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1240 Social Sciences and Humanities
University of California, Davis
One Shields Avenue
Davis, CA 95616
Phone: (530) 752-0607
Fax: (530) 752-8964
Immanuel Kant
Recent News
- The second paper is due May 30
These are the reading assignments for this class. Readings are from the course text, Classics of Moral and Political Theory.
This is the home page of G. J. Mattey's Philosophy 114, History of Ethics, for Spring Quarter, 2012.
The Course
Philosophy 114 is a survey of the views of the most influential philosophers in the area of ethics prior to the twentieth century. Focus will be on Plato, Aristotle, Hume, Kant, Mill and Nietzsche.
General Catalog Course Description
Study of some classic texts from the history of philosophical writing on central problems of ethics, taking the form either of a survey or concentrated examination of selected historical figures. Readings from such philosophers as Aristotle, Butler, Hume, Kant, Mill.
The Topic
Ethics historically has concerned itself with one of the following related topics: (1) What makes a person or a person’s life good or bad? (2) Under what conditions is a person’s action right or wrong? (3) What is the source of the values good, bad, right, and wrong? The philosophers we will study tried to give answers to these questions. We will find that their answers were many and varied. Contemporary ethicists continue to this day the debates initiated by the works we will study