THE
MORAL ACT
CHAPTER 2 - PART 2
MEANING OF MORAL ACT
- helps us distinguish between right and wrong.
- helps us understand how to live a good life based on the
values we hold sacred.
According to Guy Thwaites (2017) there are three ethical
theories of Moral Act
1. Divine Command Theory
- a moral act is one which God says is moral.
- this requires people to know what God's moral commands.
Example: Murder is morally wrong because God prohibits in the Ten
Commandments
According to Guy Thwaites (2017) there
are three ethical theories of Moral Act
2. Categorical Imperative
- a moral act is one which would be universally beneficial if everyone
did it.
Example: lf everyone told the truth, the world would be a better place.
Therefore I should tell the truth.
'You should not make a promise that you intend to break later, unless
you're willing to have everyone else do the same'
According to Guy Thwaites (2017) there
are three ethical theories of Moral Act
3. Act Utilitarianism
- a moral act is one which does the most good for the most people.
Example: If a doctor can save five people from death by killing one
healthy person and using that person's organs for life saving
transplant, then act utilitarianism that the doctor should kill the
one person to save five'
DETERMINANTS OF MORALITY IN HUMAN ACTION
3 INTEGRAL PARTS:
Object, Purpose/Intention. and Circumstances
The goodness of a moral is determined by three elements: object,
intention, and circumstances. At least one of there must be good;
others may be indifferent; and none may be evil. A defect in any of
these renders the act morally evil.
SIGNIFICANCE OF FEELINGS IN MORAL BEHAVIOR
LAUREN CASSANI DAVIS (2016)
• Discusses how feelings influence right and wrong
• Daily life is peppered with moral decisions
Rational Thinking
• Plays a role in how we make moral decisions. But our moral compasses
are also powerfully influenced by the fleeting forces of disgust, fondness or
fear.
SIGNIFICANCE OF FEELINGS IN MORAL BEHAVIOR
• Moral psychologists have been using experimental designs to assess
people's behavior and performance on certain tasks, along with fMRI
scans to glimpse the brain's hidden activity, to illuminate the structure
of moral thinking
TROLLEY PROBLEM
• Joshua Greene, combined an iconic and thorny ethical
thought experiment
• When you must decide whether or not you'd flip a switch, or
push a man off a footbridge, to cause one person to die instead
of five - with brain imaging back in 2001.
REASON AND FEELINGS
• Ethics is "concerned with making sense of intuitions" about what is right and
good.
• Biologists verify that: "Emotion is never truly divorced from decision making,
even when it is channeled aside by an effort of will."
• "Sensitivity requires rationality to complete it, and vice versa. There is no
siding onto which emotions can be shunted so as not to impinge on thought."-
by moral philosopher Mary Midgley
REASON AND FEELINGS
• We manifest empathy before developing our rational abilities, and there is
evidence for the same order of development in the evolution of the human
brain. "Empathy is a unique form of intentionality in which we are directed
toward the other's experience.
• Empathy enables us to identify with others and may generate a "perception of
the other as a being who deserves concern and respect."
• Moral sentiments came first, moral principles second.
• Our feelings and our reason reflect our participation in a moral community,
or more likely several moral communities.
Impartiality
Almost everyone thinks it’s appropriate to treat certain people
like those who are near and dear to them in special way.
2 Moral Claims:
IMPARTIALITY – When it comes to morality we should be
impartial.
PARTIALITY – It is appropriate to treat certain people in a
special sort of way.
Some tension between these two
thoughts
(1) reject the claim that we must be impartial
(2) reject the claim that it is OK to be partial to certain people, or
(3) come to understand impartiality in a different way.
Why we should be impartial?
• There is something intuitively appealing about the thought that
morality requires us to be “as strictly impartial as a disinterested
and benevolent spectator."
• One might even say that, the moral point of view is just the
impartial point of view.
• It is arbitrary to act otherwise.
7 STEPS OF MORAL REASONING
Michael Davis (1999) identified seven (7) steps guide to ethical
decision-making (or the 7-steps in reasoning model)
Davis believes that students and professionals who rely on a guide
tend to demonstrate stronger "moral reasoning skills" than those
who do not use a guide. A key feature of Davis' approach is his
emphasis on identifying multiple (more than two) options for
responding to ethical challenges.
7 STEPS OF MORAL REASONING
1. State of the Problem - Colleague test
2. Check the facts - Professional test
3. Identify relevant factors - Organization test
4. Develop a list of option 6. Make a choice based on
5. Test the options. Use some of steps 1-5
the following tests: 7. Review steps 1-6
- Harm test
- Publicity test
- Defensibility test
- Reversibility test
EMOTION AND REASON
REASONS
there is no consensus about a standard use of reason,' but it is frequently
used as a contrast or complementary term for 'faith. Reason stands for the
faculties of rational reflection, sensations and experience, memory and
inference, and any a priori or a posteriori judgment that may be exercised
without relying on a religious faith that is unsupported by reason. Faith is
beyond reason, but it may or may not be incompatible reason.
EMOTION AND REASON
Such usage is not, however, uniform, for some philosophers argue that the
content of religious faith (e.g., there is a Creator God and Redeemer) is
supported by reason.
EMOTION: Emotions (anger, love, hate, happiness) are sometimes
distinguished from ethical theory and thought to be in tension, though
more recent works by Robert Solomon and others treat emotions as
essentially involving reason.
CONSCIENCE
Conscience is the power to discern what appears to be morally right or
wrong, a virtue or vice. Religious ethicists debate the extent to which a
person's conscience is normative: if a person's conscience leads her to
think X is morally required, does she has a duty to do X? Problem cases
include persons whose conscience may be disordered but not due to any
blameworthy act of the person herslef.
ROLE OF MENTAL FRAMING
MENTAL FRAMING: the way we look at a given situation How a person
view a situation
Mental framing is also See, think, assess, and being optimistic.
2 TYPES OF MENTAL FRAMING
Positive frames - Elicit positive feelings
Negative frames - Elicit negative feelings
ROLE OF MENTAL FRAMING
Why are mental frames important?
They direct our attention toward the information we seek.
How does mental framing help us in decision making?
Decision based on the framing effect are made by focusing on the way the
information is presented instead of the information itself.
Role of mental frames in moral experience
It help us think or see a positive way to solve a situation.
It remind us that problems and experiences are natural to exist.
DEVELOPING THE WILL
• Will is at the center of who we are. Will is who we are. You are his will. Both
spiritual development and self - development, despite any distinction that
might be made between them, entail the development of will.
• Because will enters all we do and because it has many modes all spring from
one will, developing our will provides benefits across all aspects of our life.
DEVELOPING THE WILL
• Will does not operate in a vacuum. To be effective, will must act through the
medium of various inner energies, which provides an interface between our
will and our functions, such as thoughts and physical actions.
• The fundamental way to develop our will involves setting a goal, working
toward that goal, and monitoring our progress. Each of the steps requires skill
and intelligence.
• The first hurdle in setting a goal is to choose wisely. In most cases it should
be unambiguous and attainable. Also, the goal or task should not depend on
any other persons.
PRINCIPLES OF MORAL BEHAVIOR
THE PRINCIPLE IN MORAL BEHAVIOR IS BASED
ON THE GOLDEN RULE:
• The Golden Rule states: Do unto others what you would have them do
unto you-is commonly perceived as one of Jesus's greatest moral
teachings.
• The golden rule is a primitive guideline to moral behavior and stresses
benevolence or the lack of it.
NEGATIVE GOLDEN RULE
Confucius formulate the so-called Golden Rule of
Morality in a Negative fashion:
"Do not do to others what you would not like yourself.
Then there will be no resentment against you, either
in the family or in the state." (Analects 12:2)
NEGATIVE GOLDEN RULE
it cuts down on the aggressive acts which the Golden
Rule enables. But it shifts aggression in the opposite
direction towards asceticism.
Provides the justification for maintaining traditions,
such as religious traditions.
A FRAMEWORK FOR MAKING ETHICAL
DECISION
Decision about right and wrong fill in everyday life. Ethics should
concern all levels of life: acting properly as individuals, creating
responsible organizations and governments and making our society as
a whole. It provides a summary of the major sources for ethical
thinking and then presents a framework for decision-making. Ethics
provides a set of standards for behavior that helps us to decide how
we ought to act in a range of situations.
Ethics is sometimes conflated or confused with other
ways of making choices, including religion, law or
morality;
Religions may also advocate or prohibit certain behaviors which
may not be considered the proper domain of ethics, such as
dietary, restrictions or sexual behavior.
Laws may have a difficult time designing or enforcing standards in
some important areas and may be slow to address new problems.
Many people use terms morality and ethics interchangeably.
Others reserve morality for the state of virtue while seeing ethics
as a code that enables morality. To think about the relationship
between ethics and morality is to see ethics as providing a rational
basis for morality and provides good reasons for why something
moral.
THE FIELD OF ETHICS IS TRADITIONALLY
DIVIDED INTO THREE AREAS
1. META ETHICS - deals with the nature of the right or the good
2. NORMATIVE ETHICS - deals with the standards and
principles used to determine whether something is right or good
3. APPLIED ETHICS - deals with the actual application of
ethical principles to a particular situation
3 ETHICAL THEORIES
1. Consequentialist Theories – are primarily concerned with
the ethical consequences of particular actions
2. Non-consequentialist Theories – which tend to broadly
concerned with the intentions of the person making ethical
decision about particular actions
3. Agent-Centered Theories – are more concerned with the
overall ethical status of individual, or agents, and are less
concerned to identify the morality of particular actions
VIRTUE ETHICS
Derive from ancient Greek Philosophy. These includes : Arete
(excellence or virtue), phronesis (practical or moral wisdom), and
eudaimonia (flourishing).
LET'S US FIRST DEFINE VIRTUE
It is a disposition to act, think and feel in certain ways.
While ETHICS is moral principles that govern a person's
behavior or the conducting of an activity.
& VIRTUE ETHICS IN GENERAL
Is good actions as ones that display embody virtuous character
traits.But, it is not that following rules is important, Virtue
Ethics emphasis on developing oneself as a good person.
VIRTUE ACCORDING TO ARISTOTLE
Aristotle first used the term ethics to name a field of study
developed by his predecessors Socrates and Plato.
Philosophical ethics is the attempt to offer a rational
response to the question of how humans should best live.
VIRTUE ACCORDING TO ARISTOTLE
Aristotle emphasized the importance of developing excellence
(virtue) of character (Greek ethike arete), as the way to achieve
what is finally more important, excellent conduct (Greek energeia).
As Aristotle argues in Book II of the Nicomachean Ethics, the man
who possesses character excellence does the right thing, at the
right time, and in the right way.
The highest aims are living well and eudaimonia a Greek word often
translated as well-being, happiness or "human flourishing".
VIRTUE ACCORDING TO ARISTOTLE
The type of wisdom which is required for this is called "prudence" or
"practical wisdom" (Greek phroness), as opposed to the wisdom of a
theoretical philosopher (Greek sophia).
VIRTUE ACCORDING TO KANT
THE KANTIAN VIRTUE
• Is ascribed to the deontological theory of the German philosopher
Immanuel Kant. The theory, developed as a result of Enlightenment
rationalism, is based on the view that only intrinsically good thing is a
good will; an action can only be good if it's a maxim - the principle
behind it - is duty to the moral law.
Kant also distinguished between perfect and imperfect duties.
VIRTUE ACCORDING TO ST. THOMAS AQUINAS
J. Budziszewski, (2017) made a commentary on Thomas Aquinas
Virtue Ethics. He juxtaposes the original text with paraphrase and
detailed discussion, guiding us through its complex arguments and
classical rhetorical figures. His brisk and clear style illuminates
the most crucial of Aquinas' writings on moral character and
guides us through the labyrinth of this difficult but pivotal work.
PART 1: MORAL CHARACTER IN
GENERAL
Whether virtue is suitably defined?
St. Thomas investigates whether the traditional understanding
of virtue, derived from St. Augustine of Hippo via Peter
Lombard, is correct.
MORAL CHARACTER IN GENERAL
Whether virtue:
1. is a good quality
2. it is a quality of the mind
3. it enables us to live rightly
4. it is possible for it to be employed badly
5 and whether it is brought about in us by God.
MORAL CHARACTER IN GENERAL
Whether there can be moral without intellectual virtue?
Can a person who lacks intellectual virtue still possess moral
virtues such as fortitude, temperance, and justice? For a variety
of reasons, at first it seems that this is possible.
However, Thomas shows that although not all intellectual virtues
are necessary for moral virtue, the intellectual virtues of
prudence and understanding are necessary for moral virtue.
MORAL CHARACTER IN GENERAL
Whether there can be intellectual without moral virtue?
St. Thomas concludes, however, that although other intellectual
virtues can exist without moral virtue, the intellectual virtue of
prudence does require moral virtue.
Neither complete moral virtue nor complete intellectual virtue is
possible without the other.
MORAL CHARACTER IN GENERAL
Whether there are four cardinal virtues?
According to a widely held view all moral virtues depend on 4
paramount virtues:
1. Prudence
2. Justice
3. Temperance
4. Fortitude
sometimes called "Cardinal virtues after the latin word for a hinge.
MORAL CHARACTER IN GENERAL
St. Thomas presents compelling reasons for thinking
that the four virtues called cardinal surpass the
other moral virtues and are:
1. prudence, or practical wisdom
2. fortitude, or courage;
3. temperance, or restraint;
4. And justice, or fairness.
MORAL CHARACTER IN GENERAL
Whether any other virtues should be called "principal" rather
than these?
Magnanimity has been proposed.
St. Thomas argues that the fourfold list of cardinal virtues should be
left as it stands. Not only are these four concerned with matters of
paramount importance, but every other moral virtue turns out to
depend on them.
magnanimity and patience turn out to be aspects of the cardinal
virtue of fortitude, and humility turns out to be an aspect of the
cardinal virtue of temperance.
PART II. THE VIRTUE OF
JUSTICE, ESPECIALLY IN
RELATION TO LAW
Whether the precepts of the Decalogue are precepts of justice?
The notion of some people that virtue ethics is a way of doing ethics
without rules would strike St. Thomas as very strange, for the acts
to which the virtues predispose us are things which we ought to do;
he always connects virtues with precepts, dispositions of character
with authoritative rules. He is concerned with the famous set of
authoritative rules known as the Ten Commandments.
Utilitarianism as Virtue Ethics
Utilitarianism is founded on the principle of utility which
adheres to te belief that an Act is good or morally right if it
promotes happiness and bad or immoral if it produces pain.
The key principle of utilitarianism is the principle of happiness.
Principles of Justice
The most fundamental principle of justice - one that has been widely
accepted since it was first defined by Aristotle more than two thousand
years ago-is the principle that "equals should be treated equally and
unequals unequally." In it's contemporary form, this principle is
sometimes expressed as follows: "Individuals should be treated the same,
unless they differ in ways that are relevant to the situation in which
they are involved." There are, however, many differences that we deem as
justifiable criteria for treating people differently. On the other hand,
there are also criteria that we believe are not justifiable grounds for
giving people different treatment.
Different kinds of Justice
1. Distributived Justice: refers to the extent to which society's
institutions ensure that benefits and burdens are distributed among
society's members in ways that are fair and just.
2. Retributive or Corrective Justice: refers to the extent to
which punishments are fair and just. In general, punishments are
held to be just to the extent that they take into account relevant
criteria such as the seriousness of the crime and the intent of the
criminal, and discount irrelevant criteria such as race.
Different kinds of Justice
3. Compensatory Justice
refers to the extent to which people are fairly compensated for their
injuries by those who have injured them; just compensation is
proportional to the loss inflicted on a person.
Whether we should always judge according to the written law?
Summa St. Thomas has considered exceptions
Under certain conditions custom can abolish written law
Under certain conditions one may disobey so-called unjust laws
and may even be obligated to disobey them.
When cases arise which the written law was not intended to
cover, those who have the authority to make the law may also
suspend it.
In emergencies, when such cases arise but there is no time to
consult authority, the citizens themselves may set aside the words
of the law and follow its intention instead.
Whether judgement is rendered perverse by being usurped?
Usurpation of judgement is judging a case without jurisdiction,
seizing the power of judgement from the person to whom it
belongs. Present Chapter of St. Thomas is not asking whether it is
unjust for a judge to make the sorts of judgements which properly
belong to, say, the legislature. He has already established that this
is wrong, because the judge must render judgement according to
the law. Rather he is asking whether it is unjust for someone else
to make the sort of judgements which properly belong to the judge
himself.
Whether judgement is rendered perverse by being usurped?
St Thomas defends the traditional view that usurpation of
judgement is violation of justice that judging without proper
jurisdiction always destroys justice even if the usurper renders the
correct judgement
Whether the virtues annexed to justice are suitable enumerated?
Many aspects of justice may be called “parts” of justice it also the
“potential” part of justice, meaning the secondary virtues which
in some way resemble justice or are associated with it. He
defends the sixfold classification of Marcus Tullius Cicero against
the sevenfold classification of Macrobius, the ninefold
classification of Pseudo-Andronicus, the fivefold classification of
“certain others” and the single suggestion drawn from Aristotle.
He does not simply discard the thoughts of all theses others;
whenever he comes upon a worthy insight.
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