Description
Book SynopsisDetective fiction and philosophymoral philosophy in particularmay seem like an odd combination. Working within the framework offered by neo-Aristotelian virtue ethics, this book makes the case that moral philosophers ought to take murder mysteries seriously, seeing them as a source of ethical insight, and as a tool that can be used to spark the ethical imagination. Detective fiction is a literary genre that asks readers to consider questions of good and evil, justice and injustice, virtue and vice, and is, consequently, a profoundly and inescapably ethical genre. Moreover, in the figure of the detective, readers are presented with an accessible role model who demonstrates the virtues of honesty, courage, and a commitment to justice that are required by those who want to live well as a virtue ethicist would understand it. This book also offers a critique of contemporary moral philosophy, and considers what features a neo-Aristotelian conception of autonomy might display.
Trade ReviewThe Ethical Detective: Moral Philosophy and Detective Fiction, does a stellar job of not only making the often- complex facets of the discipline accessible to a wide readership but also showing how this ancient discipline can offer critics of popular culture valuable new avenues for their own analytical writing and teaching. . . . For philosophical neophytes, Haliburton’s book is the perfect introduction, marrying a keen interest in detective fiction with a thoughtful and accessible writing style that demystifies contemporary ethics and shows how moral philosophy can be, as she writes in her conclusion, made to matter in the everyday.
* Clues: A Journal of Detection *
Table of ContentsIntroduction
Chapter One: Would You Kill the Fat Man? Trolleyolgy, Stories, and the Expressive-Collaborative Construction of Morality
Chapter Two: The Ethics of Murder
Chapter Three: Moral Technology and the Development of Virtue-Based Autonomy
Chapter Four: Why Humans Tell Stories: The Place of the Moral Imagination in Ethics
Chapter Five: Exploring the Wasteland
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