Oxford University Press has published The Structure of Normative Ethics: & Other Essays in Moral Philosophy, a new volume bringing together influential essays by American philosopher Shelly Kagan. The volume was edited by Huub Brouwer and Benjamin Mullins, who selected and organized the essays and contributed both an introduction and editorial commentary.
The book contains a selection of Kagan’s essays on normative ethics, published between 1988 and 2018. The essays are arranged thematically in three parts. The first focuses on the structure of normative ethics, including normative factors, evaluative focal points, and competing views on the foundations of ethical theory. The second explores methods in normative ethics, critically examining the role of thought experiments and the practical difficulty of following moral principles under epistemic limitations. The final part brings together essays in practical ethics, including discussions of collective action problems and speciesism.
Brouwer and Mullins play a central editorial role in the volume. In addition to shaping its thematic structure, they co-authored the introduction and an editorial commentary that traces connections across Kagan’s published work and highlights criticism and further developments by other philosophers.
The volume is the first in a two-part collection of Kagan’s essays. Its successor, Rethinking Intrinsic Value & Other Essays on the Good, collects essays on value, well-being, and desert.
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Read more: The Structure of Normative Ethics: & Other Essays in Moral Philosophy | Oxford Academic
