What is Ethics?

Summarized from
Short History of Ethics
by Rogers, R.A.P
 Ethic Theories
• Known History begins with Ancient Greek
Philosphers
– Sophists
– Socrates
– Socratic schools
– Plato
– Aristotle
– Epicurus
– Stoics
 Ethic Theories
• English Positivists in Medieval Times
– Religious Ethics
• Illuminated Times
– Hobbes, the Father of Modern Ethics
– Methods: criticism and comparison
– English and German schools of ethics
(different opinions)
 Ethic Theories
• English
– Intuitionists (naturalists)
– Utilitarians

• German
– Kantian Ethics
 Ethic Theories
• 20th Century
– Evolutionary concepts
• Comte
• Darwin
• Spencer
• Green
• Utilitarians x Kantians
 What is Ethics?
• Ethics deals with human well-being.
• Discusses
– The nature of “individual” good
– The nature of “social” good
– The relation between these
– The motives for the individual to pursue
“social good” or “morally right”
 What is Ethics?
• Ethics Discusses
– The relation between “pleasure” and “good”
– The nature of “virtue” (in antique ethics)
– Duty and moral obligation (in modern ethics)
– The “freedom of the will”
– The ethical worth of “Positive Morality”
 What is Ethics?
• Some phylosophical questions
– Is “happiness” the “ultimate end” of actions?
– Is “virtue” preferable to “pleasure”?
– How do “pleasure” and “happiness” differ?
– What is meant by saying that “I ought to
perform some particular action or respect
some general precept such as the keeping of
promises”?
 What is Ethics?
• More Questions
– Am I under any obligation to seek the welfare of other
persons, as well as my own?
– If so, what is the right proportion between the two
welfares?
– What is meant by “freedom of the will”?
– Is feeling or reason the right guide to conduct?
– What do the terms “good,” “right,” obligation,” “duty,”
“conscience” signify, both practically or theoretically?
 What is Ethics?
• Definition:
– science which investigates the general
principles for determining the true worth of the
ultimate ends of human conduct
• Ideal Morality:
– Made of these principles
• Discovered
• Exactly formulated
• Leading to rules of conduct
 What is Ethics?
• Practical Morality
– The body of laws (the ethical code)
• accepted by an age or community as correct
principles for determining the true worth of actions
• expressed in the form of judgments of approval or
disapproval
Example:
industry (hard-work), temperance (self-control),
honesty (being truthful), and a regard for human
life are positive morals
 What is Ethics?
• Positive Morality may not be Ideal Morality
• Positive Morality can change with time and
country
• Positive morality reflects cultures,
conventions and customs.
Example: Slavery, polygamy, witch-burning,
and torture were once legal and acceptable.
 What is Ethics?
• Ultimate Ends
– The most important definition of Pure (Theoretical)
Ethics
– The end of a deliberate action for the sake of which it
is performed
– Some ends are pursued chiefly, as a means of
realization of other ends
– An ultimate end, however, is one that is desired for its
own sake
– Different from its utility in helping towards the
attainment of other ends
 What is Ethics?
• Ethics deals with ultimate ends of human
conduct.
• Ethics values them with the criteria
commonly accepted as “ethical.”
• Therefore, we need a good list of the
values, methods of evaluation and use a
set of “canons” or laws for sound
decisions.
 What is Ethics?
Pursuits
studies
deliberate actions
directly or indirectly satisfy some interests.
They are valued either as means or as ends, or
both.
• The main problem of Ethics; “are the satisfaction
of these interests and the attainment of these
desired objects, good in themselves?”
 What is Ethics?
• Individual Ethics
– It is not possible for an individual to satisfy
all his interests.
– Some interests are to be preferred to others
according to some principle of ethical
selection.
– Some interests, if they go beyond a limit are
destructive of their own satisfactions, and
interfere with the satisfaction of other
interests.
 What is Ethics?
• Social Ethics
– The interest of one person often conflict with
those of others
– Ethics has to try to find a practical harmony
between the interests of the different
members of society.
 What is Ethics?
• What is “good”?
• What is “morally good”?
These questions require a scientific definition.
What is consciously approved by a person
for its own sake is “good.” Satisfaction of
“interest” is “good.” Pleasurable feeling is
“good.”
 What is Ethics?
• To comparing one “good” with another
– Quality
– Duration
– Intensity of the satisfaction yielded by each,
– Effects on the attainment of other goods by
the agent or by other persons. In this way
“immediate” and “remote” goods are defined:
 What is Ethics?
• Immediate good
– the momentary satisfaction by a one person
• Remote good
– the satisfaction not confined to the present
moment or to only one person.
 What is Ethics?
• Moral Obligation
– A duty which one owes, and which he ought to
perform, but which he is not legally bound to.

1. Those founded on a natural right such as the

obligation to be charitable, which can never be
enforced by law.

2. Those which are supported by a good or valuable

prior consideration such as a man promises to donate
money, and it becomes a moral obligation to keep his
promise
 What is Ethics?
• Duty
– A human action which is exactly conformable to the
laws which require us to obey them.
– It differs from a legal obligation because a duty
cannot always be enforced by the law; it is our duty,
for example, to be temperate in eating, but we are
under no legal obligation to be so; we ought to love
our neighbors, but no law obliges us to love them.
– the preference of a higher good to a lower good.
 What is Ethics?
• Freedom of the will
– the power by human beings of subordinating
impulses and lower goods to higher goods
• VIRTUE/VICE
• Virtue is a property of character, though indirectly applied to actions
or motives. A morally virtuous man, is one who respects the moral
codes enjoining Industry, Temperance, Honor, Justice, Charity,
Mercy,… Vice is the opposite of virtue.
• It is a habitual tendency to pursue always the best attainable ends.
Virtue has wider meaning than moral virtue. The difference is special
virtue (like skill in music, mechanics, oratory,..) which may interfere
with higher virtues. Excellence in a profession by this virtue is,
however, a higher virtue. All moral virtues are on the same level; the
highest. Natural or special virtues are not attainable by everyone;
thus community does not expect everyone has them as virtue.
• WELL-BEING, HAPPINESS AND PLEASURE
• Well-being signifies the permanent realization of
good by an individual. Ancient Greek
philosophers and schools of thought had all
differing views of well-being and its definition.
Aristotle, however, puts it that “an individual
cannot regard his own bell-being apart from
others” which is still one of the best corollaries of
the well-being in our day.