Introductory Ethics

3.00 credits · Undergraduate

Prereq: 3 credits from Humanities 1600 Series; or permission of the Department This course introduces current western ethical theories (such as consequentialism, deontology, feminist, and virtue ethics) from historical sources (such as J. S. Mill, Kant, and Aristotle) as well as contemporary ones. In addition, material normally includes non-western texts (for instance, from Africana, Chinese, and Indian traditions) whose continuities and tensions with standard western theories and texts will usefully expand the scope of the discussion. Themes discussed may include: the nature of moral agency and the good life, the role of pleasure, power and desire in ethics, the relation of the ethical and the political, of the right and the good, and of reason and emotion. (Format: Lecture 3 Hours)