VICE AND VIRTUE IN EVERYDAY LIFE has been a bestseller in college ethics for more than two decades because it is well-liked by both instructors and students. Instructors appreciate it for its philosophical breadth and seriousness. Students welcome the engaging topics and irresistible readings. VICE AND VIRTUE IN EVERYDAY LIFE provides students with a lively selection of classical and contemporary readings on pressing matters of personal and social morality. The text includes an overview of seminal ethical theories, as well as a unique set of stimulating articles on matters of social responsibility, personal integrity and individual virtue. While the readings consistently represent different points of view, the book maintains a strong sense of the importance of avoiding cruelty and practicing kindness in a well-lived life.

In this college text, Christina Sommers (Clark U., American Enterprise Institute) and Fred Sommers (Brandeis U.) present a collection of classical and contemporary writings on ethics. Eighty- five essays are grouped into nine thematic sections covering good and evil, moral doctrines and moral theories, relativism, virtue, vice, morality and self-interest, morality and social policy, the meaning of life, and--new to the seventh edition--duties to animals and to nature. Also included are updated introductions to each section, 17 new readings, new material on the abortion debate, and essays addressing our moral duties to the world's poor. No subject index.
Annotation ©2006 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

In this college text, Christina Sommers (Clark U., American Enterprise Institute) and Fred Sommers (Brandeis U.) present a collection of classical and contemporary writings on ethics. Eighty- five essays are grouped into nine thematic sections covering good and evil, moral doctrines and moral theories, relativism, virtue, vice, morality and self-interest, morality and social policy, the meaning of life, and--new to the seventh edition--duties to animals and to nature. Also included are updated introductions to each section, 17 new readings, new material on the abortion debate, and essays addressing our moral duties to the world's poor. No subject index. Annotation ©2006 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Christina Hoff Sommers is Affiliate Associate Professor of Philosophy, Clark University and a Resident Scholar at the American Enterprise Institute. Her recent books include THE WAR AGAINST BOYS (New York Times Notable Book of the Year) and ONE NATION UNDER THERAPY.Fred Sommers is professor emeritus at Brandeis University. His latest article,"On the Nature of Belief," appeared in the Spring edition of the AMERICAN PHILOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY. MIT Press recently published a book of essays called THE OLD NEW LOGIC ( April 2005) that honors Sommers' distinctive contributions to 20th century philosophy.

Preface. Introduction. 1. GOOD AND EVIL. Philip Hallie: From Cruelty to Goodness. Jonathan Bennett: The Conscience of Huckleberry Finn. John T. Noonan, Jr.: Three Moral Certainties. Philip Hallie: The Evil that Men Think & And Do. Martin Gansberg: 38 Who Saw Murder Didn't Call Police. Josiah Royce: The Moral Insight. Herman Melville: Billy Budd. Friedrich Nietzsche: Beyond Good and Evil. 2. MORAL DOCTRINES AND MORAL THEORIES. The Judeo-Christian Tradition. Robert C. Mortimer: Morality Is Based on God's Commands. John Arthur: Why Morality Does Not Depend on Religion. David Hume: Of Benevolence. John Stuart Mill: Uilitarianism. Bernard Williams: A Critique of Utilitarianism. Robert Nozick: The Experience Machine. Ursula Le Guin: The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas. Immanuel Kant: Good Will, Duty, and the Categorical Imperative. Nell Noddings: The Ethics of Care. 3. IS IT ALL RELATIVE? Herodotus: Morality as Custom. Ruth Benedict: A Defense of Moral Relativism. William Graham Sumner: A Defense of Cultural Relativism. Carolyn Fluehr-Lobban: Cultural Relativism and Universal Rights. Jane Perlez: Uganda's Women: Children, Drudgery, and Pain. Lawrence Adam Lengbeyer: An Alternative to Moral Relativism. Louis Pojman: Who's to Judge? Thomas Nagel: The Objective Basis of Morality. R. M. MacIver: The Deep Beauty of the Golden Rule. Martin Luther King Jr: I Have a Dream. The United Nations Charter: The Universal Declaration of Human Rights. 4. VIRTUE. Aristotle: Happiness and the Virtues. Epictetus: The Art of Living 512 (New Translation). Vice Admiral James Stockdale: The World of Epictetus. Saint Augustine: Of the Morals of the Catholic Church. Bernardo Mayo: Virtue or Duty? Alasdair MacIntyre: Tradition and the Virtues. William Frankena: The Problem with Virtue Ethics. Adam Smith: Of Justice and Beneficence. Charles Darwin: The Origin of the Moral Sense. 5. VICE. Plutarch: Vice. Saint Augustine: The Depths of Vice. Jonathan Edwards: Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God. Dante Alighieri: The Hypocrites. Samuel Johnson: Self-Deception. Bishop Butler: Upon Self-Deceit. Immanuel Kant: Jealousy, Envy, and Spite. 6. MORALITY AND SELF-INTEREST. Plato: The Ring of Gyges. Thomas Hobbes: Of the State of Men without Civil Society. David Hume: Of Self-Love. Harry Browne: The Unselfishness Trap. James Rachels: Egoism and Moral Skepticism. Ayn Rand: The Virtue of Selfishness. Louis Pojman: Egoism, Self-Interest, and Altruism. Colin McGinn: Why Not Be a Bad Person? Peter Singer: Why Act Morally? 7 MORALITY AND SOCIAL POLICY. Peter Singer: Famine, Affluence, and Morality. John Arthur: World Hunger and Moral Obligation: The Case Against Singer. James Shikwati: For Heaven's Sake, Please Stop the Aid! John T. Noonan, Jr.: An Almost Absolute Value in History. Mary Anne Warren: On the Moral and Legal Status of Abortion. Judith Thomson: A Defense of Abortion. Don Marquis: Why Abortion is Immoral. Leon Kass: The Wisdom of Repugnance: The Case Against Human Cloning. Ranaan Gillon: Human Reproductive Cloning: A Look at the Arguments. Against It and a Rejection of Most of Them. Cass R. Sustein: The Constitution and the Clone. 8. DUTIES TO ANIMALS AND TO NATURE. Immanuel Kant: On Duties to Animals. James Rachels: A Moral Defense of Vegetarianism. Peter Singer: Down on the Factory Farm. Michael Pollan: An Animal's Place. Roger Scruton: The Case Against Animal Rights. Aldo Leopold: The Land Ethic. Bill Devall and George Sessions: Deep Ecology.Dennis Prage: Is God in Trees? Gregg Easterbrook: The Case Against Nature. 9. THE MEANING OF LIFE. Tao Ch'ien: Substance, Shadow and Spirit. Bhagavad-Gita: Selection. Buddha: The Four Noble Truths. Leo Tolstoy: My Confession. Bertrand Russell: A Free Man's Worship. Albert Camus: The Myth of Sisyphus. Thomas Nagel: The Meaning of Life. Jean-Paul Sartre: Existentialism is Humanism. Joel Feinberg: Absurd Self-fulfillment: An Essay on the Perversity of the Gods. Viktor Frankl: The Human Search for Meaning. The Book of Job: Selection.