Applied Ethics: A Reader

The essays in this book range over the fields of environmental ethics, business ethics, professional ethics, and bio-medical ethics. In each of the essays a significant question in the field of applied ethics is treated in a way that is methodologically revealing and provides some sense of new directions and preoccupations in the field. Among the questions discussed are: How should we conceive of the relations between theoretical ethics and practical ethics? What is the nature of responsible moral reasoning and deliberation? To what extent is rationality ultimately the same in morality and science? Is applied ethics inherently conventional or conservative in its deliberations and results? Can or should specialists in applied ethics claim moral expertise in relation to problems in a given domain? TO what extent is the personal history of persons working in the field opf applied ethics relevant to assessing their work? While the contributors appear to agree on the answers to some of these questions, there is spirited disagreement concerning others.

Jerrold R. Coombs is a founding member of the Association for Values Education and Research. He co-authored a number of reports of research on moral education and law-related education.

Earl Winkler is a member of the Advisory Council on Ethical Issues in Health Care for the British Columbia provincial government, a member of the Permanent Council on Ethical Issues for the Law Reform Commission of Canada, and a founding member of the Canadian Bioethics Society.