if you enjoy listening to the same three lectures each week, and the same points and ideas in the lectures, and being told what you should think and how to think, then take this class. i could not stay awake in that class, even for the last lecture. i'm sure prof hsu is a brillant man, but i'm not one to agree with that. the hardest part of the class is figuring out when he's going to get to the point, and staying awake. there's no work, just midterm and final graded by your TA. this is the first philosophy class i took, and he made me dislike it. but for as much as i slept in lectures, almost every lecture, i got a b+.

if you are coming into this class expecting to learn some sort of profound philosophical ideas do not take this class. while i enjoyed the class, it is not an easy A by all means. This class is really just about sitting around and doing some critical thinking, there isn't much work otherwise except when the take home papers come around(and note-every word is picked at). Professor hsu is a very very repetitive lecturer(the first couple weeks were extremely slow) and i think he could of condensed a weeks worth of lecture into one 50 minutes session but he is a very nice and patient guy. He just really wants you to understand the material. Your grade is heavily dependent upon your TA(can bump your grade up a 1/3 and is your grader on all papers) so make sure to go to discussion and their office hours. My TA was a particulary hard and nit- picky grader but she was very nice and tried her best to help. Overall, if you want to major in philo or have a deep interest in the subject this is a good class to take, however, if you are just looking for a philo GE to fufill i would recommend a different philo class.

I didn't do well in this class (I'm writing this review before I see my grade). I enjoyed this class to a certain extent. Taking it as a GE, I suppose I didn't take this class as seriously as I should have. Hsu is a brilliant man and his lectures are roundabout for a reason; it serves a purpose to leave nothing to doubt about what he says. The TAs seemed very good (at least mine). The only problem I had with this is the high expectations placed on the ability of the students to reason about philosophy. It wasn't clearly mentioned in the beginning for the course but it was definitely present. This was my first philosophy class so I probably shouldn't have jumped right away into Philos 21. I'm not going to be bitter if I get a C in the class or something. I'm not that type of person to b*tch about my grade...just take what you deserve. Bottom line: I feel like I learned something from Professor Hsu and that's what counts in the end.

Professor Hsu is a very friendly, accomplished, and verbose teacher. His lectures may be a bit slow and boring, but he gets his point across. You can easily approach him and ask questions if you are confused.

The material of Philosophy 21 was interesting to me, and I enjoyed taking it because I like to think. Professor Hsu got me interested in Philosophy, because his class was a nice change from regular classes.

Take him if you want a fairly easy class (all you have to do is write a few papers) that doesn't put loads of homework or reading on you. Grading will depend on your TA though.

hsu is an okay professor. his lectures do tend to go on forever and it seems like he could have said his whole lecture in about a period of 15 minutes. midterms and finals arent that bad. we had one in class midterm and the other midterm and final is a take home. in both cases we were given the question a week in advance. in general the class isnt that hard, but if u really dont want to analyze whether or not u know u exist then dont take this class. because that is the entire class.

I took Philo 21. If you are the type of person that prefers to think and be challenged by philosophy, DO NOT TAKE PHILO 21. There is absolutely no thinking involved. You go to the lectures, take notes which are already typed up on the handouts passed out, memorize the info and then write it on paper for the midterm that your TA grades. so basically,if you go to discussion and the review session and just put down what your TA says, you can get an A. its really easy, but really frustrating cuz the lectures are soooooooooooooooooooo slow. the first two weeks we have gone over like 5 pages. no kidding.