Normative ethics

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Normative ethics is the study of ethical behaviour and is the branch of philosophical ethics that investigates questions regarding how one ought to act, in a moral sense.

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Normative ethics is distinct from meta-ethics in that the former examines standards for the rightness and wrongness of actions, whereas the latter studies the meaning of moral language and the metaphysics of moral facts. Likewise, normative ethics is distinct from applied ethics in that the former is more concerned with 'who ought one be' rather than the ethics of a specific issue (e.g. if, or when, abortion is acceptable). Normative ethics is also distinct from descriptive ethics, as the latter is an empirical investigation of people's moral beliefs. In this context normative ethics is sometimes called prescriptive, as opposed to descriptive ethics. However, on certain versions of the view of moral realism, moral facts are both descriptive and prescriptive at the same time.

Most traditional moral theories rest on principles that determine whether an action is right or wrong. Classical theories in this vein include utilitarianism, Kantianism, and some forms of contractarianism. These theories mainly offered the use of overarching moral principles to resolve difficult moral decisions.[ citation needed ]

Normative ethical theories

There are disagreements about what precisely gives an action, rule, or disposition its ethical force. There are three competing views on how moral questions should be answered, along with hybrid positions that combine some elements of each: virtue ethics, deontological ethics; and consequentialism. The former focuses on the character of those who are acting. In contrast, both deontological ethics and consequentialism focus on the status of the action, rule, or disposition itself, and come in various forms.

Virtue ethics

Virtue ethics, advocated by Aristotle with some aspects being supported by Saint Thomas Aquinas, focuses on the inherent character of a person rather than on specific actions. [1] There has been a significant revival of virtue ethics since the 1950s, [2] through the work of such philosophers as G. E. M. Anscombe, Philippa Foot, Alasdair MacIntyre, and Rosalind Hursthouse. [2] [3] [4]

Deontological ethics

Deontology argues that decisions should be made considering the factors of one's duties and one's rights. Some deontological theories include:

Consequentialism

Consequentialism argues that the morality of an action is contingent on the action's outcome or result. Consequentialist theories, varying in what they consider to be valuable (i.e., axiology), include:

Other theories

Morality as a binding force

It can be unclear what it means to say that a person "ought to do X because it is moral, whether they like it or not." Morality is sometimes presumed to have some kind of special binding force on behaviour, though some philosophers believe that, used this way, the word "ought" seems to wrongly attribute magic powers to morality. For instance, G. E. M. Anscombe worries that "ought" has become "a word of mere mesmeric force." [11]

If he is an amoral man he may deny that he has any reason to trouble his head over this or any other moral demand. Of course, he may be mistaken, and his life as well as others' lives may be most sadly spoiled by his selfishness. But this is not what is urged by those who think they can close the matter by an emphatic use of 'ought'. My argument is that they are relying on an illusion, as if trying to give the moral 'ought' a magic force.

—Philippa Foot [15]

The British ethicist Philippa Foot elaborates that morality does not seem to have any special binding force, and she clarifies that people only behave morally when motivated by other factors. Foot says "People talk, for instance, about the 'binding force' of morality, but it is not clear what this means if not that we feel ourselves unable to escape." [15] The idea is that, faced with an opportunity to steal a book because we can get away with it, moral obligation itself has no power to stop us unless we feel an obligation. Morality may therefore have no binding force beyond regular human motivations, and people must be motivated to behave morally. The question then arises: what role does reason play in motivating moral behaviour?

Motivating morality

The categorical imperative perspective suggests that proper reason always leads to particular moral behaviour. As mentioned above, Foot instead believes that humans are actually motivated by desires. Proper reason, on this view, allows humans to discover actions that get them what they want (i.e., hypothetical imperatives)—not necessarily actions that are moral.

Social structure and motivation can make morality binding in a sense, but only because it makes moral norms feel inescapable, according to Foot. [15]

Feelings like shame and love are sometimes considered the only meaningful sense in which morality is binding. Absent those feelings, a person could behave "immorally" without remorse. Shame.jpg
Feelings like shame and love are sometimes considered the only meaningful sense in which morality is binding. Absent those feelings, a person could behave "immorally" without remorse.

John Stuart Mill adds that external pressures, to please others for instance, also influence this felt binding force, which he calls human "conscience". Mill says that humans must first reason about what is moral, then try to bring the feelings of our conscience in line with our reason. [16] At the same time, Mill says that a good moral system (in his case, utilitarianism) ultimately appeals to aspects of human nature—which, must themselves be nurtured during upbringing. Mill explains:

This firm foundation is that of the social feelings of mankind; the desire to be in unity with our fellow creatures, which is already a powerful principle in human nature, and happily one of those which tend to become stronger, even without express inculcation, from the influences of advancing civilisation.

Mill thus believes that it is important to appreciate that it is feelings that drive moral behavior, but also that they may not be present in some people (e.g. psychopaths). Mill goes on to describe factors that help ensure people develop a conscience and behave morally.

Popular texts such as Joseph Daleiden's The Science of Morality: The Individual, Community, and Future Generations (1998) describe how societies can use science to figure out how to make people more likely to be good.

See also

Related Research Articles

Applied ethics is the practical aspect of moral considerations. It is ethics with respect to real-world actions and their moral considerations in private and public life, the professions, health, technology, law, and leadership. For example, bioethics is concerned with identifying the best approach to moral issues in the life sciences, such as euthanasia, the allocation of scarce health resources, or the use of human embryos in research. Environmental ethics is concerned with ecological issues such as the responsibility of government and corporations to clean up pollution. Business ethics includes the duties of whistleblowers to the public and to their employers.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Consequentialism</span> Ethical theory based on consequences

In moral philosophy, consequentialism is a class of normative, teleological ethical theories that holds that the consequences of one's conduct are the ultimate basis for judgement about the rightness or wrongness of that conduct. Thus, from a consequentialist standpoint, a morally right act is one that will produce a good outcome. Consequentialism, along with eudaimonism, falls under the broader category of teleological ethics, a group of views which claim that the moral value of any act consists in its tendency to produce things of intrinsic value. Consequentialists hold in general that an act is right if and only if the act will produce, will probably produce, or is intended to produce, a greater balance of good over evil than any available alternative. Different consequentialist theories differ in how they define moral goods, with chief candidates including pleasure, the absence of pain, the satisfaction of one's preferences, and broader notions of the "general good".

In ethical philosophy, ethical egoism is the normative position that moral agents ought to act in their own self-interest. It differs from psychological egoism, which claims that people can only act in their self-interest. Ethical egoism also differs from rational egoism, which holds that it is rational to act in one's self-interest. Ethical egoism holds, therefore, that actions whose consequences will benefit the doer are ethical.

Ethics is the philosophical study of moral phenomena. Also called moral philosophy, it investigates normative questions about what people ought to do or which behavior is morally right. Its main branches include normative ethics, applied ethics, and metaethics.

In ethical philosophy, utilitarianism is a family of normative ethical theories that prescribe actions that maximize happiness and well-being for the affected individuals. In other words, utilitarian ideas encourage actions that lead to the greatest good for the greatest number. Although different varieties of utilitarianism admit different characterizations, the basic idea behind all of them is, in some sense, to maximize utility, which is often defined in terms of well-being or related concepts. For instance, Jeremy Bentham, the founder of utilitarianism, described utility as the capacity of actions or objects to produce benefits, such as pleasure, happiness, and good, or to prevent harm, such as pain and unhappiness, to those affected.

Moral realism is the position that ethical sentences express propositions that refer to objective features of the world, some of which may be true to the extent that they report those features accurately. This makes moral realism a non-nihilist form of ethical cognitivism with an ontological orientation, standing in opposition to all forms of moral anti-realism and moral skepticism, including ethical subjectivism, error theory, and non-cognitivism. Moral realism's two main subdivisions are ethical naturalism and ethical non-naturalism.

This index of ethics articles puts articles relevant to well-known ethical debates and decisions in one place - including practical problems long known in philosophy, and the more abstract subjects in law, politics, and some professions and sciences. It lists also those core concepts essential to understanding ethics as applied in various religions, some movements derived from religions, and religions discussed as if they were a theory of ethics making no special claim to divine status.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Virtue ethics</span> Normative ethical theories

Virtue ethics is a philosophical approach that treats virtue and character as the primary subjects of ethics, in contrast to other ethical systems that put consequences of voluntary acts, principles or rules of conduct, or obedience to divine authority in the primary role.

In moral philosophy, deontological ethics or deontology is the normative ethical theory that the morality of an action should be based on whether that action itself is right or wrong under a series of rules and principles, rather than based on the consequences of the action. It is sometimes described as duty-, obligation-, or rule-based ethics. Deontological ethics is commonly contrasted to consequentialism, utilitarianism, virtue ethics, and pragmatic ethics. In this terminology, action is more important than the consequences.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rosalind Hursthouse</span> New Zealand philosopher (born 1943)

Rosalind Hursthouse is a British-born New Zealand moral philosopher noted for her work on virtue ethics. She is one of the leading exponents of contemporary virtue ethics, though she has also written extensively on philosophy of action, history of philosophy, moral psychology, and biomedical ethics. Hursthouse is Professor Emerita of Philosophy at the University of Auckland and Fellow of the Royal Society of New Zealand.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Is–ought problem</span> Philosophical problem articulated by David Hume

The is–ought problem, as articulated by the Scottish philosopher and historian David Hume, arises when one makes claims about what ought to be that are based solely on statements about what is. Hume found that there seems to be a significant difference between descriptive statements and prescriptive statements, and that it is not obvious how one can coherently transition from descriptive statements to prescriptive ones.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Philippa Foot</span> English philosopher (1920–2010)

Philippa Ruth Foot was an English philosopher and one of the founders of contemporary virtue ethics. Her work was inspired by Aristotelian ethics. Along with Judith Jarvis Thomson, she is credited with inventing the trolley problem. She was elected a member of the American Philosophical Society. She was a granddaughter of the U.S. President Grover Cleveland.

Rule utilitarianism is a form of utilitarianism that says an action is right as it conforms to a rule that leads to the greatest good, or that "the rightness or wrongness of a particular action is a function of the correctness of the rule of which it is an instance". Philosophers Richard Brandt and Brad Hooker are major proponents of such an approach.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kantian ethics</span> Ethical theory of Immanuel Kant

Kantian ethics refers to a deontological ethical theory developed by German philosopher Immanuel Kant that is based on the notion that "I ought never to act except in such a way that I could also will that my maxim should become a universal law." It is also associated with the idea that "it is impossible to think of anything at all in the world, or indeed even beyond it, that could be considered good without limitation except a good will." The theory was developed in the context of Enlightenment rationalism. It states that an action can only be moral if it is motivated by a sense of duty, and its maxim may be rationally willed a universal, objective law.

"Modern Moral Philosophy" is an article on moral philosophy by G. E. M. Anscombe, originally published in the journal Philosophy, vol. 33, no. 124.

The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to ethics.

Ethics is the branch of philosophy that examines right and wrong moral behavior, moral concepts and moral language. Ethics or moral philosophy is a branch of philosophy that "involves systematizing, defending, and recommending concepts of right and wrong behavior". The field of ethics, along with aesthetics, concerns matters of value, and thus comprises the branch of philosophy called axiology.

Negative consequentialism is a version of consequentialism, which is "one of the major theories of normative ethics." Like other versions of consequentialism, negative consequentialism holds that moral right and wrong depend only on the value of outcomes. That is, for negative and other versions of consequentialism, questions such as "what should I do?" and "what kind of person should I be?" are answered only based on consequences. Negative consequentialism differs from other versions of consequentialism by giving greater weight in moral deliberations to what is bad than what is good. Due to this, it can be considered an instance of what has been called "suffering-focused ethics", the view that the reduction of suffering has moral priority over any other possible duties we may think of.

A legal norm is a binding rule or principle, or norm, that organisations of sovereign power promulgate and enforce in order to regulate social relations. Legal norms determine the rights and duties of individuals who are the subjects of legal relations within the governing jurisdiction at a given point in time. Competent state authorities issue and publish basic aspects of legal norms through a collection of laws that individuals under that government must abide by, which is further guaranteed by state coercion. There are two categories of legal norms: normativity, which regulates the conduct of people, and generality, which is binding on an indefinite number of people and cases. Diplomatic and legislative immunity refers to instances where legal norms are constructed to be targeted towards a minority and are specifically only binding on them, such as soldiers and public officials.

<i>The Right and the Good</i> 1930 book by Scottish philosopher David Ross

The Right and the Good is a 1930 book by the Scottish philosopher David Ross. In it, Ross develops a deontological pluralism based on prima facie duties. Ross defends a realist position about morality and an intuitionist position about moral knowledge. The Right and the Good has been praised as one of the most important works of ethical theory in the twentieth century.

References

  1. ↑ D. O. Thomas, Obedience to Conscience, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, New Series, Vol. 64 (1963 - 1964), pp. 243-258.
  2. 1 2 Hursthouse, Rosalind; Pettigrove, Glen (2023), "Virtue Ethics", in Zalta, Edward N.; Nodelman, Uri (eds.), The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall 2023 ed.), Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University, retrieved 2024-03-12
  3. ↑ Stohr, Karen; Wellman, Christopher Heath (2002). "Recent Work on Virtue Ethics". American Philosophical Quarterly. 39 (1): 49–72. ISSN   0003-0481. JSTOR   20010057.
  4. ↑ Simpson, Peter (1992). "Contemporary Virtue Ethics and Aristotle". The Review of Metaphysics. 45 (3): 503–524. ISSN   0034-6632. JSTOR   20129214.
  5. ↑ Johnson, Robert; Cureton, Adam (2022), "Kant's Moral Philosophy", in Zalta, Edward N.; Nodelman, Uri (eds.), The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall 2022 ed.), Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University, retrieved 2024-03-12
  6. ↑ Rawls, John (1999). A theory of justice (Rev. ed.). Cambridge, Mass: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press. ISBN   978-0-674-00077-3.
  7. ↑ Martin, Douglas (2002-11-26). "John Rawls, Theorist on Justice, Is Dead at 82". The New York Times. ISSN   0362-4331 . Retrieved 2024-03-12.
  8. ↑ Paul, Ellen Frankel; Miller, Fred Dycus; Paul, Jeffrey (2006). Natural rights liberalism from Locke to Nozick. Cambridge: Cambridge university press. ISBN   978-0-521-61514-3.
  9. ↑ Heyman, Steven (2018-03-01). "The Light of Nature: John Locke, Natural Rights, and the Origins of American Religious Liberty". Marquette Law Review. 101 (3): 705.
  10. ↑ Scanlon, Thomas (1976). "Nozick on Rights, Liberty, and Property". Philosophy & Public Affairs. 6 (1): 3–25. ISSN   0048-3915. JSTOR   2265059.
  11. 1 2 Anscombe, Elizabeth. 1958. "Modern Moral Philosophy." Philosophy 33(24).
  12. ↑ "Social Contract Theory | Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy" . Retrieved 2024-10-24.
  13. ↑ "Deontology and the Social Contract" (PDF).
  14. ↑ Hekman, Susan J. (1995). Moral voices, moral selves: Carol Gilligan and feminist moral theory. University Park, Pa: Pennsylvania State University Press. ISBN   978-0-271-01483-8.
  15. 1 2 3 Foot, Philippa. (2009). Morality as a System of Hypothetical Imperatives. In S. M. Cahn, & P. Markie,Ethics: History, Theory, and Contemporary Issues (pp. 556-561). New York: Oxford University Press.
  16. ↑ "John Stuart Mill (1863). Utilitarianism. Chapter 3: Of the Ultimate Sanction of the Principle of Utility".
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