if I messed up the quizzes or did worse on my midterm paper, I definitely would've considered dropping this class. However, I really did appreciate how the considerate the professor was of his students by making the final paper optional.

I thought this class was both easy and super interesting. Professor Smith is extremely knowledgeable which makes the lectures engaging, although attendance is not manageable. I never bought the textbook and I don't feel as though I needed it at all. I also recommend going to office hours for help on the papers. Otherwise, the workload in this class is super manageable.