When your base camp is overrun by zombies, whom do you save if you cannot save everyone? Is it permissible to sacrifice one survivor to an undead horde in order to save a greater number of the living? Do you have obligations to loved ones who have turned?
These are some of the troubling ethical questions you might face in a zombie apocalypse. Bryan Hall uses situations like these to creatively introduce the foundational theories of moral philosophy. Covering major thinkers such as Aristotle, Immanuel Kant, and John Stuart Mill, this is an introduction to Ethics like no other: a practical guidebook for surviving a zombie outbreak with your humanity intact. It shows you why moral reasoning matters as long as you still walk among the living.
The book is written entirely from the perspective of someone struggling to survive in a world overrun by the undead. Each chapter begins with graphic art and a "field exercise" that uses a story from this world to illustrate an ethical problem. By considering moral controversies through the unfamiliar context of a zombie apocalypse, the morally irrelevant factors that get in the way of resolving these controversies are removed and you can better answer questions such as:
· Do we have a moral obligation to help those less fortunate than ourselves?
· Is it ever morally permissible to intentionally kill an innocent person?
· Are non-rational but sentient beings morally considerable?
Equipped with further reading sections and overviews of the theories that you would usually cover in an introductory Ethics course, this one-of-a-kind primer critically evaluates different procedures for moral action that you can use not only to survive but flourish in an undead world.
Inhaltsverzeichnis
Read First: A Message from the Archivist
Introduction: Welcome to the End of the World
1. Coping with chaos through relativism
2. How to find moral value in the apocalypse
3. Creating an escape from the state of zombies
4. Understanding your rights and duties during the pandemic
5. Do the infected have a right to suicide from altruistic motives?
6. When to sacrifice survivors to hungry hordes
7. How to maximize pleasure in a world of flesh-consuming anguish
8. Are all zombies equal?
9. The responsibilities of strongholds to the unprotected living
10. What are your obligations to undead loved ones?
11. How to cultivate virtue among the vicious
Conclusion: A Guide for Flourishing in an Undead World
Glossary
Acknowledgments
Index
