Moral Philosophy

Ever since its publication in 1651, Thomas Hobbes' Leviathan has unsettled and challenged how we understand the World. Condemned and vilified by each new generation, Hobbes' cold political vision continues to see through any number of political and ethical vanities. In his wonderfully stimulating book The New Leviathans, John Gray allows us to understand the World of the 2020s with all its contradictions, moral horrors and disappointments through a new reading of Hobbes' classic work.

Moral Ground brings together the testimony of over eighty visionaries, theologians and religious leaders, scientists, elected officials, business leaders, naturalists, activists, and writers to present a diverse and compelling call to honor our individual and collective moral responsibility to our planet. In the face of environmental degradation and global climate change, scientific knowledge alone does not tell us what we ought to do.

In this audiobook, David Gunkel offers a provocative attempt to think about what has been previously regarded as unthinkable: whether and to what extent robots and other technological artifacts of our own making can and should have any claim to moral and legal standing.

This is a completely unabridged edition of Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals. You may also know this work as Foundations of the Metaphysics of Morals, Grounding of the Metaphysics of Morals, or The Grounding for the Metaphysics of Morals. Our rendition of this classic has crisp, well-edited audio.

With The Firm, financial journalist Duff McDonald pulled back the curtain on consulting giant McKinsey & Company. In The Golden Passport, he reveals the inner workings of a singular nexus of power, ambition, and influence: Harvard Business School. Harvard University occupies a unique place in the public's imagination, but HBS has arguably eclipsed its parent in terms of its influence on modern society.

In her 1958 article "Modern Moral Philosophy", British philosopher Elizabeth (G. E. M.) Anscombe does nothing less than challenge the very foundations of moral philosophy, the discipline that tries to understand right and wrong action. The article sets out three main ideas. First, that moral philosophy should not be explored until a philosophy of psychology is already in place. Second, that philosophers who do not believe in God should not use ideas about "obligation" and "duty".

A Thousand Small Sanities is a manifesto rooted in the lives of people who invented and extended the liberal tradition. Taking us from Montaigne to Mill, and from Middlemarch to the civil rights movement, Adam Gopnik argues that liberalism is not a form of centrism, nor simply another word for free markets, nor merely a term denoting a set of rights. It is something far more ambitious: the search for radical change by humane measures. Gopnik shows us why liberalism is one of the great moral adventures in human history.

Sprawling and illuminating, Dan Gretton’s I You We Them is an unprecedented study of perpetrators of crimes against humanity: the “desk killers” who ordered and directed some of the worst atrocities of the last century. From Albert Speer’s Nazi complicity to Royal Dutch Shell’s role in the murder of the Nigerian activist Ken Saro-Wiwa, Gretton probes the depths of the figure “who, by giving orders, uses paper or a phone or a computer to kill, instead of a gun.”

Woher kommt Moral und wie zeigt sie sich heute? Moderne Gesellschaften sind Krisengesellschaften: Universelle Werte sind erodiert, eine allgemeingültige Moral scheint für immer der Vergangenheit anzugehören. Doch der Schein trügt: Tatsächlich gibt es universelle Werte, die alle Menschen miteinander teilen.

In 2018, scientists manipulated the DNA of human babies for the first time. As biologist and historian Matthew Cobb shows in As Gods, this achievement was one many scientists have feared from the start of the genetic age. Four times in the last fifty years, geneticists, frightened by their own technology, have called a temporary halt to their experiments. They ought to be frightened.

This essay discusses the essentials of Rand's ethics and its crucial relevance to America's intellectual, moral, and political crisis. There are overtones applicable to America. It serves as an excellent commentary on the historical and cultural significance of her ethics and the view of man as a moral ideal.

In his autobiography, David Hume declared unequivocally that this work, An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals (1751) is "of all my writings, historical, philosophical, or literary, incomparably the best." In it, Hume takes the discussion away from traditional attitudes where either rational or metaphysical issues govern moral principles. Instead, he introduces the human factor, introducing the sentiments and passions inherent in human psychology.

In The Soul of Care: The Moral Education of a Husband and a Doctor, Kleinman delivers a deeply humane and inspiring story of his life in medicine and his marriage to Joan, and he describes the practical, emotional and moral aspects of caretaking. He also writes about the problems our society faces as medical technology advances and the cost of health care soars but caring for patients no longer seems important.

"Can you change the nature inside yourself?" Unlock the continuing mind-bending possibilities of ethical and moral dilemmas with "After Dinner Conversation - Season Four," the next installment of the must-read collection of the best short stories from the critically acclaimed After Dinner Conversation magazine series. Spanning all genres, from science-fiction to historical fiction and everything in between, each story is guaranteed to captivate you and leave you questioning your own beliefs. Perfect for philosophy students and fiction lovers alike, each story comes with five suggested ...

Sam Harris has discovered that most people, from secular scientists to religious fundamentalists, agree on one point: science has nothing to say on the subject of human values. Indeed, science’s failure to address questions of meaning and morality has become the primary justification for religious faith.The underlying claim is that while science is the best authority on the workings of the physical universe, religion is the best authority on meaning, values, morality, and leading a good life.

The question "What is good and evil?" may seem simple, but as the book shows, it's more complex than you might think. This sort of philosophical thinking, though often reserved for college students, can broaden the thinking of younger children. The works of different philosophers are used to explore this important question in clear, simple language and in terms that children ages 10 and older can understand.

In this groundbreaking work, Kwame Anthony Appiah, hailed as "one of the most relevant philosophers today" (New York Times Book Review), changes the way we understand human behavior and the way social reform is brought about. In brilliantly arguing that new democratic movements over the last century have not been driven by legislation from above, Appiah explores the end of the duel in aristocratic England, the tumultuous struggles over foot binding in 19th-century China, the uprising of ordinary people against Atlantic slavery, and much more.

In this second volume of the Called Out of Darkness trilogy, Father Robert Spitzer, S.J., draws together some of the best advice given by Catholic spiritual masters across the ages and brings it into harmony with modern scientific research, offering practical ways to live out the gospel in our busy days. It is a road map to a deeper relationship with the Lord and to authentic transformation through the imitation of Christ. Giving evidence that Jesus established just one Church, with Peter as its head, Spitzer shows that the Catholic Church continues to be fertile ground for conversion.

Most Americans are now familiar with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and its prevalence among troops. In this groundbreaking new audiobook, David Wood examines the far more pervasive yet less understood experience of those we send to war: moral injury, the violation of our fundamental values of right and wrong that so often occurs in the impossible moral dilemmas of modern conflict.

The essays in this fascinating volume examine present-day psychological and cultural problems with the keen insight and humanistic sympathies characteristic of Erich Fromm's work. The Dogma of Christ provides some of the sharpest critical insights into how the contemporary world of human destructiveness and violence can no longer separate religion, psychology, and politics. The book brilliantly summarizes Fromm's ideas on how culture and society shape our behavior.