Theory of Knowledge Essay

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The methods that available in the production of knowledge are limited by the ethical judgments, but the definition of whether the method is ethical or not depends on a couple different things. The first one is the personal judgments. Each person would have different judgments for the same method. However, one personal based judgment cannot be universal. The second one is the social judgment. It is related to the personal judgment. When a personal opinion for a method is agreed by most of people in the society, this opinion would become a social judgment. One example of ethical limits on natural science is the drug test. Human uses animals to test whether the new drugs are safe or not – which some people think is not ethical to do so. The judgments of the drug test are also divided into two opposite schools: the first school states that any animal test would be unethical; the other school thinks that competing to the benefits the animal tests have on human being, it is ethical. I personally agree with the second school. As I said, my personal judgment cannot represent a universal judgment, but let’s assume this theory is true. According to the statement “it is ethical because it has bigger benefits on human being”, what used to judge something is ethical or not is the value of benefit it produces. Logically, this means if one ethical issue can have profits that are way bigger than the ethical issue, this issue would be ethical. I know that it sounds ridiculous, but it is true if you think about it. Go back to the drug test example, when a new medicine which can save hundreds of human’s life comes out, who would care about the death of a couple laboratory rats? You may argue with me: “it is because the life of a couple laboratory... ... middle of paper ... ...ledge in both the arts and the natural sciences. However, they are limited differently in art and natural sciences area. In general, for natural science, the ethical judgments more depended on social judgment. Because of the product as the result of an ethical issue is measurable, as long as the product is way more valuable than the ethical issue, this issue would be ethical. In other words, if the product is not as valuable as the ethical issue, this issue would be unethical. However, in the art area, because of the product as the result of an ethical issue is hard to measure in terms, the ethical judgments are more depended on the personal judgments. Which the personal judgments are mainly depended on three different parts: the position of a person; the educational content of a person; and the emotional judgments. They are all related and none of them is absolute.

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