ARTS2383 Ethics: Theory and Practice
The Complete Exam Bible · T3 2026ARTS2383 Overview
- UNSW Sydney
- Term 3 2026
- Level 2
- Two-hour final exam
ARTS2383 Ethics: Theory and Practice is a Level 2 UNSW Sydney course offered in Term 3 2026. It trains you to move from a disputed public issue to a defensible ethical judgement by identifying the governing principle, explaining how it applies, testing objections and revising the conclusion when necessary.
- Assessment An individual essay and final examination make accurate argument reconstruction essential.
- Core method State the principle, identify its bridge to the case, then test the strongest objection.
- Final revision Compare authors on one shared question without erasing their different reasons.
How ARTS2383 is assessed
| Component | Weight | Format |
|---|---|---|
| Essay | 40% | Individual critical engagement with a key text or problem; Moodle lists 1,500 words and a due time of 4:00 pm on 8 October 2026 |
| Final Exam | 60% | Individual two-hour examination in the formal examination period; check Moodle for the sitting, question structure and permitted materials |
What ARTS2383 covers
The course begins with applied argument analysis and climate justice, then tests equal consideration, rights, responsibility and harm across immigration, animal ethics, reproductive ethics, euthanasia and capital punishment.
Applied Ethics and Argument Analysis
Principles, bridge premises, objections, replies and qualified public judgementsApplied ethics turns a public controversy into a sequence of claims that can be examined.
- Separate the concrete issue, affected agents and relevant interests before choosing a principle
- State a principle in a general form that can be applied consistently beyond the immediate case
- Identify the bridge premise connecting case facts to the principle and resulting conclusion
- Direct an objection at a premise, inference or scope condition rather than merely disagreeing
- Use a reply to defend, narrow or abandon the original conclusion
- Match the confidence of the final judgement to what the argument has established
Carbon Budgets and Distributive Justice
Historical responsibility, benefit, ability, equality and fair climate allocationA finite carbon budget creates an allocation problem as well as a technical target. Ethical analysis must ask who may use the remaining emissions space, who should finance mitigation and adaptation, and how transition costs should be distributed.
- Define the benefit or burden being allocated before choosing a principle
- Historical responsibility links remedial burden to contribution to the problem
- The benefit principle asks who continues to enjoy advantages connected to emissions
- Ability to pay assigns more burden where action is possible without serious sacrifice
- Equal per capita reasoning begins from equal personal claims to emissions space
- A justified hybrid gives each principle a stated role and an ordering rule
Historical Responsibility and Net Zero
Polluter pays, excusable ignorance, weak links, liability and target designHistorical responsibility asks whether past contribution to climate harm creates present duties.
- Polluter-pays reasoning connects contribution to a duty to remedy or compensate
- Excusable ignorance challenges blame but need not erase every forward-looking duty
- Institutional continuity asks whether present agents inherit obligations from predecessors
- Inherited benefit can matter even when current people did not cause the original emissions
- Net zero balances remaining emissions with removals but leaves ethical choices open
- A fair pathway examines timing, reliance on removals and distribution of transition costs
Subsistence and Luxury Emissions
Need, urgency, basicness, substitutability and priority in carbon budgetsThe distinction between subsistence and luxury emissions gives priority to the conditions of survival and a decent life when a carbon budget is scarce. Classification cannot be read from the object alone.
- Subsistence emissions protect survival or the basic conditions of a decent life
- Luxury emissions serve lower-priority interests when less harmful alternatives are reasonably available
- The function of an activity matters more than the social label attached to the object
- Urgency and severity explain why some needs receive priority within a scarce budget
- Substitutability asks whether the interest can be protected through a lower-emissions option
- Distribution asks who gains from the activity and who bears its climate burden
Immigration and Refugee Admission
Closure, urgent interests, capacity, asylum and the all-or-nothing fallacyRefugee admission places claims of political closure beside urgent interests in safety and the necessities of life. A defensible argument cannot treat either unlimited closure or unlimited admission as self-evident.
- Arguments for closure appeal to membership, self-determination and institutional continuity
- Equal consideration gives like interests comparable seriousness without equal weight in every case
- Safety and basic necessities can outweigh comparatively modest membership preferences
- Capacity limits feasible action but does not show that excluded people are less deserving
- The all-or-nothing fallacy wrongly turns limited ability into permission to do nothing
- Admission policy includes selection, settlement support, burden sharing and review
Animal Interests, Rights and Zoos
Sentience, equal consideration, subjecthood, inherent value and captivityAnimal ethics in this course follows two distinct routes. Singer begins with sentience and equal consideration of like interests, exposing species membership as an irrelevant reason for discounting suffering.
- Sentience grounds interests because experiences can go better or worse for the being
- Speciesism discounts interests merely because the being belongs to another species
- Equal consideration concerns like interests and does not require identical treatment
- A subject of a life has a biography, preferences and welfare across time
- Inherent value supports rights against being treated merely as a replaceable resource
- Zoo analysis separates rescue, rehabilitation, conservation, education and display
Abortion and Human Cloning
Valuable futures, bodily entitlement, status and conditions of permissibilityThe abortion readings test different links in the argument. Marquis explains the wrongness of killing through deprivation of a valuable future, offering a strong presumptive reason against abortion.
- Marquis connects the wrongness of killing to deprivation of a valuable future
- The valuable-future account supplies a strong reason without automatically settling every conflict
- Thomson grants personhood for argument and tests whether the claimed entitlement follows
- A right to life does not state by itself what bodily support another person must provide
- Responsibility for dependence can affect duties but requires an additional argument
- Cloning analysis should identify interests and conditions while staying within the available evidence
Euthanasia, Killing and Letting Die
Agency, harmful sequences, negative duties, positive duties and careThe distinction between killing and letting die cannot be settled by grammar alone. Foot connects moral differences to agency, negative duties not to originate harm and positive duties to provide aid when another person has a corresponding claim.
- Killing commonly involves initiating or sustaining a harmful sequence
- Letting die can involve failing to interrupt a harmful sequence already under way
- Negative duties prohibit forms of interference or origination of harm
- Positive duties require aid when a role, promise or relationship grounds a claim
- Identical outcomes do not prove that agency, intention and duty are identical
- Paired cases must hold motives, alternatives, relationships and rights steady
Capital Punishment and Moral Justification
Retribution, deterrence, wrongful conviction, inequality and institutional authorityCapital-punishment arguments operate at different layers.
- Retribution asks whether the punishment is deserved and proportionate to the offence
- Deterrence is an empirical claim about effects and cannot be assumed from severity alone
- Brutalisation challenges the wider social effects of state-authorised killing
- Wrongful conviction has special force because the penalty is irreversible
- Unequal enforcement challenges the fairness and legitimacy of institutions administering punishment
- A conclusion should distinguish abolition in principle from rejection under actual conditions
The teaching sequence begins with climate ethics: carbon budgets, distributive justice, historical responsibility, net zero, and the difference between subsistence and luxury emissions. It then uses the same analytical discipline on immigration and refugee admission, animal interests and rights, abortion and human cloning, euthanasia, and capital punishment.
The course is assessed by an individual essay worth 40% and a two-hour final examination worth 60%. The Moodle essay brief asks for critical engagement with a key text or problem, while the captured materials do not publish the final exam's question count, sections or permitted materials. This guide therefore concentrates on transferable reasoning rather than guessing a paper format.
Each chapter reconstructs the source position, isolates its bridge premises, supplies an original worked case, and closes with practice that makes the objection and reply visible. The recurring distinctions matter as much as the topic summaries.
Responsibility differs from ability, need differs from preference, equal consideration differs from identical treatment, and a right does not automatically include every possible entitlement. Keeping those distinctions stable lets you compare arguments without flattening them. It also helps you identify whether an objection attacks a moral principle, an empirical claim, the bridge to the case or the design of an institution.
Use the maps to locate disagreements, but write in complete argumentative paragraphs: define the view, connect it to the case, answer the strongest challenge and end with a conclusion whose confidence matches the evidence.
Worked example · free
Testing a public restriction with the harm principle
- +1State a limited principle: coercion is justified to prevent non-trivial harm to others, not merely official dislike.
- +1Connect repeated sleep disruption to that principle and show why residents have not chosen the exposure.
- +1Raise the strongest burden objection: the boundary may restrict performers more than is necessary.
- +2Reply with proportionality and less restrictive means, supporting a narrow, reviewable limit rather than a blanket ban.
Key terms
- Applied ethics
- The disciplined use and evaluation of ethical principles in concrete public problems.
- Bridge premise
- The claim that connects a general moral principle to the facts of a particular case.
- Distributive justice
- The ethics of allocating benefits and burdens within or between societies.
- Historical responsibility
- Responsibility grounded in an agent's past contribution to a harm or problem.
- Ability to pay
- A forward-looking principle assigning more remedial burden to agents with greater capacity.
- Subsistence emissions
- Emissions needed for basic survival or the conditions of a decent life.
- Luxury emissions
- Emissions serving lower-priority activities that are not necessary for survival or a decent life.
- Equal consideration
- The requirement to give like interests comparable moral seriousness without requiring identical treatment.
- Sentience
- The capacity for experiences such as pleasure or pain that can ground interests.
- Inherent value
- Regan's status of a subject of a life that requires respect rather than mere instrumental use.
- Negative duty
- A duty not to interfere with another person or originate a harmful sequence.
- Positive duty
- A duty to provide aid, goods or services when a corresponding claim exists.
ARTS2383 FAQ
How is the course assessed?
The 2026 handbook publishes two individual components: an essay worth 40% and a two-hour final examination worth 60%. Moodle describes the essay as a 1,500-word mid-term task. The captured materials do not specify final-exam sections or permitted materials, so verify those details on Moodle.
What makes an ethics answer analytical?
An analytical answer reconstructs a view accurately, names the moral principle, explains the bridge from principle to case facts, tests a relevant objection and shows how the reply changes the conclusion. A list of opinions or authors is not enough because it leaves the reasoning between claims invisible.
Which climate principles should I compare?
The course materials emphasise historical responsibility, the benefit principle, ability to pay and equal per capita allocation. Compare them on the same burden, such as mitigation finance or remaining emissions space, because a principle can look persuasive only by answering a different allocation question.
How do Singer and Regan differ on animals?
Singer begins with sentience and equal consideration of like interests, allowing consequences and trade-offs to matter. Regan begins with subjects of a life, inherent value and rights, which resists treating an individual merely as a means. A zoo can therefore face different objections under the two frameworks.
How should Marquis and Thomson be compared?
Marquis explains why killing can be seriously wrong through deprivation of a valuable future. Thomson tests whether a right to life includes entitlement to another person's bodily support. Compare the bridge premises rather than presenting the authors as simple opposites on fetal moral status.
How should I prepare for the final examination?
Revise distinctions and argument structures, not an invented paper format. Practise one accurate paragraph of exposition, one targeted objection and one qualified judgement for every topic. Before the sitting, confirm the actual question types, permitted materials, time and location through Moodle and the UNSW examinations timetable.
Questions students ask in each ARTS2383 chapter
- Why reconstruct a view before criticising it?
- A criticism has force only if it reaches the argument actually offered. Reconstruction identifies the conclusion, supporting moral reason and bridge premise. It prevents a writer from defeating an easier substitute and also reveals whether disagreement concerns a principle, a fact or an inference. Chapter 01 · Applied Ethics and Argument Analysis
- Why is a carbon budget an ethical problem?
- A budget is scarce emissions space. Allocating it affects energy access, income, health, employment and development, while financing mitigation and adaptation imposes further burdens. Technical feasibility cannot by itself decide which people or states should receive these benefits and costs. Chapter 02 · Carbon Budgets and Distributive Justice
- Does historical responsibility always require blame?
- No. Blame is one route, but remedial duties can also arise from causal contribution, inherited benefits, continuing institutions or present ability. An answer should state which route it uses instead of treating every form of responsibility as identical. Chapter 03 · Historical Responsibility and Net Zero
- Is an activity always either subsistence or luxury?
- No. Classification depends on whose interest is served, how urgent it is and what alternatives exist. The same activity can protect a basic need in one context and a readily replaceable preference in another. Chapter 04 · Subsistence and Luxury Emissions
- Does equal consideration require open borders?
- Not automatically. It requires the interests of outsiders and members to enter the same moral comparison. A restriction needs reasons tied to real interests and capacities, rather than assuming that citizenship alone ends the analysis. Chapter 05 · Immigration and Refugee Admission
- Does equal consideration mean identical treatment?
- No. Treatment can differ when relevant capacities and interests differ. Equal consideration requires a comparable interest, such as avoiding severe pain, to receive comparable seriousness regardless of species membership. Chapter 06 · Animal Interests, Rights and Zoos
- Do Marquis and Thomson answer the same question?
- Only partly. Marquis explains why killing can be a grave loss, while Thomson tests whether a right to life entails bodily support. Their arguments intersect, but a comparison must keep those different targets visible. Chapter 07 · Abortion and Human Cloning
- Is letting die always less serious than killing?
- No. An omission can violate a strong positive duty, especially when a role or promise gives another person a claim to care. The distinction directs attention to agency and duty; it does not supply an automatic ranking of seriousness. Chapter 08 · Euthanasia, Killing and Letting Die
- Does unequal enforcement refute retribution?
- It may not refute every abstract claim about desert, but it directly challenges whether actual institutions can impose the punishment fairly and legitimately. A complete answer states whether its conclusion concerns principle, practice or both. Chapter 09 · Capital Punishment and Moral Justification
How to study for the exam
Build a nine-row revision table with one row per chapter and columns for the governing principle, the bridge premise, the strongest objection, the best reply and the final limitation. Start with climate ethics because it establishes responsibility, justice, harm and need, then track how those ideas change across refugee and animal ethics.
For abortion, euthanasia and capital punishment, keep rights, duties, agency and institutional authority separate. Practise reconstruction before criticism: give yourself three minutes to state an author's view in a form its defender could accept, then add the objection. Use the original cases in this guide to test transfer rather than memorising the assigned examples.
The handbook publishes a two-hour final, but the captured sources do not publish its sections or allowed materials, so check Moodle before planning timing. In the last revision pass, write conditional conclusions. State which factual or moral premise would change your verdict. This habit prevents overclaiming and makes your evaluation responsive to evidence.
