Module 1: Chapter 1 Reading Questions (M1A1)

Please do each of the following items. Type your answers under each heading here and submit this
whole document. Please number your answers where needed and separate them with spaces.

A. Answer the Review Questions at end of Chapter 1.

1.) Moral beliefs can be said that they are not really yours when you accept and never question the
moral beliefs handed to you by your culture. That is when we let our morals control our lives but we
don’t let ourselves control our lives.

2.) We are forced to pick up on ethics, or moral values, when we are young and being raised by our
parents. We have to decided what the most important thing in our lives are, what is worth living for and
what is worth dying for. I believe that everything we love is at stake.

3.) To not question moral beliefs undermines your personal freedom, we are unlikely to find intellectual
moral growth on the safe route.

4.) Our feelings cannot be a sole guide to our morality. If we were to consult only feelings with our
morality, we would become lost amongst the rest of the humans as not every humans shares the same
feelings as you.

5.) A question that would reside with normative ethics would be when you question a rule. “Should I
really pay attention to the stop light?”. It’s a norm for people to stop at the stop lights but normative
ethics questions the norms and put their own input in.

6.) Metaethics is more so an all around ethical stand point. This is when you ask “how can an action be
right?”, or “Is there such thing as moral truth?”.

7.) The problem with God and the morality that Socrates, in Euthyphro, posed is that he put a question
out that “Is an action morally right because God wills it to be so, or does God will it to be so because it is
morally right?”. This leads a lot of people, including myself, to think about if all they have been taught
their whole life is morally right or if it was just the norm of the people around them.

8.) People disagree with religious leaders of their own and of others, people may wonder if their
religious traditions of moral teachings make sense.

9.) The whole meaning behind the arbitrariness argument is questioning; how can we say if God is right
or wrong when we don’t even know ourselves? To one side, God is all-good, would never hurt a fly. On
the other side, Gods “all-good” is meaningless.

10.) Yes, the principle of Impartiality is all about humans are humans and we should all treat each other
as equals. Differences in income, social status, skin color, ancestry and the like are not any reason to
separate a good group from a bad group. All it does is make our situation unique.
B. Answer the following Discussion Questions, 6, 8, 9 at end of Chapter 1.

6.) Two things that are super valuable to me are family time and musical experiences. Three things that
are instrumentally valuable to me is love, education and health.

8.) I believe that universalizability is all about keeping your morals all together. Such as being kind. I
believe that if I am not creating a kind reaction, then it isn’t worth the interaction.

9.) Racial discrimination violates it by believing one race is better than another, when we are all human
and unique in our own ways.

C. Explain what makes an act right or wrong on the Divine Command Theory (under the Religion and
Morality section).

Answer: What makes an act right or wrong is what your religious leader believes in. In Christianity, one
thing may be approved for acting upon but in another, it may be totally frowned upon.

D. Read Plato's Euthyphro, pp. 16-19 (see explanation on pages 10-11 and see the video — link on
assessment page). Socrates gives an argument that can be used against the Divine Command theory.
Using your own words, please explain the argument. Do you think it's a good argument against the
Divine Command Theory? Explain why or why not.

Answer: Socrates asks if it is right because God says it is right OR is it right because only because God
says it is. I believe this is a fantastic argument to put up against the Divine Command Theory. This gives
an idea on how to look at both sides without having too heavy of a “God” background.

E. Do you think the Divine Command Theory is a good theory of ethics or not? Why or why not? Defend
your answer with good reasons.

Answer: I believe that the Divine Command Theory is not a good theory of ethics because it basis your
own ethics off of your Gods ethics in your religion. When you base your ethics or morals based off of
another person’s, it is just like doing what the social norm is.

F. Read the case appearing in the "Critical Thought" box on page 10. Do you think that what Jack and
Lisa Nash did was morally permissible? In other words, did they do something immoral when they had a
child for the reasons they gave? Explain why or why not.

Answer: No, I do not believe what they did was wrong. Jack and Lisa we’re already wanting to have
another kid so that Molly would have a sibling. I believe that Jack and Lisa were just more convinced to
have that other kids when they found out about Molly. If Jack and Lisa had another kid, not only did the
other kid save their sisters life but they were brought to life because they wanted it to happen.

G. Further, can the doctrines or ideas of any religion (for example, Christianity, Islam, or Judaism) help us
evaluate the morality of what Jack and Lisa Nash did? Explain why or why not.

Answer: Yes, they can help people evaluate the morality of their decision. But at the end of the day,
everyone has their own opinion on matters such as this. Jack and Lisa are their own persons’ so what
they may believe to be morally correct may not be the same for us.