Introduction to Ethics and Food Systems Fall 2017, University of Vermont (PHIL 010: Food Ethics) Office Hours: Tues and Thurs 1:40-2:40pm in Room 209, 70 S. Williams St. Course Description This course provides an introduction to ethics through the lens of food systems. It also includes modules on the ethics of ending life, and on sustainability.
This course has two, related educational aims (goals, objectives). The first is to prepare you to begin developing and defending your own answers to these and other questions in the domain of food ethics. The second is to equip you with a certain set of skills: both in preparing for class, in your writing, and through class discussion and group work, you will develop your ability to (1) communicate clearly and concisely, (2) reconstruct arguments for a position or view from a piece of text, (3) critically evaluate arguments, (4) construct persuasive arguments of your own in defense of a position or view, and (5) anticipate and address potential objections to arguments that you find persuasive. Although deploying these skills will be crucial in your effort to advance your own thinking about the questions in food ethics that we will discuss in this class, developing these skills has independent value as they can also be usefully applied in a variety of different domains outside of philosophy. Optional Textbook Anne Barnhill et al., Food, Ethics, and Society, Oxford UP, 2016 (Readings below are marked 'T' if they are in this textbook.) Readings (Only Numbered Readings are Required) August 29: Overview of Food Ethics; Production Ethics 1. Introduction to Chapter 1: The Ethically Troubling Food System (T) Optional: Milton Friedman, "The Social Responsibility of Business is to Increase its Profits" (not in T) August 31: Intensive Industrial Animal Agriculture; Consumer Ethics 3. Humane Society of the United States, "The Welfare of Animals in the Meat, Egg, and Dairy Industries" (T) Optional: selection from Gilovich et. al., Social Psychology, 1st ed. (introduction to social psychology textbook) (not in T) September 5, 7, 12: The Ethics of Ending Life 1. Judith Jarvis Thomson, "A Defense of Abortion" (not in T) Optional: Michael Tooley, "Are Non-Human Animals Persons?" (not in T) September 14, 19: Objections to Thomson 1. Michael Tooley, objections to Thomson on abortion (not in T) (note that this provides an excellent model for how to write your own philosophy papers in this course) Optional: Carol Kaesuk Yoon, "No face, but plants like life too" (T) September 21: Utilitarianism, and Singer vs. Tannsjo on its implications 1. Peter Singer, "All Animals are Equal" (T) 2. Torbjorn Tannsjo, "It's getting better all the time" (T) FIRST PAPER ASSIGNMENT: due Sunday, October 1 at 11:59pm via email September 26: Alternatives to Utilitarianism; Consumer Ethics 1. Roger Scruton, "Eating Our Friends" (T) September 28: Vegan Arguments 1. Tristram McPherson, "How to Argue for (and against) Ethical Veganism" (T) (note that this provides an excellent model for how to write your own philosophy papers in this course) Optional: Introduction to Chapter 7: Industrial Animal Agriculture (T) October 1: First Paper Assignment is due at 11:59pm via email October 3: Vegan Arguments and the Inefficacy Objection October 5: Consumer Ethics 1. Introduction to Chapter 4: Consumer Ethics (i.e. pages 165-186) (T) October 10: Kantian theories of the ethics of production and consumption 1. Christine Korsgaard, "Getting Animals in View" (T) 2. Eliot Michaelson, "A Kantian Response to Futility Worries?" (T) October 12: Industrial Plant Ag Recommended: pp. 417-422 of the Introduction to Chapter 9: Industrial Plant Agriculture (T) Optional: David Tilman et al., "Global Food Demand and the Sustainable Intensification of Agriculture" (not in T) October 17: Alternatives To Industrial Plant Ag 1. Pages 416-430 of the Introduction to Chapter 9: Industrial Plant Agriculture (T) 2. Introduction to Chapter 10: Alternatives to Industrial Plant Agriculture (i.e. pages 459-476) (T) Optional: Fred Kirschenmann, "Can Organic Agriculture Feed the World? And Is That the Right Question?" (T) Recommended: Pages 333-334 of the Introduction to Chapter 7 (T) October 19: The Ethics of Local Food 2. Helena de Bres, "Local Food: The Moral Case" (T) Optional: Pierre Desrochers et. al., selections from The Locavore's Dilemma (T) MIDTERM EXAM: due Sunday, October 29 at 11:59pm via email October 24: Domestic Food Justice 1. Pages 92-101 (only) of the Introduction to Chapter 3: Food Justice (T) Optional: Carol Adams, "The Sexual Politics of Meat" (T) October 26: No Class (work on midterm exam) October 29: Midterm Exam is due at 11:59pm via email October 31: Food Waste, Food Justice, Gleaning Optional: USDA fact sheet on gleaning (not in T) Optional: Info on Intervale gleaning initiative and its goals (not in T) November 2: Global Hunger 1. Pages 36-47 of the Introduction to Chapter 2: Global Hunger (T) (only pp. 36-47) 1. Pages 47-57 of the Introduction to Chapter 2: Global Hunger (T) (only pp. 47-57) 2. Amartya Sen, "Hunger and Entitlements" (T) 3. USAID factsheet on the importance for food security of water, sanitation, and hygiene, 2013 (not in T) Note: these public health sources agree that proper nutrition requires more
than adequate intake of food; on this basis, USAID claims that food security should be understood as requiring more than reliably adequate dietary intake; nonetheless, global
and national definitions of 'food security' that guide policy
typically take only dietary intake into account -- for example, see FAO and USDA SECOND PAPER ASSIGNMENT: due Sunday, November 19 at 11:59pm via email November 9: Why Adequate Food Access is Insufficient for Proper Nutrition, Importance of Early Childhood Nutrition and other factors for Future Life Outcomes 1. Abhijit Banerjee and Esther Duflo, "More than 1 Billion People are Hungry in the World: But what if the experts are wrong?" (T) Optional: Lisa Belkin (and Annie Murphy Paul), "A Womb With a View" (not in T) Optional: Douglas Almond and Janet Currie, "Killing Me Softly: The Fetal Origins Hypothesis" (not in T) (feel free to skip 158-160) Optional: "Sanitation and Stunting", Research Institute for Compassionate Economics (not in T) November 14: gleaning placeholder November 16: No Class Meeting -- Meet with other students one-on-one to workshop papers Recommended: online November 19: Second paper assignment due at 11:59pm via email November 28: Singer's Argument for a Demanding Duty of Beneficence to Help the Global Poor 1. Peter Singer, "Famine, Affluence, and Morality" (T) 2. Browse www.givewell.org (not in T) Recommended: Reread pages 36-47 of the Introduction to Chapter 2: Global Hunger (T) Optional: "Philanthropy In Silicon Valley" (not in T) November 30: Objections to the Empirical Premise of Singer's Argument, and Replies 1. Page 38 and pages 57-59 of the Introduction to Chapter 2: Global Hunger (T) (only pp. 38 and 57-59) December 5: Sustainability and the Tragedy of the Commons 2. Garrett Hardin, "The Tragedy of the Commons" (not in T) Optional: Amartya Sen, "Population, Food, and Freedom" (not in T) Optional: Paul Ehrlich, "Overpopulation and the collapse of civilization" (T) December 7: Sustainability and Self-Government of Common Resources Recommended: Handout on Hardin and Ostrom 2. Pages 13-23 of Elinor Ostrom, Governing the Commons (not in T) Optional: Strong vs. weak sustainability -- and is sustainability worth focusing on? (not in T) Optional: Some definitions of sustainability (not in T) Optional: More definitions of sustainability (not in T) Optional: James C. Scott, Seeing Like a State: How Certain Schemes to Improve the Human Condition Have Failed (not in T) x: Farmers, Farm Workers 1. Seth Holmes, "Farm Workers" (T) (If you prefer, you can watch this video of Seth Holmes speaking on this topic instead.) Optional: reread Iris Marion Young, "Five Faces of Oppression" (T) x: Farmers, Farm Workers 1. Barry Estabrook, "The Price of Tomatoes" (T) 2. Introduction to Chapter 11: Workers (T) (i.e. pp. 519-529) 3. Page 179 of the Introduction to Chapter 4: Consumer Ethics (T) Optional: reread Iris Marion Young, "Five Faces of Oppression" (T) Optional: Alan Wertheimer, "The Value of Consent" (T) Optional: Hallie Liberto, "Exploitation and the Vulnerability Clause" (T) FINAL EXAM and FINAL PAPER: due via email xx at xx (university-assigned final exam time) x: Food Sovereignty, Farmers, Farm Workers 1. Paul Thompson, "Food Security and Food Sovereignty" (T) Optional: EWG Food Scores Methodology (not in T) Optional: IMMP 25th Anniversary Report on Dolphin Safe Tuna (not in T) x: What should you do? What should we do? The Role of Entrepreneurship and Civil Society 1. Pages 469-473 of Introduction to Chapter 10: Alternatives to Industrial Plant Agriculture (discussion of sustainable intensification) (T) 2. Austin Kiessig, "What 'Big Ideas' in Food Get Funded in Silicon Valley?" (T) Optional: Richard Thaler and Cass Sunstein, selections from Nudge (T) Optional: Elizabeth Devitt, "Artificial chicken grown from cells gets a taste test -- but who will regulate it?" (not in T) Optional: Stanford panel on meat without animals (not in T) Additional Resources Peter Singer and Jim Mason, The Ethics of What We Eat, Rodale, 2006 (on reserve at library) Ronald Sandler, Food Ethics: The Basics, Routledge, 2015 ([soon to be] on reserve at library) Gordon Conway, One Billion Hungry: Can We Feed the World?, Cornell UP, 2012 (on reserve at library) The Rise and Future of the Food Movement, online course with lectures at UC Berkeley, taught by Raj Patel and Michael Pollan Food, Ethics, and Global Society, course at UVM, taught by Mark Budolfson First Steps Toward Sustainable Food Solutions, course at Stanford, taught by Priya Fielding-Singh and Mark Budolfson |