Lutz Wingert: Catalogue data in Autumn Semester 2019

Name Prof. em. Dr. Lutz Wingert
FieldPhilosophy, Practical Philosophy in particular
Address
Professur für Philosophie
ETH Zürich, RZ F 2
Clausiusstrasse 59
8092 Zürich
SWITZERLAND
E-maillutz.wingert@gess.ethz.ch
DepartmentHumanities, Social and Political Sciences
RelationshipProfessor emeritus

NumberTitleECTSHoursLecturers
851-0101-79LHas Truth Any Value, And If So, How Could I Adopt a (More) Objective Attitude in My Belief Formation3 credits2GL. Wingert
AbstractIt is useful to know which fellowships are available or to know the causes of frequent occurence of extreme weather. These truths are of instrumental value. Is it also intrinsically good to know the truth, e.g. to know that there are gravitational waves? Which is the role of truth in our lives? And how should one conceive the relation between being objective and being true?
Objective1. Participant will learn different, influential philosophical answers and arguments for these answers to the overall question: Does truth has any value? (E.g. answers by William James, Friedrich Nietzsche, Hans Blumenberg, Ernst Tugendhat, Torsten Wilholt, William Kvanvig und Duncan Pritchard.)

2."Apply or die!" is often an expression of the demand to produce useful, e.g. technical knowledge. The course will enable participants to have an argument- based opinion on the relationsship between scientific research and applied science.

3. As regards personal life the course aims at an clarification of the existential role of truth in our personal lifes. Therefore, the conceptual link between objecitivity as an attitude and truth as an aim of inquiry will be clarified.

4. Objectivity is an anttitude not easy to adopt. The course should help to identify feasible conditions for taking such an attitude, and to clarify how (far) this attitude is apt to avoid prejudices, misinformation, and fakes.
851-0101-80LBasic Problems of Environmental Ethics3 credits2GL. Wingert
AbstractClimate change exerts a pressure on us to significantly change our individual and collective behaviour. Such a pressure raises questions like: Who has to give up what? What is a fair distributions of the burdens in the struggle against the cllimate change? What is the reasonable understanding of our relation to nature? How should we run our economies?
ObjectiveParticipants should become familiar with basic approaches to central problems in environmental ethics.

The course will try to give an argument-based answer to the question: What are the responsibilities for individuals (e.g. as consumers), and for collectivities (e.g. states and firms).

Another focus will be to clarify the concept of "climate justice".

The course should also enable participants to evaluate different answers to the question how we should organize our economies for securing our ecological niche.
LiteraturePreparatory Literature

1. Dieter Birnbacher, Klimaethik, Stuttgart: Reclam 2016.

2. John Broome, Climate Matters, New York/London: Norton 2012.

3. Stephen M. Gardiner, A Perfect Moral Storm. The Tragedy of Climate Change, Oxford: University Press 2015.

4. Naomi Klein, Die Entscheidung: Kapitalismus vs Klima, Frankfurt/M.: Fischer 2016.
862-0004-09LResearch Colloquium Philosophy for Master Students and PhD (HS 2019) Restricted registration - show details
For MAGPW and PhD students of D-GESS only.
2 credits1KR. Wagner, M. Hampe, L. Wingert
AbstractPh.D. students, post docs, members of staff, and senior colleagues from other philosophy departments will report on their work in progress. Furthermore, promissing new philosophical articles and parts of new philosophical books will be studied.
ObjectiveIdeas and arguments dealing with systematic problems especially in epistemology, ethics, political philosophy, and the philosophy of mind will be scrutinized and elaborated.