Biology In Society - Lecture 6

Front 1

Jonathan Glover

Back 1

British philosopher

"In Europe at the start of the 20th century most people thought there was a moral law, which was self-evidently to be obeyed"

Front 2

Lord Acton

Back 2

English Catholic historian

"Opinions alter, manners change, creeds rise & fall, but moral law is written on the tablets of eternity"

Front 3

Wittgenstein

Back 3

No moral dilemmas

Front 4

Popper

Back 4

There were moral dilemmas

Front 5

Sir David King

Back 5

7 principles aimed at building trust between scientists & society

Front 6

Nietzsche

Back 6

If God existed, he is now dead

Morals are a human construction, deriving from societies & religions that no long exist - did not take into account altruism & homeostasis

Survival of the fittest

Front 7

Immanuel Kant

Back 7

To be evil is illogical & to be wicked is inconsistent

Founded Kantianism

"Two things fill the mind with ever new & increasing admiration & awe the oftener & more steadily they are reflected on: the starry heavens above me & the moral law within me"

Front 8

Kantianism

Back 8

Moral actions are right/obligatory, irrespective of their consequences

Other actions are wrong, irrespective of their consequences

Front 9

Richard Hare

Back 9

Proscriptivism

Moral language possesses innate logic

To be evil is illogical & to be wicked is inconsistent

Front 10

Proscriptivism

Back 10

Whoever makes a moral judgement is committed to the same judgement in any situation where the same relevant facts obtain.

Front 11

Rights

Back 11

Innate moral principles, not acquired

Front 12

Arthur Koestler

Back 12

"I am not sure whether what thephilosophers call 'ethical absolutes' exist, but I am sure we have to act as if they do exist"

Front 13

Jeremy Bentham

Back 13

Consequentialism (utilitarianism)

Front 14

Consequentialism

Back 14

The consequences of conduct = ultimate basis for judgement about their rightness of that conduct.

Morally right = a good outcome

Front 15

Utilitarianism

Back 15

Aggregated happiness

Everyone to be happy

Front 16

Epicurus

Back 16

Showed consequential views in the past

Pursuit of happiness

Elimination of pain

Front 17

Ayn Rand

Back 17

Consequentialism (egotism)

Objectivism

Front 18

Egotism

Back 18

Maximise his/her own interests/welfare

Can be beneficial, detrimental or neutral to the welfare of others

Front 19

Joseph Butler

Back 19

Consequentialism (egotism)

Bishop

"Conscience & self-love, if we understand our true happiness, always leads us the same way. Duty & interest are perfectly coincident"

Front 20

Iris Murdoch

Back 20

Consequentialism (egotism)

"The imagination can be used to penetrate the veil that our own selfish concerns usually place between us & moral illumination"

"Great are inspires... it is an image of virtue. Its condensed, clarified, presentation enables us to look without sin upon a sinful world... it is a symbol of morality"

Front 21

Thomas Hobbes

Back 21

Consequentialism (contractualism)

Front 22

Contractualism

Back 22

Humans are innately bad

Form of 'rational egotism

Outside agent (government) should have control/impose a framework within which egotism can flourish without moral anarchy

Front 23

Elizabeth Anscombe

Back 23

Virtue ethics

Front 24

Virtue

Back 24

Positive trait or quality deemed to be morally good

Valued as a foundation of principle & good moral being

Front 25

Virtue ethics

Back 25

Role of one's character & the virtues that one's character embodies for determining or evaluating ethical behaviour.

Emphasizes character rather than rules/consequences.

ARETE (excellence/virtue) then PHRONESIS (practical/moral wisdom) LEADING TO EUDAIMONIA (flourishing/happiness). Telelogical.

Front 26

Alasdair MacIntyre

Back 26

Developed virtue ethics

Ethics can be eroded by skeptics (scientists)

Kant made morality a cold & unsympathetic exercise in reason

Utiliarians reduced ethics to a set of pseudo-scientific calculations - led to society empty of moral values

Still hope to stop problem - humans are unstoppable communitarians

Reject 'survival of the fittest'

Front 27

Jean Jacques Rousseau

Back 27

Rejectes Hobbes' view

Looked at man's history to find the optimal virtues

Front 28

Jonathan Dancy

Back 28

Defined particularism

Front 29

Particularism

Back 29

Reasons are context-dependent – circumstances alter cases.

No overriding principles that are applicable in every case.

New cases = new solution.

Front 30

Mary Wollstonecraft & Marth Nussbaum

Back 30

Feminists

Front 31

Peter Singer

Back 31

Animal rights

Coined 'speciesist'

Front 32

Speciesist

Back 32

Denying an animal its rights

Front 33

Jacques Derrida

Back 33

Deconstructivism

Front 34

Deconstructivism

Back 34

Break-down argument = there will be an opposing argument in it.

Contradicting.

Front 35

Foucault

Back 35

Post-modernist

"Truth is a thing of this world: it is produced only by virtue of multiple forms of constraint"

Front 36

Quine

Back 36

"The totality of our so-called knowledge or beliefs, from the most casual matters of geography & histroy to the profoundest laws of atomic physics... is a man-made fabric which impinges on experience only along the edges"

Front 37

Tannsjo

Back 37

To be moral agnostic = no systematic way to learn from experience.

Man makes himself by the choice of his morality

Front 38

Agnostic

Back 38

Believes the existence of a greater power (God) cannot be proven or disproved, it is unknown.