PHIL 2036 - How Should I Live? Contemporary Ethical Theories

For each of us, the question of how we should live is inescapable. How should we answer this question, and how should we justify our answer? This course investigates the range of answers offered by contemporary ethical philosophers. A variety of normative ethical theories - theories telling us how to live - will be examined, including forms of consequentialism, contractualism, contemporary Kantian and Aristotelian views. We should also be looking at meta-ethical theories that try to explain what ethical thought is, and in particular at the issue of whether there can be objective ethical facts.

Students completing this course should be able to: describe accurately the main normative ethical and meta-ethical theories covered by the course; state the most important arguments for and against those theories; evaluate the plausibility of those arguments, offering clearly articulated reasons for their evaluation; develop detailed and well-structured arguments for conclusions concerning two of the topics covered by the course.