I would take all the Bruinwalk reviews for this class with a grain of salt.

I took this because A) reviews indicated it was easy-ish, and B) supposedly it was a good Law-prep class (Levy himself says it is)-- neither of which turned out to be true. This class is seriously difficult, demands a lot of studying time, and while Levy is a nice guy, he isn't awesome at explaining a lot of the concepts.

Furthermore, it’s totally inapplicable to the LSAT (which has a much simpler, entirely different logic system). This class doesn't even ask you to evaluate or symbolize the logic of rhetorical arguments, is taught by an ex-computer scientist (and a lot of the TA's were math or comp-sci majors), so I'm not sure how this could be applicable to law as some have suggested. This class is basically math without numbers, and I'd assume if you're a stem major you could do well. In general however, I'd highly advise avoiding this class if you like philosophy for its conceptual content and analysis of phenomena-- this class is much closer to math than a social science.

I assume the grade distribution for this class/reviews are heavily skewed based on a large number of drops (30 in my class after the first midterm, where roughly half the class got below a C), and a lot of people (I'd confidently say a third) taking the class P/NP.

I did well mainly because Levy began grading the exams more leniently (I got an C- on the first midterm, then an B+ then an A- on the final) but I also had to study an absolutely a ridiculous amount of time to get an A-. Additionally the grading system (20% midterm 1 and 2, 40% final, and 20% HW) makes it difficult to get an A, especially given each exam is only 15 questions (so miss one or two, your grade drops significantly).

So, while the content of the class is relatively interesting, I don't think its worth your time unless you're a Philosophy major (even in that case I'd consider avoiding it).

Took it this quarter and dropped out week 3. My main gripe is that the class is called Logic, First Course and the actual class content is not what anyone expects when signing up for the class. I also found it to be my hardest and most work-intensive class by far among Korean 1, Stats for Public Affairs, and Econ 2. Levy seems to go too far in depth whether you look at it as a GE or a lower division philosophy course (relative to Phil 22). If he covered just the first half of the class then it would have been more interesting and fun instead of stressful.

Levy and Kim are both very kind and Kim was absolutely phenomenal (though I only attended section once as it was more of an office hours). I intuitively understood most concepts and it helped that I have a basic understanding of computer science and have done some preliminary LSAT preparation. Despite this and my usual love for the fast-paced nature of the quarter system I still ended up hating the class because of the speed and workload, which must have been borderline hellish for those who didn't have a little experience in this alternative way of thinking like me.

Don't trust bruinwalk for this class! Tons of people drop this class or take it P/NP so the grade distribution looks nice-- But this class is super hard! It's not philosophy in the traditional sense it's basically math (with no numbers but theories, formulas, etc). I would not classify this as a social science. There are much easier philosophy GE's to take. Levy is a nice guy but not super clear about a lot of the content. 80% of your grade is based on (short, 15 question) exams. They're hard, so hard that roughly 50% of our class got below a C on the first exam. Yes its possible to do well but it takes a ridiculous amount of studying time (Levy assigns some TA's office hours on weekends... That's how much studying time this class requires).
Levy is a computer scientist and a lot of the TAs were math/comp sci majors so if you're a Stem person you could probably do well, but otherwise I'd steer clear.

Also, a lot of the reviews on this page were written about past quarters very recently and I find that a little suspect. Most people's feelings about this course don't seem to be accurately represented on this bruin walk page. People complained about this class in the groupme and on ucla reddit all the time... but bruin walk has glowing reviews?? Hmmmm....

Like others have said, this class is way too much work and goes too far in depth to be a GE. The fact that there are weekend office hours for an introductory course is honestly kind of absurd.
If the content was cut in half it would be much more manageable. I've been an A student my entire life and got a C- on the first exam. Levy's grading and teaching style isn't predictable so, like many others in the class, I decided to take it P/NP. This is an easily avoidable GE/pre req so I'd just not take it if I were you.

Stupidly hard class. Yes you can get an A... No it's absolutely not worth the hours of office hours (including weekend office hours, which I didn't know was a thing before this class), homework, textbook reading, groupme fishing, and personal tutoring sessions you will have to endure.
There are some people that think this class is easy and intuitive... they are the minority, and mostly stem majors. This class does not come easy if you're a social-science/ philosophy person... Make no mistake: This is a MATH class, not a philosophy class. An equally apt name for this class would be "philosophy of arithmetic" or something. It's really that similar.
There's also no way that grade distribution is accurate. I'm seriously appalled by a lot of these reviews praising the class/ levy. In my class, we had a TON of drops and P/NP, and the groupme was constantly filled with complaints-- really not representative of what's shown on this site.
I'd strongly recommend avoiding this class, especially if you aren't stem. If you're a philosophy major, take another pre-req.

Prof. Levy is a very nice person but not the best professor. In my opinion, the class has far too much material to cover for being a lower division GE. Levy is very passionate about the subject and quite helpful but the material is similarly to learning a new language. This class was definitely not your typical philosophy class and I would not recommend this class for anyone taking it as a GE. The gist of it was taking a sentence and translating it into their symbolic logic. I heard that pre-law students really like this class and some people just 'get it' but this class was just hard for me. I ended up taking it PNP but I would've gotten an A- with hours of effort trying to understand how to translate the sentences. Also the material and what you learn is pretty much useless outside the class.

Please read the other reviews to get a better gauge of what this class is usually like.

I took this class in Spring of 2020 during the coronavirus/protest season. As such, everything was conducted online. The TA, Tim, was awesome, but Levy's lectures usually went on for too long and he was very unaccommodating for students especially in regards to the final; he did not account for students living in different timezones and didn't adjust exam times, nor did he take student welfare into the best interest. It was a letdown to see this sort of behavior after reading all the glowing reviews about him. Perhaps things would have been better in person, but I'm inclined to say that he was, at best, subpar this quarter as a teacher.

I took this class the first online quarter at ucla. I heard a lot of good things about him, but honestly I don't see the hype. I took this class for a philosophy pre-req and I just feel he was extremely unaccommodating towards students that either lacked internet access or that lived in different time zones. He was an okay teacher, but the 8am zoom lectures were extremely boring and the fact that he would only record his audio from the lecture was ridiculous. I would compare this class as being somewhat close to math where you need to be able to see equations rather than just hearing them in order to learn. Him not posting the slides or recording his lecture made it difficult to sometimes retain things taught in class as he always went at his own speed. I just was not a big fan of Levy, although his fangirls will fight for him, and his disregard for the current stress of everything going on in the world at the moment was discouraging and disappointing,

My very first bruinwalk comment contributes to this class. This class is not a GE and I took it as a psychology prerequisite, but I would say this is really a surprising one for me. Overall, not extremely hard class ‘cause you don’t have to use every minute to review or do assignment, but enough exercise is still important so as to be familiarize with problems. The class is divided into 4 parts: symbolization, truth tables, derivations and invalidity. Symbolization and derivations are more difficult than other two, but you can check derivations during exam, so symbolization is definitely the most uncontrollable one. Truth table is the easiest, so never lose any points on that. Invalidity only occupies 2 classes in week 9 and 10, so remember to do enough exercise—they do not give any partial credits if you don’t do invalidities correctly, and 20 points will be off. For symbolization and derivation, only two words is enough—more exercise!

The class has extremely low fault tolerance rate regarding grading.
Daily assignments—20%
Midterm 1 and 2–20% for each
Final—40%

Remember, they calculate grades based on letter grades of each part instead of raw score! The cutoff for letter grades is based on distribution of class, which is a rough bell curve and is a little bit different for each quarter. However, the cutoffs for letter grades above B are really close and are really approximate to normal grading scale(97% for A+, 93% for A, etc), meaning that getting half a problem wrong can take you from A to B+ and give much more pressure to following exams (which is my real experience). Thus, treat the first exam seriously because that must be the easiest one. BTW, there are 15 problems for both midterms and count to a total of 100, while final has 17 problems with total scores of 200, and that’s another reason of law fault tolerance—every problem is extremely important. My grading is 89(B+), 96(A), 200(A+) with a final grading A. As long as you pay enough effort, you will be OK with exams, because professor does not give weird problems, and some problems are really similar with practice exams and all exams are completely open book with no limitation of paper sizes.

The class is really really interesting, especially for derivations. Doing problems is like solving puzzles or Sudoku, and I never get bored with assignments. The LAs of this class are the best and most helpful that I ever met, everyone of them is super knowledgeable in logic and are intelligent in teaching. They have around 8 OHs in total over a week, so the support you can get is more than enough.

Overall, if the grading scale is more lenient, I will give 100/100 to the class. Now it can get 85/100, and that’s still great. If you’re interesting in logic and being good at STEM, this class will never fails your expectation. Otherwise, the grading scale is something you really need to consider before enrolling.

Honestly, I was ready to give Prof. Levy a great review. He presents the material well, the assignments, while annoying sometimes, are fair, and I can echo the above that he has a generally likable personality. Up until the last two weeks of this class, I was willing to give him the benefit of the doubt since I took his class during the COVID quarantine/remote learning phase.

Notice that I said until the last two weeks. For context, this was when the Black Lives Matter movement/George Floyd killing was in the forefront of everyone's mind. Many other departments were doing their best to accommodate for these trying times, especially for students who were affected. However, Levy decided "nah, we aren't gonna do that." For a logic professor, trying to see him argue that a no-harm optional final would cause students more stress and then mandating that everyone take the final with no grade minimum using completely illogical arguments was something to behold. He tried to use his activism back in the 1960's to appeal to empathy, and then he flat-out ignored our requests for accommodations due to time zone difference (again, remote learning) or personal mental health due to current events.

It's a real shame because after seeing everyone say that Philosophy 31 with Levy was the best class they've had and seeing his high rating (4.0 before this quarter), I was hoping for a better takeaway. I was willing to give him the benefit of the doubt (maybe he's better in person) up until that ridiculous stunt with the final.