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This course explores the values and questions posed in the formative period of East Asian civilizations. Notions of a Dao ("Way") are common to Confucianism, Daoism, and Buddhism, but those systems of thought have radically different ideas about what that Dao is and how it might be realized in society and an individual's life. These systems of thought appeared first in China, and eventually spread to Korea and Japan. Each culture developed its own ways of reconciling the competing systems, but in each case the comprehensive structure of values and human ideals differs significantly from those that appeared elsewhere in the ancient world. The course examines East Asian ideas about self-cultivation, harmonious society, rulership, and the relation between human and nature with a view toward expanding our understanding of these issues in human history, and highlighting their legacies in Asian civilizations today. The course features selective readings in classics of Confucian, Daoist, and Buddhist texts that present the foundational tenets of Asian thought. N. B. This is the first of three courses in the Humanities Core, East Asian track. These courses show how history and ideas shape our world and future. Take all three to experience a year-long intellectual community dedicated to the life of the mind.

Ethics and violence seem to be contradictory terms, yet much of Korean film and literature in the past five decades has demonstrated that they are an intricate and in many ways justifiable part of the fabric of contemporary existence. Film exposes time and again the complex ways in which the supposed vanguards of morality, religious institutions, family, schools, and the state are sites of condoned transgression, wherein spiritual and physical violation is inflicted relentlessly. This class will explore the ways in which questions about Truth and the origins of good and evil are mediated through film in the particular context of the political, social, and economic development of postwar South Korea. Tuesday classes will include a brief introduction followed by a film screening that will last on average for two hours; students that are unable to stay until 5 pm will be required to watch the rest of the film on their own.

This course explores ethical questions that arise in public service work, as well as leadership theory and skills relevant to public service work. Through readings, discussions, in-class activities, assignments, and guest lectures, students will develop a foundation and vision for a future of ethical and effective service leadership. This course serves as a gateway for interested students to participate in the Haas Center's Public Service Leadership Program.

Foundational scientific issues and philosophical perspectives related to advances in the study of brain and behavior. Implications of new insights from the neurosciences for medical therapy, social policy, and broader conceptions of human nature including consciousness, free will, personal identity, and moral responsibility. Topics include ethical issues related to genetic screening and editing, desire and addiction, criminal behavior, the biology of sexuality, fetal pain, aging and neurodegenerative disease, brain-computer interfaces, and neural enhancement and the human future. May be taken for 2 units without a research paper. Undergraduates must enroll in NBIO101. This course must be taken for a minimum of 3 units and a letter grade to be eligible for Ways credit. Application required: http://bit.ly/NBIOApplication

This course will explore the politics of memorializing World War II specifically in the city of Berlin, as the city offers numerous examples of how the past is rendered present. Students will consider debates surrounding the Holocaust Memorial established once the Wall came down. They will engage the ethical conundrums of memorializing perpetrators along with victims, and the political issues of memorializing the resistance. Finally, memorializing mass murder and genocide also raises a number of aesthetic conundrums. All these issues will be engaged by visiting a variety of memorials in Berlin, along with an introduction to the relevant literature and documentation.

Human treatment has evolved through experimentation. Ideas to influence nature's course to accelerate healing which were initially promulgated through anecdotal accounts are now rigorously tested in scientifically designed studies. In this seminar, we will explore the dual role of the investigator, to translate scientific questions into experiments and to consider the potential moral implications of the experiment. In weekly, two-session seminars, we will use published research studies to explore whether the theoretical constructs underlying the proposal are scientifically grounded and which ethical issues might be involved.

Iconographic component of criminal law; reasons and functions of the visual representation of criminal wrongdoing. Historical roots of "evil typecasting;" consideration of its variations with respect to common law and civil law systems. Fundamental features of the two legal systems. Sources, actors, enforcement mechanisms of the criminal law compared; study of cases in the area of murder, sex offences, organized crime and terrorism. Different techniques of image typecasting highlighted and discussed. International criminal law, which takes the burden to describe, typecast and punish forms of "enormous, disproportionate evil," such as genocide and other mass atrocities.

Analysis of the value of life from a philosophical point of view, presenting lay foundations of bioethics. Three main steps. 1) The notion of life, which can be seen from different angles and with diverse intentions; comparative analysis of plural interpretations of the notion of life, economic, scientific, religious, and the limits of the notion itself. 2) Ethics as a theory of value, the metaphysical background of life, and the structure of bioethics; a vision of life as a "critical choice", which implies respect for life and individual responsibility; some non-Western ideas on the value of life. 3) Practical issues such as the meaning of death, abortion and euthanasia

This course will ask how police, prosecutors, and prisons should operate in an open, democratic society, and what opportunities and challenges democracy creates for making those institutions fair, effective, and humane. Our entry point will be Cesare Beccaria's 1764 treatise, Of Crimes and Punishments, which linked criminal justice reform with the struggle against despotism. Beccaria was a key figure in the Italian Enlightenment, and his treatise laid the foundation for virtually all subsequent efforts at criminal justice reform, in the United States as well as in Europe. Beccaria's ideas heavily influenced the American Revolutionaries, found expression in the Bill of Rights, and continue to shape discussions of policing and punishment today. We will read Beccaria's treatise, as well as secondary materials placing him in historical context and tracing his influence on the reform of criminal justice institutions in Europe, the United Kingdom, and the United States. We will also examine a series of contemporary debates about policing, prosecution, and punishment, including calls for prison abolition and for defunding the police, and we will ask what light Beccaria's ideas can throw on those debates. We will consider, too, the criminal-justice dimensions of the recent rise of populism and nativism, both in the United States and in Europe, and the increasing overlap between debates about crime and debates about immigration. Studying Beccaria will provide a window into the Italian Enlightenment, and tracing his influence will help us place modern debates about mass incarceration, police violence, and prosecutorial discretion in historical perspective. We may take field trips to the sites of former prisons in Florence and to Milan, where Beccaria lived and worked.