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Ethics

The philosophical study of ethics seeks to articulate and justify standards of right and wrong, good and bad, virtue and vice. Ethical theorists also work to understand how the practice of moral judgment relates to other areas of inquiry.

FACULTY DOING RESEARCH IN ETHICS INCLUDE:

  • Theodore George works on research interests including an emphasis on continental European approaches in ethics, especially in reference to contemporary hermeneutics, applied hermeneutics, existentialism, and related areas.
  • Claire Katz works on the question of ethics as it emerges in 20th century Continental philosophy.  She is primarily interested in the “fissure” in ethics as examined in post WWII European philosophy, e.g., Hannah Arendt, Hans Jonas, and Emmanuel Levinas.  She has taught courses on Ethics after the Holocaust and has published on the work of Emmanuel Levinas.  She is the author of Levinas, Judaism, and the Feminine: the silent footsteps of Rebecca (Indiana 2003) and the editor of Emmanuel Levinas: Critical Assessments (Routledge 2005).
  • Clare Palmer has research interests in ethical theory and applied ethics, in particular environmental ethics, animal ethics, and the ethics of emerging technologies.
  • Martin Peterson works on consequentialism. He is the author of The Dimensions of Consequentialism, Cambridge University Press 2013.
  • Gregory Pappas works within the American Pragmatist tradition in ethical theory, in particular, John Dewey’s ethics. He is also working on the value theory of Latin American philosopher Risieri Frondizi.
  • Linda Radzik works on the moral issues that arise in the aftermath of wrongdoing including atonement, punishment and forgiveness. She is interested in the intersection of Kantian moral theory and feminist thought. She has also written on the problem of justifying the authority of normative claims.
  • Kristi Sweet works principally on the ethical theory of Immanuel Kant. Her broader interests are the history of ethical thought in Western philosophy, with emphases on the post-Kantian German tradition as well as Ancient Greek thought.
  • Gary Varner currently focuses the two-level (or “Kantian”) utilitarianism of R.M. Hare.

FACULTY IN OTHER TEXAS A&M DEPARTMENTS ALSO HAVE RESEARCH INTERESTS IN ETHICS:

  • Marian Eide concentrates on twentieth-century literature in English with a focus on gender and ethics. Her book Ethical Joyce was published in 2002 by Cambridge University Press. She is currently researching violence in twentieth-century aesthetics.