Ethics and Moral Philosophy

Comprehensive vocabulary flashcards covering the branches of ethics, meta-ethical stances, normative theories, moral development, and the moral reasoning model.

Moral Development

The gradual development of an individual's concept of right and wrong, conscious and unconscious, and other certain behaviors.

Post-Conventional Morality

A recognized stage and example of moral development.

Developing Will and Mental Courage

The practice of developing and maintaining self-discipline that assists an individual in carrying out determined and courageous actions.

Moral Courage

Doing the right thing even at the risk of inconvenience, ridicule, punishment, loss of job, security, or social status.

Impartiality

A moral principle involving the idea that each individual's interests and points of view are equally important.

Metaethics

A branch of ethics that studies the nature of morality, including the meaning, reference, and truth values of moral judgments.

Moral Universalism

A position theorizing that moral facts and principles apply to everybody in all places.

Moral Relativism

A position submitting that different moral facts and principles apply to different persons or groups of individuals.

Ethical Subjectivism

The view holding that the truth or falsity of ethical propositions depends on the feelings, attitudes, or standards of a person or groups of persons.

Second Step in Moral Reasoning

Determine the ethical issue in the moral reasoning model.

Seventh Step of the Moral Reasoning Model

Make a decision, which serves as the final step in the seven-step moral reasoning framework.

Cognitivism

The meta-ethical stance holding that moral judgments convey propositions, meaning they are 'truth bearers' that are either true or false.

Non-Cognitivism

The meta-ethical stance that denies moral judgments are either true or false.

Normative Ethics

The branch of ethics, categorized into three forms, that studies how man ought to act, morally speaking.

Moral Empiricism

A meta-ethical stance stating that moral acts are known through observation and experience.

Moral Rationalism

The position contending that moral facts and principles are knowable a priori, meaning by reason alone and without reference to experience.

Consequentialist Theory

A theory proposing that actions or policies should be ethically measured and evaluated by their consequences, rather than by the intentions or motives of the agent.

Virtue Ethics

A moral philosophy and system that places emphasis on developing good habits of character (such as kindness and generosity) and avoiding bad traits, teaching actions that a virtuous person would perform in the same situation.

Deontology

An ethical system within normative ethics that bases morality on independent moral rules or duties.

Teleology

A moral system within normative ethics that determines the moral value of actions by their outcomes or results.

Applied Ethics

A field of ethics that attempts to determine the ethically correct course of action in specific realms of human action.