Basic Ethical Theories Soraj Hongladarom Department of Philosophy, Faculty of Arts, Chulalongkorn University

Outline What is ethics? Normative ethics and metaethics Ethical theories Consequentialism Non-consequentialism Application

What is ethics? Ethics is a branch of philosophy dealing with the questions of what ought to be done or what ought not to be done, under what kinds of reasons. Ethical deliberation is as important as human culture itself; it originated as something based on religion, but later developed to be more secular.

Major Ethical Theories Ancient/Religious Major religions: Christianity, Buddhism, Islam, etc. Indigenous belief systems What they share with one another. Virtue ethics Based on the thoughts of the Greek, systematized by Aristotle Emphasis on development of character.

Major Ethical Theories Modern Immanuel Kant - deontological ethics ‘deontos’ is Greek for ‘duty’ Emphasis on the role of duty and conforming to rational ideal. J. S. Mill - utilitarianism, or consequentialist ethics “Greatest good for the greatest number” Calculation of goods and utilities. What these two theories share in common.

Major Ethical Theories ‘Postmodern’ theories F. Nietzsche - ‘revaluation of all values’; ‘genealogy of morals’ Basic assumption of the postmoderns - distrust in the power of reason, belief that true objectivity cannot be found, ‘truth’ is a construction. What this means for applied ethics.

Mapping So we have four major theories, or groups of theories. The ancient/religious and the virtue ethics groups can be put together, since they do not subscribe to the modern belief in individual power of reason. The postmoderns also distrust individual power of reason, but they share with the moderns distrust or disbelief in metaphysics.