Morality and Ethics: Help me Study Philosophy

[wishbone]

For those that love philosophy, i'm expecting you to flock to this thread. I've got a final on Friday regarding ethics and morality.

This semester we've covered Plato, Hobbes, Rawls, Quinn, Bentham, Mill, Hare, Kant, Harman, Nietzsche, and Kant.

So I ask, for those that know the morality and ethical approaches each one of them takes (or at least one of them), post up saying whether you agree or disagree and why...therefore I can jump in with a discussion as having reason to spark my brain for debating.

I'll start off with stating that Hare provides the best morality to follow. Utilitarianism is crucial for humanity to exist and thrive, and Hare's exact take allows agent relativism to occur in extreme situations...what more can you want?

edit:
I'm appealing to maybe the 4 people on fnk that can do this.

[Leviathan]

To me the point of an ethics course was to give you the different frameworks and models available to use as tools for decision making. In other words I have a hard time confining myself to one framework. I think every situation calls for the use of different models.

I find myself to be quite utilitarian as well but it never stops me from taking universality or ethics of care etc into account.

[djmarkpaul]

Originally Posted by wishbone

For those that love philosophy, i'm expecting you to flock to this thread. I've got a final on Friday regarding ethics and morality.

This semester we've covered Plato, Hobbes, Rawls, Quinn, Bentham, Mill, Hare, Kant, Harman, Nietzsche, and Kant.

So I ask, for those that know the morality and ethical approaches each one of them takes (or at least one of them), post up saying whether you agree or disagree and why...therefore I can jump in with a discussion as having reason to spark my brain for debating.

I'll start off with stating that Hare provides the best morality to follow. Utilitarianism is crucial for humanity to exist and thrive, and Hare's exact take allows agent relativism to occur in extreme situations...what more can you want?

edit:
I'm appealing to maybe the 4 people on fnk that can do this.

1 of those 4 is Decypher........enter stage left////

[apri_peel]

i thought i'd be able to throw something in from aristotle's ethics, but he's not on the list :D he's the closest one to the topic i've read in humanities this semester.

i would recommend wikipedia to spark some thoughts in you. i refer to it a lot when i need some inspiration, especially on tricky topics like this one.

anyone wanna help me study for humanities? i need some ideas for my essay on charles taylor's three malaises, in particular, his critique of individuality.

[glorywithheld*]

I took Phil 230 this summer (Moral theory) and covered a few of these ppl this semester in other philosophy courses:

-Plato: is always my favourite, even though I am not sure how realistic his ideas are in our modern day world. Plato dealt with the "big four": justice, holiness, courage and moderation. This, he felt, made up goodness or wisdom. I'm not sure which writings you need to study of his, I studied the ones which dealt with Socrates’ trial and death, as well as the Laches, which deals with defining courage. Plato felt that if something was real (as he felt these four virtues were) they are able to be defined. His dialogues deal with questioning people about things they have not really before considered, though they claim to know it already. He also states that one must always be just and a just man can never be harmed, he can only harm himself- his psyche or soul. Plato feels we need to focus on remembering how to be "gold souls" as Anaximader explains (in the Pre-Socratics).

-Hobbes: of course deals with the Social Contract. He does not believe that people owe each other anything, unless they are bound by this contract. Thus I could steal, kill, etc, and it would not be wrong, since I have the right to act out of self interest in order to survive. This is called the state of nature. There are laws of nature, which, if followed will lead one to naturally consider forming a social contract, since it is in our best interest.

-Kant: I find him very difficult! he believes that a supreme principle of morality exists, and he is searching for this. Principle of Humanity: treat every person as ends and never as a means (to attaining something else) He considers what it is that makes a will good, and he believes that it is when our maxim is right. Our human nature tends not to act in accordance with moral law, so therefore we need laws, recognized by reason and applicable to rational beings.

-Mill: Utilitarianism: seems at first to make sense, ie. the best possible outcome for the greatest amount of people, but then when you really consider all that this implies: suppose there are three men who are dying, and all need a different human organ. You happen to walk by them in the hospital, having all of these 3 organs. According to this, the doctor could "cut you up" and save these three, three is greater than one. Bizarre but it follows from the argument. For this to work limitations would have to be put on it, and also what exactly does "best possible outcome" mean?

-Nietzsche: more of a critic, he does not come up with any real solutions. He sees the essence of morality as selflessness

sorry if this isn’t exactly what you are looking for. I am actually supposed to be studying for a philosophy exam myself, 17th century and then Logic. thank god for study breaks! good luck

[decypher]

Originally Posted by wishbone

I'll start off with stating that Hare provides the best morality to follow. Utilitarianism is crucial for humanity to exist and thrive, and Hare's exact take allows agent relativism to occur in extreme situations...what more can you want?

I haven't read hare before but,

By extreme conditions do you mean when reduced to our natural instruments or the "state of nature" ?

So you are saying that the best set of morals to follow is that which is consequentialist in nature? An action is good or right if and only if the act maximizes good. With allowing agent relativism, in the state of nature, our morality is relative to our desires. (mill, bentham, etc)

If agent relativism takes place in the state of nature with Hobbes' "man in motion" maximizing his utility and felicity then the inherent need for self-preservation leads us into political institution (for security).

Our morality is ruled by our judgements of pleasure and pain. Aversion of death is what pushes us into the body politick (social contract theory.) So no our morality is not relative but instead governed by the laws of nature. No moral considerations are allowed in "extreme situations." (Hobbes)

Hare says that a moral action has to be universal and prescriptive, kant's categorical imperative, a universal moral principle which all obligations derive from. Hare's "Universal prescriptivism," as i read was his idea of Utilitarianism, suggests we must take into all these universal considerations including the other persons viewpoint and psychological perspective.

But what does this say for convention? Morality cannot be universal and it cannot be prescriptive because you cannot make a moral maxim a universal law. (hume) Obligation is inept in the state of nature and in society is only enforced through deterrent. Hume says that you cannot make prescriptive statements of what ought to be from what is.

Utilitarian morality gauges desirability on the basis of it's outcomes. Looking purely to outcomes. What is good is best for the greatest amount of people (Mill, Bentham). The problem with this can be seen with, say, Witch Hunting. The greater good comes for the community by burning a witch but this says nothing for justice. Those sort of considerations should not depend on what people believe ontologically.

So Utilitarianism is not the best way for humanity to exist because it is muddied with plurality. It does not give way to relativism in extreme conditions because of the laws of nature.








or something like that.

[wishbone]

Originally Posted by glorywithheld*

-Hobbes: of course deals with the Social Contract. He does not believe that people owe each other anything, unless they are bound by this contract. Thus I could steal, kill, etc, and it would not be wrong, since I have the right to act out of self interest in order to survive. This is called the state of nature. There are laws of nature, which, if followed will lead one to naturally consider forming a social contract, since it is in our best interest.

See and of course Hobbes also states we need an absolute sovereign and basically submit ourselves to the state. Prisoner's Dilemma and all that jazz.

[quote=glorywithheld*;1765242]
-Kant: I find him very difficult! he believes that a supreme principle of morality exists, and he is searching for this. Principle of Humanity: treat every person as ends and never as a means (to attaining something else) He considers what it is that makes a will good, and he believes that it is when our maxim is right. Our human nature tends not to act in accordance with moral law, so therefore we need laws, recognized by reason and applicable to rational beings.
/quote]
Basically I just need to be able to apply the categorical imperative, debunk it, support it, whatever. And yes, the whole treat every person as ends and never as means is alllll Kant.

Originally Posted by glorywithheld*

-Mill: Utilitarianism: seems at first to make sense, ie. the best possible outcome for the greatest amount of people, but then when you really consider all that this implies: suppose there are three men who are dying, and all need a different human organ. You happen to walk by them in the hospital, having all of these 3 organs. According to this, the doctor could "cut you up" and save these three, three is greater than one. Bizarre but it follows from the argument. For this to work limitations would have to be put on it, and also what exactly does "best possible outcome" mean?

See when you say it makes sense, then describe direct act utilitarianism, you're basically exposing Mill's flaws and why nobody would follow it. Hare allows you to reject the standard of right if your intuition disagreees with it. ie: that person that wanders by the hospital, and would save 3 people, without using intuition you won't consider if that person is a long-time humanitarian that has done more good than those any 3, for example. Hare allows us to reject or at least for the mean time reject the standard of right in light of giving critical analysis. Thus, Hare's indirect utilitarianism rocks :D

Originally Posted by glorywithheld*

-Nietzsche: more of a critic, he does not come up with any real solutions. He sees the essence of morality as selflessness

Aand I don't like Nietzsche because he seems to just be giving egotistical people justification in being selfish and brutish.

[wishbone]

Originally Posted by decypher

I haven't read hare before but,

By extreme conditions do you mean when reduced to our natural instruments or the "state of nature" ?

So you are saying that the best set of morals to follow is that which is consequentialist in nature? An action is good or right if and only if the act maximizes good. With allowing agent relativism, in the state of nature, our morality is relative to our desires. (mill, bentham, etc)

If agent relativism takes place in the state of nature with Hobbes' "man in motion" maximizing his utility and felicity then the inherent need for self-preservation leads us into political institution (for security).

Our morality is ruled by our judgements of pleasure and pain. Aversion of death is what pushes us into the body politick (social contract theory.) So no our morality is not relative but instead governed by the laws of nature. No moral considerations are allowed in "extreme situations." (Hobbes)

Hare says that a moral action has to be universal and prescriptive, kant's categorical imperative, a universal moral principle which all obligations derive from. Hare's "Universal prescriptivism," as i read was his idea of Utilitarianism, suggests we must take into all these universal considerations including the other persons viewpoint and psychological perspective.

But what does this say for convention? Morality cannot be universal and it cannot be prescriptive because you cannot make a moral maxim a universal law. (hume) Obligation is inept in the state of nature and in society is only enforced through deterrent. Hume says that you cannot make prescriptive statements of what ought to be from what is.

Utilitarian morality gauges desirability on the basis of it's outcomes. Looking purely to outcomes. What is good is best for the greatest amount of people (Mill, Bentham). The problem with this can be seen with, say, Witch Hunting. The greater good comes for the community by burning a witch but this says nothing for justice. Those sort of considerations should not depend on what people believe ontologically.

So Utilitarianism is not the best way for humanity to exist because it is muddied with plurality. It does not give way to relativism in extreme conditions because of the laws of nature.








or something like that.

haha and it's people like you why I won't take another philosophy course :p I can follow what you said.....I don't fully agree with you, but I can't properly defend my standpoint :( But maybe I can try (and look forward to being intellectually shot down)....

In your Witch Hunting example, you mean that of course everyone else is goinng to be happy that the witch was burned, but because the 'witch' wasn't given a fair trial that justice wasn't truly served? Therefore it was an immoral action?

I think Hare works around that, though... Hare defends an indirect act utilitarian theory that permits individuals to deliberate (at the “intuitive level” or commonsense level) using settled character traits (or virtues I guess) and prima facie principles; the relevant character traits are themselves evaluated from act utilitarian standards during “critical thinking”. Critical thinking also resolves conflicts between principles.
This indirect theory that distinguishes b/n intuitive and critical thinking contrasts this with “crude act utilitarianism” (by which Hare means direct act utilitarianism).

OK so you're going to come at it from a more Kantian standpoint where we can't use people as means to ends, then we can't kill the witch to make others happy (or Gladiator Sports would have been another applicable example? Kill the Christian, entertain the crowd?). If we use intuition as Hare allows us, we should have the intuition that murder is wrong (a standard defense of Hare) however in the face of the intuition towards 'witches should be killed', that agreeably doesn't hold up too well.

However with critical thinking, we could bring in the idea that there really are no witches, therefore we wouldn't kill the witch, and everyone else (assuming they use critical thinking [or science in this case] ) would not put us in this situation.

Hare also allows us to reject counterexamples on the mere idea that they are only logically possible; the fact that they will almost guaranteably never happen makes them worthless in debunking the defense for indirect utilitarianism.


Go easy on me, I'm in the middle of studying bullshit accounting when I'd rather get totally wrapped up in this lol. Point out my flaws!

[Bobby_T]

Looking at ethics and morality from the perspective of naturalism is so wrong. Arguements such as the greatest good for the greatest number are flawed by thier assumption of direct cause and effect and the seperation of humans from the environament and each other. IMO

Once you realise that humans part way along in an evolutionary chain and are all part of one larger conciousness then the motivation to act ethically and morally becomes clear. If we are to evolve (not in the monkey to man sense but in the higher state of consiouness sense) then those things such as the search for truth are the next step.

There is no gain to be had from acting unethically because you are only acting that way towards yourself. (No matter if it affects other people, we are all one therefore you are affecting yourself)

Of course most aren't able to understand this so we still have those that act against thier fellow man. But the balanced polarities of this universe help us to slowly inch along in this age.