KURT SYLVAN
ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR, UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHAMPTON (UK)
PH.D., RUTGERS UNIVERSITY (NEW BRUNSWICK, NJ, USA)
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SCHEDULE OF READINGS


For each week, the readings are broken down into required readings
and optional further readings.  You are not at all expected to read the
optional readings.  I include them in case you find the topic especially
interesting and would like to write a paper on it or simply learn more.

To access notes/slides for the course, click here. 
The folder will grow larger as the term proceeds.

If you like diagrams, a map of the course is here.

Week 1: Introduction

No Required Reading for this Week

Optional Reading
Driver, Julia. “Normative Ethics”
Kagan, Shelly. Normative Ethics, Chapter 1

Part 1: The Good

Week 2: What is Good for People?

Required Reading
Parfit, Derek. “What Makes Someone’s Life Go Best?”

Optional Further Reading
Arneson, Richard.  "Desire Formation and the Human Good"
​Arneson, Richard. “Human Flourishing versus Desire Satisfaction”

Feldman, Fred. Pleasure and the Good Life, Chapters 2-4
Griffin, James. Well-Being, Chapters 1-4
Haybron, Dan.  "Happiness and Pleasure"
Kagan, Shelly. Normative Ethics, Chapter 2, Sections 1 and 2
Kraut, Richard. “Two Conceptions of Happiness”
Parfit, D.  Reasons and Persons, Part Two
Plakias, Alexandra and Tiberius, Valerie.  "Well-Being"

Tiberius, Valerie.  "Recipes for a Good Life: Eudaimonism and the Contribution of Philosophy"

Week 3: Distribution and Relational Equality

Required Reading
Anderson, Elizabeth. “What is the Point of Equality?”
Parfit, Derek. “Equality vs. Priority”

Optional Further Reading
Arneson, Richard. “Egalitarianism”   SEP
Favor, Julian and Lamont, Christi. “Distributive Justice”   SEP
Kagan, Shelly. Normative Ethics, Ch. 2, Sections 4 and 5
Scheffler, Samuel. “What is Egalitarianism?”
Temkin, Larry. “Equality, Priority, and the Levelling Down Objection”
Temkin, Larry. “Inequality”

Week 4: Impersonal Goodness and Population Ethics

Required Reading
Parfit, Derek.  Selection from Reasons and Persons, Part Four

Focus on "The Non-Identity Problem" and "The Repugnant Conclusion".
Skim the rest if you're curious.

Roberts, Melinda. “The Non-Identity Problem”   SEP

Optional Further Reading
Broome, John. “Should We Value Population?"
​Harman, Elizabeth. “Can We Harm and Benefit in Creating?”

Kagan, Shelly. Normative Ethics, Ch. 2, Section 3
McMahan, Jeff. “Asymmetries in the Morality of Causing People to Exist”
McMahan, Jeff. “Problems of Population Theory”

Part 2: Restrictions on Promoting the Good

Week 5: Doing and Allowing

Required Reading
Thomson, Judith Jarvis.  "The Trolley Problem"

Strongly Recommended Reading
Quinn, Warren. “Actions, Intentions, and Consequences: The Doctrine of Doing and Allowing”

Optional Further Reading
Frowe, Helen.  "Killing John to Save Mary"
Howard-Snyder, Frances. “Doing vs. Allowing Harm”   SEP
Kagan, Shelly. The Limits of Morality, Chapter 3
McMahan, Jeff. “Killing, Letting Die, and Withdrawing Aid”
Rachels, James. “Active and Passive Euthanasia”
Thomson, Judith Jarvis. “Killing, Letting Die, and the Trolley Problem”
Tooley, Michael. “An Irrelevant Consideration: Killing and Letting Die”

Woollard, Fiona. “Doing and Allowing, Threats and Sequences”

Week 6: Consultation Week

I’ll be in my office during the normal class hours.  Feel free to arrange a meeting at another
 time if this doesn’t work for you.  Just send me an email and I’ll be happy to find a time.

Week 7: The Doctrine of Double Effect

Required Reading
Foot, Phillipa. “The Problem of Abortion and the Doctrine of Double Effect”

Strongly Recommended Reading
Quinn, Warren. “Actions, Intentions, and Consequences: The Doctrine of Double Effect”

Optional Further Reading
Bennett, Jonathan. The Act Itself, Chapter 11
Fischer, J., Ravizza, M. and Copp, D. “Quinn on Double Effect: The Problem of ‘Closeness’”

Kagan, Shelly. The Limits of Morality, Chapter 4
McIntyre, Alison. “The Doctrine of Double Effect”   SEP
McMahan, J.  "Intention, Permissibility, Terrorism, and War"
Nelkin, Dana and Rickless, Samuel. “So Close, Yet So Far...”

Nelkin, Dana and Rickless, Samuel. “Three Cheers for Double Effect”
Thomson, Judith Jarvis. "Self-Defense"

Week 8: Rights

Required Reading
Thomson, Judith Jarvis.  "Self-Defense and Rights"
Thomson, Judith Jarvis.  "Rights and Compensation"

Optional Further Reading
Davis, Nancy.  "Rights, Permission, and Compensation"
Feinberg, Joel. “The Nature and Value of Rights”
Feinberg, Joel.  "Voluntary Euthanasia and the Inalienable Right to Life"

Kamm, Frances. "Conflicts of Rights: A Typology"
Kamm, Frances. "Rights Beyond Interests"
Montague, Phillip.  "Rights and Duties of Compensation"
​Nozick, Robert.  Selection from 
Anarchy, State and Utopia on side constraints
Thomson, Judith Jarvis.  "Some Ruminations on Rights"

Waldron, Jeremy. Theories of Rights (edited collection)   BUY
Wenar, Leif. “Rights”   SEP

Part 3: Non-Teleological Conceptions of Value

Week 9: Are All Values To Be Promoted?

Required Reading
Kamm, F.  "Non-Consequentialism, the Person as an End-in-Itself, and the Significance of Status"

Strongly Recommended Reading
Scanlon, T. M. What We Owe to Each Other, Chapter 2

Optional Further Reading
Anderson, Elizabeth. Selections from Value in Ethics and Economics
Kamm, Frances. “Moral Status”
Korsgaard, Christine. “Kant’s Formula of Humanity”
Korsgaard, Christine. “Two Distinction in Goodness”
Parfit, Derek. On What Matters, Volume 1, Chapter 11
Woollard, Fiona.  "Intricate Ethics and Inviolability: Frances Kamm's Nonconsequentialism" (esp. pp.235-8)

Part 4: The Limits of Impartiality

Week 10: The Limits of Impartiality

Required Reading
Williams, Bernard. “Persons, Character, and Morality”

Strongly Recommended Reading
Wolf, Susan. “Moral Saints”

Optional Further Reading
Baron, Marcia. “On the Alleged Moral Repugnance of Acting from Duty”
Kagan, Shelly. 
The Limits of Morality, Chapters 7-9
Kagan, Shelly. Normative Ethics, Chapter 5, Sections 1 and 2
Scheffler, Samuel.  "Morality's Demands and their Limits"
Scheffler, Samuel. The Rejection of Consequentialism, Chapters 2 and 3
Railton, Peter. “Consequentialism, Alienation and the Demands of Morality”
Williams, Bernard.  "The Point of View of the Universe: Sidgwick and the Ambitions of Ethics"
Wolf, Susan.  "Meaning and Morality"

Week 11: Understanding Partiality

Required Reading
Jeske, Diane. Rationality and Moral Theory, Chapters 2-4

Optional Further Reading
Jeske, Diane. “Special Obligations”   SEP
Jeske, Diane and Fumerton, Richard. “Relatives and Relativism”
Keller, Simon.  Partiality, Chapter 1
Kolodny, Niko. “Which Relationships Justify Partiality?”
McMahan, Jeff. “The Limits of National Partiality”
Nagel, Thomas. The View from Nowhere, Chapters 9 and 10
​Scheffler, Samuel. “Relationships and Responsibilities”


Part 5: The Evaluation of the Agent

Week 12: Moral Worth

Required Reading
Arpaly, Nomy. “Moral Worth”

Strongly Recommended Reading
Williams, Bernard. “Moral Luck”

Optional Further Reading
Adams, Robert. “Involuntary Sins”
Enoch, David and Marmor, Andrei. “The Case against Moral Luck”

Herman, Barbara. “On the Value of Acting from the Motive of Duty”
Markovits, Julia. “Acting for the Right Reasons”
Markovits, Julia. “Saints, Heroes, Sages, and Villains”
Nagel, Thomas. “Moral Luck”
Nelkin, Dana. “Moral Luck”   SEP
Smith, Holly. “Varieties of Moral Worth and Credit”
Zimmerman, Michael. “Moral Luck: A Partial Map”
Zimmerman, Michael. “Taking Luck Seriously”
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