1. Ethical Theory

2. 2
The Trolley Problem

3. 3
The Trolley Problem: take 2

4. 4
The Transplant Surgeon

5. 5
Consequentialism & Deontology
 Consequentialism – rightness depends on consequences
 Deontology – rightness depends at least in part on a formal
moral rule or principle

6. 6
$180 billion government bailout
A few months later...
$165 million in bonuses to 400 executives

7. 7
Relativism
“What I feel is right is right. What I feel is wrong is wrong.”
– Jean Jacques Rousseau
 Ethical Subjectivism - There are no objective moral truths –
only an individual’s feelings or preferences.
 Some Criticism:
 No arbitration between views possible, other than
the exercise of power.
 Anyone can harm others if it feels right to them
 And we do tend to think that arbitration is possible –
we do it all the time. And that it’s wrong to harm
others for such a reason.

8. 8
Relativism
 Cultural Relativism - All (not some) moral values are nothing
more than cultural customs and laws.
 Some Criticism:
 Guilty of deriving ought from is (the Naturalist Fallacy).
 Offers no criteria for distinguishing between reformers and
criminals
 Can’t explain moral progress
 Encourages blind conformity to cultural norms, rather than
rational analysis of moral issues (which we think is important)
 Doesn’t work in pluralistic cultures (like ours)
 Can lead to suspicion and mistrust of other cultures

9. 9
Following the law is not the
same thing as acting morally
 Laws can be immoral
 Laws can provide
insufficient direction
 Laws can be ambiguous
 Doing the moral minimum is doing what you are
morally obligated to do (not doing bad)
 Doing good: going beyond your obligations

10. 10
Moral Development & Maturity
Postconventional thinking does
not need to reject cultural norms,
but rather to evaluate them. If it
accepts them, it’s because they
are the right norms to have – not
because they are the norms we
do have,
The more you think about your choices,
the more you think about your reasons
and the reasons of others, the more
you open your mind and widen your
horizons, the more your moral
reasoning is likely to mature!

11. 11
Ethical Egoism - everyone ought to do what is in
his or her own rational self-interest
“The achievement of his own happiness is man’s highest
moral purpose”
– Ayn Rand, The Virtue of Selfishness (1964)
 Some Criticism:
 Justifies any self-interested action – no
matter how it effects others.
 Selfishness is usually associated with
immorality, altruism with morality

12. 12
Utilitarianism
Jeremy Bentham (1748 – 1831)
The morally right act for an agent A at a time
t is that act available to A at t, that will
maximize the total amount of good in the
world (that will have the best
consequences).
“The greatest good for the greatest number”

13. 13
Hedonistic Utilitarianism
What is good?
Pleasure and the absence of pain are good
Pleasure is any sensation you would rather have
than no sensation at all; and pain is any sensation
you’d rather not have than no sensation at all.
.

14. 14
What Bentham thinks are the
advantages of Utilitarianism
 Neutralistic – treats everyone in the same way
 Realistic – it’s based on real psychology. It works with
people as it finds them and organizes society so that they
being that way actually has good consequences for
everyone.
 Non-metaphysical – it doesn't make goodness/badness
right/wrongness some sort of weird qualities. What in the
world is “a natural right?”
 Non-elitist – it counts all sentient creatures. And all types of
pleasures equally
 Determinate in principle – in principle, you can use the
hedonic calculus to get an actual answer to the question
of “what should I do in this case?”.

15. 15
The Hedonic Calculus
For each action-alternative:
 Determine Intensity x duration
 Determine Probability
 Calculate Total = (intensity x duration) x Probability
Perform the action-alternative with the highest total

16. How do we regard different 16
types of pleasures?
 What counts as pleasure?
 What about sadistic and masochistic pleasures?
 Bentham: the source of pleasure doesn’t matter
 Are there higher and lower pleasures?
 Bentham: It’s a subjective criterion – “Pushpin is as
good as poetry”
 J.S. Mill: There is an objective quality to different
pleasures that should also be factor into our
calculations
Quality comes from what people would choose if
they had access to all possible pleasures

17. 17
Are all goods commensurable?
 Can all pleasures be roughly compared? Can they
be reduced to some sort of homogenous value?

18. 18
Utilitarianism & business
Market view – Free and unregulated markets would maximize the overall good
by most efficiently connecting supply with demand.
Administrative view – Policy experts manipulate the economy to attempt to
improve the outcome beyond the capacities of a purely free market.

19. 19
Criticisms of Utilitarianism
 It’s too difficult to apply
 People care about more than just pleasure
 We can not reduce all human goods into quantifiable
units which can be aggregated and compared
 There is no non-arbitrary limit to how far into the future we
should consider consequences
 Intention is important for determining the moral
status of actions, but no room for this in utilitarianism
 Justifies acts that seem to be plainly wrong like
murder and rape

20. 20
Other forms of Utilitarianism
 Rule Utilitarianism - Always act according to
the rule that would produce the most utility
in the world (vs. “act” utilitarianism)
 Preference Utilitarianism: Always act so as to
maximize satisfaction of people’s
preferences (vs. “Hedonistic” Utilitarianism)

21. 21
Rights and duties
 One way to think of a right is as a trump against
the claims of the general welfare.
 Rights hook into correlative duties: if you have a right
not to be killed, then I have a duty not to kill you.
 Negative rights are rights to non-interference
 A right not to be killed, have your property stolen, raped, etc.
 Positive rights are rights to aid – entitlements to
be provided with something
 Right to due process of law in the US, to free
education, to healthcare coverage, etc.

22. 22
Kantianism
 Moral actions follow from the right moral principles
 How do we know if our moral principles are good ones?
 Hypothetical imperatives are conditional,
rather than categorical/absolute
 All moral rules must rest on a categorical imperative (CI)
 To find out whether a moral principle is ok to act
from, you see if it’s compatible with the
Categorical Imperative (CI)

23. 23
The Categorical Imperative
 2nd formulation of Categorical Imperative:
“Never treat a person merely as a means to an end,
but always treat them as an end in themselves”
 1st formulation of Categorical Imperative:
"Act only according to that maxim that you can at
the same time will that it should become a universal
law.” (a rule that applies to everybody)
 Step 1: Formulate a sincere and rational maxim (a
subjective principle of action that states what you propose
to do, and why)
 Step 2: Universalize the maxim to everyone, past, present
and future. (everyone, as if by a law of nature, does A in C
in order to achieve E)

24. The Categorical Imperative 24
 Step 3: Imagine the world that would result from
conjoining all the laws of physics, psychology,
sociology, etc. with the law you made in Step 2
 Step 4: Test the maxim
 The contradiction in conception test – In the social
world of (3) would it be possible to achieve your
end by means of the action you proposed in 1?
 The Contradiction in the Will test - Could I
consistently will that this social world actually exist?
If a maxim of action fails the CI tests, it is NOT permissible to
act on that maxim! AND that means that not to do that
thing is a moral duty.

25. 25
Criticisms of Kantianism
 Its absolutist and inflexible (What if the negative consequences
are too high?)
 Some maxims which seem to be ok, fail the CI test. (e.g. Go to
the beach on a sunny day)
 We have no positive formula for constructing
maxims, so it seems we may propose any number
of maxims for any action. Which should we follow?
 The whole approach of basing morality on
rationality, rather than feelings is mistaken.

26. 26
Some major moral principles
 The Principle of Nonmaleficence – We ought to
act in ways that do not cause needless harm or
injury to others
 The Principle of Beneficence – We should act in
ways that promote the welfare of other people
 The Principle of Utility – We should act in such a
way as to bring about the greatest benefit and
the least harm

27. 27
Virtue Ethics
 Virtue ethic focuses on having a good character – tells
you what kind of person you ought to be
 It is action-guiding in the sense that it recommends
that you become the kind of person that will do what
is right – perhaps instinctively
 How do you become virtuous?
 Develop the sort of habits or instincts that a virtuous
person has through good upbringing, education,
reflection, experience, and effort
 What habits or instincts are these?
 Those that your “moral exemplars” poses

28. 28
Virtue Ethics – the virtues
 Mor
al
 Benevolence, compassion, honesty, charity, sincerity,
Virtu
sympathy, respect consideration, kindness,
thoughtfulness, loyalty, fairness, etc.
es
 Practical/non-moral virtues
 Rationality, intelligence, tenacity, capability,
patience, prudence, skillfulness, shrewdness,
proficiency, etc.

29. 29
Criticisms of Virtue Ethics
(1) Different cultural groups have had different,
sometimes conflicting, opinions on what
constitutes a virtue. If Virtue Ethics has no universal
basis, it leads to an undesirable cultural relativism.
(2) Virtue Ethics may praise certain character
traits, but this provides us with no or insufficient
practical guidance about which specific actions
to perform

30. 30
Using Child labor