Contemporary Ethics
Code: 100283 ECTS Credits: 6| Degree | Type | Year | Semester |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2500246 Philosophy | OB | 3 | 2 |
Contact
- Name:
- Jordi Riba Miralles
- Email:
- jordi.riba@uab.cat
Use of Languages
- Principal working language:
- catalan (cat)
- Some groups entirely in English:
- No
- Some groups entirely in Catalan:
- Yes
- Some groups entirely in Spanish:
- No
Prerequisites
No requirement
Objectives and Contextualisation
- Discover the main tendencies and authors of moral thinking in the 19th and 20th centuries.
- Play an active role in developing the content through oral interventions from students.
Competences
- Analysing and summarising the main arguments of fundamental texts of philosophy in its various disciplines.
- Applying the knowledge of ethics to the moral problems of society, and assessing the implications about the human condition of changes in the world of contemporary techniques.
- Recognising and interpreting topics and problems of philosophy in its various disciplines.
- Recognising the philosophical implications of the scientific knowledge.
- Students must be capable of applying their knowledge to their work or vocation in a professional way and they should have building arguments and problem resolution skills within their area of study.
- Students must be capable of collecting and interpreting relevant data (usually within their area of study) in order to make statements that reflect social, scientific or ethical relevant issues.
- Students must be capable of communicating information, ideas, problems and solutions to both specialised and non-specialised audiences.
- Students must have and understand knowledge of an area of study built on the basis of general secondary education, and while it relies on some advanced textbooks it also includes some aspects coming from the forefront of its field of study.
Learning Outcomes
- Ability to maintain an appropriate conversation.
- Accurately drawing up normative texts.
- Accurately using the specific lexicon of the history of philosophy.
- Analysing the main ethical concepts in the current moral dilemmas.
- Assessing a concrete ethical position, in the context of the current world's problems.
- Assessing the legitimacy of the thesis defended by participants of the most important contemporary controversies.
- Assessing the philosophical importance of several factors of current social conflicts.
- Autonomously searching, selecting and processing information both from structured sources (databases, bibliographies, specialized magazines) and from across the network.
- Carrying out oral presentations using an appropriate academic vocabulary and style.
- Effectively communicating and applying the argumentative and textual processes to formal and scientific texts.
- Establishing relationships between science, philosophy, art, religion, politics, etc.
- Explaining the philosophical importance of contemporary science and its implementation area.
- Judging the moral impact of new technological developments on humans.
- Reading basic philosophical text thoroughly.
- Relating the characteristic elements and factors of the philosophical tradition.
- Students must develop the necessary learning skills to undertake further training with a high degree of autonomy.
- Summarising the main arguments of the great contemporary texts of ethics and political philosophy.
- Summarising the topics and arguments exposed in a classical philosophical debate.
- Using suitable terminology when drawing up an academic text.
Content
1. The philosophical crisis of the nineteenth century and its effect on practical philosophy
2. The construction of moral individuality: Schleiermacher, Stirner, Schopenhauer and Kierkegaard.
3. Criticism of the Kantian moral imperative: Nietzsche, Guyau, Durkheim and Simmel
4. From the morals of duty to the morals of responsibility: Guyau, Simmel, Weber
5. The sociologization of morality: Durkheim, Levy-Bruhl
6. From ethics to politics: Arendt, Rancière, Badiou
Methodology
The course methodology will based strictly on continuous and joint assessment of the subject:
1) Students will undertake comprehensive readings of seminal texts on topics related to the subject as preparation for participation in formal discussion sessions. These texts will be made available to students via the virtual campus one week before the joint discussion class.
2) The teacher will provide theoretical explanations about key points of the subject syllabus.
3) Under the teacher's supervision, the students will choose one topic from the syllabus and give a group oral presentation about it.
Annotation:Within the schedule set by the centre or degree programme, 15 minutes of one class will be reserved for students to evaluate their lecturers and their courses or modules through questionnaires.
Annotation: Within the schedule set by the centre or degree programme, 15 minutes of one class will be reserved for students to evaluate their lecturers and their courses or modules through questionnaires.
Activities
| Title | Hours | ECTS | Learning Outcomes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Type: Directed | |||
| Comment, expose texts | 45 | 1.8 | 8, 2, 11, 12, 10, 9, 19, 14, 1, 15, 18, 3 |
| Type: Supervised | |||
| Readings of texts and other writings | 20 | 0.8 | 4, 12, 5, 13, 7, 18 |
| Type: Autonomous | |||
| Classes, explanation of texts | 70 | 2.8 | 10, 9, 13, 14, 1, 3 |
Assessment
- The assessment process comprises three activities spread across the year: Text comment1 (20%), text coment2 (40%), Oral presentation in group(40%).
- The virtual campus will be used to prepare the readings discussed in class.
- Prior to each assessment, the teacher will inform students (via Moodle to create an official record) of the results review procedure and date.
- Students who do not obtain the average pass grade for the subject will have to resit the exam, otherwise they will fail the subject. To be able to resit the exam, students must have already undertaken assessments equivalent to a weight of at least two thirds of the overall grade, and they must have obtained a minimum average grade of 3.5 for the subject.
- Not Assessable: Students who do not undertake any of the assessments will obtain a "Not Assessable".
- In the event of a student committing any irregularity that may lead to a significant variation in the grade awarded to an assessment activity, the student will be given a zero for this activity,
regardless of any disciplinary process that may take place. In the event of several irregularities in assessment activities of the same subject, the student will be given a zero as the final grade for this subject.
- In the event that tests or exams cannot be taken onsite, they will be adapted to an online format made available through the UAB’s virtual tools (original weighting will be maintained). Homework, activities and class participation will be carried out through forums, wikis and/or discussion on Teams, etc. Lecturers will ensure that students are able to access these virtual tools, or will offer them feasible alternatives.
Assessment Activities
| Title | Weighting | Hours | ECTS | Learning Outcomes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Oral presentation in group | 40% | 6 | 0.24 | 4, 12, 10, 9, 19, 5, 6, 13, 14, 1, 7, 17, 18, 3 |
| Text comment1 | 20% | 2 | 0.08 | 4, 8, 2, 11, 10, 9, 19, 5, 6, 14, 1, 7, 16, 15, 17, 18, 3 |
| Text comment2 | 40% | 7 | 0.28 | 4, 8, 2, 11, 12, 19, 5, 6, 13, 14, 7, 16, 15, 17, 18, 3 |
Bibliography
Bergson, H. Las dos fuentes de la moral , Madrid, Tecnos,
Feuerbach, L. Manifestos Antropológicos,
Guyau, J-M. Esbozo de una moral sin obligación ni sanción, ed. Descontrol, Barcelona, 2015.
Guyau, J-M. Esquisse d'une morale sans obligation ni sanction, Payot, Paris, 2012..
Kierkegaard, S. Las obras del amor, Sígueme, Salamanca, 2006.
Kropotkin, P. Ètica, Júcar, Avilés, 1976.
Nietzsche, F. Genealogia de la moral , Madrid, Alianza,
Schleiermacher, Monólogos, Barcelona, Anthropos,
Schopenhauer, A. Los dos problemas fundamentales de la ética, Madrid, SigloXXI, 2002.
Simmel, G. La ley individual, Paidós, Barcelona, 2005.
Stirner, El único y su propiedad.
Bibliografía complementaria:
Andolfi, F. La ética de Schleiermacher,
Brentano, F, Las razones del desaliento en la filosofía, Madrid, Encuentro, 2010.
Brentano, F. El porvenir de la filosofía, Salamanca, Encuentro, …
Freuler, L, La crise de la philosophie au XIX siècle, Vrin, Paris, 1997.
Lipovetski, G. El ocaso del deber, Barcelona, Anagrama,
Löwith, K. de Hegel a Nietzsche,
Riba, J. “Hijos de Kant” Intrducción a Simmel, G. La Ley individual, Barcelona, Paidós, 2005.
Simmel, G. Las dos formas del individualismo, en Simmel, G. La Ley individual, Barcelona, Paidós, 2005.
Software
no program required