Philosophy 320: Ethics (Dr. Ezio Vailati) Fall 07
Where to reach me: PB 2212; phone: 3376; homepage: http://www.siue.edu/~evailat; email: evailat@siue.edu
Office hours: T, 12:30-1:30; W, 5:00-6:00 and by appointment if necessary.

Course Description
This is an introduction to some of the main themes in ethics, with special attention to consequentialist, deontological, and virtue theories as well as to their application to some concrete issues such as suicide, abortion, punishment and animal rights.

Course objectives
1. To assist students in acquiring an understanding and appreciation of some basic issues and perspectives in ethics.
2. To develop the ability of the students to identify, evaluate and compare moral positions on the basis of arguments.
3. To develop the capacity of the students to reason to their own views on moral issues and problems.

Course-Format
Lecture/discussion. Class participation is essential in considering the problems raised by the readings.

Texts:
1) L. P. Pojman, Ethical Theory, 5th edition (Wadsworth) (E)
3) Simon Blackburn, Being Good (OUP) [B].
4) Assorted material to be downloaded from my homepage. If you don't already have access to the Internet, get it through SIUE; it's free.

This is a very good web site on Ethics

Course outline and readings:

Week 1: The nature of ethics. B: 1-8. Ethics and Religion: Readings: B, 10-19; E, 592-97.

Week 2: Some threats to ethics. Ethical Relativism: Reading, B: 19-29; E, 38-51. Unmasking Morality; Reading B: 29-55. Listen to Philosophy Talk on the origin of morality.

Week 3: Basic principles and false starts: Universalization and the Golden Rule. A problem: Why be moral? Reading: E, 82-87; Handout: Baier. Lecture on Baier. First quiz.

Week 4: Showing of Woody Allen's Crimes and Misdemeanors. Discussion.

Week 5: Utilitarianism: Mill. Reading: E, 183-196; B 86-93.

Weeks 6-7: Kant's Deontology: Kant. Reading: E, 255-75. B, 116-124. Second quiz

Week 8: Virtue ethics: Aristotle. Reading: E, 375-88; 395-97. (Download Aristotle on magnanimity)

Week 9: Divine command theory. Reading: download Paley

Week 10: Contract theory. Reading: Handout; E, 346-58; B,125-128. First paper due (Download paper topics) Third Quiz

Week 11: Class Discussion.

Week 12: Death. Reading: B, 65-73. Suicide. Reading: R, ch. 3; (Download Hume's "On Suicide ") (Download Aquinas on suicide); Kant on suicide: Handout. Listen to Philosophy Talk

Week 13: Autonomy. Reading: download Mill's On Liberty ch. III and ch. IV; B 93-107. Handout: Devlin on the enforcement of morality. Fourth Quiz

Week 14: Abortion. Reading: Handout; B 56-65; (Download Roe v. Wade).

Week 15: Animals. Reading: Handout. (Download US Animal Welfare Act). Second paper due (download paper topics) Fifth Quiz

Topics for final (Download)

Course requirements
1) Five multiple-choice quizzes, some in-class, some take-home, each worth 4% of the course grade. For for dates, see the course outline.
2) Two papers, typed, double spaced and 4 pages long, each worth 30% of the course grade. For due dates, consult the course outline.
3) A one hour long final exam, consisting of a multiple choice quiz and a short essay. The essay will be chosen by me (not by you) out of a set of essay topics you'll be able to download in due time. The final will be worth 20% of the course grade.
4) There are 100 possible points in this course. The breakdown in terms of grade is roughly as follows: 100-90:A; 89-77:B; 76-60:C; 59-50:D; 49 or less: E.

Academic policies
1) Cheating of any kind will be swiftly and severely punished according to the draconian guidelines of CAS.
2) Students are responsible for knowing what has been said in class, especially announcements concerning reading assignments and papers. Papers or quizzes may be based on classroom discussions not derived from any written material. If for any reason you miss some classes, make sure to find out, from some other student or from me, what has been done in class.

Papers
1) First and foremost, be aware that you cannot write a successful paper in one evening or one night unless you have thought about it at length before. You are encouraged to give me rough drafts of your papers. Keep in mind that I can return them with significant comments only if

they are given to me at least one full week before the papers are due
they are written reasonably clearly.

Rough drafts consisting only of disjointed paragraphs or, worse, mere paragraph headings cannot be properly evaluated. You may turn in your rough drafts as many times as you like, compatibly with the above requirements.
2) Grading criteria for papers are as follows. A paper providing mere information adequately and accurately in clear prose substantially free of spelling and grammatical mistakes will be in the C/B- range. A paper which in addition to meeting this requirement shows some originality supported by reasonably clear and cogent arguments will be in the B/A- range. A paper which shows significant originality, clarity and cogency will be in the A range.
My reading a student's rough draft of a paper does not entail, although it makes it somewhat likely, that the paper, even if my comments are considered, will get a B or an A. Often a bad paper must be revised more than once to become good.
3) Spelling and grammar
It goes without saying that papers should be written in clear and correct English. Out of carelessness or ignorance, some students confuse the following words:
it's/its; there/their; cite/site; principal/principle; than/then; to/too/two; who's/whose; weather/whether; conscience/conscious; since/sense; coarse/course.
Note that spell-checkers don't catch such errors.
In addition, philosophy students are often guilty of the following misspellings:
arguement; diety; concieve; decieve; percieve; sieze; truely; wholely.
If unsure about how to spell these words correctly, check a dictionary.

Some advice
I have put my lectures on line as a courtesy to my students. Since they are my lectures, I lecture from them. This neither means nor entails that I merely repeat what's in them. Hence, it's a rather bad idea to skip class. Not reading the primary texts and just looking at lectures and notes is even a worse idea.

It's a good idea to give me rough drafts of the papers.