Phil la to Be Dropped Due to Staff Shortage

No lower level courses in ancient philosophy will be offered by that department next year, since Philosophy 1a is being temporarily discontinued. Only Humanities 5--which this year had nearly 600 students--will elucidate the early thinkers to novices.

Phil. 1b, "The History of Modern Philosophy," will be taught in the spring by Donald C. Williams, professor of Philosophy. Due to scheduling difficulties, however, neither he nor any other member of the Department has found it possible to give the first half of the survey course.

Raphael Demos, Alford Professor of Natural Religion, Moral Philosophy, and Civil Polity, who is retiring this year, taught Phil 1 for more than 30 years. According to him it has been offered uninterruptedly for at least 75 years.

Roderick Firth, professor of Philosophy and chairman of the Department, expressed his great regrets at having to discontinue Phil 1a, calling it "one of the University's famous courses." He explained the difficulty partly by the fact that the philosophy department uses the members of its permanent staff as tutors, thus giving them less available time, and partly by the yearly changes in staff members. The department "is certainly going to make every effort" to reinstate the course by 1963-4, he said. He suggested that this might be done by sharing the job among a number of faculty members.

"That's how life is," Demos commented. "Things get born, they grow, and they die."