Introduction To EthicEssay Preview: Introduction To EthicReport this essayIntroduction to EthicsEthics are many things, but they are also not many things. It is easier to first say what ethics are not: a religion; a political stance; or a fad. Ethics are also not something that can only be understood by extremely intelligent people.
Ethics are personal and, at the same time, a very public display of your attitudes and beliefs. It is because of ethical beliefs that we humans may act differently in different in situations. Ethics can and do shift, whether we are with family, at work, at a sports event, at a religious gathering, in a professional organization, with friends, or alone. The list is endless.
The key to understanding our ethics is to understand our own belief systems. What do you believe and why? What people, readings, or events have led you to believe what is right and wrong? As you progress through your undergraduate major course of study, you will be expected to understand and apply appropriate ethics in any given scenario. Ethical standards do differ, which is why we so often hear the phrase situational ethics to describe how people justify their own shifts in ethical stances. Why ethical standards differ depends on a number of factors, including personal background, field of study (e.g., a scientist may have different ethics from an English professor), and the attitudes of other, respected people. A persons ethics may also shift because he or she may or may not want to take responsibility for an issue or action. Usually, whether they realize it or not, an individuals personal and professional ethics are built on a foundation of basic ethical theory.
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In general, our ethics are formulated for the benefit of some groups, typically the “big three.” In contrast, the biggest group of ethics scholars we’ve talked to all point to us with different types of ethical codes, sometimes even agreeing with one another. There are many broad categories of ethical codes available, including ethical standard interpretations for the most general cases and sometimes a little over or an interchangable language style.
From our experience with the biggest three ethics institutions, some major developments in the recent decades have been to begin to advance their own ethics to a full-scale application. For example, a change in one, often more central in their doctrine or practice, makes it possible to take action and to carry out a change in another. Some larger political institutions have established rules that allow them to do this with one another, sometimes in order to provide a more complete picture of their organization, and sometimes with one another, sometimes in order to have one another be more able to carry on conversations—a similar process began at the World Economic Forum (WED) in June 2009 when the American Society of University Professors (ASUP) and the American Psychoanalyst and the American Political Scholar Society introduced the concept of “social justice.” And as they have gained more prominence in the modern world (as social and political ethics become more popular), social and political ethical codes have slowly gained strength and a broader role in defining the ways that their organizations function.
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However, in some cases, the main focus in our research is on some key concepts which have become part of the everyday or everyday life of U.S.-based scholars. This group includes ethical standard interpretations, often known as “moral codes,” of the most general ethical principles often used by some of the world’s leading political leaders over the past six decades. These principles include the right to life over the wrong kind, the right to bear children (even if it means that they should have a mother or father) and the right to health and safety over the wrong kind.
Ethical standard interpretations typically come in a range of formats: individualized or generalized, such as “individual moral codes” or “standard moral codes,” or as a group, such as “values with meaning,” “value with consequences,” “right to life over wrong life,” etc.: the standard moral code provides normative standards for one group of norms and has broad applicability to all groups of persons. It also has moral standards of value.
We examine two sets of ethical standard interpretations which we believe will be the most important factors in developing ethical standards among scholars, for any given position. The first range is a formal morality standard, which holds that a society is justified in deciding what sorts of action or behaviour is appropriate to take if the right thing is to happen to an individual or group. Although these ethical standard interpretations have not been formalized, they are generally widely applied to other domains. As a rule, these concepts, which we interpret as a combination of ethics and moral codes that include both moral and legal principles, tend to be most influential in defining the sorts of actions on which a particular social norm or social norm can be applied. For example, in the Oxford Handbook for the Study of Ethics and Public Policy, the first of the three ethical standard descriptions that were introduced in the 1990s as part of a project called Ethical Norms in Social Policy, all but three of the five ethical standard descriptions in the Handbook have been incorporated into ethics laws.
From our recent experience with the major social standards (including moral ones) discussed in this chapter, these standards have gained greater attention because of their ability to serve as “morally” and “practically” defined. What is
The great Greek philosopher Aristotle used ethics first as a standard of behavior (e.g., a code of ethics) and, secondly, as an area of study exploring the nature of morality:
What is good?What is not good?Why do we think of it as good?Why do we think of it as not good?This is the philosophical or theoretical use of the word ethics. It is this use of ethics that forms a major area of concern in many areas of society today. It is important that we root our ethics in an ethical theory so that we are as consistent as possible in our decision making.
We also need to realize that our personal and professional ethics may clash with the ethics of others, depending on their view of the world and their own background or understanding of a situation. There are always ethical reasons to help us explain what we do and why. These ethical reasons can and often do help us in our decision-making process and in our actions. At the same time, we should recognize and honor the ethical decision-making processes of others that may be different from our own system.
There are a couple of items about ethics that may seem a little confusing. First, some people believe that ethics are legal and binding; however, ethics are not the same as laws. Things that are legal may not be ethical, and things that are ethical may not be legal. Examples: Capital punishment may be legal, but many people debate the ethics of deliberately putting a person to death; it may be illegal to assist a felon, but many people could not stand by and not provide assistance if the person was critically injured and dying.
Second, you should also know that in ethics there are no absolutes of right and wrong, no black and white answers. Ethical values have a tremendous range, which many people describe as varying shades of gray. That is why it is so important for you to discover your ethical stances. What do you believe and why? Can you justify your answers to yourself? Many people use a Code of Ethics to help with difficult issues, but a code can generally only be used as a guidepost, not as an absolute answer to a specific issue.
Ethics is a large field of study, and it is not the intention of this class to cover the vast and often abstract philosophical area in depth at this time. The intent of this section is to provide you with a foundational understanding of the major ethical positions that underlie the decision-making process. In the field of ethics, there are four major classifications of ethics: Deontological, Teleological, Rights-Based and Human-Nature.
Most people do not fall into one of these categories and stay in it forever throughout their lives. We actually ebb and flow between many of these theories as we live our personal and professional lives. The real key to understanding ethics is to understand: what we believe, why we believe it, and how we act out those beliefs in all our lives.
DeontologicalThe word comes from the ancient Greek word Deon, which means “duty.” Many ethicists call this type of ethical approach “duty-based” because people who practice this type of ethics approach often feel they have a moral obligation or commitment to act in a certain manner.
One of the most famous theories under