Ethics 211 Preliminary Exam Reviewer PDF

ETIC 211 PRELIM EXAM REVIEWER WEEK 1: Introduction to Ethics - Ethics was taken from the Greek word 'ethos' which means 'customs', 'usage' 'characteristic'. - Ethics: It is a branch of philosophy that is a philosophical enterprise that investigates and questions the way or the nature...

ETIC 211 PRELIM EXAM REVIEWER WEEK 1: Introduction to Ethics - Ethics was taken from the Greek word 'ethos' which means 'customs', 'usage' 'characteristic'. - Ethics: It is a branch of philosophy that is a philosophical enterprise that investigates and questions the way or the nature of human actions, see if it has a ground so that it supports its own moral claim. - Ethics investigates or studies morality.\ thus, the term ethics is expressed in various ways of understanding and examining the moral life of the person as it is cited by Beauchamp and Childress (1994). - Acts of Human- These are actions that do not require a\ decision- making action from a person. These actions are also considered indifferent or amoral. - Human- Acts- These are actions that require a decision- making action from a person. These actions are also classified as good or bad. - Moral Standards refers to the guidelines we have on the types of acts that we find morally permissible and morally unacceptable. - Through ethics, people can determine the difference between right and wrong. - Morals refers to specific beliefs or attitudes that people or to describe acts that people perform. - A Filipino young boy was discriminated in their school in Canada for eating with a spoon and fork. - Martine Bertrand is the lunch monitor who reprimanded Luc Cagadoc. Examples of Acts of Man: - Blinking of the Eyes - Breathing - Beating of the heart Examples of Human Acts: - Telling the truth - giving money to the poor - returning a lost item Week 2 - Normative Ethics is also known as prescribed ethics because it prescribes how an individual can figure out the correct moral action that they should take. - Applied Ethics is the study of applying theories from the philosophers regarding ethics in everyday life. - Meta-ethics refers to the nature of the ethical terms and concepts. - Culture: Aesthetic and etiquette standards - Moral Standards: Good and Proper Behavior/ Religious Standards - Standards of Etiquette: Tradition and Conventional Practices - Morality: Own character - Etiquette: Table Manners Week 3: - The External Authority is derived from societal norms, legal systems, religious doctrines, or cultural traditions. - The Internal Authority stems from an individual\'s values, conscience, and sense of morality. - External Authority guides behavior behavior through external rules, regulations, or expectations, often driven by fear of punishment or societal approval. - Internal Authority guides behavior based on personal convictions, moral values, and ethical beliefs, driven by an internal moral compass. - Law refers to a system of rules, regulations, and principles established by a governing authority (such as a government) to regulate the behavior of individuals and groups within a society. - Abortion may be permitted by law in the United States, but the Catholic Church considers it immoral. - Not all legal is moral, and not all moral is legal. - Polygamy is considered morally acceptable in Islam but is deemed immoral in Christianity. - Eating dinuguan is considered immoral by certain religions but not by Catholics. - According to culture, we are in no position to judge whether the ethical thought or practice of another culture is acceptable or unacceptable. - James Rachels defines cultural relativism as the position that claims that there is no such thing as objective truth in the realm of morality. - According to James Rachels, the argument of cultural relativism is that since different cultures have different moral codes, then there is no one correct moral code that all cultures must follow. - James Rachels believed that moral progress is possible and that societies can improve their moral standards over time. - James Rachels argued against cultural relativism, which is the idea that moral beliefs are entirely determined by one's culture, and there is no universal moral truths. - If individuals unquestioningly accept their cultural moral beliefs, they may fail to recognize and correct morally problematic aspects of their culture. - According to Rachels, accepting moral beliefs without questioning them can hinder this progress because it may prevent individuals from challenging and revising outdated or harmful moral norms. - It is believed that no culture, whether in the present world or in the past, would promote murder instead of prohibiting it. - Cultural Relativism holds that all religious, ethical, aesthetic and political beliefs are completely relative to an individual within a society of a particular culture. - Cultural Relativists often make a certain type of argument. They begin with facts about cultures and wind up drawing a conclusion about morality. - The starting point of subjectivism is the recognition that the individual thinking person (the subject) is at the heart of all moral valuations." - "The individual is the sole determinant of what is morally good or bad, right or wrong." - In Psychological Egoism, human beings are naturally self-centered, so all our action are always already motivated by self-interest." - In Ethical Egoism, we should make our own ends, our own interest, as the single overriding concern. - According to Ayn Rand, the achievement of his own happiness is the man's highest moral principle. - The Universal Declaration of Human Rights states that as a human beings, we are born free and equal in dignity and in rights; we possess the inalienable right to freedom of religion in practice and the indispensable social and cultural rights for the dignity and freedom of an indivdiual's personality. - Psychological Egoism makes a claim about human existence or about the way things are. Week 4 - Lawrence Kohlberg is the proponent of Stages of Moral Development. - Moral Development is divided into 3 levels and broken down into 6 stages. - Pre- Conventional Level (0-9 years old) Stage 1:Punishment and Obedience\ Stage 2: Individual and Instrumental Exchange - Conventional Level (9-20 years old) Stage 3: Mutual And Interpersonal Conformity\ Stage 4: Law And Order - Post- Conventional (20 years old and above) Stage 5: Social Contract And Individual Rights\ Stage 6: Universal Ethical Principles - Good Boy/ Good Girl Orientation \- Finds peer approval very important - Legalistic Social Contract: Respects the right of the majority especially the rights of the individual. - Universal Ethical Principles: Believes that the human dignity of humanity is sacred - Obedience and Punishment: Obeys rules in order to avoid punishment. - Social Contract and Individual Rights: Characterized by thinking about a society in a very theoretical way, stepping back from their own established society and considering the rights and values of the society ought to uphold. - Law and Order; Characterized by abiding the law and respecting authority and performing one's duty so that social order is maintained. - Mutual and Interpersonal Conformity- characterized by an attitude that to do that will gain the approval of others. - Individual and Instrumental Exchange: characterized by a view that behavior means acting in one's own best interests. - - The duty not to lie. If we lie to other people, we will suffer all the ill effects of a bad reputation. People will distrust us and avoid doing business with us. - The duty to keep our witnesses: It is to our own advantage to enter mutual beneficially arrangement with other people. Week 5 - Moral dilemma occur when one is placed in a situation and when confronted by the choice of what act to perform. - The ethical issues are stated in terms of competing interests or goods. It's these conflicting interests that actually make for an ethical dilemma. - Frequently ethical dilemmas can be resolved simply by clarifying the facts of the case in question. In those cases that prove to be more difficult, gathering the facts is the essential first step prior to any ethical analysis and reflection on the case. - Part of the creative thinking involved in resolving an ethical dilemma involves coming up with various alternative courses of action. Although there will be some alternatives that you will rule out without much thought, in general the more alternatives that are listed, the better the chance that your list will include some high-quality ones. - If a clear decision is not forthcoming, then the next part is the model that must be considered. At the least, some of the alternatives may be eliminated by this step of comparison. - Ethical decision- making involves the process of identifying, evaluating, and choosing among alternative courses of action in a manner consistent with ethical principles and values. - In business ethics there is often a conflict between the right of a firm to make profit and its obligation to the community.