Fro 016
Frontiers: Ends, Means and the Greater Good - Ethics in the 21st Century
In 1921, with the discovery that adding the lead-based agent TEL to lower grades of gasoline significantly increased automobile effciency and reduced engine “knock,” leaded gasoline soon became the fuel that literally drove the modern transportation industry and infrastructure. By 1970, leaded gas had polluted the Earth with up to 1,000 times the naturally occurring level of lead, causing countless illnesses, birth defects, and deaths. Do the myriad benefits transportation has brought to the world offset the fact that TEL caused one of the greatest environmental crises of the 20th century? With rapid global changes in technology, population, culture, and politics come unprecedented ethical challenges as we attempt to reconcile when the ends justify the means, and whether the greatest good for the greatest number outweighs the individual. This course will explore modern ethics, and the dilemnas we face in the 21st century. Specific topics will include emerging technology, environmental responsibility, and espionage.