Ethical Decision Making In Hamlet

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Recommended: Reflecting on ethical decision making

Making ethical decisions has always been a tough, challenging task. Yet, no matter how painful the decision-making process can be, we eventually have to take side. As Shakespeare wrote in Hamlet: to be or not to be, that is the question.
Determining whether certain action is ethical, considering the whole picture from the point of view of virtue ethics is essential to me. The rationale is simple: Everyone is unique. People comes from all walks of lives with various background and different stakes. All these contribute to diversified values among different people. Applying the same rule or set of rules onto everybody brings in efficiency when we need to judge quickly. However, this might lead to overlooking the differences amongst peers. In case in point is that a Muslim would agree to sacrifice his/her …show more content…

I have a real life example of my own. I saw my friend having her cardigan worn inside out. I informed her promptly when I realized that and she asked “Are you the only one who knows of it?” Unfortunately, I was actually told that she had the situation by another boy. To prevent embarrassment and hurt feelings of that girl, I said “Yes, I’m the only one.” When I was making this decision, my mind was telling me that lying is wrong according to categorical imperative. Meanwhile, I thought that telling her the truth would not help the situation but only aggravate it by creating embarrassment to the girl. At this point, I brought in ethical consideration. I knew that telling the truth should always be the way to go in most situation. Nevertheless, I do not think telling the truth would fit this particular situation. Ultimately, I decided to conceal the truth. This demonstrates practical wisdom in virtue ethics, which enables us to act right under different

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