Ethics: A Contemporary Introduction

Harry Gensler’s Ethics introduces undergraduates to the main issues in contemporary moral philosophy. It also relates these issues to practical controversies, with special attention paid to racism, moral education, and abortion. It gives a practical method for thinking about moral issues, a method based largely on the golden rule.

Key Features:
• Serves as either the sole textbook for a lower-level introduction to ethics/moral philosophy course or a supplementary text for a more advanced undergraduate ethics course
• Provides clear, direct writing throughout, making each chapter easily accessible for an engaged undergraduate
• Offers a philosophically rigorous presentation of the golden rule
• Includes helpful study aids, including: bolded technical terms, boxes for key ideas, chapter summaries, suggested readings, and a glossary/index

Key additions to the Second Edition:
• A new chapter on virtue ethics, which deals with Aristotle, Plato, and related controversies
• A new chapter on natural law theory, which deals with Aquinas, double effect, sexual morality, and related controversies
• A significantly revised chapter on the golden rule, which is now much clearer on certain key points
• A significantly revised chapter on nonconsequentialism, which now has expanded coverage of human rights, libertarianism, and socialism, and uses the right to health care as a case example
• An expanded bibliography
• A new appendix that overviews key books students will want to pursue upon completing, Ethics, Second Edition
• A rewritten instructional program, EthicCola, which is now much easier to download and use and has (for students) revised exercises for each chapter and (for instructors) a score-processing program, class slides, and instructor’s manual. This can be found on the book’s companion website: http://www.routledge.com/textbooks/gensler.

Harry J. Gensler, S.J., is Professor of Philosophy at John Carroll University in Cleveland. Some of his other books include Formal Ethics (1996), Ethics: Contemporary Readings (2004), Anthology of Catholic Philosophy (2005), Historical Dictionary of Logic (2006), Historical Dictionary of Ethics (2008), and Introduction to Logic, Second Edition (2010).