This is a course in the History of Philosophical Ethics, or Ethical Theory, and it has as its main aim thoroughly to familiarize the student with most of the main arguments and analyses concerning ethical issues advanced by Western moral philosophers up to 1900.
One might best approach this course as a "Great Books" or "Great Authors" study, where the primary task is to understand the ethical views of Plato, Aristotle, Augustine, Aquinas, Hobbes, Butler, Hume, Immanuel Kant, John Stuart Mill, and Henry Sidgwick, along with a number of lesser figures.
From the lecturer's point of view, the material of the course is viewed as a dialectical stream proceeding from Pre Socratic Greece to the England of 1900, in which the recurring antitheses are: "The Good" as something specifically human (Protagoras, Aristotle, Hobbes, Hume, Mill) and "The Good" as something transcendental to human nature (Plato, Clark, Price, Kant, and in the early 20th Century G. E. Moore).
Related Resources
This is a course in the History of Philosophical Ethics, or Ethical Theory, and it has as its main aim thoroughly to familiarize the student with most of the main arguments and analyses concerning ethical issues advanced by Western moral philosophers up to 1900.
Because of the vast area to be covered, there will be a large amount of reading to be done, most of it in primary sources.
The student might best approach this course as a "Great Books" or "Great Authors" study, where the primary task is to understand the ethical views of Plato, Aristotle, Augustine, Aquinas, Hobbes, Butler, Hume, Immanuel Kant, John Stuart Mill, and Henry Sidgwick, along with a number of lesser figures.
From the lecturer's point of view, the material of the course is viewed as a dialectical stream proceeding from Pre Socratic Greece to the England of 1900, in which the recurring antitheses are: "The Good" as something specifically human (Protagoras, Aristotle, Hobbes, Hume, Mill) and "The Good" as something transcendental to human nature (Plato, Clark, Price, Kant, and in the early 20th Century G. E. Moore).
TEXTS:
Click the "Download" link for the complete 67-page syllabus.
