KURT SYLVAN
ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR, UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHAMPTON (UK)
PH.D., RUTGERS UNIVERSITY (NEW BRUNSWICK, NJ, USA)
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 ETHICS    
SPRING 2018          


Lectures take place Mondays from 3-4pm in 65/1133
and Thursdays from 4-6pm in 65/1133

SCHEDULE OF READINGS

The readings divide into required, strongly recommended,
and optional further readings.  I include the optional readings
just in case you find the topic especially interesting or would like
to write a paper on nearby issues.

Required readings are available for registered students on this
password-protected page.  Most of the optional further readings
can be found for free online or through the university library.


Part 1.  Meta-Ethical Preliminaries

Week 1: Moral Relativism - Its Varieties and Status
​ 
Required

Mary Midgley.  1981.  ‘Trying Out One’s New Sword’ in Heart and
Mind: The Varieties of Moral Experience
.  New York: St. Martin’s Press.

 
Strongly Recommended
 
James Rachels.  1986.  ‘The Challenge of Cultural Relativism’ in
The Elements of Moral Philosophy.  New York: McGraw Hill.

 
Further Reading

Michele Moody-Adams.  2002.  ‘The Empirical Underdetermination
of Descriptive Cultural Relativism’ in Fieldwork in Familiar Places. 
Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
 
David Wong.  2006.  Natural Moralities.  Oxford University Press.

 
Gilbert Harman.  1975.  ‘Moral Relativism Defended.’  Philosophical Review 85: 3-22.
 
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy entries on African and Chinese ethics:
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/african-ethics/
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/ethics-chinese/


Week 2: The Nature of Moral Judgment
 

Required

R. M. Hare.  1991.  ‘Universal Prescriptivism’ in Singer, P. (ed.)
A Companion to Ethics.  Blackwell.

           
Further Reading

Simon Blackburn.  1993.  Essays in Quasi-Realism. Oxford University Press.
 
Allan Gibbard.  1990.  Wise Choices, Apt Feelings. Oxford University Press.
 
            Mark Schroeder.  2010.  Non-Cognitivism in Ethics.  London: Routledge.
           
            Charles L. Stevenson.  1937.  ‘The Emotive Meaning of Ethical Terms.’  Mind 46: 14-31.
           
            Stanford Encyclopedia entry on cognitivism vs. non-cognitivism:
            https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/moral-cognitivism/



Week 3: Morality, Reason, and Motivation

Required

Philippa Foot.  1972.  ‘Morality as a System of Hypothetical Imperatives.’ 
Philosophical Review 81: 305-316.

 
Further Reading

Stephen Darwall.  1997.  ‘Reasons, Motives, and the Demands of Morality:
An Introduction’ in Darwall, S., Gibbard, A., and Railton, P. (eds.) M
oral Discourse and Practice
.  Oxford: Oxford University Press.
           
David Hume.  Treatise of Human Nature, Book II, Part III, Section III;
Book III, Part I, Section I.
 
Christine Korsgaard.  1997.  ‘The Normativity of Instrumental Reason’ in Cullity, G.
and Gaut, B. (eds.) Ethics and Practical Reason.  Oxford: Clarendon Press.
 
Christine Korsgaard.  1986.  ‘Skepticism about Practical Reason.’ 
The Journal of Philosophy 83: 5-25.
           
Derek Parfit.  2011.  On What Matters, Volume One, Part One. 
Oxford: Oxford University Press.
 
Derek Parfit.  1997.  ‘Reasons and Motivation.’  Proceedings of the
Aristotelian Society 
71: 99-146.



Part 2. What Matters Morally?
                   
Week 4: Goodness and its Distribution
 
Required

Thomas Hurka.  2006.  ‘Value Theory’ in Copp, D. (ed.) The Oxford
Handbook of Ethical Theory
.  Oxford University Press.

 
Further Reading

            Shelly Kagan.  1998.  Normative Ethics, Chapter 2.  Westview Press.
           
Derek Parfit.  1984.  ‘What Makes Someone’s Life Go Best?’ in Reason
and Persons
.  Oxford: Oxford University Press.
 
Alexandra Plakias and Valerie Tiberius.  2010.  ‘Well-Being’ in Doris, J. (ed.)
The Moral Psychology Handbook.  Oxford: Oxford University Press.
 
Derek Parfit.  1997.  ‘Equality and Priority.’  Ratio 10: 201-221.
 
Larry Temkin.  2000.  ‘Equality, Priority, and the Leveling Down Objection’
in Clayton, M. and Williams, A. (eds.) The Ideal of Equality.  Macmillan.
 
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy articles on well-being,
intrinsic and extrinsic value, egalitarianism and distributive justice:

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/well-being/
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/value-intrinsic-extrinsic/
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/egalitarianism/
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/justice-distributive/

 
Week 5: Values beyond 'Goods' and Relational Equality
 
Required

Elizabeth Anderson.  1999.  ‘What Is the Point of Equality?’  Ethics 109: 287-337.
 
Strongly Recommended

Elizabeth Anderson.  1993.  Selection from Value in Ethics and Economics.
Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.


T. M. Scanlon.  1998.  What We Owe to Each Other, Chapter 2.
Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

 
Further Reading
 
Miranda Fricker.  2007.  Introduction to Epistemic Injustice.
Oxford University Press.
 
Charles Mills.  2015.  ‘Racial Equality' in Hull, G. (ed.)
The Equal Society.  Lanham: Lexington Books.
           
Samuel Scheffler.  2003.  ‘What Is Egalitarianism?’ 
Philosophy and Public Affairs 2003: 5-39.
 
Samuel Scheffler.  2015.  ‘The Practice of Equality’ in Fourie, C.,
Schuppert, F. and Wallimann-Helmer, I. (eds.) Social Equality. 
Oxford University Press.
 
Fabian Schuppert.  2015. ‘Being Equals’ in Fourie, C., Schuppert, F.
and Wallimann-Helmer, I. (eds.) Social Equality.  Oxford University Press.
 
Naomi Zack.  Equality after the History of Philosophy, Chapter 8. 
Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield.



Week 6: Doing and Allowing Harm, Rights, and Self-Ownership, Part 1

Required
 
Judith Jarvis Thomson.  1985. ‘The Trolley Problem.’  The Yale
Law Journal
 94: 1395-1415.

 
Further Reading
 
Philippa Foot.  1967.  ‘The Problem of Abortion and the Doctrine
of Double Effect.’  Oxford Review 5: 5-15.
 
Judith Jarvis Thomson.  1976.  ‘Killing, Letting Die,  and the
Trolley Problem.’  The Monist 59: 204-217.
 
Judith Jarvis Thomson.  2008.  ‘Turning the Trolley.’  Philosophy and
Public Affairs
 36: 359-374.
 
Fiona Woollard.  2012.  ‘The Doctrine of Doing and Allowing, Part 1.’ 
Philosophy Compass 7: 448-458.
 
Michael Tooley.  1994.  ‘Killing and Letting Die: An Irrelevant Distinction’
in Norcross, A. and Steinbock, B. (eds.) Killing and Letting Die. 
New York: Fordham University Press.



Week 7: Doing and Allowing Harm, Rights, and Self-Ownership, Part 2

Required
 
Fiona Woollard.  2012.  ‘If This Is My Body…  A Defense of the Doctrine of
Doing and Allowing.’  Pacific Philosophical Quarterly 94: 315-341.

 
Further Reading
 
Jeff McMahan.  1993.  ‘Killing, Letting Die, and Withdrawing Aid.’  Ethics 250-279.
 
Warren Quinn.  1989.  ‘Actions, Intentions, and Consequences: The Doctrine of
Doing and Allowing.’  The Philosophical Review 98: 287-312.
 
Fiona Woollard.  2012.  ‘The Doctrine of Doing and Allowing, Part 2.’  Philosophy
Compass 
7: 459-469.
 
Fiona Woollard.  2015.  Doing and Allowing Harm.  Oxford: Oxford University Press.


​
Week 8: Intention

Required
 
Jeff McMahan.  2009.  ‘Intention, Permissibility, Terrorism, and War.’ 
Philosophical Perspectives 23: 345-372.

 
Further Reading
 
Judith Jarvis Thomson. 1991. ‘Self-Defense.’  Philosophy and
Public Affairs
 20: 283-310.
 
Doug Husak.  2009.  ‘The Costs to Criminal Law Theory of Supposing that
Intentions are Irrelevant to Permissibility.’  Criminal Law and Philosophy 3: 51-70.
 
F. M. Kamm.  2008.  ‘Terrorism and Intending Evil.’  Philosophy and
Public Affairs
 36: 157-186.
 
Victor Tadros.  2011.  ‘Wrongdoing and Motivation’ in The Ends of Harm. 
Oxford University Press.
 
T. M. Scanlon.  2008.  Moral Dimensions, Chapters 1 and 2. 
Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
 
Warren Quinn.  1989.  ‘Actions, Intentions, and Consequences: The
Doctrine of Double Effect.’  Philosophy and Public Affairs 18: 334-351.



Part 3: Generalist Moral Theory and its Critics

Week 9: Consequentialism

Required
 
Henry Sidgwick.  1874.  Selections from Methods of Ethics.  London: MacMillan.


Strongly Recommended

Henry Sidgwick.  Further Selections from Methods of Ethics.

Roger Crisp.  The Cosmos of Duty, Chapters 1 and 7.
 
Optional Further Reading
 
            Stanford Encylopedia of Philosophy entries on consequentialism:
            https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/consequentialism/
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/consequentialism-rule/
 
Stanford Encylopedia of Philosophy entry on the history of utilitarianism:
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/utilitarianism-history/
 
Stanford Encylopedia entries on Bentham, Mill, Sidgwick, and Moore:
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/bentham/
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/mill/#MillPracPhil
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/sidgwick/
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/moore-moral/



Week 10: Non-Consequentialism

Required
 
Allen Wood.  2006.  ‘The Supreme Principle of Morality’, Sections 1 and 2,
in Guyer, P. (ed.) The Cambridge Companion to Kant and Modern Philosophy. 
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

 
Optional Further Reading
 
F. M. Kamm.  2006.  ‘Nonconsequentialism’ in Intricate Ethics. 
Oxford: Oxford University Press.
 
Immanuel Kant.  1785.  Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals.
 
W. D. Ross. 1930.  ‘What Makes Right Acts Right?’ in The Right and
the Good
.  Oxford: Clarendon Press.
 
Barbara Herman.  ‘Leaving Deontology Behind’ in The Practice of
Moral Judgment
.  Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
 
Thomas Hill.  1980.  ‘Humanity as an End in Itself.’  Ethics 91: 84-99.
 
Christine Korsgaard.  1986.  ‘Kant’s Formula of Humanity.’ 
Kant-Studien 77: 183-202.
 
Allen Wood.  2002.  ‘What Is Kantian Ethics?’ in Wood, A. (transl.)
Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals.  New Haven: Yale University Press.



Week 11: Unprincipled Ethics and Non-Ideal Theory

Required
 
Charles Mills.  2005.  ‘‘Ideal Theory’ as Ideology.’  Hypatia 20: 165-184.
 
Philosophy Bites interview with Jonathan Dancy on Moral Particularism
http://traffic.libsyn.com/philosophybites/Jonathan_Dancy_on_Moral_Particularism.mp3

 
Optional Further Reading
 
Mark Lance and Margaret O. Little.  2006.  ‘Particularism and Anti-Theory’
in Copp, D. (ed.) The Oxford Handbook of Ethical Theory.  Oxford: Oxford University Press.
 
Amartya Sen.  2006.  ‘What Do We Want from a Theory of Justice?’ 
The Journal of Philosophy 103: 215-238.
           
Tommie Shelby.  2004.  ‘Race and Social Justice: Rawlsian Considerations.’ 
Fordham Law Review 72: 1697-1714.
 
Laura Valentini.  2012.  ‘Ideal Theory vs. Non-Ideal Theory: A
Conceptual Map.’  Philosophy Compass 7: 654-664.
 
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy entry on moral particularism:
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/moral-particularism/
 


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