Can COVID-19 Help Us Be More Ethical? There is so much bad news caused by the pandemic these days—infections, deaths, depression (mental and economic)—that many of us find ourselves hunting for every little bit of good news. In a recent blog post, attorney Jeffrey Kaplan found a silver lining in all our quarantining and social distancing by suggesting that working from home […] Ver
COVID-19’s Moral Harm On April 27, 2020, we learned that Dr. Lorna Breen, head of the ER at a New York City hospital, committed suicide after fighting on the front lines in the coronavirus battle. Just two days earlier, John Mondello, a Bronx EMT, also took his own life after witnessing the human tragedies that seem ubiquitous on […] Ver
The Dangerous Moral Superiority of Physical Distancers Many people spent Easter weekend worshiping in the Church of Anthony Fauci. These «Faucians» did not attend any actual services at physical places of worship, because their sacraments include self-quarantine and physical distancing rather than communion, wearing face masks and gloves rather than hijabs or yarmulkes, and baptizing delivered packages in disinfectant rather than new […] Ver
Moral Injury As with so many of our blog posts, this one is prompted by a recent book, Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland by Patrick Radden Keefe. This highly-regarded book is about the troubles (and more) in Northern Ireland. The detailed descriptions of the violent struggles and political battles between […] Ver
Astros: Sign-stealing Is Still Stealing In 2017, the Houston Astros brought great pride to the State of Texas by winning the World Series. It was especially satisfying, as a rags-to-riches tale. In 2011, 2012, and 2013, the Astros were the worst team in baseball. By 2015, however, the ‘Stros were in the Major League Baseball (MLB) playoffs, and won it […] Ver
Naked and Ashamed We ordered Krista K. Thomason’s book, Naked. You can imagine our disappointment when it arrived and was not the coffee table book we’d envisioned. OK, that was the lame joke we were thinking about beginning this blog with until we realized that some people might take offense and we would be ashamed that we had […] Ver
Dueling Bible Classes People often puzzle over the question of whether religious people act more ethically than not-so-religious people. The scientific evidence is certainly mixed. There is strong evidence that religious people self-report being more ethical than non-religious people, but less evidence that their actions actually match their reports (Xygalatas, 2017). For example, some studies indicate that “religiosity […] Ver
Oil, Indians, and Obedience to Authority Christopher Leonard’s new book Kochland: The Secret History of Koch Industries and Corporate Power in America tells the story—the good, the bad, and the ugly—of one of the world’s most successful and most controversial companies. Koch Industries, like all large companies, has both ethical bright spots and low lights on its resume. Think of Johnson […] Ver
Debating Debate In an October 12, 2019 New York Times op-ed, philosophy professor Jonathan Ellis and law student Francesca Hovagimian lodged a one-sided critique of competitive high school and college debate on grounds that it teaches students to make one-sided arguments, which, they assert, helps create our current, unproductive political discourse where the goal is to win […] Ver
Garden of Leaders Not long ago, we blogged about a book on the philosophy of philanthropy edited by our friend, prominent philosopher and classicist Paul Woodruff: https://ethicsunwrapped.utexas.edu/purdue-pharma-and-the-met-opioids-and-art. Paul has just published another book that caught our attention—The Garden of Leaders: Revolutionizing Higher Education (Oxford University Press 2019). The book emphasizes the importance of leadership and chastises modern universities […] Ver