Ethics and Political Philosophy Commons^™

The Republic Of Ignorance, Daniel R. Denicola

Philosophy Faculty Publications

“When did ignorance become a point of view?” the cartoon character Dilbert once asked. It’s a question that has become increasingly resonant these days—especially in our public life, and especially in our political campaigns in which elected officials and those who seek election seem to assume a startling level of public ignorance. Perhaps that’s smart. [excerpt]

Ancient Animal Ethics: The Earliest Arguments For The Ethical Consideration Of Nonhuman Animals, Joshua J. Sias

The Downtown Review: An Interdisciplinary Journal Written and Peer-Reviewed by Mandel Honors College Students at Cleveland State University

Primarily focused on the ancient Greek philosophers, this work offers a survey of the earliest arguments for and against the inclusion of nonhuman animals in human realms of ethical consideration. By following the trends of ancient western thought concerning animal ethics, the influencing factors behind the downfall of the subject in Medieval times, both in terms of discourse and practice, is discovered in the philosophical exchange that preceded medieval thought.

Feminist Futures And Campus Changes: Dismantling Ursinus College's Greek Life, Jordan Ostrum

Richard T. Schellhase Essay Prize in Ethics

No abstract provided.

Proto-Postmodernism: Constructing Postmodern Ethics Through Cold War Literature And Theory, Rock Lamanna

Departmental Honors Projects

While postmodern theory and literature is typically viewed as either “anti-humanist” or a rejection of Humanism, this essay reconsiders these assumptions by exploring ethical questions in early postmodern novels and theory, referred to as “proto-postmodernism.” For proto-postmodernists such as Hannah Arendt, Albert Camus, Ralph Ellison, Joseph Heller, and Kurt Vonnegut, Humanism—the ethical framework that asserts a centered “self” and a collective “metanarrative” of human progress—causes and legitimates violence, yet in their theories and literature, they promote the humanist value of dignity in their critiques of modern ethics and politics. To examine this hybrid stance toward Humanism, the first section situates …

Reason And Emotion, Not Reason Or Emotion In Moral Judgment, Leland F. Saunders

SPU Works

One of the central questions in both metaethics and empirical moral psychology is whether moral judgments are the products of reason or emotions. This way of putting the question relies on an overly simplified view of reason and emotion as two fully independent cognitive faculties whose causal contributions to moral judgment can be cleanly separated. However, there is a significant body of evidence in the cognitive sciences that seriously undercuts this conception of reason and emotion, and supports the view that moral judgments are caused by a complex interplay of psychological mechanisms that are both cognitive and affective, but in …

Reparations For Racism: Why The Persistence Of Institutional Racism In America Demands More Than Equal Opportunity For Black Citizens, Alexander Lowe

Richard T. Schellhase Essay Prize in Ethics

No abstract provided.

Is 'Equal Pay For Equal Work' Merely A Principle Of Nondiscrimination?, Jeffrey Moriarty

Philosophy Faculty Publications

Should people who perform equal work receive equal pay? Most would say ‘yes’, at least insofar as this question is understood to be asking whether employers should be permitted to discriminate against employees on the basis of race or sex. But suppose the employees belong to all of the same traditionally protected groups. Is (what I call) nondiscriminatory unequal pay for equal work wrong? Drawing an analogy with price discrimination, I argue that it is not intrinsically wrong, but it can be deceptive, in which case it is wrong.

"The Box" And The Dark Night Of The Soul: An Autoethnography From The Force Of Losing A Child In The Delivery Room, Santiago Pinon Jr

Journal of Health Ethics

From the perspective of parents who have lost children in labor and delivery rooms due to miscarriages, stillbirths, or who were born too early, the author argues that health care personnel including administrators, nurses, and doctors must be held accountable to the ethical responsibilities of caring for the parents of the children who have died. Based on the fact that administrators market their services to pregnant couples and promise to provide care, health care workers are ethically responsible to provide continued compassion.

The Confluence Of Philosophy And Biology: An Excavation Of Philosophical Issues In Molecular And Developmental Biology, Patrick Johnson Mendie, Emmanuel Bassey Eyo (Ph.D)

Journal of Health Ethics

Philosophical evaluations have played an influential role in the growth and development of molecular and developmental biology to ensure that every individual is born healthy, born wanted and has the privilege to fulfil his or her potentials for a life free from disease and disability. This is why it becomes necessary for biologists to carefully understand human genes, evolution, cells and general human anatomy to fulfil this project. During this process, they are faced with challenges where they also lack the foundation on how to solve them. This challenge gave birth to a philosophical excavation of molecular and developmental biology. …

Phenomenology And Blindness: Merleau-Ponty, Levinas, And An Alternative Metaphysical Vision, Jesse Younger Workman

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This project addresses the problem of an "ocularcentric" bias in philosophy, with a focus on phenomenological and continental thought. Being a blind phenomenologist, I noticed an ocularcentric tendency dominating philosophers' perspectives, including their arguments, use of metaphors, and choices of examples. As a blind reader I found that such ocularcentrism prevented me from understanding their claims. This made me wonder whether ocularcentric biases might be leading them to unbalanced or invalid arguments and world-views. The questions raised are: Can there be philosophy that is not reliant on vision above all other senses? Is it possible for philosophy to not be …

Noetic Propaedeutic Pedagogy As A Panacea To The Problem Of Abortion, Peter B. Bisong

Journal of Health Ethics

This work is instigated by the increase in the number of countries that have legalized abortion and the ones debating over the issue. Even most countries where abortion is illegal like Nigeria are experiencing increase in cases of abortion. The author is worried that the danger of abortion is seemingly not taken note of by stakeholders, thereby leading him to believe alongside Asouzu that the constraining mechanisms have clouded the minds of men, and impeding them from seeing reality in a complementary way. The noetic propaedeutic pedagogy as propounded by Asouzu is the self-conscious retraining of the mind to overcome …

Animals & Ethics 101: Thinking Critically About Animal Rights, Nathan Nobis

eBooks

This book provides an overview of the current debates about the nature and extent of our moral obligations to animals. Which, if any, uses of animals are morally wrong, which are morally permissible (i.e., not wrong) and why? What, if any, moral obligations do we, individually and as a society (and a global community), have towards animals and why? How should animals be treated? Why? We will explore the most influential and most developed answers to these questions – given by philosophers, scientists, and animal advocates and their critics – to try to determine which positions are supported by the …

Animals & Ethics 101: Thinking Critically About Animal Rights, Nathan Nobis

Moral Standing and Animal Rights Collection

This book provides an overview of the current debates about the nature and extent of our moral obligations to animals. Which, if any, uses of animals are morally wrong, which are morally permissible (i.e., not wrong) and why? What, if any, moral obligations do we, individually and as a society (and a global community), have towards animals and why? How should animals be treated? Why? We will explore the most influential and most developed answers to these questions – given by philosophers, scientists, and animal advocates and their critics – to try to determine which positions are supported by the …

Aristotle On The Moral Status Of Animals, Devin Henry

Data and Test Instruments

No abstract provided.

Fundamentally Incompetent: Homophobia, Religion And The Right To Parent, Samantha Brennan, Colin Mcleod

Data and Test Instruments

What happens when the expression of parental values in child rearing runs contrary to the claim of children to be loved and respected by parents? This chapter asks whether parents who hold, and seek to express, attitudes and beliefs that are contemptuous of sexual minorities are competent parents. We argue that homophobic views held by parents can pose a serious threat to the well-being of children and that adults who harbour such views fall below the threshold of competency requisite to acquiring and maintaining the moral right to parent. We explore this issue by considering whether conservative religious fundamentalists who …

Confucian Thought And Care Ethics: An Amicable Split?, Andrew Lambert

Publications and Research

Since Chenyang Li’s (1994) groundbreaking article there has been interest in reading early Confucian ethics through the lens of care ethics. In this paper, I examine the prospects for dialogue between the two in light of recent work in both fields.

I argue that, despite some similarities, early Confucian ethics is not best understood as a form of care ethics, of the kind articulated by Nel Noddings (1984, 2002) and others. Reasons include incongruence deriving from the absence in the Chinese texts of a developed account of need, and doubts about whether the parent-child relationship in Confucian thought is best …

Soldier Enhancement: Ethical Risks And Opportunities, Matthew Beard, Jai Galliott, Sandra Lynch

Philosophy Papers and Journal Articles

Over the past decade, interest in human enhancement has waxed and waned. The initial surge of interest and funding, driven by the US Army’s desire for a ‘Future Force Warrior’ has partly given way to the challenges of meeting operational demands abroad. However the ethical opportunities provided by soldier enhancement demand that investigation of its possibilities continue. Benefits include enhanced decision-making, improved force capability, reduced force size and lower casualty rates.

These benefits — and enhancement itself — carry concomitant risks, including morale issues due to tension between enhanced and unenhanced soldiers, the issues of enhanced veterans and ownership of …

Freedom To And Freedom From, Clare C. Hagan

Ethics and Social Justice Center Essay Prizes

This paper seeks to answer the question, "If I cannot express my hatred, am I less free?" The discussion is framed through an examination of positive and negative freedom, looking at whether or not the loss of certain freedoms-from, such as freedom from injustice, freedom from discrimination, and freedom from fear might potentially outweigh the right of an individual to express his or her hatred.

Digital Intimacy, Katherine Landers

Ethics and Social Justice Center Essay Prizes

This papers seeks to determine how, and to what extent, social media affects humans as moral beings. The discussion revolves around the idea of media detaching humans beings from the world around them, and in turn, other humans.

Why Babies Do Not Feel Pain, Or: How Structure-Derived Functional Interpretations Can Go Wrong, Helmut Segner

Animal Sentience

The response to pain involves a non-conscious, reflexive action and a conscious perception. According to Key (2016), consciousness — and thus pain perception — depends on a neuronal correlate that has a “unique neural architecture” as realized in the human cortex. On the basis of the “bioengineering principle that structure determines function,” Key (2016) concludes that animal species such as fish, which lack the requisite cortex-like neuroanatomical structure, are unable to feel pain. This commentary argues that the relationship between brain structure and brain function is less straightforward than suggested in Key’s target article.