This class was really great. The focus on Kierkegaard's works was excellent, since it allows for a real depth of understanding rather than a quick skim. Dr. Kraal is an excellent professor who is incredibly knowledgeable about Kierkegaard and how theology works within his texts. He also shows some opposing interpretations to his own and encourages you to think for yourself and decide what you think is more convincing. Absolutely recommended.

This class was, for my section, graded based upon three in-class exams. The first wasn't so bad. The second was more nuanced and difficult, etc. All this to say: study the texts well, annotate them, pay attention in class and take diligent notes. As long as you are familiar and comfortable with dealing with the nuance of the texts insofar as it's explored in this class, you'll do great.

This is a brilliant course. Dr. Kraal surveys a good range of voices in the philosophical debate surrounding metaphysics in the areas of ontology & free-will.

This is all very useful for someone who's going to study philosophy deeply or get interested in metaphysics for graduate study (me). It gives you an excellent taste of the the contemporary fields and debates in metaphysics. The content is solid and fun. I had a great time with ontology given its complexity. Dr. Kraal has said we could have surveyed other topics like time and possible worlds, but he said he preferred to give us the other topics seeing as this was an introductory course.

Dr. Kraal is a wonderful lecturer, and is incredibly accessible and helpful. He is professional and kind with his students, cracks jokes, tells great stories and is willing to have fun, honest, conversations.

I don't think there's anything too surprising here. It's a standard Kraal class--two exams and a paper; favouring your expression of your opinion; and great lectures with fun stories. Take diligent notes and study well--you'll be rewarded.

This is a pretty darn good PHIL class. Kraal is a great instructor, no surprises there. Area covered is huge, and hopefully it leaves you less certain about your initial thoughts on atheism vs. theism. Super neat if you approach things honestly.

Content works like this: first you tackle purely theistic arguments, then you start doing problem of evil, then get theist replies, then atheist replies to those replies. There's even modal logic in there. You write two exams, one paper, so really there is not a lot going on, work-wise. Take lecture notes with substantial detail and include every little detail you can because that's what'll put you in A territory on your exam. Merely getting things right doesn't net you an excellent grade. Content is diverse, as you cover such authors as William Lane Craig, Epicurus, Darwin, Hume, (lots of) Plantinga, Irvine (modal logic), Anselm, Kant, Russell, etc. There's a lot in the class but it's manageable because it's essentially a big old dialogue between the authors and the kinds of arguments the...read more

Dr. Kraal is great. He welcomes challenges to what he argues for or what he's explaining, provided they're smart and well-delivered. I had several conversations about authors' arguments or his own in class to dig deeper into their flaws or merits. It was really meritorious to do so, in my opinion, because it lent depth to certain points of the course so that I could give better exam answers and think about problems of religion in more depth. Dr. Kraal just knows how to make the class interesting and fun to take.

I recommend you take it and be realistic about challenging your assumptions. A lot will come down to your intuitions, but I think it's okay to keep your mind open and not dogmatic, especially if you're decidedly a theist or atheist. Exams are chilled out if you study well and take good notes. The paper was good fun, really not that hard when it came down to it, just make sure you do it enough in advance to get someone to peer-review it for you so that you can see if you've made it logical and grammatical.