My teaching is student-centered and incorporates the most recent effective teaching strategies published in the pedagogy literature. My classes are designed to help students focus for short lectures and internalize the material with in class exercises.
I strive to create an inclusive environment that stimulates student learning: I do this both by creating a civil atmosphere in class, where everyone’s identity is respected, and by designing inclusive syllabi.
In addition to teaching standard courses such as critical reasoning and logic, I have developed syllabi from a feminist perspective. Examples include a history of medicine that analyzes the role of women in reproductive theories from Ancient Greece to the Early Modern period, and a history of space and time that focuses on the views of female scholars, for the periods in which literature is available.
Here is my full teaching portfolio
Classes Taught Independently
Graduate
SOEE5550M Climate Change: Impacts and Adaptation (Section on Adaptation) (Spring 2020, 2021)
SOEE5020M Research Project (MSc Thesis Advising) (AA 2019/20)
Undergraduate
SOEE3112 Environmental Risk (Lecture on Uncertainty) (Fall 2019, 2020)
HPS0515 Magic, Medicine and Science (Spring 2017)
HPS0427 Myth and Science (Fall 2016)
HPS0611 Principles of Scientific Reasoning (Spring 2015)
Teaching Interests
Undergraduate
Introduction to Philosophy of Science
This course will cover the most important topics in 20th century philosophy of science, such as the problem of induction, falsifiablity, demarcation, evidence and confirmation, realism and topics on the social relevance of science.
Space Time and Matter
This course will cover the classical historical development of philosophical questions concerning space, time and matter from Antiquity (Heraclitus, Parmenides, Zeno, Euclid, Plato and Aristotle) to the Modern period (Newton, Leibnitz, Conway, Du Châtelet, Maxwell), possibly covering relativity. This course includes, where possible, primary and secondary literature by women.
Introduction to Philosophical Problems in Climate Science: evidence and action.
This course will use popular and scientific sources to investigate some of the most pressing epistemic issues in contemporary climate science. In the first part of this course, we will look at how climate scientists define the climate and how evidence bears on the claim that the climate is changing due to anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions. In the latter half of this course, we will explore approaches to incorporating scientific evidence to adapt to and mitigate climate change.
Introduction to Philosophical Problems in Climate Science: Ethics.
This course will cover basic ethical problems that arise from climate science. We will survey questions such as: What are the personal and collective responsibilities of individuals in the face of climate change? How can we assess these responsibilities given the ‘uncertainty’ that arises in models of the climate?
Advanced Undergraduate and Graduate
Philosophical Problems in Climate Science
This course will cover the major philosophical contributions to issues in climate science, covering both epistemological problems and problems in value theory. We will cover the work of important contributors to the debate such as the work of Parker, Lloyd, Frigg, Werndl and Winsberg, among others.
Ethical Problems in Climate Science
This course will cover the major ethical problems that arise from the impact of climate change and related adaptation options. We will cover recent work on the problem of the differential nature of the impact of climate change and the vulnerability of the poorest and economically disadvantaged societies in the world. We will also discuss issues tied with organizing governments to come up with adaptation and mitigation measures, and how to distribute the burden of the cost of these masures. We will cover the writings of Gardiner, Stern, Singer and Parfit, among others.
A History of the Climate I
This course will survey the origin and development of global climate models. We will start with early theories of global warming suggested at the end of the 19th century and subsequently look at the foundational work of Bjerknes, Rossby, Charney and Lorenz. We will also read contemporary historical work such as the work of Dahan Dalmedico and Fleming.
A History of the Climate II
This course will survey the impact that the development of computers had on the development of climate models. In particular, we will look at the huge shift that occured in numerical modeling and at the influence that John Von Neumann had on the development of global climate models.
Marina Baldissera Pacchetti 