Postgraduate Course: Applied Ethics MSc (PHIL11105)
Course Outline
| School | School of Philosophy, Psychology and Language Sciences |
College | College of Humanities and Social Science |
| Credit level (Normal year taken) | SCQF Level 11 (Postgraduate) |
Availability | Not available to visiting students |
| SCQF Credits | 20 |
ECTS Credits | 10 |
| Summary | This course will consider the application of ethical theory to cases, imagined and real.
Shared with UG Applied Ethics course PHIL10017
For courses co-taught with undergraduate students and with no remaining undergraduate spaces left, a maximum of 8 MSc students can join the course. Priority will be given to MSc students who wish to take the course for credit on a first come first served basis after matriculation.
**The course will take place in room 1.20 Dugald Stewart Building and not G.06, 50 George Square. |
| Course description |
This course will consider the application of ethical theory to cases, imagined and real. Special emphasis will be given to the issue of humanity and its relations to the ideas of human dignity and genetic enhancement. The first part of the course will begin with topics that have received considerable philosophical debate, such as abortion and euthanasia. From these we will move toward contemporary issues, e.g. future challenges arising from the application of technology to medical science. Overall we will be concerned to understand the role that applied ethics can play in meeting these challenges. Similarly we will be seeking to understand the limits of applied ethics and philosophy, more generally, in these arenas, especially in contrast to the considerations that may apply in making social policies.
The course will not be discussing the following topics which often feature in applied ethics courses: engineering, environmental, legal, medical, healthcare, information, political ethics or animal rights.
|
Entry Requirements (not applicable to Visiting Students)
| Pre-requisites |
|
Co-requisites | |
| Prohibited Combinations | |
Other requirements | None |
Course Delivery Information
|
| Academic year 2015/16, Available to all students (SV1)
|
Quota: 8 |
| Course Start |
Semester 1 |
Timetable |
Timetable |
| Learning and Teaching activities (Further Info) |
Total Hours:
200
(
Lecture Hours 20,
Feedback/Feedforward Hours 2,
Programme Level Learning and Teaching Hours 4,
Directed Learning and Independent Learning Hours
174 )
|
| Assessment (Further Info) |
Written Exam
0 %,
Coursework
100 %,
Practical Exam
0 %
|
| Additional Information (Assessment) |
One 2500 word essay due at the end of the semester.
Essay deadline: Thursday 17th December 2015 by 12 noon.
Word limit: 2750 maximum excluding references (2500 words with a 10% allowance)
Return deadline: Thursday 21st January 2016 |
| Feedback |
Students have the opportunity to submit a formative essay by week 6 deadline on Turnitin via Learn. The essay cannot be draft of summative essay but it can be on the same topic.
Formative essay deadline: Thursday 29th October 2015 by 12 noon
Return deadline: Friday 20th November 2015 |
| No Exam Information |
Learning Outcomes
On completion of this course, the student will be able to:
- develop further the philosophical skills and to extend as well as deepen knowledge acquired in previous philosophy courses, with special emphasis on the application of moral theory to current challenges in society.
- learn how to use the techniques of philosophical analysis and division, as well as the approaches of past philosophers, and apply them to contemporary issues arising in the fields of medicine, law and social policy
|
Reading List
There is no single textbook required for this course, each week there are one or two required readings.
Week 1: Introduction
No required reading
Week 2: Abortion
Judith Jarvis Thomson, 'A Defense of Abortion', Philosophy and Public Affairs, Vol. 1, No. 1 (Autumn, 1971), pp. 47-66.
Week 3: Euthanasia and Dying
J. David Velleman, 'Against the Right to Die', 2004. https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2088349 [A revision of his paper from The Journal of Medicine and Philosophy, 1992.]
James Rachels, "Active and Passive Euthanasia" The New England Journal of Medicine, Vol. 292, January 9, 1975, pp. 78-80.
http://www2.sunysuffolk.edu/pecorip/scccweb/etexts/deathanddying_text/Active%20and%20Passive%20Euthanasia.pdf
Week 4: Child Selection and the Unborn
S. Matthew Liao, 'Selecting Children: The Ethics of Reproductive Genetic Engineering', Philosophy Compass 3 2008: 1-19.
http://www.smatthewliao.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/07/liaoselectchildren.pdf
David McCarthy, 'Why sex selection should be legal?', Journal of Medical Ethics 2001; 27: 302-307.
Week 5: Obligations to the Aged/Ill (Partiality and Value of Human Life)
'The Ethics of Caregiving: General Principles', Chapter 3 in Taking Care: Ethical Caregiving in Our Aging Society, The President's Council on Bioethics 2005
http://bioethics.georgetown.edu/pcbe/reports/taking_care/chapter3.htm
Christopher Cordner, 'Life And Death Matters: Losing A Sense of The Value of Human Beings,' Theoretical Medicine and Bioethics (2005) 26: 207-226.
Week 6: Causing Harm and Doing Wrong
Judith Jarvis Thomson, "Killing, Letting Die, and the Trolley Problem." The Monist 59, 1976, pp. 204-217.
Glover, Jonathan 'It Makes No Difference Whether or Not I Do It,' Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, 49, 1975.
Week 7: Stem Cells
Howard J. Curzer, 'The Ethics of Embryonic Stem Cell Research', Journal of Medicine and Philosophy 2004 29(5):533-562.
Week 8: Germline Enhancement & Post-Humans and Risk
Julian Savulescu, 'Genetic Interventions and the Ethics of Enhancement of Human Beings,' The Oxford Handbook on Bioethics ed. B. Steinbock, Oxford University Press, 2007, pp. 516-535. [Available through the library online.]
http://www.practicalethics.ox.ac.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0019/28171/savulescu_chaptersydneyideas08.pdf
Ingmar Persson and Julian Savulescu, 'The Perils of Cognitive Enhancement and the Urgent Imperative to Enhance the Moral Character of Humanity', Journal of Applied Philosophy, Volume 25, Number 3, August 2008 , pp. 162-177(16).
Week 9: Autonomy and Disability
David Shoemaker, 'Responsibility and Disability,' Metaphilosophy, 40:3-4, 2009, pp. 438-461. [Available online through the library.]
Week 10: Well-being and needs
Jennifer Hawkins, 'Well-Being, Time, and Dementia,' Ethics 124:3, 2014, pp. 507-542.
Week 11: Being Human
Daniel C. Dennett 'How to Protect Human Dignity from Science', HDB, ch. 3.
A full weekly reading list is available on Learn. |
Additional Information
| Course URL |
Please see Learn page |
| Graduate Attributes and Skills |
Not entered |
| Additional Class Delivery Information |
The course is taught by Dr David Levy. |
| Keywords | Not entered |
Contacts
| Course organiser | Prof Theodore Scaltsas
Tel: (0131 6)50 3649
Email: Scaltsas@ed.ac.uk |
Course secretary | Miss Lynsey Buchanan
Tel: (0131 6)51 5002
Email: Lynsey.Buchanan@ed.ac.uk |
|
© Copyright 2015 The University of Edinburgh - 18 January 2016 4:42 am
|
University Homepage