Philosophy

Ethics and Sexuality The course aims to investigate the issue of sexuality from a bioethical point of view, surveying the many ways in which our sexual practices have been described and conceptualized in some selected moments of modernity and contemporaneity. The first part of the course will be dedicated to the study of sexuality in its emergence in modernity as a morally and politically relevant issue, using as a guide Michel Foucault's (1926-1984) reflection on the history of sexuality. In the second part, selected aspects of the discourse around sexuality in the contemporary world pertaining to the relationship between humans and robots will be tackled, trailing a line of research which puts at its center, and problematizing, the many relationships opened up by the possibility of establishing intimate relationships with, and by means of, non-human bodies.

The course presupposes a basic knowledge of the history of philosophy.

M. Mori, La bioetica: la risposta della cultura contemporanea alle questioni morali sulla vita, in C.A. Viano (a cura di), Teorie Etiche Contemporanee, Bollati Boringhieri, Torino, 1990, pp. 186-224 M. Foucault, La sessualità. Corso all'Università di Clermont-Ferrand (1964) e Il discorso della sessualità, corso all'Università di Vincennes (1969), Feltrinelli, Milano, 2023 M. Foucault, Tecnologie del sé e sessualità, in Antologia. L’impazienza di libertà, Feltrinelli, Milano, 2005, pp. 167-203 Uno a scelta tra: M. Balistreri, Sex Robots. L'amore al tempo delle macchine, Fandango Libri, Roma, 2018 J. Danaher e N. McArthur, Robot Sex: Social and Ethical Implications, MIT Press, Cambridge, 2018 J. Wosk, Artificial Women: Sex Dolls, Robot Caregivers, and More Facsimile Females, Indiana University Press, 2024

Attendance is highly recommended.

The exam, beside in-class active participation, consists in an oral examination, which will last an average of 30 minutes and will be about the themes presented in class. In order to successfully pass the exam, students should prove to: 1. know the fundamental doctrines of the various authors covered; 2. be able to read and comment the texts analysed in class; 3. properly master the technical terminology of the various covered authors; 4. being able to recognise and carefully reconstruct the most important theoretical concepts, also in their diachronic evolution; 5. offer critical and original arguments departing from the texts and authors analysed. The fulfilment of 1 and 2 is necessary for the passing of the exam. Marks above 27 will be given to students fulfilling all five points above.

E. Lecaldano, Bioetica. Le scelte morali, Laterza, Roma-Bari 2005 A. Davidson, L'emergenza della sessualità. Epistemologia storica e formazione dei concetti, Quodlibet, Macerata 2010 P. Dumouchel e L. Damiano, Vivere con i robot. Saggio sull'empatia artificiale, Raffaello Cortina Editore, Milano, 2019

The course will consist in standard lectures, in which the instructor will present the texts, sketch the ethical-philosophical background in which they situate, and encourage students to actively participate by asking questions and clarifications.