ETHICS

What is Ethics?
• Ethics is a set of moral principles and values
that we use to answer questions of right and
wrong.
• Ethics can also be defined as the general
nature of morals and of the moral choices
made by individuals in their relationship with
others.
 What is Ethics?
• Today, we think of ethics in pragmatic terms – our
choices are based on what seems reasonable or
logical to us according to our personal value
system. This is called Ethical Relativism.
• The very concept of Ethics suggests that there is a
real distinction between good or bad.
• It is our obligation to do our best and what is right.
Morality and Other Phases of Human Life
1.Ethics and Education – Education develops
the whole man: his moral, intellectual and
physical capacities. “All schools should
develop good moral character, personal
discipline, civic consciousness, etc.
Morality and Other Phases of Human Life
2. Morality and Law – Morality and law are
intimately related. Right and wrong, good and bad
in human action presupposes a law or rule of
conduct.
 Morally guilty – a man may commit a thousand
murders in his mind or a thousand adulteries in his
desires, yet legally, he is not criminally liable or guilty.
Morality and Other Phases of Human Life
3. Ethics and Art – ethics stands for moral
goodness; art for beauty.
 Evil always implies ugliness or defects and the
good is always beautiful since it is the very
object of desire.
Morality and Other Phases of Human Life
4. Ethics and Politics - politics aims at good
government for the temporal welfare of the
citizens.
 Politics has often become very dirty and the
reason is precisely because it is divorced from
ethics.
Morality and Other Phases of Human Life
5. Religion and Ethics – True ethics can
never be separated from God.
 Ethics implies morality and morality presupposes
a distinction between right and wrong in human
actions.
 The Importance of Ethics
1. Ethics means right living and good moral
character; and it is in good moral character that
man finds his true worth and perfection.
2. Education is the harmonious development of the
whole man – of all man’s faculties: the moral,
intellectual and physical powers in a man.
3. According to Socrates, “the unexamined life is not
worth living for man.”
 Fundamental Concepts of Ethics
• MORALITY – refers to the quality of goodness or
badness in a human act.

• Norm of Morality – this is the distinction between right

or wrong in the case of human acts. Norm of Morality
means:
– The standard of right and wrong in human acts.
– The reason why certain acts are morally right and why
certain actions are wrong
 Fundamental Concepts of Ethics
• Human Acts
– The (free) voluntary acts of man.
– Acts done with knowledge and consent
– Acts which are proper to man as man; because, of all
animals, he alone has knowledge and freedom of will.
– Acts which, we are conscious, are under our control and for
which we are responsible.
– Human acts are those of which man is master, which he has
the power of doing or not doing as he pleases.
 Voluntariness and Responsibility
• The fundamental concepts of ethics, morality,
human acts, responsibility, rewards or punishment
are intimately related to each other. All these
concepts presuppose freedom of choice in man,
or voluntariness.
1. Relation between voluntariness and Ethics –
Ethics studies human acts, and human acts, to be
human, must be voluntary.
 Voluntariness and Responsibility
2. Between morality and voluntariness – only
voluntary acts have a moral bearing.
3. Human act and voluntariness – we have shown
that human acts are the free acts of man.
4. Responsibility and voluntariness – there can
be responsibility only if there is knowledge and
consent; and consent means voluntariness.
 Voluntariness and Responsibility
5. Punishment – it is absurd and most
cruel to punish anyone who acted because
of pure necessity, for doing what he could
not do otherwise.
–Unless there is voluntariness, there can be no
responsibility, and without responsibility,
punishment is meaningless.
 Moral and Normal
• Moral is distinguished from normal in that the
latter refers to a physical or psychological
standard and has no reference to moral
rectitude.
–A perfectly normal person can be very immoral
in his life, whereas an abnormal person can be
very moral in his acts and live in accordance
with the moral law.
 Immoral and Amoral
• Immoral is the contradictory of moral. It
means contrary to, or violative of, the rules of
right conduct. Amoral means morally
indifferent, i.e., it is neither good nor bad, in
itself.
 The Moral Principle Involved in
Actions Having Two Effects
• “Should a man be restrained from saving his
honor because the reputation of a high
government official will be destroyed from the
disclosures he has to make in his defense?”
• “Was it morally right to drop the atomic bomb
which would shorten the war, but which would
destroy thousand & thousand of innocent lives?”
 The Moral Principle Involved in
Actions Having Two Effects
• The answer to these questions is yes, but under
the following conditions:
–The act in itself should be good, or at least morally
indifferent
• “The end does not justify the means.” We should not
employ bad means even in order to attain a good end. We
may not do evil that good may result.
 The Moral Principle Involved in
Actions Having Two Effects
• The answer to these questions is yes, but under
the following conditions:
–The evil effect should not be directly intended, but
morally allowed to happen as a regrettable side issue.
• If the evil be directly intended, the act would be don for the
sake of evil, and this is forbidden by the moral law.
 The Moral Principle Involved in
Actions Having Two Effects
• The answer to these questions is yes, but under
the following conditions:
–There should be a reason sufficiently grave in
doing the act
–That the evil effect should not outweigh the good
effect.