Consequentialism

Ethics Exam 1. What is the value and importance of a course in Ethics? Answer: The significance of taking ethics course is that it can help or redirect a misguided individual to the right path. Also, ethics can help a person to rationally establish an argument for what is right and what is wrong and as well as forming an argument on why he/she should do what is right. 2. What are the advantages of and disadvantages of Utilitarian system of ethics? Answer: The advantages of utilitarian system is…

Final Exam 1. In “A Critique of Utilitarianism”, Bernard Williams argues against the fundamental characteristics of utilitarianism and believes that the notion of ends justifying the means are a way of representing the doctrine of negative responsibility which can lead to consequences from the choices we make/do not make (663). As a result, we are all responsible for the consequences that we fail to prevent as well as the ones we brought upon ourselves. That is, in each case the choice on…

Natasha The War on Morality Morality is defined as principles concerning the line between right and wrong, or good and bad. Ethics is defined as moral guidelines that govern a person's actions. Morality and ethics are often suspended in war time. This fact is demonstrated by the massive amount of civilian casualties that wars seem to carry as well as, the destruction of homes and land. But why would such a thing occur. After all, wars are fought by humans who have the capacity for compassion.…

Ethics has a great impact on people whenever they are facing a difficult or biased situation. It depends on what ethical philosophies that people believe in, which would justify their actions towards a specific problem. The goal of this paper is to reflect the different responses of bystanders under two different ethical approaches, which are the utilitarianism or the deontology approach. According to the textbook (Introducing Philosophy through Pop Culture: From Socrates to South Park, Hume to…

The End Game Everyone has the need to have purpose in their life. Meaning that everyone has an end goal in mind. But, does the method getting there really matter? Can the end justify the means? This question arises when reading through Heart of Darkness. Many characters in the novel had purpose in their actions, two major characters are Kurtz’s purpose of obtaining power, and Marlow’s purpose of doing what’s morally right. Kurtz’s main goal was to achieve power and that was enough justification…

Ethical theories can be broken down into two basic categories; consequentialist and non-consequentialist. Consequentialism focuses on the consequences of an action to determine if the action is good or bad. Non-consequentialism looks at intrinsic qualities of the action to determine its moral value, not the results of the action. Ethical egoism is a consequential moral philosophy where the individual takes care of themselves first by putting their goals and interests ahead of everyone else.…

There are many different ethical views, like Consequentialism and the ethics of care that can be utilized to evaluate the approach one should make under particular circumstances (Russ Shafer-Landau, The Fundamentals of Ethics, Third Edition, Oxford, 2014.). Consequentialism “says that an action is morally required just because it produces the best overall result” (121). Consequentialists look to see if the ends justify the means, so long as the ends are good enough (120). This means that…

medicine. It involves the consideration of both contemporary and traditional bioethical issues that have derived from advancements in modern technologies and uncertainty about how to respond to these issues. Non- Absolutism and Consequentialism: Non-absolutism and consequentialism are key concepts that influence Buddhist bioethical applications. These ethical concepts are very subjective and relate to a variety of circumstances based on an adherent’s own interpretation and situation. This is…

the topics discussed today were non-consequentialism/consequentialism and virtue theories. Consequentialism is concerned with only looking at the consequences of an action and non-consequentialism looks at the action itself. Two examples of consquentialism considered were egoism and utilitarianism. An egoist acts in their own self-interest while the utilitarian looks at the maximum number of good for the greatest number of people. In contrast, non-consequentialism looks at the moral action…

Many scholars who seek to justify the use of torture use the consequentialist argument by saying the positive consequences compensate for any of the negatives. Thus saying torture is a permissible mechanism as long as torture is the lesser of two evils. In order for those who support torture to fortify and expand their stance, they depend greatly on the theoretical scenario of a ticking bomb, which was formerly thought of by an English philosopher known as Bentham (Bellamy 137). The ticking bomb…