(Ch. 1 part 2) Deontology. Greek word – deon (duty) Focus is on the rights, duties, obligations and rules Looks at intrinsic value of the action, what are you having to do? consequences/outcome of the action are secondary, or to some of these ethicists, completely irrelevant . - PowerPoint PPT Presentation
(Ch. 1 part 2) Deontology • Greek word – deon (duty) • Focus is on the rights, duties, obligations and rules – Looks at intrinsic value of the action, what are you having to do? • consequences/outcome of the action are secondary, or to some of these ethicists, completely irrelevant . • Spinello: deontological ethicists “argue for the priority of the right over the good” … “their rightness or wrongness does not depend in any way in the consequences which they effect.”
Transcript
(Ch. 1 part 2) Deontology
• Greek word – deon (duty)
• Focus is on the rights, duties, obligations and rules– Looks at intrinsic value of the action, what are you having
to do?• consequences/outcome of the action are secondary, or
to some of these ethicists, completely irrelevant.
• Spinello: deontological ethicists “argue for the priority of the right over the good” … “their rightness or wrongness does not depend in any way in the consequences which they effect.”
Kant - Universalism
• Immanuel Kant looks to what would happen if the action were universal.
• “I shall never act except in such a way that I can also will that my maxim become universal law.”– Absolutist: always wrong to lie. No exceptions
• Kant’s first formulation:– “Act only according to that maxim whereby you can at the
same time will that it should become a universal law.”• Kant’s second formulation:
– “Act in such a way that you treat humanity, whether in your own person or in the person of any other, always at the same time as an end and never merely as a means to an end.”
Three minute philosophy:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xwOCmJevigw
• Telos: Greek for end or purpose• Actions evaluated by their consequence.
– Consequentialism: the consequence of an action, not the motivation behind the action, makes an action good or bad
– Guiding principle: to increase happiness, a.k.a. utility (satisfies needs and values)
– Utilitarianism: an action is good if it causes more happiness than a potential, alternative decision*
*Look at the net consequence of behaviors.
Consequentialism/Utilitarianism’s Calculus
• Predictive
• Greatest good for the greatest number, including “depth” of happiness, p. 17 ex.
• Looking at the net consequences:
– Spinello’s summary: without being arbitrary, utilitarianism requires a “moral calculus”… “using all the possibilities” to find “the greatest net expectable utility”
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Utilitarianism Ethicists
• Theory: correct course of action maximizes expected utility &/or minimizes expected negative utility for humans
• Leading theorists are Jeremy Bentham & John Stuart Mill
• Bentham looks for what promotes “the general good”:
• "An act is right from an ethical point of view if, and only if, the sum total of utilities produced by that act is greater than the sum total utilities produced by another act the agent could have performed in its place."
• Act Utilitarianism: the concept of performing an action that maximizes happiness– Act Utilitarianism & Officer Schmidt’s dilemma
• Rule Utilitarianism: the concept of adopting a set of rules, and only violating them in the case where compelling evidence indicates that utility is increased by such a violation.– See Gert’s rules, p. 19– Rule Utilitarianism & Officer Schmidt’s dilemma
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Comparing Deontology to Teleological Ethics
• Deontological ethics theories differ from teleological/consequentialist theories– the intention behind the action is considered more
important than the end result– focuses on rights, duties, obligations, and rules– assumes that the result will end badly if these rules are not
met
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Calvin is not a deontologist, but is he a consequentialist?
Contractarianism
• State of Nature: people are rational beings who seek to promote the common interests of society in order to promote their own self-interests– In Leviathan by Hobbes, life
w/o gov’t is pondered and declared to be “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short”
• w/o rules, complete entitlement to everything
– To escape this condition “men in the state of nature accede to a social contract and establish a society”
– Thomas Hobbes1588-1679
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Question: “Is the person’s self-interest really maximized by acting for the public good?”
• Game Theory: math modeling of scenarios of conflict and cooperation between rational decision makers.
• Prisoner’s Dilemma: a scenario in which two people are offered a choice—cooperate or defect– Example with explanation:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yqn6MXyJ37c – Multiple iterations, as opposed to a one shot, would model closer to
the real world.• Best strategy, cooperate then tit for tat; Cooperate would be best
• Semi-transparent Prisoner’s Dilemma, another Golden Balls– http://davidweinberger.sys-con.com/node/2256940/en.wikipedia.org/
• Positive: – obligation to provide/help– examples?
Ethics of Justice
• Impartiality: the quality that every person is treated equally and no one is given preferential treatment in the theory
• Universality
• Rawls’s Theory of Justice: explores the basic rules that are necessary to ensure fairness in society as a whole– argues that the principles of “justice as fairness” underlie
all just societies
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Ethics of Justice (continued)
• According to Rawl’s Theory of Justice, in order for a society to be just:– Everyone has as much freedom as possible.– Everyone has an equal opportunity to reach desirable
positions in society.– All socio-economic differences are of the most benefit
to the least advantaged.
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Ethics of Justice (continued)
• Difference Principle: social and economic inequalities are justified only if such inequalities provide the greatest benefit to the least advantaged– Explains why impartiality is not always desirable.
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Rawl’s Veil of Ignorance
• Veil of Ignorance: a test of whether rules are fair.
• Card Game
• Idea: What if you got to choose your social contract before you were born, but you did not know your lot in life, would you consider the rules to be fair?
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Ethics of Caring
• Nel Noddings: morality boils down to a single virtue, which is caring for other individuals
• Difference in how good is defined: – Noddings: the only inherent good is caring– Kant: the only inherent good is good will– Utilitarians: the only inherent good is happiness
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Ethics of Caring (continued)
• Because it is possible to care for everyone, impartiality is rejected.– It is only necessary to care for those with whom one
shares a relationship.– There is no universal way to externally judge whether
an action is morally right or wrong.• The judgment varies on the relationship between
the one-caring individual and the person being cared for.
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Ethics of Caring (continued)
• A computerized pill dispenser is equipped with alarms and self-opening caps that help remind patients to take their medication.– Is it morally permissible to require all patients with a
history of ignoring their medication to use this technology?– Is it morally permissible to require all elderly patients to
use this technology?
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Ethics of Reasoning
• Pure Reason: deductive reasoning on which Euclidean geometry is based; its purpose is to establish the truth – issues are straightforward
• Practical Reason: the reasoning used to make decisions– issues are complex– used to resolve ethical issues
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Ethics of Reasoning (continued)
• Deliberative Critical Discussion: a conversation in which the participants consider the partners in the discussion are well-intended and informed; with this understanding, participants bring their knowledge to the discussion to share their own opinions and develop more refined perspectives.Avoid:
- charged language - hyperbole
- Ad hominem
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Reconciling Ethical Approaches
• Let each approach shed light on different aspects of an ethical problem
