Select a topic for your paper :

1. Go to the Concise Edition of the Ethics: Theory and Contemporary Issues book (it is your E-text assigned for this class) and pick a topic that you would like to explore. The topic I've chose is abortion

· Read the book's chapter that pertains to your selected topic to inform yourself about different moral positions on the issue that you selected to write about.

2. Start your paper by explaining why you selected this topic and why the topic is important from the moral philosophy point of view (hint: people often disagree on how to handle morally important topics)

3. Proceed to describe how different moral theories that we have learned about in class would explain different moral positions that can be developed regarding this topic (hint: utilitarian theory will say this about the topic, cultural pluralism will say this, and deontology will say this); please use at least two different moral theories two address different positions on the topic.

4. Make sure to use additional sources of information while describing different sides of the issue that you are exploring: you can use newspaper articles, scientific journals (the Library has databases that contain scientific journal articles), and internet data posted by non-profits or think tanks that research your chosen topic.

Using mass media articles can be done in two ways: you can either add some factual information to the issue (hint: not everyone who is placed on the death row has actually committed a crime of which they were convicted, etc.), or you can use mass media articles to find an opinion on the issue and integrate it into your paper.

Some mass media articles may integrate both: factual information about an issue and an opinion that an author developed or is advocating for based on this factual information.

5. Conclude with a summary of different moral philosophy approaches to the issue that you have explored in your paper and tell me which moral theory you personally favor in your own view on the issue. Explain why you are favoring a particular moral theory for this particular issue.

6. Make sure that you list all of your references, spellcheck your paper, number your pages, and make sure that it is at least 800 words in length (you can submit up to a 2000 word long paper).