Ethics
Notes
Ethics asks: what is the right thing to do, and how can we know? This Map covers the full landscape of moral inquiry — from the grand frameworks that answer this question differently, to the criteria for judging what is "good," to the psychology of why we act (or fail to act) morally, to the social dynamics through which ethics operates.
Ethical Frameworks (Metaethics) maps the foundational schools — deontology, utilitarianism, virtue ethics, care ethics, and moral pluralism — each anchored to a different locus of moral value: duty, consequences, character, relationships, or shared moral intuitions.
Moral Epistemology addresses the prior question: how do we know what is moral at all? It covers the spectrum from subjectivism and relativism to pragmatism and nihilism, examining the criteria by which different traditions ground moral judgment.
Moral Psychology studies the gap between knowing what is right and doing it — the role of reason and emotion, the dispositions that enable consistent moral action, and the ways in which moral knowledge fails to translate into moral behavior.
Social and Group Ethics situates ethics in its social context: how morality operates as coordination (the free-rider problem), how in-group bias shapes moral perception, and how reciprocity structures the moral fabric of communities.
Books
Ego Is The Enemy (book) Give and Take (book) The Genealogy of Morals (book) The Righteous Mind (book) Theory of Moral Sentiments (book)
Philosophers
Socrates (philosopher) Hellenistic Age (philosopher) Immanuel Kant (philosopher) Eastern Philosophy (philosopher) Aristotle (philosopher)