Ethical Choices

[evmori]

Stosh beat me to it!

 

Without a basis (rules or guidelines) there is nothing to base ethical decisions on. How would you know if something is ethical if you have no basis?

 

 

Ed Mori

1 Peter 4:10

[Eagledad]

>>Without a basis (rules or guidelines) there is nothing to base ethical decisions on. How would you know if something is ethical if you have no basis?

[Gunny2862]

YES.

 

Except the examples of the rules given are codifications of ethics as seen by a society rather than ethics deriving from those rules.(This message has been edited by Gunny2862)

[Docrwm]

Ethics is a way of saying that the person has exhibited that they understand the Spirit of the body of laws. One is Ethical when one extends their behavior beyond the letter of the rules/laws and exhibits behavior in concert with those laws but for which there is currently no specific law. One cannot be behaving ethically when they are coerced into acting but only when they freely choose to act without any compulsion because they believe it to be right and proper given the values that underlie and weave all the rules and laws together and are the origin of those rules/laws.

 

Just my thoughts.

[Trevorum]

 

"But god or gods or goddesses are incorruptible and their word is eternal."

 

This is actually a fairly recent notion. Throughout history, most gods that people have worshipped have been selfish, cruel, and deceitful. (Just like people, go figure...)

[CalicoPenn]

Rules and guidelines are tools - nothing more. Their impact on ethics is at a very basic level. If your ethics are based solely on rules and guidelines, then your automatic "choice" tends to be following the rules - which isn't really a choice as much as it is a conditioned response. You can claim you've made a choice, but in reality, the choice was made by someone else, and you are simply following that entity's choices, not your own.

 

To truly make ethical choices, one needs to bring in more advanced tools to help with the decision - tools such as (but not limited to) humanity, compassion, empathy and sympathy (or the antithesis of one or more of these tools).

 

An ethical choice may very well be that the best course of action is to follow the rules - but an ethical choice may also be that the best course of action is to bend or break the rules. There are times when it may be more ethical to break a rule than to follow a rule. Which is more ethical - letting a group of people suffer from dehydration in a natural disaster or breaking into a closed convenience store to get bottled water for victims of the disaster? It's the "Les Miserables" conundrum.

 

As has been pointed out, morality is also a component (tool - and another advanced tool at that) of ethics, but morality is not universal (and of course, neither is ethics). Eric Rudolph, who bombed abortion clinics, the Atlanta Olympics, and gay bars, followed an internal morality that approved of these actions. I dare say most of us would disagree with the ethical choices he made - but we would base that disagreement on our own internal morality and application of ethics.

 

Calico

[Stosh]

ethic

 

noun a set of moral principles.

 

ORIGIN Latin ethice, from Greek he ethike tekhne the science of morals.

 

Sorry, but one who does not conform to moral principles is unethical. Moral principles are codified norms by which people have agreed to live which direct what is acceptable actions to live by.

 

To think ethics are independent from morals, codified principles, etc. simply doesn't understand what the word ethic means.

 

To think these moral codes, principles, and or agreements by which people live are not rules and regulations, is simply not defining the words properly, or at least not with commonly accepted definitions.

 

To think that following

 

principle

 

noun 1 a fundamental truth or proposition serving as the foundation for belief or action. 2 a rule or belief governing ones personal behaviour. 3 morally correct behaviour and attitudes. 4 a general scientific theorem or natural law. 5 a fundamental source or basis of something. 6 Chemistry an active or characteristic constituent of a substance.

 

PHRASES in principle in theory. on principle because of ones adherence to a particular belief.

 

ORIGIN Latin principium source, from princeps first, chief

 

Redefining words doesn't really change anything for the general public, only those who are making up rules as they go.

 

Stosh

[Eagledad]

>>"But god or gods or goddesses are incorruptible and their word is eternal."

 

This is actually a fairly recent notion. Throughout history, most gods that people have worshipped have been selfish, cruel, and deceitful. (Just like people, go figure...)