Ethics : History, Theory, and Contemporary Issues

The most comprehensive anthology of its kind, Ethics: History, Theory, and Contemporary Issues, Fourth Edition, provides the breadth and the depth to accommodate a variety of courses in ethics and contemporary moral problems. Its readings - unabridged where possible - are organized into threeparts, essentially offering three books under one cover. Part I, Historical Sources, presents influential ethical theories spanning 2,500 years of philosophical thought, beginning in ancient Greece with the ideas of Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle and continuing through to the twentieth-century ideasof Camus and Sartre. Part II, Modern Ethical Theory, explores the theoretical issues concerning the nature of moral judgments, the resolution of moral disagreements, and the evaluation of moral theories through the perspectives of major contemporary philosophers, including Baier, Brandt, Foot,Harman, Williams, and Wolf. Finally, Part III, Contemporary Moral Problems, offers opportunities to apply the theories of the first two parts; it contains arguments for and against such issues as abortion, euthanasia, animal rights, and torture.