ETHICS and RELIGION

Religion and Ethics

Can we be Ethical without being Religious?

 A longstanding debate has been whether ethics plays a role in religion.

Most religions have an ethical component. Ethics, which is a major
branch of philosophy, encompasses right conduct and good life. It is
significantly broader than the common conception of analyzing right
and wrong. Ethics deals with ideas such as Right, Good and Duty and
these concepts were discussed in ancient Greece by Plato and Aristotle
in the 3rd & 4th Century BCE.

Reference: Blog posted by Steven Mintz, aka Ethics Sage, on September 4, 2012
 Religion and Ethics
 The influential philosopher, Immanuel Kant defended the idea of God as a
basic requirement of ethics. We ought to be virtuous and do our duty, he
said. Kant believed virtue should be rewarded by happiness, and it would
be intolerable if it were not so. Since it's clear that virtue often does go
unrewarded in the present life, Kant argued that the soul must be
immortal.

 Virtue must receive its due recompense in a future life, and there must be a
God guaranteeing that it is so rewarded. The existence of God and the
immortality of the soul were what Kant called the postulates of practical
reason - the assumptions without which, so he claimed, ethics and a moral
life would not be possible.

Reference: Blog posted by Steven Mintz, aka Ethics Sage, on September 4, 2012
 Religion and Ethics
 Further, some of our most basic moral sentiments are directly connected
to religious ideology.  For example, most people agree that things like
murder and adultery are always wrong, regardless of circumstances.  Most
major world religions echo these sentiments, and it can be argued that the
ancient codes of conduct these traditions embody are actually the original
source of our social intuitions.  At a minimum, we do seem to regard
religion as a good source of basic moral guidance, making it unwise to
argue that there ought to be no connection between religion and ethics.
 The link between religion and morality is best illustrated by the Golden
Rule.  Virtually all of the world’s great religions contain in their religious
texts some version of the Golden Rule: “Do unto others as you would wish
them do unto you”. In other words, we should treat others the way we
would want to be treated. This is the basic ethic that guides all religions. If
we do so, happiness will ensue.  
Reference: Blog posted by Steven Mintz, aka Ethics Sage, on September 4, 2012
Globalization and Pluralism:
New Challenges to Ethics
 Globalization and Pluralism:
New Challenges to Ethics

What Is Globalization?
Globalization is a process of interaction and integration among the people,
companies, and governments of different nations, a process driven by international
trade and investment and aided by information technology. This process has
effects on the environment, on culture, on political systems, on economic
development and prosperity, and on human physical well-being in societies
around the world.

What is Cultural Pluralism?

Cultural Pluralism can be defined as an arrangement in a society where multiple
smaller cultures assimilate in mainstream society but also maintain their cultural
uniqueness without being homogenised by the dominant culture.

References: www.globalization101.org/what-is-globalization
www.sociologygroup.com/cultural-pluralism
 Globalization and Its Ethical Challenges
Globalization poses four major challenges that will have to be addressed by
governments, civil society, and other policy actors.

• One is to ensure that the benefits of globalization extend to all countries.

That will certainly not happen automatically.

• The second is to deal with the fear that globalization leads to instability,
which is particularly marked in the developing world.

• The third challenge is to address the very real fear in the industrial world
that increased global competition will lead inexorably to a race to the
bottom in wages, labor rights, employment practices, and the environment.

• And finally, globalization and all of the complicated problems related to it

must not be used as excuses to avoid searching for new ways to cooperate in
the overall interest of countries and people.
Reference: Challenges of Globalization, Human Rights Dialogue 1.11 (Summer 1998)
"Toward a "Social Foreign Policy" with Asia"
Millenials and Filinnials :
Ethical Challenges and
Responses
 Milennials and Filinnials:
Ethical Challenges and Responses

 The term Millennials generally refers to the generation of people born

between the early 1980s and 1990s, according to the Merriam-Webster
Dictionary. Some people also include children born in the early 2000s. 

 The Millennial Generation is also known as Generation Y, because it

comes after Generation X — those people between the early 1960s and
the 1980s. The publication Ad Age was one of the first to coin the term
"Generation Y," in an editorial in August 1993. But the term didn't age
well, and "Millennials" has largely overtaken it. But the terms basically
mean the same thing. 

Reference: https://www.livescience.com/38061-millennials-generation-y.htm l
 Milennials and Filinnials:
Ethical Challenges and Responses

Millennials characteristics

A story in Time magazine said polls show that Millennials "want

flexible work schedules, more 'me time' on the job, and nearly nonstop
feedback and career advice from managers." Another Time story in May
2013, titled "The Me Me Me Generation," begins: "They're narcissistic.
They're lazy. They're coddled. They're even a bit delusional. Those
aren't just unfounded negative stereotypes about 80 million Americans
born roughly between 1980 and 2000. They're backed up by a decade of
sociological research." The article also points out that Millennials may
be simply adapting quickly to a world undergoing rapid technological
change.

Reference: https://www.livescience.com/38061-millennials-generation-y.html
 Milennials and Filinnials:
Ethical Challenges and Responses

Millennials characteristics

A 2012 study found Millennials to be "more civically and politically

disengaged, more focused on materialistic values, and less concerned
about helping the larger community than were GenX (born 1962-1981)
and Baby Boomers (born 1946 to about 1961) at the same ages,"
according to USA Today. "The trend is more of an emphasis on extrinsic
values such as money, fame, and image, and less emphasis on intrinsic
values such as self-acceptance, group affiliation and community." The
study was based on an analysis of two large databases of 9 million high
school seniors or entering college students.

Reference: https://www.livescience.com/38061-millennials-generation-y.html
 Milennials and Filinnials:
Ethical Challenges and Responses

Generation Me

There is a spirited, if not tiresome, debate about whether Millennials

are self-entitled narcissists or open-minded do-gooders; surely the
truth lies somewhere in-between. Generally, however, there does seem
to be more of an emphasis on the self than in previous generations, one
reason why this group has been called Generation Me. Research
presented at the 2016 annual meeting of the Society for Personality and
Social Psychology (SPSP) in San Diego found that Millennials
themselves do believe that they are more narcissistic that previous
generations, but they don't like it. Also, the uptick in narcissism is only
very slight when compared with other generations. 

Reference: https://www.livescience.com/38061-millennials-generation-y.html
 Milennials and Filinnials:
Ethical Challenges and Responses

ACTIVITY
(Submit your answers to my e-mail address:
harvey_islan@yahoo.com) not later that May 16, 2020.

Questions:
1. What are the issues that cause moral friction between
Millenials/Filinnials and their parents?
2. How should we resolve the friction? Who is right?