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Do not trust the grade distributions for this class. A huge number of drops and a ton of P/NP makes the above distributions possible.
Levy is a nice enough guy, but this class goes wayyyyy too in depth to be a GE. I'm not sure if its Levy's doing or the class itself (somehow, I think its the former).
It's absurd to expect students to attend weekend office hours (with tutors, not Levy himself) if they want to learn the content.
The only C I've ever gotten on a test were on Levys exams. I improved on subsequent exams, but Levy was super unclear about his grading practices (based on a mysterious and subjective curve where exam weights would change) so I (like seemingly 50% of the class) chose to take it P/NP.
I'd highly recommend avoid this class. Even if you do well, the time it takes to succeed to learn something that you can easily, easily get away without knowing at all (whether you're a philosophy major or pre law, there are plenty of other classes/ways to prep) is absurd. The grade distribution is a mirage. Trust me don't take it.
This was a very difficult class, but Professor Levy made it worthwhile. His lectures were always engaging, fun, and informative. If you want an A in this class, you must go to office hours and show up for lecture. He does not record his lectures.
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.
Lot of disgruntled people talking about how hard the class is. Logic isn't for everybody, but Steve Levy is. He's experienced, helpful, accommodating, and he wholeheartedly believes in your ability to grasp the concepts and will help you get there.
this course is pretty much discrete math at a very basic level but from a linguistic/rhetorical perspective so take it if you like that and don't take it if you don't. concepts felt pretty straightforward. homework is due through a dated-looking application called "logic" but the problems are very targeted (not too repetitive except at beginning) and helpful so it's clear that prof has taught this course a fair amount of times
s levy is a very kind, affable, and humorous person and you can tell he wants to help everyone do well despite the large amount of students in class (over 300). trust him and pls laugh at his frequent jokes
This class is hilariously easy if you understand logic. The prof is slow and old but you don't need to watch all the lectures to do well.
I ended up graduating UCLA summa cum lade this year in a stem field. Upon reflection, this is the absolute hardest class I took at UCLA. The pacing was god awful, it goes far too in-depth to be a GE, the expectation that you attend instruction on weekends was absurd. Many people dropped and took it P/NP.
I'm currently in the process of wrapping up my LSAT studies and this class (and formal logic in general) contributes absolutely nothing to one's understanding of that test. Again, there is NO SECTION of the LSAT that requires you to understand formal logic. Derivations and logical phrasing are not useful in any way, shape or form for legal thinking or the LSAT. This class is good for one thing only: pursuing a logic concentration in philosophy at UCLA. It should not be advertised as a class that prepares someone for Law School or the LSAT.
I'd discourage almost anyone from taking this class.
The two other reviewers for this quarter are pathetic. If you are serious about academics, then regardless of protests or pandemic, you would have been enthusiastic about this time-tested class.
Indeed, there were some mishaps with the exams, but overall, I would 100% recommend this course to anyone interested in logic, philosophy, or law school.
LEVY ROCKS. He is like the epitome of the crazy philosophy professor. I LOVED going to lecture, and never wanted to miss one because he was so fun and engaging. He makes the worst jokes ever and puts really pointless animations in his powerpoints, but all of that makes the class so fun.
Like everyone else said; do the homework. And do it ON TIME. Not only is it crucial to your understanding of the material but the points add up, and even just doing it late can hurt your grade. That being said, it isn't difficult. This depends highly on how your mind works, but don't believe anyone that says you have to be a math person. I'm not at ALL and I got 100% on the final. Just be open to thinking a new way and ask questions in section when you have them, and you'll be gold.
Levy's class is the bomb, I highly recommend it, especially for every Philosophy major.
Do not trust the grade distributions for this class. A huge number of drops and a ton of P/NP makes the above distributions possible.
Levy is a nice enough guy, but this class goes wayyyyy too in depth to be a GE. I'm not sure if its Levy's doing or the class itself (somehow, I think its the former).
It's absurd to expect students to attend weekend office hours (with tutors, not Levy himself) if they want to learn the content.
The only C I've ever gotten on a test were on Levys exams. I improved on subsequent exams, but Levy was super unclear about his grading practices (based on a mysterious and subjective curve where exam weights would change) so I (like seemingly 50% of the class) chose to take it P/NP.
I'd highly recommend avoid this class. Even if you do well, the time it takes to succeed to learn something that you can easily, easily get away without knowing at all (whether you're a philosophy major or pre law, there are plenty of other classes/ways to prep) is absurd. The grade distribution is a mirage. Trust me don't take it.
This was a very difficult class, but Professor Levy made it worthwhile. His lectures were always engaging, fun, and informative. If you want an A in this class, you must go to office hours and show up for lecture. He does not record his lectures.
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.
Lot of disgruntled people talking about how hard the class is. Logic isn't for everybody, but Steve Levy is. He's experienced, helpful, accommodating, and he wholeheartedly believes in your ability to grasp the concepts and will help you get there.
this course is pretty much discrete math at a very basic level but from a linguistic/rhetorical perspective so take it if you like that and don't take it if you don't. concepts felt pretty straightforward. homework is due through a dated-looking application called "logic" but the problems are very targeted (not too repetitive except at beginning) and helpful so it's clear that prof has taught this course a fair amount of times
s levy is a very kind, affable, and humorous person and you can tell he wants to help everyone do well despite the large amount of students in class (over 300). trust him and pls laugh at his frequent jokes
This class is hilariously easy if you understand logic. The prof is slow and old but you don't need to watch all the lectures to do well.
I ended up graduating UCLA summa cum lade this year in a stem field. Upon reflection, this is the absolute hardest class I took at UCLA. The pacing was god awful, it goes far too in-depth to be a GE, the expectation that you attend instruction on weekends was absurd. Many people dropped and took it P/NP.
I'm currently in the process of wrapping up my LSAT studies and this class (and formal logic in general) contributes absolutely nothing to one's understanding of that test. Again, there is NO SECTION of the LSAT that requires you to understand formal logic. Derivations and logical phrasing are not useful in any way, shape or form for legal thinking or the LSAT. This class is good for one thing only: pursuing a logic concentration in philosophy at UCLA. It should not be advertised as a class that prepares someone for Law School or the LSAT.
I'd discourage almost anyone from taking this class.
The two other reviewers for this quarter are pathetic. If you are serious about academics, then regardless of protests or pandemic, you would have been enthusiastic about this time-tested class.
Indeed, there were some mishaps with the exams, but overall, I would 100% recommend this course to anyone interested in logic, philosophy, or law school.
LEVY ROCKS. He is like the epitome of the crazy philosophy professor. I LOVED going to lecture, and never wanted to miss one because he was so fun and engaging. He makes the worst jokes ever and puts really pointless animations in his powerpoints, but all of that makes the class so fun.
Like everyone else said; do the homework. And do it ON TIME. Not only is it crucial to your understanding of the material but the points add up, and even just doing it late can hurt your grade. That being said, it isn't difficult. This depends highly on how your mind works, but don't believe anyone that says you have to be a math person. I'm not at ALL and I got 100% on the final. Just be open to thinking a new way and ask questions in section when you have them, and you'll be gold.
Levy's class is the bomb, I highly recommend it, especially for every Philosophy major.