ETHICS

Morality

4
 What is Morality?
Pertains to the rightness or wrongfulness of an act and what
is the basis of the judge concerned. These are ethical
questions that up to this time, baffled sages and persons
alike and remain unanswered.
 
Morality refers to the set of standards that enable people to
live cooperatively in groups. It’s what societies determine to
be “right” and “acceptable.”
How Morals Are Established?
Morality isn’t fixed. What’s considered acceptable in
your culture might not be acceptable in another
culture. Geographical regions, religion, family, and life
experiences all influence morals.
 
Scholars don’t agree on exactly how morals are
developed. However, there are several theories that
have gained attention over the years.
Theories of Moral Development

Freud’s morality and the superego:

Sigmund Freud suggested that moral development

occurred as a person’s ability to set aside their selfish
needs was replaced by important socializing agents'
values.
Piaget’s theory of moral development
Jean Piaget focused on the social-cognitive and
social-emotional perspective of development.
Piaget theorized that moral development unfolds over
time, in certain stages as children learn to adopt
certain moral behaviors for their own sake—rather
than just abide by moral codes because they don’t
want to get into trouble.
He developed two phases of moral development, one
common among children and the other common
among adults.
Piaget’s theory of moral development
Phase/Stage
This phase, more common among
children, is characterized by the
idea that rules come from
authority figures in one’s life,
such as parents, teachers, and
God.

Heteronomous Phase This absolutism in moral

development is seen in children’s
play from the age of 5, where
they exhibit a blind belief in the
rules and ideas of right and
wrong passed to them by their
elders.
Piaget’s theory of moral development
Phase/Stage
This phase is more common after
one has matured and is no longer
a child. In this phase, people
begin to view the intentions
behind actions as more important
than their consequences.

Autonomous Phase This phase also includes the idea

that people have different morals
and that morality is not
necessarily universal.

People in the Autonomous Phase

also believe rules may be broken
under certain circumstances.
B.F. Skinner’s behavioral theory:

B.F. Skinner focused on the power of external forces

that shaped an individual’s development.
Learning is a process of ‘conditioning’ in an
environment of stimulus, reward and punishment.
Explain the difference between formal and informal
learning.
Kohlberg’s moral reasoning

Lawrence Kohlberg proposed six stages of moral

development that went beyond Piaget’s theory. Through a
series of questions, Kohlberg proposed that an adult’s
stage of reasoning could be identified.
 
Using a stage model similar to Piaget’s, Kohlberg
proposed three levels, with six stages, of moral
development. Individuals experience the stages
universally and in sequence as they form beliefs about
justice.
He named the levels simply: (1) preconventional, (2)
conventional, and (3)post-conventional.
Kohlberg’s moral reasoning
The Norms of Morality
Man acts in accordance to his nature
Human nature quantify as justification as to why an act be
it good or bad is performed.
The morality of man follows a proximate norm and an
ultimate norm
The Norms of Morality
Proximate Norm

Is immediately applicable to the acts

The proximate norm there is to follow human nature
which is the low end of a human being.

Example:
The stimulus of hunger based on proximate norm
simply means to eat the food regardless as to
whether it is for somebody else, spoilt or poisonous
The Norms of Morality

Ultimate Norm
Follow divine nature which are decisions that are
based on morality.

Example:
If man decides to study the situation by not initially
grabbing the “opportunity”, then he acted in
relation to the ultimate norm.
Defective Norms of Morality
1. Hedonism
2. Utilitarianism
a. Individual utilitarianism
b. Social utilitarianism
3. Moral Rationalism
4. Moral Positivism
5. Moral Evolutionism
6. Moral Sense
7. Communism
Defective Norms of Morality

Hedonism
 The Philosophy of Pleasure that pleasure alone is
the primary purpose of man’s existence.
 “The maximization of pleasure and minimization of
pain” motivate human behavior.
 Is an ethical theory that holds that the supreme end
of man consists in the acquisition of pleasure.
Morality is grounded on the pleasure or satisfaction that
an act brings or entails.
• The good action is the pleasant action.
• The bad action is that which produces pain or
unhappiness.
Defective Norms of Morality
Utilitarianism

It is an ethical theory founded by Jeremy Bentham

and developed and popularized by John Stuart Mill.
The ends of an action must be good, if it is not then
the action is unjustified.
From the word “utility” adheres to the belief that: an
act is good or right if it promotes happiness, and bad
or immoral if it is tends to produce pain.
Defective Norms of Morality
Utilitarianism

Types of Utilitarianism

1. Individual utilitarianism -known as egoism/egoistic

utilitarianism
An ethical theory holding that the good is based on the
pursuit of self-interest. 

2. Social utilitarianism - known as altruism/altruistic

utilitarianism
Refers to a quality possessed by people whose focus is on
something other than themselves, and its root reveals the
object of those generous tendencies. 
Defective Norms of Morality
Defects (Hedonism and Utilitarianism)

a. Both propose an earthly goal for man, that is, the

temporal welfare here on earth.
b. Both make or tend to make morality relative.
c. Both theories make morality extrinsic because they make
it depend on the effect or on a concomitant factor of an
act.
d. Satisfaction/pleasure may indicate and accompany the
doing of a good act; but the act is good not because it
brings satisfaction, but rather, it brings satisfaction
because it is good
Defective Norms of Morality
Moral Rationalism
Human reason is the only foundation of morality by
German Philosopher Immanuel Kant which he dubbed
as “Categorical Imperative”.
People have to do good because we ought to be good
in doing so he is implying blind obedience.
In his philosophy “autonomy of reason”, inasmuch as
reason creates the law, it is “reasonable” for men to
obey it without question nor ambiguity.
Defective Norms of Morality
Moral Rationalism

Moral Rationalism Is the theory that maintains that all

knowledge and all truths are derived from human reason.

Why we must do good?

We must do good because we must, it is our duty to

obey unconditionally without questioning (Principle of
Deontology).
Defective Norms of Morality
Moral Rationalism

Defect
a. Based on Heteronomy of Reason
Defective Norms of Morality
Moral Positivism

States that morality is adherence to State Laws as

philosophized by the English sage Thomas Hobbes.
The State is the foundation of morality since laws are
geared for the common good apparently, an act is moral it
obeys the law and evil if he disobeys it.
This theory holds that the basis/source of all moral laws is
the laws of the State.
Defective Norms of Morality
Moral Positivism

Defects
a. It makes morality relative.
b. It reverses the natural order of things.
Defective Norms of Morality
Moral Evolutionism

Friedrich Nietsche added that man was born with hardly

any basis for right and wrong and their collective lives is a
never-ending struggle for change until they reach
perfection.

He was convinced that traditional values represented a

“slave morality,
a morality created by weak and resentful individuals
who encouraged such behavior as gentleness and
kindness because the behavior served their interests.
Defective Norms of Morality
Moral Evolutionism

Nietzsche, developed the idea of the “Superman/Overman”.

Superman/Overman

an individual who overcame the slave morality of

traditional values, and lived according to his own
values/morality.
Defective Norms of Morality
Moral Sense

Men are born with a special moral sense (not reason)

that is comparable to the five senses.
For example, man can easily differentiate noise
from music, salty from sweet as well as pleasant
and unpleasant that may also serve as means to
moral judgment.
Is an ethical theory that holds that man is endowed
with a special moral sense (other than reason) by
virtue of which man distinguishes between right
and wrong.
Defective Norms of Morality
Moral Sense

Defect
a. It makes morality relative.
Defective Norms of Morality
Communism
Although this is more of an economic theory its
social implication cannot be denied and is geared
for a classless society.
They believed in the philosophy of material
dialectics.
This is founded on theory of change, evolution
and revolution.
According to this theory, what only matters is the reality. It
logically follows:

a. The denial of the existence of God since God is a

spirit and nothing exists but the materials.
b. The denial of the freedom of the will of man, since
matter the sole existent reality
c. The denial of immorality
Defective Norms of Morality
Communism
Defect
a. It is vitiated with the fallacy of exclusiveness and
misproportion.

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