On the other extreme we have those who claim that there are ethical principles, which one should follow no matter the circumstances. Christianity is one such “philosophy”. The Bible was meant to be a complete ethical constitution with laws or principals applicable to any situation one might come across. These laws and principals are summed up in the Ten Commandments, which are according to the Christians rules everyone must follow in all situations.
Utilitarianism is a third extreme view proposing that the ethical correctness in a behavior should be measured in its consequences, i.e. an action is good if it increases the sum of happiness in the world. There are problem with this perspective, however. Applying this claim as our basic rule of thumb the next question would be; how do we know what amount of happiness is caused by a certain behavior, and how can we measure it? Since we do not even have a good definition of happiness (it is a very subjective term) this seemingly simple rule turns out to be rather complicated and evasive.
These three perspectives all seem reasonable when first explained, though serious flaws exist in each perspective. What would the world look like if leaders, in possession of weapons of mass destruction, would act in accordance with their animal instincts?
Christian rules also appear imperfect when put into an extreme situation. Imagine yourself standing in a street corner; suddenly a terrified person runs by, two seconds later another out of your mind looking man with a knife raised over his head comes and asks you if you saw in which direction the first man went. Should you tell him the truth? If you are a true Christian you should, since lying is wrong according to the Ten Commandments.
The utilitarian perspective seems good since happiness will increase. However, wouldn’t this ethically otherwise horrible action such as World War 2? It has after all had many positive effects such as the creation of the United Nations i.e. the long tern effect has increased happiness on the earth. A world ruled according to this principle would also mean an end to all individual rights. If killing someone would make people happy then it would be justified to execute that individual.
Anders Rasmussen, D1099019
My conclusion so far is that it is wrong to make ethical laws or principals; there will always be situations such as the ones exemplified above where it is not appropriate. I think that ethics is subjective and should remain so, since creating laws will most likely lead to misinterpretations and a more inhuman society. Ethics is after all one of the prime things that makes us human. This though is not to say that we should live in total anarchy, people that obviously do harm to mankind should be punished. I believe in rules as long as they don’t take away the individual responsibility.
Accepting that ethics is something each individual has to take into consideration in each situation the next issue would be what tools are we in possession of when deciding the ethical correctness in a certain behavior, and more importantly, what tools should we use?
John Stuart Mill, a famous utilitarian, claimed that it is through reason, and reason only, that one should decide what to do. Using logical reasoning one should derive as many consequences as possible and measure the happiness they bring and upon these grounds we should decide what to do. Reason I think is very important when it comes to decisions. It is much more objective than the intuition, which is our second tool. To say that we should only use reason, however is to underestimate our intuitive moral sense. Usually when making a decision we have an inner voice that tells us what is good and what is bad. Totally discarding this intuitive feeling, as Mill proposes, is to deny that it is often right (looking at visible the consequences).
Freud’s personality theory illustrates our intuition very well. He said that our personality is made up by the ego, the superego and the Id, the ego representing the reasoning and the two latter our intuition. The Id is the animal-like, innate, egoistic instincts seeking satisfaction by uttering sex and aggression energies. The superego is our moral values, which has been inflicted upon us by our surroundings. If the intuition was just a mixture of these two quite opposing forces I would as John Stuart Mill not trust it, but I think that most people are able to separate these two forces from each other and tell, which will is coming from the Id and, which is coming from the superego. It could be seen as a struggle within between the devil and the angel, where we are the ones who have to decide who we should listen to. As long as we do not let the Id (our innate needs) get the upper hand, but instead listens to our superego, the intuition is a very useful tool when taking hard decisions. There are some problems though about the superego. If our values are inflicted upon us by the culture in which we have grown up (a Christian would probably say that they are given to us from God) and thus differs from one culture to another (we can by looking at the world tell that this is the case!) clashes might occur when different societies meet. Since different subjective meanings about what is right and what is wrong will be shared by one society. It is in such situations, when the intuition fails to settle argument, that we should use our more objective tool… the reasoning.
Conclusion:
First of all we should not create a strict ethical constitution telling us the exact answer to the question “How do we know if at all that our behavior is ethical?” We should not let the moral philosopher become an engineer. Instead it is the individual that should, in each unique situation, use all available tools and act the way he or she finds most appropriate in the particular situation i.e. “how do we know, if at all, that our behavior is ethical is a question which will have different answer in different situation and we must therefore ask ourselves this question as often as possible. This is not a “perfect” system, and it will always create conflicts among us. Still I think taking away all moral responsibility is to take away what makes us human. Truly believing that you are acting ethically is as ethical one can ever get, as a human being.
Anders Rasmussen, D1099019
References:
Richard.D.Gross (1996): Psychology – The science of mind and behavior, third edition, Hodder & Stoughton
Bryan Magee (1998): Story of philosophy, Dorling Kindersley Limited, London
Mastering philosophy, second edition (2001), Anthony Harrison-Barbet
Anders Rasmussen, D1099019
