Practical Ethics MSt

University of Oxford

The MSt in Practical Ethics offers high quality training in practical ethics through flexible, part-time learning.

This course is run jointly by the Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics (a research centre in the Faculty of Philosophy in the Humanities Division), and the Department for Continuing Education, and draws on the internationally recognised research and expertise of the Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics, the Ethox Centre and the Faculty of Philosophy.

The course is highly interdisciplinary in character but the primary focus is ethical and philosophical. Students will learn how to apply rigorous philosophical analysis to real-life ethical problems and will be provided with a grounding in key ethical concepts and methods, as well as in major debates in practical ethics. Students will also have the opportunity for in-depth research on a topic of their choice.

The course is relevant to students from a wide range of professional backgrounds, including philosophy and bioethics, medicine and health, the technology sector, and the legal and public policy sectors.

The University of Oxford was ranked as the top university for the study of ethics by the Centre for World University Rankings in 2017, and has consistently ranked as the top university in applied ethics and normative ethics by the Philosophical Gourmet Report, including its most recent report (2021-22).

In this course, students undertake six taught modules and a dissertation. There is one compulsory module and a choice of five out of eight option modules.

Compulsory module:

• Ethical Concepts and Methods

Option modules:

• Artificial Intelligence Ethics
• Climate, Environment and Animals
• Data Ethics
• Ethics of the Beginning and End of Life
• Neuroethics
• Philosophy, Psychiatry and Mental Health
• Research Ethics and Empirical Ethics
• Well-Being, Disability and Enhancement

The compulsory module runs yearly and five of the eight option modules should run each year. Each module will be taught over an intensive residential teaching week (~25 contact hours) in Oxford to include lectures, seminars, and discussion groups. Modules are normally provided in clusters, offering students options around the number of visits to Oxford each year. Online materials are available including essential readings, texts and online lectures, alongside forums where students can communicate and continue discussion when away from Oxford.

It is also expected that students undertake significant independent study in order to complete the assessments at the level expected. This will vary from student to student and over the life of the course according to the modules taken, but is expected to be around 16 hours of independent study per week for periods equivalent to the length of term (three sets of eight weeks) throughout the year, although the course will not stick rigidly to the term structure.