If homosexuality is wrong, there should be a good reason to believe that. Likewise, if homosexuality is not wrong, there should be a good reason to believe that. This essay reviews some of the most influential arguments on the ethics of homosexuality.
Racism: What Makes Something Racist?
Theories of racism try to answer these questions by trying to identify the essence of racism, the unifying and fundamental feature(s) of all racist things that explains why they are racist. This essay surveys some influential theories of racism.
Mindreading: Understanding Others’ Thoughts and Feelings
The ability to understand others’ beliefs, desires, intentions, emotions, and moods is called mindreading. This essay introduces issues in the study of mindreading, the main theories of mindreading, and its place in our understanding of others.
Ethical Non-Cognitivism: Are Ethical Judgments More Like Desires Than Beliefs?
Ethical non-cognitivists argue that ethical judgments are, strictly speaking, not beliefs: they are expressions of emotions, or commands, or expressions of approval or some other non-cognitive mental state. This essay introduces this view in metaethics.
Immigration Ethics: An Overview
This essay explores some key competing philosophical arguments about whether it should be easier for people to immigrate to whatever country they would like.
Pragmatic Encroachment: Do Our Practical Interests Affect What We Know?
An introduction to pragmatic encroachment, the view that the pragmatic or practical stakes of a belief can make a difference to whether that belief is justified or known.
Plato’s Symposium: Philosophizing About Love
Imagine throwing a party with delicious food where you and your friends debate what love is. Ancient Greek philosopher Plato (428–348 BCE) tells a similar story in his Symposium. This essay introduces Plato’s Symposium by summarizing the core philosophical views in its speeches.
Causation: What Are Causes?
What is a cause? What is it for something to cause something else? This essay presents three of the most important philosophical theories of causation.
Equality: What Is It and How Is It Different from Equity?
Many say that we should make society more equal. But what should we equalize? This essay explains two of the most important ones: equality of outcome and equality of opportunity.
Ethics and God: the Divine Command Theory and the Euthyphro Dilemma
This essay introduces the Divine Command Theory of ethics, that wrong actions are wrong because God forbids them and right actions are right because God commands them, and the most important responses to it, which date back to Socrates’ discussion in ancient Greece with a man named Euthyphro.