Ethics and Values

1. Definition and Origin:

• Ethics: Ethics refers to a set of principles or guidelines that dictate appropriate behavior in a particular profession or organization. These principles are often written down in a code of ethics or conduct, and are based on the values of the organization or profession.
• Morals: Morals refer to personal beliefs about right and wrong. These beliefs are often shaped by cultural, religious, and personal experiences.

2. Objective vs. Subjective:

• Ethics: Ethics are often objective and universal in nature. They are developed to ensure that individuals within a particular profession or organization are held to the same standards of behavior.
• Morals: Morals are often subjective and may vary from person to person. They are influenced by a person's upbringing, culture, religion, and personal experiences.

3. Flexibility:

• Ethics: Ethics are often less flexible than morals because they are developed to ensure consistent behavior within a profession or organization.
• Morals: Morals are often more flexible because they are based on personal beliefs that may change over time.

4. Examples:

• Ethics: Examples of ethics include the American Bar Association's Model Rules of Professional Conduct for lawyers or the American Psychological Association's Ethical Principles of Psychologists and Code of Conduct.
• Morals: Examples of morals include a person's belief that lying is always wrong or that it is important to treat others with kindness and respect.

In summary, ethics refer to a set of principles or guidelines that dictate appropriate behavior in a particular profession or organization, while morals refer to personal beliefs about right and wrong that may vary from person to person. Ethics are often objective and less flexible, while morals are subjective and more flexible.

Ethics and Values: Western Debates through the ideas of various thinkers

1. Socrates

• A belief that good actions are natural and a result of knowledge
• Equated knowledge with self-awareness, virtue, and happiness
• Virtue can be known and the virtuous person will act virtuously

2. Plato

• True knowledge consists in knowing something general that is common to all particular cases
• The Form of the Good is a perfect, eternal, and changeless entity in which particular good things
  share or participate
• Justice exists when the three elements of the soul act in harmony with each other

3. Aristotle

• Life of virtue is rewarding for the virtuous as well as beneficial for the community
• Virtue is a balance point between a deficiency and an excess of a trait
• Self-realization and the development of one’s talents is the surest path to happiness
• Encouraged moderation in all things

4. Jeremy Bentham

• Nature has placed human beings under two masters – pleasure and pain
• Right and wrong can be meaningful only if they are used in accordance with the utilitarian principle
• Whatever increases the net surplus of pleasure over pain is right and whatever decreases it is wrong

5. John Stuart Mill

• Distinguished between pleasures that are higher and lower in quality
• Utilitarianism is compatible with moral rules and principles relating to justice, honesty, and truthfulness

6. Rousseau

• A proponent of rule by the “general will”
• The general will is the true common will of all the citizens

7. Immanuel Kant

• Most virtues and vices are highly ambivalent and should always be judged in a specific context
• Rational action cannot be based on an individual’s personal desires but must be in accordance with a
  universal law
• One’s actions possess moral worth only when one does his duty for its own sake