Ethics and Ethical Theories

1
Ethics and Ethical Theories

• Herman T. Tavani, Ethics and Technology, Chapter
  2, Wiley, 2004.

2
Morality and moral systems

• Rules of conduct
• Rules for individuals
• Rules for social policies
• Principles of evaluation

3
Justifying rules for moral systems

• Religion teachings of religious leaders
• Philosophical ethics appeals to reason
• Law codes determined by constitutions and
  legislation

4
Discussion stoppers

• People disagree on solutions.
• They also agree on many things.
• Who am I to judge?
• Sometimes we have to make judgments.
• Ethics is a private matter.
• Morality is essentially a public system.
• Morality is a matter for individual cultures.
• Do in Rome as the Romans do.

5
Why ethical theories are needed

• Follow the golden rule.
• Doesnt cover when others have different desires.
• Follow your own conscience.
• Some people think it all right to fly airplanes
  into towers.

6
Consequence based ethical theories

• Bentham (1748-1832) and Mill (1806-1873)
• What results from an act
• The ends justify the means
• Principle of social utility measured by the
  resulting amount of happiness

7
Utilitarianism

• Act utilitarianism Act is good if it results in
  the greatest good for the greatest number.
• What happens to minority?
• Rule utilitarianism Act is good if it comes
  from following rules that bring good to greatest
  number.
• Should we base ethics on happiness and pleasure?

8
Duty-based ethical theories Deontological
theories

• Kant (1724-1804) Duties and obligations that
  people have to one another.
• People have rational natures
• People should never be treated as means to the
  ends of others
• Each individual has the same moral worth as every
  other.

9
Rule deontology Kants categorical imperative

• Rules that all individuals should be treated as
  ends in themselves and not means to an end.
• Rules that can be universally binding for all
  people.
• One person or group should not be privileged over
  all others.

10
Act deontology

• Ross (1930) - Problem if two conflicting moral
  duties
• When conflict, consider individual situations
• Prima facie (self-evident) duties.
• Honesty, justice, helpfulness
• Actual duty What to do when have conflicts.
• Use rational intuitionism.
• Weigh evidence to decide course of action in
  particular case

11
Contract-based ethical theories

• Hobbes(1588-1679) Premoral state
• state of nature where all free to do as like
• People establish formal legal code
• In each persons self-interest to develop system
  with rules
• Objections Depends only on formal legal rules
• Difference between doing no harm and doing
  good.

12
Rights-based contract theories

• Jefferson (1776) and Aquinas (1225-1274)
• Natural rights or inalienable and self-evident
  rights
• Legal rights positive rights and negative
  rights
• Negative rights
• Privacy, no interference in right to vote
• Positive rights
• Education (in US through 12th grade)

13
Character-based ethical theories

• Virtue ethics - Plato (427?-327 BCE) and
  Aristotle (384-322 BCE)
• Development of good character traits and habits
• Be a moral person rather than just follow rules
• Agent-oriented rather than action or
  rule-oriented
• Develop character traits such as kindness,
  truthfulness, honesty, trustworthiness,
  helpfulness, generosity, and justice
• More likely to work in homogeneous societies
  rather than our pluralistic one
• Consequences often should be taken into account

14
Single comprehensive theory

• Rawls (1971) and Moor (1999) Just-Consequentiali
  st Theory
• Start with core values Do no harm
• Support justice, rights, and duties Do your
  duty
• Settle conflicts two steps
• Consider situation impartially without regard to
  specific case choice between ethical vs.
  unethical policies
• Consider consequences of specific case choice
  between better vs. worse policies
• Consider whether problem is disagreement about
  facts rather than value differences

15
Moors ethical framework

• Deliberate from an impartial point of view
• Does it cause any unnecessary harm?
• Does it support individual rights, duties?
• Select the best policy from the set
• Weigh the good and bad consequences
• Distinguish between disagreements about facts vs.
  disagreements about values