Learning Objectives

After reading this chapter you should be able to:

1. define ethics;
2. identify the different schools of ethics;
3. describe the different approaches to ethics; and
4. outline the uses of ethics.

Definition

 Ethics is defined as moral philosophy or code of morals

practiced by a person or group of people an example of
ethics is a code of conduct set by a business.
 At its finest, Ethics is a system of moral principles.
They affect how people make decisions and lead their lives.
Ethics is concerned with what is good for individuals
and society and is also described as moral philosophy.
Ethics is a system of moral principles. They affect how
people make decisions and lead their lives
 Ethics is concerned with what is good for individuals
and society and is also described as moral philosophy.
 The term is derived from the Greek word ethos which can
mean custom, habit, character or disposition.

Ethics covers the following dilemmas

 how to live a good life

 our rights and responsibilities
 the language of right and wrong
 moral decisions- what is good and bad?

Our concepts of ethics have been derived from religions, philosophies and
cultures. They infuse debates on topics like abortion, human rights and
professional conduct.

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School of Ethics

The three schools are:

 virtue ethics
 consequential ethics
 deontological or duty-based ethics

Each approach provides a different way to understand

ethics.

Approaches to Ethics

Philosophers nowadays tend to divide ethical theories into three areas:

metaethics, normative ethics and applied ethics.

 Meta-ethics deals with the nature of moral judgment. It looks

at the origins and meaning of ethical principles.
 Normative ethics is concerned with the content of moral
judgments and the criteria for what is right or wrong.
 Applied ethics looks at controversial topics like war, animal
rights and capital punishment

Use of Ethics

 Ethics needs to provide answers.

 If ethical theories are to be useful in practice, they need to affect the way
human beings behave.
 Some philosophers think that ethics does do this. They argue that if a person
realizes that it would be morally good to do something then it would be
irrational for that person not to do it.
 But human beings often behave irrationally - they follow their 'gut instinct'
even when their head suggests a different course of action.
 However, ethics does provide good tools for thinking about moral issues.
 Ethics can provide a moral map

 Most moral issues get us pretty worked up - think of abortion and euthanasia
for starters. Because these are such emotional issues we often let our hearts
do the arguing while our brains just go with the flow.

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 But there's another way of tackling these issues, and that's where philosophers
can come in - they offer us ethical rules and principles that enable us to take a
cooler view of moral problems.

 So ethics provides us with a moral map, a framework that we can use to find
our way through difficult issues.

 Ethics can pinpoint a disagreement

 Using the framework of ethics, two people who are arguing a moral issue can
often find that what they disagree about is just one particular part of the issue,
and that they broadly agree on everything else.

 That can take a lot of heat out of the argument, and sometimes even hint at a
way for them to resolve their problem.

 But sometimes ethics doesn't provide people with the sort of help that they
really want.

 Ethics doesn't give right answers

 Ethics doesn't always show the right answer to moral problems.

 Indeed more and more people think that for many ethical issues there isn't a
single right answer - just a set of principles that can be applied to particular
cases to give those involved some clear choices.

 Some philosophers go further and say that all ethics can do is eliminate
confusion and clarify the issues. After that it's up to each individual to come to
their own conclusions.

 Ethics can give several answers

 Many people want there to be a single right answer to ethical questions. They
find moral ambiguity hard to live with because they genuinely want to do the
'right' thing, and even if they can't work out what that right thing is, they like
the idea that 'somewhere' there is one right answer.

 But often there isn't one right answer - there may be several right answers, or
just some least worst answers - and the individual must choose between them.

 For others moral ambiguity is difficult because it forces them to take

responsibility for their own choices and actions, rather than falling back on
convenient rules and customs.

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Ethics and People
 Ethics is about the 'other'
 At the heart of ethics is a concern about something or someone other than
ourselves and our own desires and self-interest.
 Ethics is concerned with other people's interests, with the interests of society,
with God's interests, with "ultimate goods", and so on.
 So when a person 'thinks ethically' they are giving at least some thought to
something beyond themselves.

Ethics as a source of group strength

 One problem with ethics is the way it's often used as a weapon.
 If a group believes that a particular activity is "wrong" it can then use morality
as the justification for attacking those who practice that activity.
 When people do this, they often see those who they regard as immoral as in
some way less human or deserving of respect than themselves; sometimes
with tragic consequences.

Good people as well as good actions

 Ethics is not only about the morality of particular courses of action, but it's
also about the goodness of individuals and what it means to live a good life.
 Virtue Ethics is particularly concerned with the moral character of human
beings.

Sources of right and wrong

 At times in the past some people thought that ethical problems could be solved in one
of two ways:

o by discovering what God wanted people to do

o by thinking rigorously about moral principles and problems

 If a person did this properly they would be led to the right conclusion.
 But now even philosophers are less sure that it's possible to devise a satisfactory and
complete theory of ethics - at least not one that leads to conclusions.
 Modern thinkers often teach that ethics leads people not to conclusions but to
'decisions'.
 In this view, the role of ethics is limited to clarifying 'what's at stake' in particular
ethical problems.
 Philosophy can help identify the range of ethical methods, conversations and value
systems that can be applied to a particular problem. But after these things have been
made clear, each person must make their own individual decision as to what to do,
and then react appropriately to the consequences.

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Objectivity and Ethical Standards

Do ethical statements provide information about anything

other than human opinions and attitude?

 Ethical realists think that human beings discover ethical truths that
already have an independent existence.
 Ethical non-realists think that human beings invent ethical truths.

 The problem for ethical realists is that people follow many different ethical codes
and moral beliefs. So if there are real ethical truths out there (wherever!) then
human beings don't seem to be very good at discovering them.
 One form of ethical realism teaches that ethical properties exist independently of
human beings, and that ethical statements give knowledge about the objective
world.
 To put it another way; the ethical properties of the world and the things in it
exist and remain the same, regardless of what people think or feel - or whether
people think or feel about them at all.

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Four Ethical ‘isms’

When a person says “murder is bad” what are they doing?

That's the sort of question that only a philosopher would ask, but it's
actually a very useful way of getting a clear idea of what's going on
when people talk about moral issues.

The different „isms‟ regard the person uttering the

statement as doing different things.

We can show some of the different things I might be doing when I say 'murder is bad'
by rewriting that statement to show what I really mean:

I might be I might be making I might be I might be giving

making a a statement about expressing my an instruction or a
statement about my own feelings feelings prohibition
an ethical fact  "I disapprove  "Down with  "Don't murder
 "It is wrong of murder" murder" people"
to murder"  This is  This is  This is
 This is subjectivism emotivism prescriptivism
moral
realism

MORAL REALISM
Moral realism is based on the idea that there are real objective moral facts or
truths in the universe. Moral statements provide factual information about
those truths.

SUBJECTIVISM
Subjectivism teaches that moral judgments are nothing more than statements
of a person's feelings or attitudes, and that ethical statements do not contain
factual truths about goodness or badness.

In more detail: subjectivists say that moral statements are statements about the
feelings, attitudes and emotions that that particular person or group has about
a particular issue.

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 If a person says something is good or bad they are telling us about the positive
or negative feelings that they have about that something.

So if someone says 'murder is wrong' they are telling us that they disapprove of
murder.

These statements are true if the person does hold the appropriate attitude or
have the appropriate feelings. They are false if the person doesn't.

EMOTIVISM

Emotivism is the view that moral claims are no more than expressions of
approval or disapproval.

This sounds like subjectivism, but in emotivism a moral statement

doesn't provide information about the speaker's feelings about the topic
but expresses those feelings.

When an emotivist says "murder is wrong" it's like saying "down with murder"
or "murder, yecch!" or just saying "murder" while pulling a horrified face, or
making a thumbs-down gesture at the same time as saying "murder is wrong".

So when someone makes a moral judgment they show their feelings about
something. Some theorists also suggest that in expressing a feeling the
person gives an instruction to others about how to act towards the subject
matter.

PRESCRIPTIVISM

Prescriptivists think that ethical statements are instructions or

recommendations.

So if I say something is good, I'm recommending you to do it, and if I say

something is bad, I'm telling you not to do it.

There is almost always a prescriptive element in any real-world ethical

statement: any ethical statement can be reworked (with a bit of effort) into a
statement with an 'ought' in it. For example: "lying is wrong" can be rewritten
as "people ought not to tell lies".

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Origin of Ethics

Philosophers have several answers to this question:

 God and religion

 Human conscience and intuition
 a rational moral cost-benefit analysis of actions and their
effects
 the example of good human beings
 a desire for the best for people in each unique situation
 political power
:

GOD BASED ETHICS- SUPERNATURALISM

Supernaturalism makes ethics inseparable from religion. It teaches that the
only source of moral rules is God.

So, something is good because God says it is, and the way to lead a good life is
to do what God wants.

INTUITIONISM

Intuitionists think that good and bad are real objective properties that can't be
broken down into component parts. Something is good because it's good; its
goodness doesn't need justifying or proving.

Intuitionists think that goodness or badness can be detected by adults - they

say that human beings have an intuitive moral sense that enables them to
detect real moral truths.

They think that basic moral truths of what is good and bad are self-evident to a
person who directs their mind towards moral issues.

So good things are the things that a sensible person realises are good if they
spend some time pondering the subject.

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 Don‟t get confused. For the intuitionist:

 moral truths are not discovered by rational argument

 moral truths are not discovered by having a hunch
 moral truths are not discovered by having a feeling

It's more a sort of moral 'aha' moment - a

realization of the truth.

CONSEQUENTIALISM
M
This is the ethical theory that most non-religious people think they use every day.
It bases morality on the consequences of human actions and not on the actions
themselves.

Consequentialism teaches that people should do whatever produces the greatest

amount of good consequences.

One famous way of putting this is 'the greatest good for the greatest number of
people'.

The most common forms of consequentialism are the various versions of

utilitarianism, which favor actions that produce the greatest amount of
happiness.

Despite its obvious common-sense appeal, consequentialism turns out to be a

complicated theory, and doesn't provide a complete solution to all ethical
problems.

Two problems with consequentialism are:

 it can lead to the conclusion that some quite dreadful acts

are good
 predicting and evaluating the consequences of actions is
often very difficult

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NON-CONSEQUENTIALISM OR DEONTOLOGICAL ETHICS

Non-consequentialism is concerned with the actions themselves and not with the
consequences. It's the theory that people are using when they refer to "the
principle of the thing".

It teaches that some acts are right or wrong in themselves, whatever the
consequences, and people should act accordingly.

VIRTUE ETHICS

Virtue ethics looks at virtue or moral character, rather than at ethical duties and
rules, or the consequences of actions - indeed some philosophers of this school
deny that there can be such things as universal ethical rules.

Virtue ethics is particularly concerned with the way individuals live their lives,
and less concerned in assessing particular actions.

It develops the idea of good actions by looking at the way virtuous people express
their inner goodness in the things that they do.

To put it very simply, virtue ethics teaches that an

action is right if and only if it is an action that a
virtuous person would do in the same circumstances,
and that a virtuous person is someone who has a
particularly good character.

SITUATION ETHICS

Situation ethics rejects prescriptive rules and argues that individual ethical
decisions should be made according to the unique situation.

Rather than following rules the decision maker should follow a desire to seek the
best for the people involved. There are no moral rules or rights - each case is
unique and deserves a unique solution.

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ETHICS AND IDEOLOGY

Some philosophers teach that ethics is the codification of political ideology, and
that the function of ethics is to state, enforce and preserve particular political
beliefs.

They usually go on to say that ethics is used by the dominant political elite as a
tool to control everyone else.

More cynical writers suggest that power elites enforce an ethical code on other
people that helps them control those people, but do not apply this code to their
own behaviour

Are there universal moral values?

One of the big questions in moral philosophy is whether or not there

are unchanging moral rules that apply in all cultures and at all
times.

MORAL ABSOLUTISM
 Some people think there are such universal rules that apply to
everyone. This sort of thinking is called moral absolutism.
 Moral absolutism argues that there are some moral rules that are
always true, that these rules can be discovered and that these rules
apply to everyone.

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 Immoral Acts

 acts that break these moral rules - are wrong in themselves,

regardless of the circumstances or the consequences of those acts.

 Absolutism takes a universal view of humanity - there is one set of

rules for everyone - which enables the drafting of universal rules - such
as the Declaration of Human Rights.
 Religious views of ethics tend to be absolutist.

Why people disagree with moral absolutism:

Many of us feel that the

consequences of an act or Absolutism doesn't fit with
the circumstances respect for diversity and
surrounding it are tradition
relevant to whether that
act is good or bad

MORAL RELATIVISM
 Moral relativists say that if you look at different cultures or different periods
in history you'll find that they have different moral rules.
 Therefore it makes sense to say that "good" refers to the things that a
particular group of people approve of.
 Moral relativists think that that's just fine, and dispute the idea that there
are some objective and discoverable 'super-rules' that all cultures ought to
obey. They believe that relativism respects the diversity of human societies
and responds to the different circumstances surrounding human acts.

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Why people disagree with moral relativism:

 Many of us feel that moral rules have more to them than the general
agreement of a group of people - that morality is more than a super-
charged form of etiquette
 Many of us think we can be good without conforming to all the rules of
society
 Moral relativism has a problem with arguing against the majority view:
if most people in a society agree with particular rules, that's the end of
the matter. Many of the improvements in the world have come about
because people opposed the prevailing ethical view - moral relativists
are forced to regard such people as behaving "badly"
 Any choice of social grouping as the foundation of ethics is bound to be
arbitrary
 Moral relativism doesn't provide any way to deal with moral differences
between societies
 Moral somewhere-in-between-ism
 Most non-philosophers think that both of the above theories have some
good points and think that
 there are a few absolute ethical rules
 but a lot of ethical rules depend on the culture

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 WORK SHEET NO. 1 GUIDE QUESTIONS

Name _______________________________________________________ Score ________________

Course/Year/Section _______________________________________ Date _________________

1. Do you consider yourself to be an ethical person? Justify your answer.

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2. Is stealing ALWAYS wrong? When is it right to steal?

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Name _______________________________________________________ Score ________________

Course/Year/Section _______________________________________ Date _________________

ETHICS

Use the clues provided to complete the puzzle on Ethics.

1.
2.
3.

4.

5.

6.

7.

8.

9.
Across Down
4 For every action there is a __________. 1 One of the ethics theories
5 Environmental policies and actions are 2 This behavior is within the
implemented to look after this law
6 If you have ethics you will behave in an 3 Also known as regulations
____________________________manner. 4 Companies use this to
7 One of the attributes of ethics that means you ensure that all
are not dishonest stakeholders behave in an
8 Very important in business to have a good ethical manner
____________(what people think of you).
9 People can trust you

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