PHIL2617: Practical Ethics Semester 1, 2024

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PHIL2617: Practical Ethics

(Semester 1, 2024)

Take-Home Assignment

Submission requirements: Assignments should be submitted on-line via Canvas.

Answers should be typed and proper referencing is required.

Late Submissions: Note that the conditions for submission of take-home exams differ from those for essays: late take-home assignments WILL NOT BE ACCEPTED without a formal extension or special consideration application. This means that you cannot simply submit late without special consideration and expect to receive a late penalty (late submissions without a special consideration application will receive a mark of 0).

Assignment Questions: You should answer two of the following questions. The overall word count of the exam is 2500 words (so write approximately 1250 words per question). Submissions with a total word count greater than 2,750 will be penalized.

Assignment aims & advice. Your answer should contain a clear argument for a thesis that answers the question. Try to make your main points as concisely as possible. Carefully set out each step in your argument and provide supporting reasons. Avoid wandering off track. Make sure you define key terms where necessary (e.g., ‘commodification’). Use lecture and reading material discussed in this course but engage with it critically. Feel free to use your own examples. Clear, succinct writing, and evidence of critical reasoning, analysis and independent thought will be rewarded.

1. Ethics and World Poverty. Are affluent individuals morally required to assist those in absolute poverty until the point when further assistance would involve sacrificing something of moral significance?

2. Designing Children. Do parents show a morally problematic attitude to their children if they genetically enhance them?

3. Consent to Sex. Under what circumstances, if any, does “verbal coercion” invalidate consent to sex?

4. Commercial Surrogacy. Does commercial surrogacy commodify children in a morally problematic way?

5. Pornography, Free Speech and Censorship. What, if anything, is morally problematic about inegalitarian pornography?

6. Moral Ignorance. Can someone be excused for racist behavior if they are brought up in a society where racism is socially accepted?