Ethics

Maybe ethics is more for you? Looking into the ethics of humans, their morality, the ethics of judgment or the nature of ethics could be the topic for you!

Example ethics dissertation topic 1:

What is a person? How the 21st century is shaping a modern-day philosophical conundrum.

Designer babies, cloning, memory, personality and IQ enhancing drugs are but some aspects of the modern human condition. Genetic manipulation is another facet of modern life through which we have the scientific skill (if not the legal framework) to eradicate or change further characteristics of human nature. Such developments suggest, at least philosophically, that we may be approaching a time when ‘what it means to be human’ is more open to debate than hitherto. Indeed, what aspects of a person are unchanging and fixed – if any? Musing upon this contemporary philosophical conundrum, this dissertation seeks answers not only through the utilisation of historic core texts of philosophy but also through the medium of developing science and ethics. This is a cross-cultural and cross-disciplinary dissertation that has much scope for original thought.

Suggested initial topic reading:

• Baumeister, R.F. (2005). The cultural animal: Human nature, meaning, and social life. New York: Oxford University Press.
• Hauskeller, M. (2009). ‘Making sense of what we are: A mythological approach to human nature’, Philosophy, Vol. 84(1), pp. 95-109.
• McConnell, T. (2011). ‘Genetic enhancement and moral attitudes toward the given’, Journal of Applied Philosophy, Vol. 28, pp. 369-380.