Overview

Description

COURSE DETAILS:

Selected Topics: Epistemic Responsibility

[Note: this course is to be taught concurrently with PHIL 421W.]  

Important note regarding enrollment: All seats are reserved for Philosophy Graduate students. Enrollments from other departments will be considered only upon submission of the Graduate Course Add Form, and with instructor's permission. All such enrollments will be done in or after the first week of classes.

Philosophical discussions of moral responsibility, especially analytic philosophy over the past several decades, has focused on the type of freedom that is necessary for moral responsibility and whether that type of freedom is compatible with causal determinism.  But, at least since Aristotle, philosophers have also recognized an epistemic condition on moral responsibility.  Questions regarding whether and how ignorance can undermine moral responsibility have garnered more attention over the past several years and will serve as the focus of this seminar.

Suppose the CEO of a pharmaceutical company is presented with two options for treatments the company could develop.  She chooses the one which, unbeknownst to her and the researchers, turns out to have severe side-effects.  Is the CEO responsible for the harm caused by the treatment?  What if the CEO knew of the side-effects of a given treatment but was unaware that there were alternative treatments they could develop?  Or what if she is fully aware of all the relevant non-moral facts, but believes her primary moral responsibility is to the shareholders, and thus believes that she morally ought to develop the treatment in spite of the known side-effects, because it is the most profitable of the options?  Assuming that the CEO is wrong about what her moral obligation is in this case, does her false moral belief defeat or mitigate her blameworthiness?  In the first two examples involving mistaken non-moral beliefs, does the CEO’s moral culpability for harm depend on her moral culpability for having those mistaken beliefs, for example, on whether she has violated a duty to be informed about potential side-effects or alternative treatments?   While it is generally accepted that non-moral ignorance can excuse, at least when that ignorance itself is non-culpable, there is a great deal of debate over whether moral ignorance can likewise excuse, even when the ignorance is non-culpable.  In this seminar we will explore these and other questions about the ways in which ignorance can affect a person’s moral culpability.  

COURSE-LEVEL EDUCATIONAL GOALS:

Successful completion of this course will satisfy the “Value Theory Stream” distribution requirement toward the MA degree for Philosophy graduate students.

In addition to learning about the nature of moral responsibility and some of the contemporary debates regarding the epistemic condition on responsibility, the primary objective of this seminar is for students to learn how to research and compose a substantial piece of philosophical writing that draws on multiple sources in order to answer a significant question arising from a body of literature. 

Grading

Materials

MATERIALS + SUPPLIES:

Students must have access to reliable internet and a computer/other device that permits streaming video, word processing and teleconferencing with Zoom.

REQUIRED READING: