Customer Reviews

The Moral Life: An Introductory Reader in Ethics and Literature

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

I use this book as a text book for my introduction to ethics course at a local community college. This book is not only great for a text but also very interesting to read. Some of the selections are difficult to understand and are difficult reading but over all it is a great book for those wishing to gain a broad base of knowledge on a variety of moral theories and issues.

I felt compelled to write this review after seeing certain things in other reviews which attack the character of this man, rather than the quality of the passages contained in the text. I hope that this review will educate individuals about the text, as well as the passages contained in the text.

Firstly i take issue with this personal attack on Pojman. Yes, I disagree with 99% percent of what this man believes on issues concerning morality, but I don't think attacking his character is a fair way to review his text. Secondly, many people, including my fellow students, felt as though Pojman presented his opinions in a fundamentalist light, which would certainly follow because of his own beliefs. Though there are certainly shades of fundamentalism and even neo-conservatism in this book, is that necessarily a bad thing?

The purpose of this book was to present ethics in as many ways as possible. Though there does seem to be an proportionately large amount of material in here that most postmodern, existential, utilitarian, conflict theorist, etc... would disagree with. It is important for a college student in an intro to ethics class to be exposed to different points of view, even if they aren't popular.

And all the popular points are certainly there as well. Nietzsche, Mill, Dostoevsky, Hobbes. Certainly this book could have been more comprehensive and presented in a more relative light (as Pojman will show favoritism in painfully obvious ways) but hey, as far as intro to ethics books go this is about as good as it gets. Most level-headed college students that walk into a class that uses this book will walk out remembering the classic texts, and not the obscurities carefully selected by Pojman.

There is a great cross-section of selections here that will undoubtedly upon the mind of any college student. I highly recommend this book, just be careful and draw your own conclusions.

Note to professors: Please teach this class carefully, as if you strictly assign material and do not go over it in a comprehensive manner, students may walk away with nothing more than the opinions of an inferior ethicist. Still you could do much worse than this book.

This is the best book available on the interrelationship between ethics and literature. Seeing the moral dimension of the works of Hawhorne, Hugo, Huxley, LeGuin and scores of others highlights the importance of morality in our lives and awakens the imagination to possibilities hitherto ignored. This is a wonderful book which every intlligent person should read.

I've used various editions of this text over a six-year period and found them excellent--a nice blend of theory and (literary) experience. To borrow from Kant, "Theory without experience is empty; experience without theory is blind." Some of the reviews below illustrate why ethics (and philosophy generally) so desperately needs to be studied. Muddleheadedness is (frequently) a curable disease. Pojman is part of the cure, not the illness.

I bought this book twice: once because it was a required textbook (I loaned it to a fellow student the next semester, who somehow never got around to returning it. Maybe she liked it too much to return it. That's OK. She can keep it as a gift from me), and twice because I loved it (for its different but interesting philosophical approaches to making moral and ethical decisions). A very enjoyable and thought-provoking book.

Got here in 2 days, the day before I nedeed it for my Ethics class, absolutely great shipping. Liking the book so far.

Loved this book. Got it for a college course so we only went through parts of it. I put it aside for personal reading I loved it so much...

This book was supposed to be in good condition, well it was far from good, I would have said fair condition, and way more than gently used. The cost that was saved from new to used was not significant. I have purchased used books with a rating that was similar but the condition was excellent almsot new. So always buyer beware.

Pojman teaches at the Military Academy at West Point, and is a known proponet of the death penalty; that's not why Om giving him a bad review. This might not even distress you, but getting ethics from west point seems to me like getting Gay and Lesbian studies from Brigham Young.

Authors like Nieziche, John Stuart Mill, and Ayn Rand will start off a chapter, only to be immediately refuted by someone like Phillip Hallie or Jean Bethke Elshtain who make anyone remotely relativist, egoist, utilitarian seem like some sort of heartless monster. These obscure types all seem to have failed comp. Granted, I'm no fan of Niziche or Rand, but the entire voice of the volume (not to mention the several essays Pojman writes himself) seems self-referential and absolutist. Pojman claims that "parents would abandon or abuse their children and spouses abandon each other whenever it was convenient...commitment, loyalty, fidelity all...are moral notions." (39); animals have no morality, and, yet, they protect their offspring.

Pojman seems to believe that on our own, we humans will not only sink down to the level of animals, but below the level of animals; not even Hobbes will believe that. The first work of literature is Lord of the Flies, and it seems to set the tone for the entire chapter. Literature like Sophie's choice and a narrow sliver from The Brother's Karamozov seems to lean toward the sensationalist rather than the insightful, while the philosophical essays, as always, reduce human nature down to its most absurd situations.

This volume is edited in such a way, that it presents an untrusting view of humanity, and an even less trusting view of society. In my opinion, there's too much urgency and not enough scholarship for this book to serve me well. My ethics professor says he thinks Pojman makes a good foil; at 68 bucks, that's one expensive foil.

I had to buy this book for a philosophy class. I do not like this book. I think that for an lower level philosophy course, there is not enough explaination from the author.