Help your students discover the ethical issues and implications surrounding today's most compelling social dilemmas--from genetic engineering and cloning to terrorism and the use of torture--with APPLYING ETHICS: A TEXT WITH READINGS, 11th Edition. Framed by the authors' helpful introductions and supported by a variety of readings and cases that reflect both sides of the topics being explored, this best-selling book offers a balanced introduction to ethics today. Important Notice: Media content referenced within the product description or the product text (...) may not be available in the ebook version. (shrink)

Discussion of the sufficiency of the traditional account of knowledge as justified true belief has focused on cases in which justified true belief does not constitute knowledge because one's justification depends essentially on a false belief or is defeated by a false statement. I propose three cases designed to show that the traditional account is insufficient for other reasons and that, Consequently, Even undefeated justified true belief does not constitute knowledge.

Moral Freedom reconciles three apparently inconsistent truisms about morality: first, moral rules are society's rules; second, morality is a matter of individual choice: and third, some things are wrong regardless of what any society or individual has to say. In developing a moral theory that accommodates all three truisms, Jeffrey Olen offers a view of morality that allows individuals a generous degree of moral freedom.The author explores various answers to the question, "Does anybody or anything have any moral authority over (...) how I live my life?" His answer is "No." In a lively, conversational style, Olen leads the reader through the arguments, examples, and exceptions that contribute to this conclusion. Along the way, he contends that what most philosophers call the moral point of view, but what he refers to as the impersonal moral point of view, is but one of two moral points of view. The other is the personal moral point of view, which Olen defends against the allegedly overriding demands of impersonal morality.Moral Freedom considers the work of philosophers as diverse as Kant, Nietzsche, Kurt Baier, Bernard Williams, and Daniel Dennett. Admitting that this is a personal discussion of the nature of morality, Olen claims the "freedom" to engage these intellectual issues in a personal style to illustrate the personal moral point of view that he champions. Author note: Jeffrey Olen is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Wisconsin, Stevens Point. (shrink)

Joseph Margolis, a relativist with respect to aesthetic qualities, has argued that nonrelativists must produce a theory of perception capable of providing a basis for the distinction between an object’s actually possessing a specified aesthetic quality and an object’s only seeming to possess it. Although I think Margolis is probably right on the point, my concern is not with the need for the non relativist to produce such a theory; rather, it is with the need for the relativist to give (...) an account of the perception of aesthetic qualities. (shrink)

It is argued that the application of such predicates as 'is lovely' and 'is somber' to works of art must be construed relativistically. it is first argued that interpretations of works of art bear important similarities to scientific theories, such that the application of aesthetic predicates cannot proceed independently of these interpretations. it is then argued that there are important differences between scientific theories and works of art, such that relativism is precluded with respect to the former but demanded with (...) respect to the latter. hence, relativism is demanded also with respect to aesthetic predicates. (shrink)