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Compare and contrast virtue ethics utilitarianism
The importance of ethical decision
The importance of ethical decision
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Recommended: Compare and contrast virtue ethics utilitarianism
Imagine if you had the ability to save the lives of five strangers but in order to do so you would have to sacrifice the life of another. What would you do? How would you decide what was the right thing to do? The majority of people will try and find the most ethical thing to do. Ethics is defined by a standard of behavior that tells humans how to act in certain situations. However, not all approaches will produce the same outcome, and even if they do produce the same outcome the process that was used to reach that outcome can be very different. The ethical dilemma of “The Fat Man and the Trolleys Car was created by philosophers to determine how people would react to a life or death situation. “Suppose a runways trolley car was hurtling down the tracks and was about to kill five people. You are standing on a bridge above the tracks and are aware of the immediate disaster, you decide to jump on the track and block the trolley car. Although you will die, the five people will be saved. Just before your leap, you realize that you are too light to stop the trolley. Next to you, a fat man is standing on the very edge of the bridge. He would certainly block the …show more content…
The utilitarian approach takes the personal reasons for doing something out of the decision, and makes it the choice simple. The right thing to do is to save as many people as possible and minimize the amount of harm done. So, is the case of “the Fat Man and the Trolley Car the decision is simple. Save five lives by sacrificing one other. Unlike when you use the virtue approach to analysis the ethical dilemma. When using the virtue approach the choice is much harder to make because you have to decide in that moment what kind of person you are or want to be. The utilitarian approach takes any personal motives out of the decision and make it so that the greatest amount of good will come out of that
Ethics is an important proponent when considering any decision. Knowing the difference between right and wrong is something everyone should know. However, the importance of ethics gets minimized when a decision that seems wrong actually has benefits. In the efforts of improving society, often ethics is violated. Sometimes in order for society to be better off as a whole, there has to be little sacrificing of ethical practices along the way to do so.
Utilitarianism is an example of Consequentialist Ethics, where the morality of an action is determined by its accomplishing its desired results. In both scenarios the desired result was to save the lives of thousands of people in the community. Therefore, a Utilitarian would say that the actions taken in both of the scenarios are moral. Since an (Act) Utilitarian believes that actions should be judged according to the results it achieves. Happiness should not be simply one's own, but that of the greatest number. In both scenarios, the end result saved the lives of 5,000 members of the community. The end result is the only concern and to what extreme is taken to reach this result is of no matter. In these instances the things that are lost are an Inmates religious beliefs or a mothers fetus, on the other hand Thousands of citizens were saved from dying from this disease.
What is ethics? Ethics are the philosophical principles of good verses bad moral behavior. It is a guideline to help people make decisions or make a judgment calls. There are two main types of ethical principles that will be discussed in this paper, and how they are applied to the decision making process. They are Deontological and Utilitarian. Deontological ethics are based on the righteousness or wrongness of the action-taking place. It does not base itself on the bad or good consequences that come from the action. Immanuel Kant introduced deontological ethics in the 18th century. Kant believed that every decision or action made by a person had to be evaluated by his or her moral duty. He stated that humanity shouldn’t side on its
The utilitarian faces many problems because he loses any ability to live a personal life. By this is meant that in making decisions the utilitarian must consider the steps which lead to the highest level of goodness in society. The utilitarian reaches for the greatest good for the greatest number of people. Two main aspects dominate the light of utilitarian beliefs. The consequentialist principle explains that in determining the rightness or wrongness of an act one must examine the results that will follow. The utility principle is that you can only deem something to be good if it in itself will bring upon a specific desired state, such as happiness or fulfillment. There are two types of utilitarians: Act utilitarians and Rule utilitarians. An act utilitarian believes that a person must think things through before making a decision. The only exception to this idea applies with rules of thumb; decisions that need to be made spontaneously. The right act is the one that results in the most utility. Rule utilitarians believe that an act is only deemed appropriate if it fits in line with the outline of valid rules within a system of rules that target the most favorable outcome.
Ethics is “a branch of philosophy concerned with the study of questions of right and wrong and how we ought to live” (Banks, 2013). Also it involves making moral judgments about what is right and or wrong, good or bad. In the process of everyday life, moral rules are desirable, not because they express absolute truth, but because they are generally reliable guides for normal circumstances. Ethics or moral conduct, are of major importance in the criminal justice field today. If the police force condoned unethical behavior, there would be very little, if any, justice being served. A system of rules and principles helps to guide in making difficult decisions when moral issues arise. Ethics has been shown to be a central component in decisions involving ethical dilemmas. It is “concerned with standards of conduct and with “how I ought to act”, and standards of conduct may vary among different societies” (Banks, 2013). An ethical dilemma arises only when a decision must be made that involves a conflict at the personal, interpersonal, institutional, or societal level or raises issues of moral character. Richard Hare argues that we initially use an intuitive level of moral thinking when we consider ethical dilemma. There are “six steps in analyzing an ethical dilemma and they would be as follow” (NASW, 2014):
Ethics are the set beliefs and values of an individual which they apply to circumstances relating to morality. To act in an ‘ethical’ manner, an individual must display integrity by doing what they believe to be right.
Cross-culturally there are many difference between moral values. The extremes of these moral differences include cannibalism or incest which were normal in some cultures, closer to home there are value differences between liberals and conservatives or between the South and the West, any two cultures will have different ideas of moral values. There are three potential sources to base moral values on, faith, emotion, or reason. Individuals all have different ideas about what is moral and they conflict with one another. If morals were based solely reason everyone would eventually reach the same moral ground. If they could be based only on reason, it would mean universal morals. However, based on how we determine our morals now, where
Utilitarianism is a moral theory that approaches moral questions of right and wrong by considering the actual consequences of a variety of possible actions. These consequences are generally those that either positively or negatively affect other living beings. If there are both good and bad actual consequences of a particular action, the moral individual must weigh the good against the bad and go with the action that will produce the most good for the most amount of people. If the individual finds that there are only bad consequences, then she must go with the behavior that causes the least amount of bad consequences to the least amount of people. There are many different methods for calculating the utility of each moral decision and coming up with the best
An ethical dilemma is only examined in a situation which has the following conditions; the first condition takes place in a situation, when an individual has to make a decision on which course of action is best. The second condition is there must be more than one course of action to choose from. The third action is no matter what course of action is taken, certain ethical principles are conceded. In other terms, there is no perfect result. When defining what forms an ethical dilemma, it is important to make a division between ethics, morals, values, laws and policies.
According to the theory of consequentialism, “an action is morally required just because it produces the best overall results” (Landau, 2015, p.121). In this view, an individual’s action is deemed moral only if it produces the optimific result in any situation. In the article “Framing Effect in the Trolley Problem and Footbridge Dilemma,” the authors introduced the “Footbridge Dilemma”, wherein an individual is given the option to save the lives of five workers by pushing an innocent man towards an incoming trolley (Cao, et. al, 2017, p. 90). In this dilemma, consequentialism suggests that it is moral to push the innocent man and save the workers. Even though pushing the man would kill him, the action would yield the optimific outcome in that
A utilitarian approach to moral reasoning is also one where different options are weighed, although utilitarians are interested in minimising harm and maximising benefit. Importantly, utilitarians hold a universal perspective when reasoning, where they consider the impact upon all those who may be affected, who have interests of their own (Grace & Cohen 2013: 14-15).
As a function, ethics is a philosophical study of the moral value of human conduct, and of the rules and principles it should govern. As a system, ethics are a social, religious, or civil code of behavior considered correct by a particular group, profession, or individual. As an instrument, ethics provide perspective regarding the moral fitness of a decision, course of action, or potential outcomes. Ethical decision-making can include many types, including deontological (duty), consequentialism (including utilitarianism), and virtue ethics. Additionally, subsets of relativism, objectivism, and pluralism seek to understand the impact of moral diversity on a human level. Although distinct differences separate these ethical systems, organizations
Ethics is such a broad topic, In which I personally believe there is no concrete right or wrong answer. It all depends on religious beliefs and cultural backgrounds. Nevertheless, there is an underlying idea of what is right and what is wrong that has been established by society over the years such as not killing, not lying and helping others when you can. When we (my group and I) were discussing the ethical dilemmas we were able to agree in most of the scenarios with justifications into why we believed so. This is due to the similar lifestyles we have and the similar ways we were raised. After discussing the different forms of ethics in class I was surprised to realize that I use Kantian ethics to come to most of my conclusions. I do not solely
As a branch of philosophy, ethics investigates the questions “What is the best way for people to live?” and “What actions are right or wrong in particular circumstances?” In practice, ethics seeks to resolve questions of human morality, by defining concepts such as good and evil, right and wrong, virtue and vice, justice and crime. As a field of intellectual enquiry, moral philosophy
When asked what is the definition of ethics, many responded that being moral meant doing the right thing. But how can we justify what is a good action and what is a bad action? All humans were created equal, but our principles, and ways of thinking can be extremely different. Some may say doing the right thing means following your heart, your inner feelings and intuition. But emotions can be misleading. Others say in order to do what is the morally right thing means to follow the law and do what is right by society, to be accepted. But today’s society is judgmental and can be corrupted with numerous opinions due to the diversity of cultures. So what does it mean to be ethical? Being ethical means doing what is right in terms of virtues, fairness, duties, responsibilities, obligations, and moral believes all which derived from cultures and family backgrounds.