Justice: What’s the Right Thing to Do?

Justice is the first Harvard course to be made freely available online and on public television. Nearly a thousand students pack Harvard’s historic Sanders Theatre to hear Michael Sandel, perhaps the most prominent college professor in America, talk about justice, equality, democracy, and citizenship.

In the first lecture Sandel talks about the moral side of the murder. If you had to choose between killing one person to save the lives of five others and doing nothing even though you knew that five people would die right before your eyes if you did nothing—what would you do? What would be the right thing to do? Thats the hypothetical scenario Professor Michael Sandel uses to launch his course on moral reasoning.

There are 12 lectures included in the playlist above. They address the following questions:

1. The Moral Side of Murder; The Case for Cannibalism.
2. Putting a Price Tag on Life; How to Measure Pleasure.
3. Free to Choose; Who Owns Me?
4. This Land is My Land; Consenting Adults.
5. Hired Guns?; For Sale: Motherhood.
6. Mind Your Motive; The Supreme Principle of Morality.
7. A Lesson in Lying; A Deal is a Deal.
8. What’s a Fair Start?; What Do We Deserve?
9. Arguing Affirmative Action; What’s the Purpose?
10. The Good Citizen; Freedom vs. Fit.
11. The Claims of Community; Where Our Loyalty Lies.
12. Debating Same-Sex Marriage; The Good Life.

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Julian Nam
Interesting. I watched the cannibalism one. I would say the students have received a good introduction to the difficulties with utilitarianism. I’m impressed with the students who have the courage to stand up in front of everyone, the professor and the camera. That is what education is about!
wald0
This series of lectures has done more to inform my moral sense and make me question my beliefs on morality, justice, free will, etc. than anything else I have ever read or been part of. I can not recommend this series highly enough, everyoone will benefit from watching. Even if you feel you already have strong moral grounding and have thought these questions through before I promise there is something new here for you. Please give it a try, you will be glad you did and so will everyone around you.
wald0
That depends on what you accord as “respect”. Yes if they refrain from cannibalism they will die, and if one considers quantity of life as more important than the quality of life then this could be seen a disrespectful. I value the quality of life more than the quantity, I say once you partake in the murder of another human that is not harming you or anyone else, you are no longer human in a sense. So what have you saved?
bb
but is it possible to maintain the respect for humanity in the case of the cabin boy without sacrificing the respect for the others?
dewflirt
Been chipping away at this since Monday, partly because I don’t want to use it up too quickly. This is well worth a listen. Watch too, you can almost see the cogs turning in the kids heads, lovely :)
wald0
I take back my last comment. If you continue to watch you can actually see these students begin to get it, to improve their ability to critic the material at hand. In fact it seems as if they were simply a bit shy in the beginning and that once they begin to settle in and get comfortable they are capable of forming very subtle and complex opinions. Kudos to the instructor for being able to cultivate that.
wald0
Man, I am severly dissapointed with the students of this class. They don’t seem to be able to form an intelligent defense or criticism of the material at hand, and these are supposed to be our best and brightest? I can do better and I only went to a small unheard of public university.
wald0
I was surprised when he asked everyone in part two about the murder of the orphaned cabin boy that no one said it was wrong for reasons of principle and identity. We as human beings have a moral identity that in part at least makes us human. In my opinion it is wrong to sacrifice those principles even if if that means we die. To believe other wise means we only have principles and moral beliefs when they are convenient. Now if this is the case what real value do those principles have? How do they identify us? My suggestion is that they do not define us at all if we give them up in order to simply keep being. Instead we are then defined by self and species preservation, just like wild animals that have no moral sense what so ever.