Ethics

• What is ethics?


  “…philosophical inquiry into the nature and grounds of morality.”
• Morality?

  • moral requirements
  • moral value e.g. a person who has good character
  • moral discourse (talking about moral requirements)
  • moral inquiry (what basis I can we claim that…)
• different kinds of requirements

  • Legal requirements e.g. staying below the speed limit
  • Etiquettical e.g. don’t slurp your soup
  • Rational e.g. don’t believe a contradiction
  • Professional e.g. A CEO should operate the business for the benefit of the shareholders
• what makes a moral requirement different?


  something that might be considered characteristic of moral requirements is that when they are violated, attitudes such as resentment, guilt and shames are considered appropriate
• ethical reasons


  are special in two ways
• Ethical reason 1. action requiring

  ethical judgements are normative, ethical reasons set a standard
• ethical reason 2


  we take them to express more than a mere preference. We think or act as if there is fact of the matter about which ethiCal reasons are correct
• ethical reason 3

  Our ethical judgements are partly constitutive our sense of who we are as persons. This notion of moral character reflects this
• Anthropological inquiry: what are the moral standards and practises actually accepted by this or that social group
• psychological inquiry:


  interrogates the causes that lead people to disagree with something
• philosophical questions about ethics

  • are we justified in accepting the moral standard we accept
  • among the many different standards of morality should we accept, which should we accept
  • is there a fact of the matter about which moral standard we should accept
  • which features of a morality right act to make it right
• moral judgments, rules and principles 


  “ Tom should not have lied to Jenny yesterday”

  • makes a moral judgment and asserts a wrongness about lying to jenny.
  • makes a moral rule…”dont lie”
  • ”treat others as you would like to be treated” is the overarching moral principle
• Golden rule 1.


  ”treat others as you would like to be treated”
• the greatest happiness principle


  “act so as to produce the greatest happiness for the greatest number”
• the categorical imperative


  “act in such a way that you treat humanity, whether in your own person or in the person of any other, never merely as a means to an end, but always at the same time as an end.”
• The Golden rule 2.

  • How useful is this principle as a guide for action?
  • how useful is this principle for making judgements about right and wrong?
  • would this principle recommend any kinds of action that would normally be considered wrong?
  • Would this principle prohibit any action that might normally be considered perfectly permissible

  Is it possible to treat someone as you want to be treated, and yet still do something wrong?
• Literalness of the golden rule


  Instead say “treat others as you consent to be treated in the same situation”
• Applying golden rule correctly:

  • K (know) -“how could my actions affect others”
  • I (imagine) -“what would it be like to have this done to me in the same situation”
  • T (test for consistency) -“am i willing now that if i were in the same situation then this be done to me”
  • A (act towards others only as you are willing to be treated in the same situation
• Difference between greatest happiness principle and Golden Rule


  GR focuses moral evaluation directly on our actions whereas GHP focuses moral evaluation on the consequences of our actions.
• Greatest happiness principle

  • how useful is this principle as a guid for action
  • how good is this principle for making judgements about right and wrong?
  • would this principle recommend any actions that would normally be considered wrong
  • would this principe prohibit action that would be morally right
• Two Ambiguities


  Q. What is happiness

  “by ‘happiness’ is meant pleasure and the absence of pain; by ‘unhappiness‘ is meant pain and the lack of pleasure“

  “nature has placed mankind under the governance of two sovereign masters, pain and pleasure. They alone point what we aught to do and determine what we shall do; the standard of right and wrong, and the chain of causes and effects, are both fastened to their throne to their throne. They govern us in all we do, we all say, all we think…

  Q. The greatest number of… who or what
• JS Mills on pleasures

  he says that everyone would agree that the higher pleasures are those that cater to our human, rather than animal natures.
• The greatest number….

  We should try to maximise the happiness everyone affected by a given decision.

  In doing so, we should give no special consideration to any individual or group, including ourselves. We must be impartial.
• Imperative


  An imperative is a command, or “ought” statement
• The meaning of categorical


  It is so ebb understood in terms of a contrast with its opposite.
• what makes commands hypothetical

  commands are hypothetical because the force of each command- their being ‘taken up’ in your practical deliberation- depends on a condition
• a categorical imperative


  a categorical imperative is a command that does not depend on any condition
• Idea of a categorical imperative


  The idea of their possibly being commands which i ought to follow, they are not conditioned in any way by what i want, or as a means to something i want. - Kent’s idea is at the heart of morality
• constraints on categorical imperative

  1. can’t be contradictory
  2. must obey the laws of reason
• categorical imperatives rules

  1. the formula of universal law
  2. the formula of the end itself
• the formula of universal law 


  act only according to that maxim by which you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law.

  • a maxim can be thought of as the policy or principle that motivates your actions. fancy way of talking about intentions.

  to make your maxim into a universal law, is to make it that everybody* ought to do

  *those who are capable or acting on the basis of reasons and not just impulse or inclination.

  if it doesn’t pass the “can everybody do this” test then it cant happen.
• One of the major aims of the formula for universal law is to make a connection between morality and rationality

  • to act immorally is to act irrationally

  the thought that acting immorally involves making an exception of yourself
• the formula of the end within itself 


  act in such a way that you always treat humanity, whether in your own person or in the person of any other, never simply as a means but always as an end.

  does the act that I’m about to perform treat someone as a mere means?
• means and ends

  End in a kind of goal

  The means to an ‘end’ is whatever used to achieve the goal

  (end).
• Mere means


  “To use someone as a mere means is to involve them in a scheme of action to which they could not principle consent“
• Ends in themselves


  The idea that other people, like us, are the kinds of creatures capable of using reason, and of having wills and desired of their own. Reason Demands that these characteristics are to Be respected. Other rational creatures cannot be used in such ways that shows disregard for their rational nature.
• Attractive about Kants categorical imperative

  • Universal law Appeals to intuitive notion of fairness, applies to us all with no exceptions
  • They explain intuition that many people have
  • under Kant‘s theory, the moral evaluation of our actions is shielded from moral luck
  • If the rightness depends of my actions depends on if i choose the right action and i chose the wrong one then i am subject to blame.
• Kant V. Hume 


  Hume thought morality was about sentiments like feelings, desires and emotions rather than reasons.

  Kant wanted a theory that could show that moral obligation was independent of our desires and inclinations.
• Duty and inclination

  Consequently, Kants view means that the moral worth of a person‘s action depends entirely on whether or not they acted for the right reason.

  No moral worth unless i act for the sake of duty.

  if my actions conform with duty merely because it is what i am inclined to do(because of my feelings/desires determine that i act in that way), then my actions have no moral worth.
• lying - Kant


  Always wrong to lie because:

  -the maxim “lie when it is to my advantage“ cannot be universalised

  -lying to another involves treating them as a mere means