THE ETHICS OF OBLIGATION

1
THE ETHICS OF OBLIGATION

• How Should I Behave In Order To Promote A
  Cooperative Society Where I, And Every Other
  Human Can Pursue Their Lifes Plan?

2
Obligations of the Social Contract

• Our duty, to gain the benefits of an ordered
  society, requires that we set aside our short
  term self-interested inclinations in favor of
  general rules that impartially promote the
  welfare of everyone including ourselves
  (ultimately) rules that are in our enlightened
  self-interest.
• We can do this because others in society have
  agreed to do the same thing, because it is in
  their enlightened (ultimate) self-interest as
  well.
• The social contract is how we create an ordered
  society, escaping anarchy.

3
Common MoralityDeciding What To Do

• Bernard Gert
• Stone Professor of Philosophy
• Dartmouth College
• 2004
• Common Morality is a major revision for the lay
  audience of Dr. Gerts 1984 treatise Morality A
  New Justification for the Moral Rules

4

• Moral Precepts are rules or principles that no
  rational person would want violated with regard
  to themselves or anyone for whom they cared
  without reason. They are precepts that protect
  the individual from suffering or evil at the
  hands of another.

5
THE MORAL PRECEPTS

• 1. Dont Kill
• 2. Dont Cause Pain
• 3. Dont Disable
• 4. Dont Deprive of Freedom
• 5. Dont Deprive of Pleasure
• 6. Dont Deceive
• 7. Dont Break Your Promises
• 8. Dont Cheat
• 9. Dont Disobey the Law
• 10. Dont Fail to do Your Duty

6
Moral Precepts SummarizedDont Cause Evil or
Harm
7

• The only purpose for which power can be
  rightly exercised over any member of a civilized
  community, against his will, is to prevent harm
  to othersHe cannot rightfully be compelled to do
  or forbear because it will be better for him to
  do so, because it will make him happier, because
  in the opinions of others, to do so would be wise
  or even right.
• John Stuart Mill
  in On Liberty

8
Ethics as a Blunt Instrument

• Ethics is a fairly blunt instrument, it is not
  a scalpel that cuts sharply.
• Although precise and rigorous, ethics does not
  enable one to determine that one and only one
  action is moral.
• Certain alternatives may be ruled out, but not
  infrequently range of possible actions often
  remain that are morally acceptable.

9
Ethics As A Blunt Instrument (continued)

• Sometimes all possible actions infringe on one
  moral rule or another.
• It sometimes becomes a matter of determining
  which is the lesser of two evils, or
• which moral rule deserves receiving the most
  weight in a particular circumstance.

10
Moral Precepts AreUniversal, Not Absolute

• Universality in applying the moral precepts
  means that all rational human beings with
  voluntary abilities are to abide by the moral
  precepts.
• Moral absolutism is the claim that we ought
  never break any moral precept for any reason.

11
Moral Justification

• Everyone is always to obey the precepts except
  when impartial, rational people who know all of
  the relevant facts advocate that violating it
  be allowed.
• On reflection, the consequences of following a
  moral precept in a situation could result in more
  harm than good.
• Not infrequently all of the options available in
  a situation would result in violating a moral
  precept. Thus reflection forces consideration
  (and justification) of which course of action
  will result in the greater good or the lesser
  harm.

12
EXAMPLE

• Nazi storm troopers at the door of the Dutch home
  where Anne Frank and her family are hiding--does
  one lie to the storm troopers, and violate the
  moral precept, "do not deceive," or tell the
  truth, revealing the hiding place of the Frank
  family, and violate the moral rule, "do not
  deprive of freedom or opportunity?" The moral
  life is ambiguous, and frequently requires
  reflection and justification.

13
Rationality

• Rationality is concerned with actions/behavior.
  Rational actions are actions that comport with
  ones enlightened self-interest, or the
  interest of one for whom one cares.
• Irrational actions are actions everyone would
  agree they would not advocate for one for whom
  they were concerned or cared. Rather they would
  avoid these actions.
• They are actions prohibited by reason against
  reason.

14
Irrationality

• Actions against reason prohibited by reason.
• To act contrary to ones self-interest, for no
  reason.
• Actions characterized as crazy, stupid, idiotic,
  and insane.
• Distinguished from mistaken judgements or
  reasoning. It is irrational for adults to
  believe in the tooth fairy or Santa Claus or that
  the earth is flat.
• Many beliefs are mistaken, but not irrational,
  e.g., believing Oswald did not kill John Kennedy
  or the Holocaust did not really occur.

15
Impartiality

• A person is impartial when their evaluation of
  actions is not influenced by who is benefited or
  harmed by those actions.

16
Applying Moral Justification

• Moral Justification indicates that when
  every impartial, rational person who knows and
  understands the relevant features of a proposed
  violation of a moral precept and agrees that it
  is morally permissible, then it is strongly
  justified morally.
• When every knowledgeable impartial, rational
  person agrees it is not permissible then the
  violation is strongly unjustified.
• When people disagree about whether the violation
  is justified, then the violation is weakly
  justified, and the person could be sanctioned for
  the violation.

17
Kants Categorical Imperative

• Immanuel Kant, the 19th century German
  philosopher, helps further characterize moral
  justification with his famous dictum, act only
  on that maxim that you would will it as a
  universal law.
• If your action in a given circumstance could be
  willed to be universalized, that is, you would
  advocate that all people do what you are
  proposing to do in like circumstances, then you
  could make the claim that the action is
  impartial...and appropriate .

18
Moral Rules(Duties to Others)Correspond to
Individual Rights
19
Reciprocity
20

• Rights are correlates of duties--the
  performance of which we are not willing to leave
  to individual discretion.
• James Rachels
• in Created From Animals

21
ButWhat Is the Role of Doing Good in the
Moral Life?

• The Moral Ideals
• Prevent Evil or Harm

22
The Moral Ideals

• 1. Prevent Killing
• 2. Prevent the Causing of Pain
• 3. Prevent Disabling
• 4. Prevent Deprivation of Freedom
• 5. Prevent Deprivation of Pleasure
• 6. Prevent Deception
• 7. Prevent the Breaking of Promises
• 8. Prevent Cheating
• 9. Prevent Disobeying the Law
• 10. Prevent Others From Failing to do
  Their Duty

23
Gerts Summary...

• Obey the moral rules (precepts)
• follow the moral ideals.

24
The Moral Ideals

• Encouraged but not required.
• Sanction someone for violating a moral precept
  causing harm, unless able to be justified.
• Do not sanction someone for failing to follow the
  moral idealsdoing good.
• Can we require the doing of good? Why? Why not?

25
Moral Heroism

• Heroes are individuals who, in the view of
  society, take actions that are dangerous to self,
  in general, put their lives at risk, in an
  attempt to come to the aid of another.
• Heroes are people who do not only not kill
  (moral precept) but go beyond that, risking their
  lives to prevent killing (moral ideal.)
• This introduces the subject of altruism.

26
Altruism

• Altruism refers to actions taken by one person,
  which at some cost to the self, improves the
  welfare of another.
• behaves in such a way as to increase another
  entitys welfare at the expense of his own.
  Richard Dawkins
• Definition of altruism is based solely on
  outcome, not motivation.

27
Motivations To Altruism

• desire to provide aid to another that has no
  self-interested dimension strong altruism. Many
  do not think such exists.
• to escape the personal distress from seeing
  another in distress.
• to avoid the guilt and shame which would result
  from not helping.
• to gain social rewards that come from acting in
  socially approved ways.
• to avoid social sanctions that could be incurred
  from not helping.
• to develop in the other a sense of responsibility
  to help one in return at a later date.
  .reciprocal altruism--Ill help you now so that I
  can depend on you to help be later. Reciprocal
  altruism is the technical name for what is
  understood as cooperation or
• to share in the joy the distressed may be
  expected to receive.

28
Altruism

• The dominant view is that all helping acts are
  fundamentally egoistic. That is, despite any
  surface indications that a helping act is
  intended simply to aid the victim, all helping
  ultimately results from a desire to ultimately
  increase the welfare of the helper, rather than
  the victim--weak altruism.
• Altruism, in the strong sense of the word, that
  is, motivated solely by increasing the welfare of
  the other, does not exist except potentially in
  relationship to individuals who are closely
  related genetically, such as children, siblings,
  or other closely genetically related individuals.

29
Altruism

• Are dentists, or any professionals altruistic?
• If so, in what sense?
• Does the concept of professionalism require that
  professionals be altruistic if they are to be
  ethical?