Toward Better Problems

Anthony Weston teaches Philosophy at State University of New York, Stony Brook and is the author of A Rulebook for Arguments.

• Preface 1. Practical Ethics in a New Key 2. Pragmatic Attitudes From Puzzles to Problematic Situations * Reconstructive Strategies * Integrative Strategies 3. Rethinking the Abortion Debate Against Drawing Lines * Multiple Relevant values * Deciding the Question: An Integrative Approach * Social Reconstruction and the Abortion Debate 4. Other Animals "Speciesism" * Outlines of an Integrative Approach * Reconstructing the Human Relation to Other Animals 5. The Environment The Need for Environmental Ethics * "Intrinsic Values" in Nature? * Integrating Environmental Values: Toward an Ecology of Values * Reconstruction in Environmental Ethics 6. Justice Justice in Problematic Situations: Between the Prevailing Paradigms * Some Integrative Methods * A Reconstructive View: Beyond the Justice Debate 7. Conclusion The Question of Critical Standpoint * The Question of Optimism Notes Index

"Toward Better Problems is a work of considerable merit.... [Weston] is effective in showing how the 'theoretical' approach obscures the real values at issue and hinders their realization."-James Gouinlock, Emory University