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Books > Humanities > Philosophy > Topics in philosophy > Ethics & moral philosophy
This volume brings together fourteen mostly previously published
articles by the prominent Nietzsche scholar Maudemarie Clark.
Clark's previous two books on Nietzsche focused on his views on
truth, metaphysics, and knowledge, but she has published a great
deal on Nietzsche's views on ethics and politics in article form.
Putting those articles - many of which appeared in obscure venues -
together in book form will allow readers to see more easily how her
views fit together as a whole, exhibit important developments of
her ideas, and highlight Clark's distinctive voice in Nietzsche
studies. Clark provides an introduction tying her themes together
and placing them in their broader context.
Patrick Riordan takes a different approach to the questions of
global ethics by following the direction of questioning initially
pioneered by Aristotle. For him the most basic question of ethics
is 'What is the Good Life?' So in the context of contemporary
global ethics the Aristotelian questioner wonders about the good
life on a global scale. "Global Ethics and Global Common Goods"
fills a gap caused by the neglect of the topic of the good in
global ethics.Beginning by outlining answers to questions such as
'What is Good?' and 'Is there a highest good?', chapters follow on
to demonstrate the value of a common good perspective in matters of
universal human rights and their institutions and practices, the
study of international relations and the construction of global
institutions, debates about global justice between cosmopolitanism
and nationalism and other forms of particularism, and of course
debates about globalisation in economic affairs. Philosophical
questions provoked by these debates are identified and pursued,
such as the question of a common human nature which seems
presupposed by the language of universal rights. The possibilities
for politics on a world scale are part of the literature of the
relevant disciplines, but the perspective of the common good adds a
new and distinctive dimension to those debates. The concerns for
global security and the challenges of managing conflict are also
shown to benefit from a rereading in terms of the goods in common
between participants in global political affairs.
Contemporary debates on free will are numerous and multifaceted.
According to compatibilists, it is possible for an agent to be
determined in all her choices and actions and still be free.
Incompatibilists, on the other hand, think that the existence of
free will is incompatible with the truth of determinism. There are
also two dominant conceptions of the nature of free will. According
to the first, it is primarily a function of being able to do
otherwise than one in fact does. The second approach focuses on
issues of sourcehood, holding that free will is primarily a
function of an agent being the source of her actions in a
particular way. This book guides the student through all these
debates, demarcating the different conceptions of free will,
exploring the relationships between them, and examining how they
relate to the debate between compatibilists and incompatibilists.
In the process, it addresses a number of other views, including
revisionism and free will scepticism. This is the ideal
introduction to the contemporary debates for students at all
levels.
The problem of free will arises from ordinary, commonsense
reflection. Shaun Nichols examines these ordinary attitudes from a
naturalistic perspective. He offers a psychological account of the
origins of the problem of free will. According to his account the
problem arises because of two naturally emerging ways of thinking
about ourselves and the world, one of which makes determinism
plausible while the other makes determinism implausible. Although
contemporary cognitive science does not settle whether choices are
determined, Nichols argues that our belief in indeterminist choice
is grounded in faulty inference and should be regarded as
unjustified. However, even if our belief in indeterminist choice is
false, it's a further substantive question whether that means that
free will doesn't exist. Nichols argues that, because of the
flexibility of reference, there is no single answer to whether free
will exists. In some contexts, it will be true to say 'free will
exists'; in other contexts, it will be false to say that. With this
substantive background in place, Bound promotes a pragmatic
approach to prescriptive issues. In some contexts, the prevailing
practical considerations suggest that we should deny the existence
of free will and moral responsibility; in other contexts the
practical considerations suggest that we should affirm free will
and moral responsibility. This allows for the possibility that in
some contexts, it is morally apt to exact retributive punishment;
in other contexts, it can be apt to take up the exonerating
attitude of hard incompatibilism.
This book provides cross-cultural ethical exploration of sex robots
and their social impact. What are the implications of sex robots
and related technological innovations for society and culture? How
should we evaluate the significance of sexual relations with robots
that look like women, men or children? Critics argue that sex
robots present a clear risk to real persons and a social
degradation that will increase sexual violence, objectify women,
encourage pedophilia, reinforce negative body images, increase
forms of sexual dysfunction, and pass on sexually transmitted
disease. Proponents judge robotic sexual companionship as just
another step in the exploration of human desire. They see sex
robots, and similar technology, such as virtual reality
pornography, as providing autonomy affirming companionship for the
lonely and a relatively harmless outlet for sexual fantasies that
avoids the use of human prostitutes and thus reduces sexual
victimization. Some appreciate sex robots as a social evil, others
as a positive good, and still others as a harmless pastime. How we
come to terms with such conceptual and moral concerns will have
significant implications for society and the future of human
relations. This book is of great interest to researchers in
bioethics, human sexual behavior, AI ethics, and philosophy of sex.
Reflections on the Religious, the Ethical, and the Political
presents fourteen essays devoted to the interconnected topics of
religion, ethics, and politics, along with an introductory
interview with the author regarding his philosophical development
over the years. This volume serves two interconnected purposes: as
an introduction or reintroduction to Calvin O.Schrag s intellectual
contributions to a critical consideration of these three topics,
and as a critical companion and supplement to Schrag s published
work on these topics. The topics of religion, ethics, and politics
have served as pivot points throughout Schrag s career in the
academy, which spans half a century."
The variety of approaches to the concept of trust in philosophy
reflects the fact that our worries are diverse, from the Hobbesian
concern for the possibility of rational cooperation to
Wittgenstein's treatment of the place of trust in knowledge. To
speak of trust is not only to describe human action but also to
take a perspective on it and to engage with it. Olli Lagerspetz
breathes new life into the philosophical debate by showing how
questions about trust are at the centre of any in-depth analyses of
the nature of human agency and human rationality and that these
issues, in turn, lie at the heart of philosophical ethics. Ideal
for those grappling with these issues for the first time, Trust,
Ethics and Human Reason provides a thorough and impassioned
assessment of the concept of trust in moral philosophy.
Exploring the environmental effects of animal agriculture, fishing,
and hunting, Eating Earth exposes critical common ground between
earth and animal advocacy. The first chapter (animal agriculture)
examines greenhouse gas emissions and climate change, manure and
dead zones, freshwater depletion, deforestation, predator control,
land and useincluding the ranching industries public lands
subsidies. Chapter two first examines whether or not the
consumption of fish is healthy and outlines morally relevant
aspects of fish physiology, then scrutinizes the fishing industry,
documenting the silent collapse of ocean ecosystems and calling
attention to the indiscriminate nature of hooks and nets, including
the problem of bycatch and what this means for endangered species
and fragile seascapes. Chapter three outlines the historic link
between the U. S. Government, wildlife management, and hunters,
then systematically unravels common beliefs about sport hunting,
such as the belief that hunters are essential to wildlife
conservation, that contemporary hunting qualifies as a tradition,
and that hunting is merciful, economical, or rooted in fair chase.
At the end of each chapter, Kemmerer examines possible solutions to
problems presented, such as sustainable meats, organic and local,
grass fed, aquaculture, new fishing technologies, and enhanced
regulations. Eating Earth offers a concise examination of the
environmental effects of dietary choice, clearly presenting the
many reasons why dietary choice ought to be front and center for
environmentalists. Kemmerers writing, supported by nearly 80 graphs
and summary slides, is clear, straightforward, and punctuated with
wry humor.
Something is subject to luck if it is beyond our control. In this
book, Haji shows that luck detrimentally affects both moral
obligation and moral responsibility. He argues that factors
influencing the way we are, together with considerations that link
motivation and ability to perform intentional actions, frequently
preclude our being able to do otherwise. Since obligation requires
that we can do otherwise, luck compromises the range of what is
morally obligatory for us. This result, together with principles
that conjoin responsibility and obligation, is then exploited to
derive the further skeptical conclusion that behavior for which we
are morally responsible is limited as well. Throughout these
explorations, Haji makes extensive use of concrete cases to test
the limits of how we should understand free will moral
responsibility, blameworthiness, determinism, and luck itself.
Death has long been a pre-occupation of philosophers, and this is
especially so today. The Oxford Handbook of Philosophy of Death
collects 21 newly commissioned essays that cover current
philosophical thinking of death-related topics across the entire
range of the discipline. These include metaphysical topics-such as
the nature of death, the possibility of an afterlife, the nature of
persons, and how our thinking about time affects what we think
about death-as well as axiological topics, such as whether death is
bad for its victim, what makes it bad to die, what attitude it is
fitting to take towards death, the possibility of posthumous harm,
and the desirability of immortality. The contributors also explore
the views of ancient philosophers such as Aristotle, Plato and
Epicurus on topics related to the philosophy of death, and
questions in normative ethics, such as what makes killing wrong
when it is wrong, and whether it is wrong to kill fetuses,
non-human animals, combatants in war, and convicted murderers. With
chapters written by a wide range of experts in metaphysics, ethics,
and conceptual analysis, and designed to give the reader a
comprehensive view of recent developments in the philosophical
study of death, this Handbook will appeal to a broad audience in
philosophy, particularly in ethics and metaphysics.
This is a book about the body and its amazing contribution to the
moral mind. The author focuses on the important roles the body
plays in moral cognition. What happens to us when we observe moral
violations, make moral judgments and engage in moral actions? How
does the body affect our moral decisions and shape our moral
dispositions? Can embodied moral psychology be consistently pursued
as a viable alternative to disembodied traditions of moral
philosophy? Is there any school of philosophy where the body is
discussed as the underlying foundation of moral judgment and
action? To answer these questions, the author analyzes Confucian
philosophy as an intriguing and insightful example of embodied
moral psychology.
In ""The Historian's Conscience"", Macintyre and thirteen other
Australian historians put history and the history profession under
the microscope. Eminent contributors include Alan Atkinson, Graeme
Davison, Greg Dening, John Hirst, Beverley Kingston, Marilyn Lake,
and Iain McCalman. They not only ask but answer the hard questions
about writing and researching history. How do historians choose
their histories? What sort of emotional investment do they make in
their subjects, and how do they control their sympathies? How do
they deal with unpalatable discoveries? To whom are historians
responsible? And for whom are they entitled to speak?
Intellectually provocative, often personally revealing, always
engaged, ""The Historian's Conscience"" is a 'must read'.
Since World War II, there have been many changes in our nation due
to shifts in our philosophy of man and moral law. The Soul of a
Nation is a series of essays on these critical transformations in
our society. This book will be of interest to citizens and scholars
who question our society's political drift in recent years. The
Soul of a Nation was written not only for scholars and students,
but for their parents and elders as well.
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