261021 Ethical Intuitionism (GradS) (SoSe 2010)

Most of us believe that it is wrong to torture people, that happiness is better than unhappiness, and that cowardice is not a virtue. How do we know such things? Then prominent moral philosophers like Henry Sidgwick, G.E. Moore and Sir David Ross explain moral knowledge by appeal to intuitions. Since the 1940th ethical intuitionism was dismissed, however, by almost all moral philosophers. Intuitionism was deemed an outmoded epistemology, so much that philosophers seldom even took care to argue against intuitionism. Nowadays this theory has its adherents again, and we witness an increasing interest in the epistemological role of intuitions. In the seminar we shall read texts by classical and contemporary intuitionists as well as by critiques of ethical intuitionism.

Teilnahmevoraussetzungen, notwendige Vorkenntnisse

Diese Veranstaltung richtet sich in erster Linie an Masterstudierende im Fach Philosophie. BA-/MA ed.-Studierende der Philosophie oder andere Studierende können nach persönlicher und rechtzeitiger Rücksprache mit dem Veranstalter zugelassen werden. Im Bedarfsfall kann die Veranstaltung (mit 2 LP) für ein BA-/MA ed.-Hauptmodul angerechnet werden.

The seminar will be exclusively in English, but you are not expected to be a perfecly fluent speaker!

Literaturangaben

A reader will be provided at the beginning of the semester.