Faculty

William James DeAngelis

Associate Professor of Philosophy
Office: 368 Holmes Hall
Phone/Voice: Mail: 617-373-4163
E-Mail: w.deangelis@neu.edu

I have been a fulltime teacher of philosophy since 1967. I have taught at Cornell University, the University of Missouri, and here at Northeastern. I have won Northeastern University’s Presidential Award for Excellence in Teaching. My approach to teaching depends very much on the course being taught. My Introduction to Philosophy Course, which I teach each year, is playful, interactive, and places philosophical problems themselves rather than works of the great philosophers, center stage. My strong feeling is that the problems of philosophy are challenging enough for first-time students without adding to their difficulties, those involved in reading Plato, Aristotle, Hobbes, St. Augustine, Descartes, Locke, Hume, Kant, Mill, Marx, Russell, Heidegger, Wittgenstein and other world historic philosophical figures. As such, I confine myself to texts written for and directed at first-time undergraduate students.

Introduction to Logic, another course I teach each year, is another story. This is a skills course that introduces mathematically rigorous formal techniques, primarily for determining the validity and invalidity of arguments. These techniques must be learned and my logic courses emphasize constant drilling and testing of essential fundamentals. Logic is the only philosophy course in which the answers are in the back of the book! I treat it as such - trying, along the way, to employ amusing or thought provoking problems upon which to employ the techniques learned in the course. Empirical studies show that students who master these techniques improve dramatically in their critical reasoning skills. I try to enhance this effect by emphasizing the connections between formal logic and everyday reasoning.

The other courses I teach on a yearly or bi-yearly basis are Modern Philosophy (17th and 18th Century European Philosophy), Philosophy of Mind, Philosophical Ideas in Literature, and seminars in Descartes, Hume, and Wittgenstein. In these classes the emphasis is on reading and discussing great works of philosophy with the aim of gaining a critical understanding of them. This is challenging stuff and can sometimes be almost unbearably difficult. Be that as it may, students tell me that I have a knack for lightening the load of all this heaviness by injecting just enough playfulness and humor into my classes. I feel fortunate that my main philosophical interests lie in the areas in which I teach. My colleagues and departmental Chairs have tended, within reason, to allow me to teach what I want to teach. I think it is no exaggeration to say that I enjoy wonderful personal relationships with my colleagues at Northeastern and my students. Among my friends are many of my past and present students.

EDUCATION

B. S. - Philosophy and Mathematics, City College of New York, 1964
M.A. - Cornell University, 1966
Ph.D. - Cornell University, 1970

TEACHING EXPERIENCE

Introduction to Philosophy, Introduction to Logic, Symbolic Logic, Epistemology, Modern Philosohy, Theory of Knowledge, Philosophy of Mind, Social and Political Philosophy, Analytic Philosophy, Philosophical Ideas in Literature, Seminars in Descartes, Hume, Russell, and Wittgenstein.

RESEARCH INTERESTS

Philosophy of Mind, Self-Deception, Descartes, Wittgenstein, especially Wittgenstein’s Philosophy of Culture and Religion.
I have just completed a book, In The Darkness of this Time - Spenglerian Cultural Themes in the Later Philosophy of Wittgenstein. It is, in many respects, a refining and further development of the ideas contained in papers (4) - (6) below.

PUBLICATIONS

Of my thirty or so publications, here are the five of which I am most proud. I will supply a copy of any of these to anyone who is interested in reading one.
(1) "Wittgenstein's Last Writings On the Philosophy of Psychology", Philosophical Investigations, October 1984. (Reprinted in The Philosophy of Wittgenstein, vol. v, edited with an introduction by J.V. Canfield, Garland Publishing, 1986.)
(2) "New Possibilities for Self-Deception", delivered at New England Society for Philosophy and Public Affairs colloquium, "Hypocrisy and Self-Deception", Cark College, Worcester, MA, April 1986 (Refereed Paper.)
(3) "Wittgenstein and Spengler", Dialogue, vol. xxxiii, 1994.
(4) "Anglo-American Metaphysics - 1900 - 1945", in Routledge History of Philosophy, vol. X, a ten-volume multi-author comprehensive history under the general editorship of G. H. R. Parkinson and S. G. Shanker, Routledge, 1996.
(5) "Ludwig Wittgenstein - A Religious Point of View?: Thoughts On Norman Malcolm's Last Philosophical Project", Dialogue, volume xxxii, Spring 1997.

ALSO OF INTEREST

For the past three years I have been very much involved with the W. E. B. DuBois Program in the Humanities - a federally funded program and partnership between Northeastern University and Roxbury Community College that brings eight months of college-level Humanities instruction for college credit to a clientele that could not otherwise enjoy college level education. This clientele consists of high school grads (or G.E.D. recipients), living near the poverty line, with onerous job and/or family responsibilities. The program offers college level mini-courses in Philosophy, Literature, History, Art, and Writing. I was Academic Director of the DuBois program during its first year and have continued as its Philosophy teacher in subsequent years. For my role in starting up this program, I received Northeastern’s Presidential Aspiration Award. I am proud to have participated in this worthwhile, cutting edge educational experiment, and equally proud of Northeastern University for supporting it administratively, academically, and financially.