Chapter 7: Ethics

7.1 : What is ethics?

• We daily face moral questions that should be answered by values we have chosen for ourselves.
• Ethics is the study of morality; it involves reflecting on one’s moral standards or the moral standards of a group or a society, and %%asking%% whether they are reasonable.

7.2 : Is ethics relative?

• Cultural relativism affirms that societies differ in their moral standards.
• Ethical absolutism is the view that there is one and only one correct set of moral standards that everyone should follow everywhere and always.
• Ethical relativism argues that because societies differ in the moral standards they accept, it follows that there is no single correct set of moral standards everyone should adopt; instead, people should follow the standards that their own society accepts.
• Problems with ethical relativism include these:
  • (1) When people in a society disagree on the standards they accept, whose should be followed?
  • (2) Ethical relativism implies that one has to accept society’s views and not question them.
  • (3) From the fact that societies differ in the moral standards they accept, it does not follow that there is not one correct group of moral standards.
  • (4) There are some moral values that all societies must accept if they are to survive.

7.3 : Do consequences make an action right?

• Consequentialist ethical theories hold that a morally right action is one that produces more good and fewer bad consequences than any other action.

Egoism

• Ethical egoism claims that a morally right action is one that produces more good and fewer bad consequences for oneself than any other action.
• Hedonist egoists such as Epicurus claim that good consequences are those that produce pleasure for oneself, whereas bad consequences are those that produce pain.
• Unlike hedonists, some egoists hold that good consequences are those that produce knowledge, power, or self-realization.
• Problems with ethical egoism include these: It is unclear what is morally right when people’s interests conflict
  • it is unclear how to advise two people whose interests conflict; ethical egoism is not impartial because it favors oneself, so it is not consistent with a moral point of view.

Utilitarianism

• Utilitarianism claims that a morally right action is one that produces more good and fewer bad consequences for everyone than any other action.
• In Bentham’s utilitarianism, good consequences consist of happiness or pleasure, and bad consequences consist of unhappiness or pain
  • the quantity of pleasure produced by an action is measured by its intensity, length, certainty, likelihood to produce more pleasure, and so on.
• Act utilitarianism claims that the right action is the one that itself produces more pleasure and less pain for everyone than any other action.
• Rule utilitarianism is supposed to not have the wrong implications that act utilitarianism does.
  • Rule utilitarianism claims that the right action is the one that follows those moral rules that will produce more pleasure and less pain if followed by everyone.
• Critics claim that moral rules will produce more pleasure and less pain if they allow for exceptions, but once moral rules allow exceptions, they have the same wrong implications that act utilitarianism has.
• Taylor and other act utilitarians argue that because all sexual activity—including incest, adultery, and homosexuality—usually produces more pleasure and less pain than any other action, all sexual activity can be morally right. To many, this view seems overly permissive.
• Rule utilitarians such as the Ramsey Colloquium argue that moral rules that prohibit adultery, divorce, and homosexuality will produce more pleasure and less pain than other rules, so it is wrong to engage in adultery, divorce, and homosexuality.
• Critics argue that it is not clear that such rules will have the consequences the Ramsey Colloquium claims they will.

7.4 : Do rules define morality?

Divine Command Theory

• Divine command theory is a nonconsequentialist theory that says the morally right action is the one that God commands for example, in scripture.
• Critics argue that there are too many conflicting scriptures and that we cannot know which one reports the true commands of God; also, if something is right because God commands it, then even cruelty could be morally right.
• Natural law ethics says that human nature has certain natural tendencies and that morally right actions are those that follow these natural tendencies.
  • Because God created these tendencies, following them is doing what God intended us to do.
• Aquinas’s “principle of double effect” says that when an action has both a good and a bad effect—it produces one good but destroys another
  • it is morally permissible to perform the action and “allow” the bad effect so long as one’s intention is aimed at the good effect and not the bad
  • so long as the evil is necessary, and proportional to, the good one achieves.
• Critics of natural law ethics say that it is not clear why we are morally obligated to follow our natural inclinations,
  • it is not clear exactly what goods we are naturally inclined toward
  • it is not clear that one can keep from intending a foreseen evil as the principle of double effect says one must.

Implications of Divine Command Ethics

• Finnis, a natural law ethicist, claims that sexual acts that “exclude the possibility of procreation” are “unnatural” and so morally wrong
• other natural law ethicists, such as Levy, argue that sexual acts are not necessarily wrong when they exclude procreation, but only when they destroy a basic human good.

Kant’s Categorical Imperative

• Kant claimed that autonomy—the ability to decide for oneself the moral laws one will follow—is the heart of ethics.

• To let something or someone else decide what moral laws one will follow is “heteronomy” and is wrong because morality should depend on one’s own will—one’s own decision-making ability.

• The will is a person’s ability to make decisions on the basis of reasons; Kant argues that nothing is good without qualification except a good will; and a good will is one that chooses what is morally right because it is right and not because it is pleasurable or in one’s self-interest.

• Kant next argued the following:

  • (1) A person with a good will does what he does because he believes it is morally right to do it.
  • (2) To believe it is morally right to do something, is to believe it is what all human beings ought to do.
  • (3) Therefore, to be a person of good will—to be a good person—one must do what one believes all human beings ought to do.

• Kant’s categorical imperative—the basic principle of morality—is the conclusion (3) of the preceding argument

  • which says that to be a morally good person I must never do something unless it is what I believe everyone ought to do

• in other words, it is morally wrong for me to do something unless it is something that I am willing to have everyone do and so something I believe everyone could do.

• Kant argues that committing suicide, making false promises, failing to develop one’s talents, and failing

  to help those in need are all morally wrong because they are all actions that I would not be willing

  to have everyone do or actions that not everyone could do.

• Kant gives a second version of the categorical imperative:

  • (1) Every human being is an end in himself—a person whose capacity to choose for himself must be respected
  • (2) we should always treat people as ends in themselves—as persons whose capacity to choose for themselves must be respected—and not only use them as means to achieve our own goals.

• Critics say Kant’s theory cannot deal with conflicts among duties

  • critics also claim that his theory implies that certain acts (such as lying) are always wrong no matter what the circumstances might be, and this implication seems mistaken.

• Using Kant’s theory, Mappes argues that it is wrong to sexually use a person through coercion or deception, which is why rape and sexual harassment of employees are wrong.

• Critics say that Kant’s theory implies that any kind of sexual activity between informed and consenting persons is morally right, and this seems too permissive

  • other critics argue that free, rational consent may not be possible where sex is concerned.

Buddhist Ethics

• Buddhism considers volitional actions as supremely important because they contribute to a person’s karma, which then determines a person’s future
  • Buddhism also considers morality and wisdom to be closely related.
• The Four Noble Truths of Buddhism are as follows:
  • (1) Whatever is tied to our individuality, such as birth, age, disease, death, and pain, brings suffering.
  • (2) We suffer because we crave things: pleasure, life, power.
  • (3) Only putting an end to craving will end our suffering.
  • (4) Craving can be ended only by following the Noble Eightfold Path of right understanding, right thought, right speech, right conduct, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness, and right concentration.
• Buddhist teaching enjoins five precepts that must be followed if one is to develop and liberate one’s mind:
  • (1) Harm no living thing
  • (2) do not take what is not given
  • (3) do not misuse the senses
  • (4) refrain from wrong speech
  • (5) do not eat or drink anything that clouds the mind.
• Among the Buddhist virtues or “wholesome states” are da-na, the willingness to give when need arises, and metta, loving kindness.
• The ideal according to some Buddhist texts is to not indulge in sexual pleasures but to work toward enlightenment; other texts condemn homosexuality, adultery, and prostitution.

7.5 : Is ethics based on character?

• MacIntyre argues that ethics should not be concerned with rules about what one should do, but with the virtues that make us morally good persons.

Aristotle’s theory of virtue

• Aristotle’s theory of virtue says humans will achieve happiness—their ultimate end—only by fulfilling their specific purpose, which is to exercise their reason, and to do so in an excellent or virtuous way.
• Excellence in any field is achieved by hitting the mean and not by excess or deficiency.
  • So being virtuous in our actions and feelings is achieved by hitting the mean as determined by reason and avoiding excess or deficiency in our actions and feelings.
• Virtue is acquired by repeatedly being made to act virtuously until it becomes a habit
  • vices are acquired by repeatedly acting viciously until it becomes a habit.
  • When a virtue is acquired, one is able to do virtuous acts and to feel pleasure in virtuous acts.
• According to the virtue theory of Smith, one can evaluate the moral quality of sexual behaviors by asking whether those behaviors develop virtues or vices.

Love and Friendship

• Aristotle, who claimed that friendship is a virtue and is one of life’s necessities, argued that two people are friends when each wishes good for the other, both are aware of this, and each does so because he believes the other is good, pleasurable, or useful.
• The three traditional kinds of love are
  • philia (brotherly love)
  • eros (an intensely passionate love)
  • agape (the love that God or a Christian has for every person even if there is nothing good, pleasurable, or useful about that person)
• The relationship view says love consists of a positive response to something good in a person and thus wishing for and doing what is good for her, wanting to be with her, wanting her to flourish and do well for her own sake, and empathizing with her.
• The emotion view says love is an emotion that arises when one sees the beloved as attractive and valuable
  • this complex emotion is a pleasure one feels when the person does well and pain when the person does not
  • it is a heightened awareness of the person; it is an attraction toward and cherishing of the person
  • it is a desire to be with the person.
• The union view of love says it is a kind of union between two persons
  • one version sees this union as identifying with the other’s interests and concerns
  • another version says it is a “fusion of two souls” that forms a new shared identity that is a new entity, a “we.”
• The creative view of love says love is not a response to the goodness already present in another person but that it creates goodness in the other person so that the loved one becomes better
  • love sees the potential good in another and brings it out of her.

Male and Female Ethics?

• Kohlberg argued that moral development moves through three levels:
  • a preconventional level, focused on the self
  • a conventional level, focused on being accepted by a group and accepting the group’s conventional morality
  • a postconventional level, focused on moral principles.
  • The postconventional level of moral principles is the most advanced form of morality.
  • Most women seemed to Kohlberg to re-main at the less advanced conventional level.
• Gilligan argued that Kohlberg’s levels are those through which men’s morality develops, but women’s morality develops through a different sequence of levels based on caring for oneself and for others.
• Because women are always focused on caring relationships, they seem to always be stuckin Kohlberg’s second level, but in reality they are developing through different levels of caring.
• Gilligan claims that moral development in women moves through
  • (1) a level in which they are overly devoted to caring for themselves
  • (2) a level in which they are overly devoted to caring for others
  • (3) a level in which they balance caring for others and for themselves.
• Gilligan concludes that for women, morality is focused on caring for others and maintaining personal relationships, whereas for men, morality consists of following impersonal rules and principles.
• Gilligan and Noddings now agree that both men and women can approach morality either from a caring perspective or from universal moral principles, but women tend to deal with moral issues in terms of the caring relationships involved, whereas men tend to deal with them from a principle-based perspective.

7.6 : Can ethics resolve moral quandaries?

• No single ethical theory can elucidate all aspects of all moral decisions, yet each identifies some of \n the ethical considerations involved in moral decisions; by using all the theories, we come to see all or most of the considerations we need to take into account when making moral decisions.

Abortion

• Although the Supreme Court in 1973 ruled that state laws had to allow abortions in the first six months of pregnancy, the morality of abortion remains undecided.
• Many, including those who have had abortions, often have contradictory feelings about the ethics of having an abortion.
• Some argue that the fetus is not a person with a right to life because it lacks certain mental traits, but critics respond that infants, retarded adults, and future generations also lack these traits yet have a right to life.
• Hare claims that because we should do to others what we are glad was done to us, we should not abort a fetus that would have a life like ours if we are glad we were not aborted.
• Utilitarians argue that abortion is justified when it has better consequences than the alternatives.
• English, a utilitarian, claims that it is wrong to abort a fetus in the late months of pregnancy—when it looks like a person—because doing so lessens the respect we have for persons in general.
• Using virtue theory, Smith argues that abortion is wrong because it produces and is produced by a moral character characterized by the vices of irresponsibility, dishonesty, carelessness, indifference, and lack of principles.

Euthanasia

• In passive euthanasia, a person is allowed to die from a disease without treatment that could prolong her life; in active euthanasia, something is done or given to the person that causes her death.

• Gay-Williams uses natural law ethics to argue that because we have a natural inclination toward life and because our dignity comes from seeking that toward which we have a natural inclination, it is wrong

  to destroy life through euthanasia.

• Rachels uses utilitarianism to argue that when euthanasia benefits everyone concerned by putting an end to a person’s pain and suffering and violates no one’s rights, it is morally justified.

• Rachels also uses Kantian ethics to argue that because we would not be willing to live by a rule that forced us to suffer pain when we had a terminal illness instead of being put painlessly to death, it is wrong to apply such a rule to others.

• Each theory sheds a different light on considerations to keep in mind when deciding whether euthanasia is morally justified.

7.7 : Ethics & Moral responsibility

Excusability and Moral Responsibility

• We excuse a wrongful act when
  • (1) the agent was ignorant of the consequences or circumstances of the act
  • (2) something forced the agent to do what he did
  • (3) unavoidable circumstances led to the wrongdoing
  • (4) the agent had neither the ability nor the opportunity to do otherwise.
• Ignorance is excusable only when it is not deliberately used.
• Constraints on action include internal constraints (within the agent) and external constraints (forces outside the agent).
• Excusing uncontrollable circumstances include illness, accidents, and unexpected events.

Casuality and Moral Responsibility

• Some people claim that because a person’s actions are always caused by previous events, a person is never morally responsible for his actions even when none of the four excusing conditions are present.
• Determinism holds that actions are caused by previous events, so people are never morally responsible for their actions
• libertarianism holds that people’s actions are not caused by previous events, so people can be morally responsible for what they do
• compatibilism redefines freedom as the absence of external restraints and holds that people can be free according to this definition even if their actions are caused by previous events.

\