Chapter 3 The Moral Agent and Culture

• A moral agent is a being who is capable of acting with reference to right and wrong. However, not all agents are automatically considered moral agents.
• A moral agent is a being who is capable of acting with reference to right and wrong. However, not all agents are automatically considered moral

  agents.
• Culture is an aggregate of the learned beliefs, attitudes, values, norms, and customs of a society or a group of people, shared by them and

  transmitted from generation to generation within that society.
• Human is a being that acts, one who acts with will and knowledge and holds responsible for the acts.
• human being is the moral agent endowed with all possibilities and capabilities to act upon actions with moral considerations.
• High Culture


  Linked with the elite, upper class society, those families and individuals with an ascribed status position. Often associated with the arts such as opera, ballet and classical music, and sports such as polo. Maintains its elite and exclusive position.
• Cultural Diversity


  A concept relating to culturally embedded differences within society, the fact that different cultures exist alongside each other.
• Subculture


  Culture enjoyed by a small group within society. A minority part of majority culture. They have distinct norms and values which make them a sub-section of society.
• Popular Culture


  Borrows the idea from high culture and popularizes it, making it available for the masses. A product of the media dominated world. A positive force that brings people of different backgrounds together in a common culture.
• Multiculturalism


  Depicted to be very similar to cultural diversity, other definitions align multiculturalism with different ethnic groups living alongside each other.
• Global Culture


  A key feature of globalization, emerged due to patterns of migration, trends in international travel and the spread of the media, exposing people to the same images of the same dominant world companies.
• Types of Culture

  • High Culture
  • Cultural Diversity
  • Subculture
  • Popular Culture
  • Multiculturalism
  • Global Culture
• IMPORTANCE OF CULTURE

  • Culture affects perception
  • Culture influence behavior
  • Culture shapes personalities
  • Culture shapes our values and belief systems
• Morals are the prevailing standards of behavior that people have to follow and act in accordance with one’s beliefs in order to live cooperatively in groups.
• Moral behaviors are what one believes to be the right things to do.
• Culture relativism is the principle of regarding the beliefs, values, and practices of a culture from the viewpoint of that culture itself.
• Culture provides norms, customs, laws, and moral

  demands that are to be followed. It considerably

  shapes its members on how they live and relate

  within themselves and other cultures. It influences

  and changes our definitions of what ought to be

  seemed morally acceptable by consistent exposure

  to it.
• ethical relativism is the theory that holds that morality is relative to the

  norms of one’s culture.
• Moral relativism is the view that moral judgments are true or false only relative to some

  particular standpoint (for instance, that a culture or a historical period) and that no

  standpoint is uniquely privileged over all others.
• Moral relativism is the idea that there is no universal or absolute set of moral principles.
• says that moral standards are culturally defined- Descriptive Moral Relativism
• Meta- ethical moral relativism states that there are no objective grounds for preferring the moral values of one culture over another.
• Normative moral relativism is the idea that all societies should accept each other’s differing moral values,
• moral absolutism -which says that there is always one right answer to any ethical question.
• Landauer & Rowlands believes that moral relativism is an ethical judgement that claims that no ethical system is bether than another. It rests on the belief that values are subjective.
• Diverse Geography- the primary shaper of ones culture