In 9 sessions (1-2 Sundays per month) Uli Widmaier will address core topics and questions in ethics including:
How do we tell right from wrong, good from evil, just from unjust? How to resolve ethical disagreements? What does Judaism have to say about ethics? What is God's role? How has Judaism influenced Christian and modern secular ethics? What does ethics have to say about politics?

Syllabus:
1. (9/10) The goals of ethics: be a good person, do the right thing, strive for a just society, repair the world
2. (10/15) Thought experiments: the Trolley Problem and related scenarios
3. (11/12) Utilitarianism: Peter Singer, animal rights, effective altruism
4. (12/17) Immanuel Kant and the Categorical Imperative: self-determination, liberty, the Rule of Law
5. (1/14) Jewish ethics: Torah, Prophets, Rabbis
6. (1/28) Jewish ethics: God, evil, idolatry
7. (2/25) Jewish ethics and its spinoffs: from Christian to modern secular ethics
8. (3/3) Political ethics
9. (5/5) Summary: the essence of ethics

About Uli:
Uli Widmaier received his BA and MA from Brown, and his JD from Yale Law School. He was an attorney in private practice (1994-2016) and a Lecturer in Law at the University of Chicago Law School (2002-2016). He has been a musician and music teacher from 2017 to today.  At his law firm (2007-2016), Uli was the ethics partner, responsible for educating and advising colleagues to ensure the firm followed best ethical practices. He has taught the CEC 9th-grade Jewish Ethics class since 2008, and he taught ethics to the CEC Leadership Development class in 2021 & 2023.