Day 33: Intro to Ethics

1.  Is there such a thing as a selfless act?  Phoebe

2.  Small group discussions:
  Are Moral Choices Possible?
  Why Do the Right Thing?
  Can People Be Good Without a Common Idea of Good?
  How Should the Rightness or Wrongness of Actions Be Determined?

3.  Ethics Vocab List:
Vocabulary for Ethics

Humanism
An approach that emphasizes the human or secular (non-religious)realm over the religious or spiritual realm.

Theories of action
Theories that deal with how people should act.

Theories of character (virtue theories)
Theories that deal with questions about character traits that are morally good and morally bad.

Theories of value
Theories that deal with questions about the things people value.

Moral Agent
Someone who is capable of thinking about a moral problem, making a decision how to act, and taking responsibility for this action.

Divine Command Theory
Right and wrong are defined by the commands of the supreme being.

Divine Command Ethicists
A person whose actions are defined by the commands of the supreme being.

Utilitarianism (Developed by John Stuart Mill and Jeremy Bentham)
Morally good choices are those that result in the greatest good (amount of happiness) for the greatest number of people.

Kantian Ethicists
Believe that moral choices must be judged, not by their consequences, but by the good will of the moral agent. 

Egoists
Believe that people should act in their own interest.

Intuitionists
Believe that truths, and therefore morals, are understood by intuition (an experience that is independent of reasoning).

Objective
Knowledge that is supported by evidence.

Subjective
Opinions that depend on personal feelings, experience, or thought.


5.  Read and take notes on pp. 242 - 259 of the text.