Part 1A Introduction to Normative Ethics
Undergraduate CourseThis is the web page for the Philosophy Part 1A course Introduction to Normative Ethics given by Richard Holton at the University of Cambridge, Michaelmas term 2019. This page provides links to papers and other texts that may be useful and to pdf versions of the handouts. If you have suggestions or comments, please let me know by emailing me at rjh221@cam.ac.uk
The course will cover the syllabus materials on Morality and the Self and Forms of Consequentialism, and more broadly will provide some introduction to other normative approaches, and to other topics in moral psychology.
Lectures
Introduction: Some Puzzles and Some Considerations
(16 October) Handout
Primary
- Judith Jarvis Thomson The Trolley Problem Yale Law Journal 94 (1985)
Egoism: Philosophical and Empirical Issues
(23 October) Handout
Primary
- Bishop Butler Fifteen Sermons Sermon XI
Our Moral Natures 1
(30 October) Handout
Primary
- E. Fehr & U. Fischbacher ‘The Nature of Human Altruism’ Nature 425 (2003) 785-91 [On-line]
Secondary
- Stich, Doris and Roedder Altruism (Discusses Batson, and Sober and Wilson)
Our Moral Natures 2
(6 November) Handout
Primary
- Michael Tomasello Why We Cooperate
Secondary
Consequentialism
(13 November) Handout
Primary
- JJC Smart and Bernard Williams, Utilitarianism For and Against
Secondary
- Philip Pettit, ‘The Consequentialist Perspective’ in Baron, Pettit and Slote, Three Methods of Ethics
Deontology
(20 November) Handout
Primary
- Kant, Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals
Secondary
Virtue Theory and Particularism
(27 November) Handout
Primary
- Rosalind Hirsthouse Virtue Ethics, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Secondary
- Aristotle Nicomachean Ethics
- Anscombe Modern Moral Philosophy
- Dancy Ethical Particularism and Morally Relevant Properties
Pulling Some Themes Together: Intention, Double Effect, Moral Rules
(4 December) Handout