Ethics · Philosophy
Midterm and take home final. Two papers. Overall the assignments were graded toughly. You need to write a thorough essay. I spent a lot of time in office hours and both Moody Adams and my TA were extremely helpful. It is not hard to do well if you try. Also a decent amount of readings.
This was one of my favorite classes in college, and it is in large part thanks to Prof. Moody-Adams. She is one of the sweetest and most caring professors I have had. She genuinely cares about her students and their interests, even if they do not always relate to class. I once went to her about an article I was writing relating to political science, and she helped me find resources and consider ethical considerations which may guide my opinion. She was truly one of the most genuine professors I have had. She is a no-nonsense teacher and takes your time seriously, which is great because it makes you feel like you are not wasting your time. She wants to be there and she wants to teach, making it fun and rewarding to be her student. She is also very funny and uses great examples from her personal life, the lives of students, and from others to explain main ideas. The class itself and the material is great too. You go through many frameworks of moral philosophy. The papers are also very fun to write and research. I went in having read most of the works for the first half of the course, and I came out which a much better and more in-depth understanding. This class gives a great overview which offers a perfect spring board into ethics. Truly my favorite philosophy course I have taken, one of, if not, my favorite professor I have taken, and it rivals the best classes offered at this…
About 3-4 hours of reading per week, but a lot of times you can get away with sort of skimming the papers. Two short papers and in class midterm which many struggled with. "Take home final" but really just a final paper (about 6 pages). Grading depends on TA but most people I know were in the high B and low A range.
MMA is a very nice woman and can be engaging in her courses, however, the reality of the situation is that much of her class is spent listening to her read off slides and desperately trying to keep up in your own notes. While at some points it is hard to blame her---ethics is not a topic conducive to lectures---she could do a better job of interacting with the students and ensuring understanding. Topics were difficult at times and regardless of whether the students completely understood a concept (almost to boredom) or had no clue what she was talking about, MMA continued to simply read off the slides. You will likely learn a decent amount of ethics, but it will not be interesting and engaging as ethics has the potential to be. By far the best part of this class was the discussion sections, which always had fantastic discussion of interesting topics we were all confused about in class (shout out to TA Anthony).
Moody-Adams is a true badass. She is a fascinating and very kind woman who never runs out of interesting stories about famous philosophers she's worked with. She starts every lecture with a piece of artwork that connects to the material and overall tries hard to be engaging. My only critique (this may be specific for the online format because I know she usually holds exams differently) is that her assignments are both laborious and unnecessarily hard/complicated. I loved the class and paid a solid amount of attention, but no matter the effort I put in I was not prepared for the essays/midterms/finals. I know some other students who had a really positive experience but even they admitted that they were unnecessarily complicated. Honestly, I think moody-Adams does it because she really does care if you learn and makes you workkk for it. Like she expects you to be graduate student level... my friend went to office hours and asked a basic question and she was super unresponsive basically saying you should already know that. TLDR; she's one of the coolest professors I've ever had but her online format exams were tedious and unnecessary
2 Papers (each 4-6 pages) 1 Midterm (in class, not too hard but very pressuring time-wise) 1 Take-home final
I highly recommend this class to anyone who is interested in philosophy or ethics in any capacity. Professor Moody-Adams is a wonderful human being and a great teacher. She lectures off of slides that she puts on Courseworks so a lot of people don't go to class, and this is a huge mistake. The slides don't contain everything she wants to say and often times she explains things in ways that the slides do not capture or she discusses something that isn't on them at all. The class covers some of the more classic ethical theories (util., Kant, Aristotle) and then moves on to some other topics (Ethics of Care, Egoism, Meta-ethics). It's a great introduction to some of the major topics in ethics (both new and old), and also a great introduction into philosophical thinking. Professor Moody-Adams is really nice so go to her office hours and ask questions. In general the grading is very fair and the workload pretty light. If you go to the TA's before the papers you will not have a hard time writing them.
Not so heavy. One 2-3 page paper, one in-class midterm, one 4-6 page paper, and a take-home final. Readings were also of very reasonable length.
Moody-Adams is an ethical boss. Her understanding of the material and her personal insights into it--especially during the last third of the course--are amazing. She has done a tremendous amount of thinking--and writing--in philosophical ethics, and always gives well thought out arguments for and against the claims made in each reading. She has also developed some really compelling views of her own that seem to capture important aspects of what ethical inquiry what is really about. These views are creative and new, yet draw on what feels to be the actual way in which people think about their moral lives, and the class has the privilege of reading a few excerpts from her work in the last week. I'm a philosophy major and gained a lot from her class; anyone who puts thought into their interactions with the world has much to learn from MMA. I'm really happy I took ethics with her. That said, her lecture style can be frustrating. First of all, she uses powerpoint, which in my opinion is always boring. Her lecture style can be engaging--she certainly does not just read from the slides--but the medium makes the class boring at times and sometimes hurts the logical flow of the class. Secondly, she is often very tired, and it shows. She can be a little disorganized and some of her lectures were not so clear as a result. Outside of her lecturing--which, to be clear, is sometimes great,…