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What is Ethics?
The branch of philosophy concerned with
systematizing, defending, and proposing
concepts of right and wrong conduct.
The term ethics derives from the Ancient Greek
word ethikos, which derives from the word
ethos (habit, or custom).
- Investigates various moral questions, such as “What
is the best way for people to live?” or “What actions
are right or wrong” or “What’s the proper course of
action in particular circumstances?”
- Ethicists are philosophers who specialize in ethics.
The three major areas of study within ethics are:
1. Meta-ethics.
2. Normative ethics.
3. Applied ethics.
Meta-ethics: (Descriptive) What does "right"
even mean?
Normative (prescriptive) ethics: How should
people act?
Applied ethics: How do we take moral
knowledge and put it into practice?
META-ETHICS
Asks how we understand, know about, and what
we mean when we talk about right and wrong. A
question such as, "Should I get an abortion?" or
“Is it ever right to kill?” are not meta-ethical
questions. A meta-ethical question is more
general and more abstract: "Is it possible to
acquire knowledge of right and wrong?" or “Are
certain actions objectively right or wrong” “If
certain actions are objectively wrong or right,
what makes them so?”
Meta-ethicists have different approaches: cognitivism
and non-cognitivism:
Cognitivism: ethical sentences express actual
propositions that can be true or false, which noncognitivists deny. Cognitivism embodies many views:
e.g. moral realism: ethical sentences express
propositions about mind-independent facts.
moral subjectivism: ethical sentences express
propositions about peoples' attitudes or opinions.
error theory: ethical sentences express propositions,
but they are all false.
Non-cognitivism: when we judge something as right or
wrong, this is neither true nor false. We express our
emotional feelings about these things.
Cognitivism: when we talk about right and wrong, we are
talking about matters of fact.
Moral ontology is about the kind of things we refer to by
ethical propositions.
Non-descriptivists and non-cognitivists say morality does
not need a specific ontology, since ethical propositions do
not refer to anything. This is known as an anti-realism.
Realists on the other hand claim morality to have a
paradigm.
• Moral Nihilism (also known as ethical nihilism): metaethical view that nothing is intrinsically moral or
immoral. killing someone, for whatever reason, is
neither inherently right nor inherently wrong. Moral
nihilists consider morality to be human construction..
• Moral nihilism is distinct from moral relativism, which
does allow for actions to be right or wrong relative to a
particular culture or individual.
• Moral nihilism implies moral skepticism.
• Moral nihilism = "nothing is morally wrong." There are
several forms of moral nihilism: error theory and
expressivism.
• Expressivism: when someone says
something is immoral he is not saying it is
right or wrong. He express his feelings,
emotions. Torture, is disgusting, not morally
wrong.
• Expressivism: a form of non-cognitivism:
the view that moral statements lack truthvalue.
• non-cognitivism implies that moral
knowledge is impossible.
• Not all forms of non-cognitivism are forms of
moral nihilism: universal prescriptivism is a
non-cognitivist form of moral universalism:
judgments about morality may be correct or
not in a consistent, universal way, but do not
attempt to describe features of reality.
• Error theory:
• There are no moral features in the world;
nothing is right or wrong.
• No moral judgments are true; however,
• Our sincere moral judgments try, but always
fail, to describe the moral features of things.
• Thus, we always lapse into error when
thinking in moral terms. We are trying to state
the truth when we make moral judgments.
But since there is no moral truth, all of our
moral claims are mistaken—hence the error.
NORMATIVE ETHICS
Is the study of ethical action. It is the area of ethics
concerned with the set of questions that arise when
considering how one ought to act, morally speaking.
Normative ethics is distinct from meta-ethics
because it examines standards for the rightness and
wrongness of actions, while meta-ethics studies the
meaning of moral language and the metaphysics of
moral facts.
Normative ethics because deals with norms or
moral systems, which we’ll consider later on.
• APPLIED ETHICS
• Examination of particular moral issues in private
and public life. Use of philosophical methods to
identify the morally correct course of action in
various fields of human life.
• Bioethics.
• Environmental ethics
• Business ethics.
• Spots ethics.
PERSONAL AUTONOMY AND MORAL AGENCY
People make many different moral choices without knowing that
they are. Take something simple as buying a pair of shoes or a
perfume: leather, animal suffering, testing. In any event, we take
it for granted that we are autonomous. But what does it mean?
Autonomous: one is able to make free choices as a selfdetermining individual. Are we all autonomous?
Certainly not. To be fully autonomous, one must satisfy
3 conditions:
1. Independent condition.
2. Competency condition.
3. Authenticity condition.
Infants, comatose people, senile, and so on lack
autonomy because lack independence. Also, to be
autonomous one must make free choices without the
control of anyone or the control of something from within
the subject.
If you are under threat, under age, you lack autonomy.
If you have OCD, suffer from kleptomania, addictions, etc.
you are not autonomous.
Competency. One must also be rational and
rationally capable of deliberating his or her
moral choices.
(a)know what our choices are.
(b)able to understand consequences for those
choices.
(c)able to evaluate the best choices for us.
(d)must make decisions that are true most of
the time.
(e) and we need to be able to reason correctly.
Last conditions to be fully autonomous is authenticity. The
idea is that one may be independent, competent, but not
individualistic. Think about how many “fully functional” adults
you know who nonetheless make decisions based upon their
upbringing, faith, peer pressure.
EG: refuse medical treatment based on one’s interpretation of
religious doctrines.
Individuals who lack autonomy, for whatever reasons, are
morally incompetent. When one is morally incompetent and
the state for example overrules his choices and actions for his
own good, and this is called paternalism.
Whether or not one is able to make independent, competent,
or authentic choices, he or she is referred to as a moral agent.
MORAL RELATIVISM
challenge to ethics: the concept that morality is relative. This can
be relativism or subjectivism.
Objectivism says that all people are under the same moral
principles. Moral principles are objective.
Subjectivism: each individual has his/her own moral principles.
Relativism says that societies decide what is moral. Who are we
to judge?
Many people are attracted by this ethical view. The Callatians, an
Indian people, ate their dead people, while ancient Greeks
cremated theirs. The story goes that they viewed each other’s
practice as immoral. So moral relativism concludes that morality
is a matter of what peoples take it to be.
However, it is not always clear that people’s moral principles
differ. People’s beliefs differ. Callatians believed that their dead
would continue living if ingested. Greeks believed flesh could be
corrupted and so cremated the dead. Also Greeks believed fire to
purify the body. Often, two peoples’ differences are not moral
but cultural.
Abortion? People are divided over abortion. Why? People who
are pro and people who are against both agree that murder is
wrong. But they disagree over whether a fetus is a person.
If relativism were true then we could never say with certainty
that some practice or principle is immoral or wrong. If you are a
relativist, the implication is that you must admit there was
nothing wrong about Nazi morality and slavery!
M.L.K, Jr. and William Garrison who fought against segregation and slavery. They
were moral reformers. If you are a moral relativist, you cannot praise King or
Garrison. In fact, you should condemn them.
Moral progress is impossible if relativism is true. If one tries to better the living
conditions and moral principles of a society he is making progress. Moral progress
implies moving toward an ideal, objective, moral standard. But this is what
relativism denies!
Also, relativism says that moral standard of a particular society is determined by
what that society practices and deems moral. But a society cannot make moral
progress because progress requires changing the practices that give that society
their moral standards!
Also, relativism says that the social group you belong to determines morality. But
ask yourself, to which social group do I belong? Answer, you belong to many
groups.
Finally, some might say that relativism is valid because we should have tolerance
and respect other people’s practices and beliefs. But, if we apply the principle of
tolerance as a universal principle, then tolerance is ruled out by relativism! In
other words, if you use the argument from tolerance, you are not a relativist but
an objectivist.
Assessing ethical theories
The Important aspect of ethics is to determine what makes
things right or wrong. So we want an ethical theory to be able
to simplify morality.
A theory’s principles must provide a compelling explanation of
why certain things are good or right while others are bad or
wrong.
Therefore, any adequate ethical theory needs to satisfy certain
criteria. The more fully the theory satisfies all these criteria the
better the theory.
1. Completeness: we want our theory to be able
to address and make sense of certain moral
concepts. If the theory leaves something out that
must be included, then that theory is faulty.
Hedonistic theories, don’t account for justice.
2. Explanatory Power: The theory must give us
insight into what makes something moral or
immoral. It must help us understand the
difference between right and wrong, and
illuminate the nature of morality, that is, where
morality comes from.
3. Practicability: how useful is a theory? - Clear and
precise moral claims. If the theory’s principles are
vague, then it isn’t a practical theory: “don’t hurt
people unless they deserve it.” Vague.
Moral guidance to ordinary people.
Principles should not create conflict. Imagine a friend
lives in the US illegally. Should you turn him in? A
practicable theory must be able to resolve your
dilemma.
4. Moral confirmation: obviously ethical theory gives
the correct answers to our moral questions. Does it
work? A theory is morally confirmed if we have good
reasons to consider it true. This criterion resembles
the scientific method. In science we begin testing a
theory’s hypotheses by experiment and observation.
• SOME WAYS NOT TO ANSWER MORAL
QUESTIONS, AND THE IDEAL MORAL JUDGMENT
• Moral judgments and personal preferences. Some
people like classical music; others do not. This is
disagreement in preferences. Moral
disagreements, disagreements over right or
wrong, are not the same. If I say abortion is
always wrong and you say abortion is never
wrong, then you are denying what I affirm. The
point: right or wrong require reasons. Cannot be
determined just by finding out about the
personal preferences of people.
• Moral judgments and feelings. Some
philosophers think words like right and wrong are
just labels. This position suggests it doesn’t
matter one way or the other. But morality
matters. So, one must not use personal feelings
to determine what’s right and wrong.
• Thinking it is so does not make it so. This should
be obvious: upon reflection you might be
surprised. You might think same-sex marriage is
immoral, but when you reason logically, you
might arrive at the opposite conclusion.
• Irrelevance of statistics. Some people think that the
more people believe something, the truer something
is. Religious people may say that God exists because
the majority of the world’s population believes in a
god. Clearly this is not true. If the majority holds that
capital punishment is wrong, that doesn’t make it
wrong.
• The appeal to a moral authority. Many people think
that there is a moral authority, and that is God.
However, appealing to such an authority creates
problems because the existence of God is
controversial.
THE IDEAL MORAL JUDGMENT
There are at least different concepts that an ideal moral
judgment must satisfy:
• Conceptual clarity: if someone tells us that euthanasia is
always wrong we could not determine whether that
statement is true before we understand what euthanasia is.
Concepts need clarity. In the case of abortion, for example,
many think the question turns on whether the fetus is a
person. In other words, the ideal moral judgment must be
clear.
• Information: We must answer moral questions by having
knowledge of the world. For example, in order to know why
eating meet is morally wrong, we must know the facts, that is,
animals feel pain and like us do not want to feel pain. They are
killed, Chopped up, packaged, and sold. Many people ignore,
or want to ignore, these facts.
• Rationality: it is required to have the ability to
recognize the connection between different ideas. The
only way to be rational in morality is to use logic. Sally
thinks all abortions are morally wrong, but she recently
has had an abortion. Sally is not being rational or
logical.
• Impartiality: when we try to reach the correct answer
to moral questions, we must strive to guard against
extreme unquestioned partiality. Impartiality is related
to the principle of justice: the principle that justice is
the similar, and injustice the dissimilar, treatment of
similar individuals. If causing suffering to humans is
wrong, but it is not wrong in the case of animals, this is
not impartial.
• we should not consider irrelevant characteristics such
as the color of the skin, the color of hair, nationality,
height, age, species, and so on.
• Coolness: the idea is that the more emotionally
charged we are, the more likely we are to reach a
mistaken moral conclusion come while the cooler
or calm or we are, greater the chances that we
will avoid mistakes.
• Valid moral principles: In an ideal moral
judgment, it is not enough that the judgment be
based on completing information complete
impartiality, complete conceptual clarity, And so
on. It is also essential that the judgment be based
on valid or correct moral principles. Ideally, one
wants not only to make the correct moral
judgment but also to make it for the correct
reasons.
Criteria for evaluating moral
principles:
• Consistency: principles should be consistent. Take the example of
Sally: whatever principle let her to believe that all abortions are
morally wrong and yet her abortion is morally right, must be an
inconsistent principle.
• Adequacy of scope: A successful principle is one that provides
guidance to different circumstances. So, the wider the principle’s
scope, the greater its potential uses, the narrower its scope, the
narrower its range of applications.
• Precision: What we want from an ethical principle is not to be
vague. For example if we are told we should love our neighbors and
we should do no harm we must also be told in a clear way what
love, harm, and a neighbor are supposed to mean.
Moral Theories
• Consequentialism:
• Utilitarianism – right actions maximize
happiness/pleasure.
• everything we do is motivated by a desire to
maximize pleasure and minimize pain. – the
greatest amount of good for the greatest number
of beings.
• Why pleasure/happiness? Because that’s the only
thing that matter.
• What beings? All sentient beings.
• Only intrinsic good is pleasure. It is good in itself.
• No God or moral authority or moral paradigm.
• Humans are not divine or special, and as
individuals have no intrinsic value.
• The happiness of the majority is what counts.
• Why consequentialism? Something is right based
on consequences.
• I should not make a decision based on principles
or duty. I must consider the consequences of my
actions.
• Right action is one that produces consequences
that maximize happiness for the greatest number
of beings.
• Act utilitarianism: must decide by calculating
consequences case by case.
• Rule utilitarianism: based on experiences of
consequences, apply certain rules that maximize utility.
• Hedonistic utilitarianism: maximize pleasure/minimize
suffering.
• Preference utilitarianism: maximize utility based on
people’s preferences. Each individual preference is
unique. But in the end the aggregative satisfaction is
the goal.
• True preferences vs. corrupt preferences.
Criticisms
• Is happiness all that matters?
• Paradox of Hedonism: if happiness is all that
matters, we must pursue it. But we can’t.
• Try making yourself happy.
• Happiness is like a NYC bus—you never know
when it’s coming.
• Kant
• The only unconditionally good this is the will.
• 1. Only actions that proceed from duty have moral worth.
I can act in accordance or in conformity to duty: I promise that I will
give you a lift, but I do it because I want to avoid the ill consequences
from not doing so. I then am not doing what is right for the right
reason. My action does not proceed from duty. My will cannot be
good. If I pay my debt because I want you to lend me more or because
I am afraid to pay penalties, my will is not good because my action dos
not proceed from the recognition that I have a duty. Or, I can charge
difference prices to different customers. But say that I want to
maintain a good reputation for my business, then I will conform with
the duty that I should not charge different customers differently. But
am I doing it for the right reason? No because my action does not
proceed from duty.
• An action that proceeds from duty has its moral worth not
from the purpose to be attained but from the maxim by
which it is determined. A maxim is a subjective principle of
volition. My maxim is the principle that motivates me to do
something. So an action is never morally good because of
what I do but rather because of why I do it. My will might
be motivated by material incentive = Not good. If I pay you
back not because of reputation or because I want you to
like me, or what not, but because I recognize that I have a
duty, a principle, categorical that commands me to pay you
back. This is good.
• Duty is the necessity of acting from respect for the moral
law.
Categorical imperative.
– “Act only according to that maxim whereby you
can at the same time will that it should become a
universal law without contradiction.”
– Ask yourself “Would I want all people in all places,
at all times to do what I am about to do?”
The first formulation
• Requires that the maxims be chosen as though they should
hold as universal laws of nature. This is a test to determine
whether a maxim can be universalized:
• Take a moral statement, for example the declaration “I will
cheat for personal benefit.”
• Imagine a possible world in which everyone followed that
maxim.
• Decide whether any contradictions or irrationalities arise in
such a world as a result of following the maxim.
• If a contradiction or irrationality arises, acting on that
maxim is not allowed in the real world.
• If there is no contradiction, that maxim is morally sound;
but if there is, well, then it is not morally sound!
• The second formulation holds that the rational
being is “the basis of all maxims of action” and
must be treated never as a mere means but as an
end. What this means is that all rational beings
should never be exploited for personal gain.
• What makes a being rational?
• The third formulation
• All maxims must harmonize with a possible
Kingdom of Ends. This means that we should act
in such a way that we may think of ourselves as
“a member in the universal realm of ends”.
Virtue Ethics
• A virtue is a human excellence. An excellent trait of
one’s character.
• emphasizes the role of one's character and the virtues
that one's character embodies for determining or
evaluating ethical behavior.
• Character requires practice.
– Role models.
• No rule can tell me to do the right thing. I must use my
virtues to determine correct action.
• To do wrong is lack of knowledge.
• Goal of virtue ethics is well being/happiness/human
flourishing.
Virtues
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Prudence
Generosity
Benevolence
Wisdom
Justice
Courage
Temperance
Aristotle argued that moral virtues are means between
two corresponding vices, one of excess and one of
deficiency. For example: courage is a virtue found
between the vices of cowardliness and rashness.
Feminist Ethics/Care
• Women see morality differently from men.
• Motherly care.
• Kohlberg stages.
– Medicine dilemma. Would it be right to steal a
medicine that you cannot afford but will safe your
life?
Men tend to respond in legal/obligation terms.
Women prefer compassion.