Ethics Moral Values Wolf

7/28/2019 Ethics Moral Values Wolf

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Ethics and Moral Values

Clark Wolf

Iowa State University


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Philosophical approaches to ethicalchoice and reflection


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The problems of philosophy involve questions in whichwe are all (or should all be) deeply interested at the

most basic level. They are important to us as we makedecisions about what to believe, and how to be criticalof our own naively held beliefs. Philosophicalinvestigation may help us to determine what kinds ofchoices we should make, and what kind of person to

be. It may help us to understand and justify our belief(or disbelief) in God. It may help us to form a rationallife plan, and to better understand our own motivesand fears. Philosophical questions are important to usas we try to understand what we are and to determine

our place in the scheme of things. And they areimportant to us as we try to choose right actions in acomplicated and difficult world, and to find meaning inour lives. These are not trivial projects.


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Identifying Ethics: Principles of ethics

should provide us guidance as we make

choices in a complicated world. Ideally, anaccount of ethics should help us to identify

moral principles and morally relevant features

of the choices we face.


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There is no simple recipe for ethicaldecision making. Philosophical and

religious theories about ethics do notremove our need (obligation?) toexercise deliberative judgment and to

evaluate alternative values that are atplay in concrete cases.


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Ethics: Ethical codes of conductinstruct us on what we ought or ought

not to do. Typical ethical theories orethical codes include basic principlesthat are intended to be used to guide

conduct.


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Values: Values underlie ethicalcodes. For any ethical code, we can

evaluate it by considering the valuesthat support it.


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Values and Wants: The things wewant are usually among the things we

value, but values and wants aredifferent. It is possible to want whatone does not value, and possible to

value what one does not want.


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Role of Religious Belief in Ethics: Forthose of us who have religious beliefs,

often these beliefs are intimately tied to ourvalues and to the ethical principles weaccept. But it would be a mistake tosuppose that ethical values are simply

religious valuesat least, the relationship ismore complex than people sometimesrealize.


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Any time says that we should do Xbecause it is what God wants us to do,

it is appropriate to consider thereasons we have for thinking that thisis what God wants. Once we ask this

question, were doing philosophy.


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Question: Are Ethical JudgmentsRelative, Subjective, and

Incomparable?


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Relative: Different people makedifferent judgments, and the

evaluative judgments people make arewholly relative to the values that theyhold.


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Subjective:Different people justhave different values, and there is no

way to argue or reason about theevaluative assumptions that lie behinddifferent ethical judgments or choices.

There are no evaluative facts in theway that there are facts about thephysical universe.


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Incomparable: There is no way tocompare the judgments of different

people, and no one's evaluativejudgments are any better than theevaluative judgments of anyone else.


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Claim: If it were true that ethicalvalues are all relative, subjective, and

incomparable, then talking aboutethics would be useless.

Why might one believe this?

Is it true?


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Claim: Because we have manyvalues in common, discussions in

ethics often involve appeals tocommonly shared values.


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Claim: Often discussions in ethicsinvolve appeals to values one believes

that others accept, or values onebelieves that others have reasontoaccept.


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Ethical argument and discussionrequires an informed and sympathetic

understanding of other peoples valuesand other peoples point of view. Weget no where if we simply preach our

own values without making an effortto understand others.


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One Form of Ethical Argument: Elicita value judgment by coming to an

understanding of some of the valuesanother person holds. Then showthat the value in question has

implications that are not consistentwith the persons actions.


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Example: Robert Nozick onVegetarianism. (Hand-out.)


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Ethical Arguments

Argument: A set of statements, someof which serve as premises, one of

which serves as a conclusion, wherethe premises are intended to provideevidencefor the conclusion.


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When presented with an argument,one may either

1) Accept the premises and theconclusion

2) Reject the premises

3) Argue (or show) that the conclusiondoes not follow from the premises.

Ethical Arguments


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An Example of an Ethical

Argument: Hand-out: Argument for Vegetarianism and

Limitations on Animal Testing

Do you accept the premises? If not, whichpremise do you reject or find questionable?

Does the conclusion follow from thepremises?


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Example: Peter Singer

1) Suffering and death from lack of food, shelter,and medical care are bad.

2) Singer's Principle: Two versions.

Version i) If it is in our power to preventsomething bad from happening, without therebysacrificing anything of comparable moralimportance, we ought, morally, to do it.

Version ii) If it is in our power to prevent somethingvery bad from happening, without therebysacrificing anything of moral significance, we ought,morally to do it.


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Example for Singers Principle: If I'mwalking past a shallow pond, and I see

a child drowning in it, I ought to wadein and pull the child out.

COST: Muddy Clothing. BENEFIT: Child's Life.


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Extending the Argument:Whenever we spend on ourselves or

our loved ones money we could use toaddress the more pressing moral issueof absolute poverty, we are violating

a moral principle that we accept.


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Notice that Singers argument is anappeal to our integrity. He is not

simply preaching his values andapplying them (perhapsinappropriately) to us.


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Basic and Derivative

Obligations When obligations can be derived from

others, the more basic obligations

have a kind of priority over thederived obligations.


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Basic and Derivative

Obligations Question: Is there an identifiable set

of fundamental obligations, such that

all our real obligations can be derivedfrom that set?


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Basic Values: The Josephson Proposal:

Trustworthiness

Respect Responsibility

Fairness

Caring Citizenship


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W.D. Rosss List of Prima Facie Duties:

1) Duties that rest on previous acts of my owna) Promises. b) Duty to rectify previous wrongs.

2) Duties that rest on previous acts of others (Duties

of gratitude).3) Duties of justice (Ross interprets this as a duty to

endeavor to bring the distribution of pleasure orhappiness in line with merit.)

4) Beneficence- Duty to benefit others.

5) Duty to improve one's own virtue or intelligence.

6) Duty not to injure others.


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Joel Feinbergs List of Basic Obligations:

1) Fidelity- Obligation to keep promises.

2) Veracity- Obligation to tell the truth, or (or better-- not to telllies).

3) Fair Play- Obligation not to exploit, cheat, or "free load" onothers

4) Gratitude- Obligation to return favors

5) Nonmaleficence- Obligation not to cause harm, pain orsuffering to others,6) Beneficence- Obligation to help others in distress, at least

when this involves no great danger to oneself or to thirdparties.

7) Reparation- Obligation to repair harms to others that areone's fault.

8) Obligation not to kill others (except in self-defense).9) Obligation not to deprive others of their property.10) Obligation to oppose injustices, at least when this involves no

great cost to oneself.11) Obligation to promote just institutions and to work toward

their establishment, maintenance, and improvement.


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Finding an appropriate list of basicobligations may seem like a

philosophers game. But the businessof making appropriate ethical decisionsis not a game. One practical goal of

such a list is that it may help us tomake appropriate decisions incomplicated circumstances.


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What more basic values are involved?

Helping out on your father-in-laws farm, youdiscover that he has ceased to use

appropriate environmental precautions. Hisplow patterns are leading to excessive soilerosion and excessive pesticide run-off.There is reason to believe that his unsafe

practices are significantly contributing togroundwater contamination, and thaterosion from his fields is


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Ethics and ethical decision making are notsimply the province of philosophers orethicists. Our choices reveal our values to

the world. These values are eitherunreflective and shallow, or reflective anddeep.

Philosophical deliberation should help us tomake our values and choices deep andthoughtful. Maybe this makes it more likelythat our choices will be the right ones.

Ethics Moral Values Wolf

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