Progress

Description

Ethics can be defined as a branch of philosophy that deals with distinguishing right from wrong behaviour. While this definition appears rather straightforward, it turns out to be complex to explain precisely what makes particular acts right or wrong. Some people believe, for example, that an act is right if it leads to good outcomes whereas others think that it matters more whether an act is done for the right reasons. Each week we study a key ethical theory from Greek antiquity to the present-day. We will study virtue ethics, deontology, utilitarianism, social contract theory, feminist and care ethics, and postmodern ethics. After successfully completing this course, students are acquainted with these ethical theories and will be able to apply them to real-life cases.

Learning objective

After successful completion of this course PM-40 Introduction to Ethics, the student will be able to:

Recognise and describe main theories in ethics and differentiate between moral principles and moral epistemologies (learning outcome 1a, 1b, 2a).
Evaluate the argumentative force of critical positions and the alternatives to existing theory (learning outcomes 2a, 3a). Compare and contrast different positions on ethical issues and evaluate their argumentative force (learning outcomes 2a, 3a).
Situate ethical questions and theory in their historical context (learning outcome 1b).
Reproduce the content of different positions in ethics (learning outcome 1a).
Apply and differentiate ethical theories and positions to current societal issues and practices (learning outcome 2a), and construct substantiated ethical arguments (learning outcomes 3a, 4a).

Prerequisites

A basic proficiency in English is presupposed.

Literature

Author	Title	Price	ISBN	Mandatory	External url
Shafer-Landau	A Concise Introduction to Ethics	€ 37.24	9780190058173	Yes

Part of

Title	Workload
Pre-master	30 ECTS

Teaching methods

~Hoorcollege
~Werkgroep

Teachers

Name	Role
Adrienne de Ruiter	Coördinator