Emily Dupree

The course is an historically structured survey of ethical theory. The aim of the course is to familiarize students with the major ethical theories developed over the history of philosophy and to apply these theories to contemporary social and political problems, such as the authority of government, the significance of consent and democratic rule, charity, friendship, war, and the distribution of wealth. Class time is focused heavily on discussion of the intuitions brought to bear to defend and explain these theories, such as our own impressions of when and why someone is morally responsible for what they do. Major texts include Plato?s Gorgias and Crito, Aristotle?s Nicomachean Ethics, Augustine?s On the Free Choice of the Will, Kant?s Groundwork, Nietzsche?s Genealogy of Morals, Mill?s Utilitarianism, Nozick?s Anarchy State and Utopia, and Rawls? Theory of Justice. Assignments vary, but they might include some or many of the following: weekly reading responses, quizzes, papers, and exams.

Environmental Ethics is the study of the ethical connections between our environment and its inhabitants, including ourselves. While ethics has traditionally focused on how people should treat other people, environmental ethics expands this inquiry into questions about how we should treat non-human animals and the environment itself. On what grounds might these kinds of arguments be made? And are these terms -- like 'the environment,' 'nature,' and 'animals,' -- as straightforward as they first appear? In this course we will focus on these foundational questions in environmental ethics, paying particular attention to the foundational philosophical concepts, how they interact with real-world examples here in Chicago, and what duties we might be under as citizens of this globe.

Capitalism predominates over the world today. In this course, we will engage in a philosophical study of capitalism, using the writings of Karl Marx as our guide. We will consider his analysis of capitalism as an economic system that interferes with human flourishing, the material basis of its world-historical emergence, the ethical issues that arise under this system, and how we might understand theories of labor, globalization, exploitation, and alienation from both ancient and contemporary philosophical perspectives. Readings from this course will also include texts by Aristotle, Frederick Engels, Vladimir Lenin, Rosa Luxemburg, Frantz Fanon, Silvia Federici, and Nancy Fraser.