ST.

BRIDGET
COLLEGE
MRS. KRISTINE P. JABAT
 LEARNING TARGETS
1. Identify several moral theories and their
implications
2. Explain the role of mental frames in moral
experience
3. Classify the dominant mental frames
4. Articulate what is meant by virtue ethics
5. Critique virtue ethics and its importance and
make use of it
6. Understand and articulate the Rights Theory
7. Differentiate legal from moral rights
It’s Joke Time!
 TOPICS
• Moral Theories
• Mental Frames
• Aristotle and St. Thomas
• Kant and Rights
• Rights and Nature of Rights
• Kinds of Rights
• Distinction between Moral Rights
and Legal Rights
 What is
your
philosophy
in life?
 “The secret of a happy
living is not do what
you like but to love what
you do.”
https://wheelofnames.com/
 THE EARLY
PHILOSOPHERS
AND THEIR
WORKS
 While moral theory does not invent
morality, or even reflection on it, it does
try to bring systematic thinking to bear
on the phenomenon. Ancient moral
theory, however, does not attempt to be
a comprehensive account of all the
phenomena that fall under the heading
of morality. Rather, assuming piecemeal
opinions and practices, it tries to
capture its underlying essence.
Early Philosophers
Aristotle
Immanuel Kant
 Story: Motherhood
Jenna is a loving mother of 6 who tries to make
ends meet by offering her services for laundry, cleaning
houses, taking care of kids or old folks and just basically
accepting any job she can. The husband on the other
hand, is a carpenter who recently had an accident.
While recovering, he is selling all sorts of items. One
day, Jenna found out that she is pregnant again with
twins. They cannot afford another mouth to feed, let
alone two. Despite neighbors telling her to have an
abortion, she decided to continue with her pregnancy
because for her, she cannot entertain the idea of killing
her unborn children. However, as soon as they were
born, she gave them up for adoption to a childless
couple.
 Story: Motherhood

1.Do you think Jenna is a

morally good person?
2.If you were in her situation,
what would you have done?
3.Do you agree with her
decision?
Aristotle
 Aristotle on Ethics
• The most famous and thorough of Aristotle’s
ethical works is Nicomachean Ethics. This
work is an inquiry into the best life for
human beings to live.
• The life of human flourishing or happiness
(eudaimonia) is the best life.
• It is important to note that we translate as
“happiness” is quite different for Aristotle
that it is for us.
 “Virtue lies in our power, and
similarly so does vice; because
where it is in our power to act, it
is also in our power not to act.”
-Aristotle, The Nicomachean Ethics
 Aristotle on Ethics
• We often consider happiness to be a
mood or an emotion, but Aristotle
considers it to be an activity – a way
of living one’s life.
• Thus, it is possible for one to have an
overall happy life, even if that life has
its moments of sadness and pain
(Barnes, 1984).
 Aristotle on Ethics
• Happiness is the practice of virtue or
excellence (arête), and so it is important to
know the two types of virtue: character
virtue, the discussion of which makes up
the bulk of the Ethics, and the intellectual
virtue.
• Character excellence comes about through
habit – one habituates oneself to character
excellence by knowingly practicing virtues.
 Aristotle on Ethics
• To be clear, it is possible to perform an
excellent action accidentally or without
knowledge, but doing so would not make
for an excellent person, just as accidentally
writing in grammatically correct way does
not make for a grammarian. One must be
aware that one is practicing the life of
virtue (Broadie, 1991).
 Aristotle on Ethics
• Aristotle arrives at the idea that “the
activity of the soul in accordance with
virtue” is the best life for human beings
through the “human function” argument.
• The function of the human being is logos
or reason, and the more thoroughly one
lives the life of reason, the happier one’s
life will be (Kraut, 2014).
Aristotle on Ethics
So, the happiest life is
a practice of virtue,
and this is practiced
under the guidance of
reason.
 Aristotle on Ethics
• Examples of character virtues would be
courage, temperance, liberality, and
magnanimity (Rorty, 1984).
• Friendship is also a necessary part of the
happy life. There are three types of
friendship, none of which is exclusive of
the other: a friendship of excellence, a
friendship of pleasure, and a friendship
of utility.
 Friendship of Excellence
• based upon a virtue, and each friend
enjoys and contemplates the
excellence of his/her friend. A mark of
good friendship is that friends “live
together,” that is that friend spends a
substantial amount of time together,
since a substantial time apart will
likely weaken the bond of friendship.
 Friendship of Pleasure and
Utility
• the most changeable forms of friendship
since the things we find pleasure or
useful tend to change over a lifetime.
For example, if a friendship forms out of a
mutual love for beer, but the interest of
one of the friends later turns towards
wine, the friendship would likely dissolve.
Again, if a friend is merely one of utility,
then the friendship will likely dissolve
when it is no longer useful.
 Aristotle on Ethics
• Since the best life is a life of virtue or
excellence, and since we are closer to
excellence the more thoroughly we will fulfill
our function, the best life is the life of theoria
or contemplation. This is the most divine life,
since one comes closest to the pure activity of
thought. It is the most self-sufficient life since
one can think even when one is alone.
 Aristotle on Ethics
• For Aristotle, the contemplation of
unchanging things is an activity full of
wonder. Aristotle considered the cosmos
to be eternal and unchanging. So, one
might have knowledge of astronomy, but
it is the contemplation of what this
knowledge is about that is most
wonderful.
 Aristotle on Ethics
• The Greek theoria is rooted in a verb
for seeing, hence our word
“theatre”. So in contemplation or
theorizing, one comes face to face
with what one know (Barnes, 1991).
 Aristotle on Ethics
• Aristotle also made mention of telos. A telos is
derived from the Greek word for “end”,
“purpose”, or “goal”. It is an end or purpose,
in a fairly constrained sense used by
philosophers such as Aristotle. It is the root for
the term “teleology”, roughly the study of
purposiveness, or the study of objects with a
view to their aims, purposes, or intentions.
• Teleology figures centrally in Aristotle’s biology
and in his theories of causes.
SUMMUM BONUM
•“Highest good”
•Final end
•Eudaimonia (happiness)
“Happiness is the meaning and
the purpose of life, the whole
aim and end of human
existence.”
- Aristotle
 Virtue as a Habit

•Virtue should be understood

as being a habit. It should be
something that has shaped
one’s character through
constant and consistent
virtuous act.
 Virtue of the Mean

•In his Nicomachean

Ethics, Aristotle devised a
standard virtue which
should be a mean
between two vices.
(Virtue of the Mean)
 Examples:
Vice (Too Much) Virtue (Right Vice (Too Little)
Balance)
Rashness Courage Cowardice
Wastefulness Generosity Stinginess
Shamelessness Modesty Bashfulness
vanity Rightful pride Undue meekness
timidity gentleness Wrathfulness
apathy patience Aggression
ambition Proper ambition Lack of Ambition
 Examples:
Vice (Too Much) Virtue (Right Vice (Too Little)
Balance)
Self-indulgence Temperance Insensibility
Vulgarity Magnificence Pettiness
Irascibility Good Temper Lack of Spirit
Boastfulness Truthfulness Mock Modesty
Shyness Modesty Shamelessness
Spite Proper Envy
Indignation
Obsequiousness Friendliness Surliness
 Trivia:
The Nicomachean Ethics was
dedicated to his son, Nicomacus,
who died in battle.
St. Thomas Aquinas
 “Some truths about God exceed all
the ability of human reasons… But
there are some truths which natural
reason also is able to reach. Such as
that God exists.”
- Summa contra Gentiles Book 1
 Trivia:
Aquinas is considered as the
Patron Saint of Students and
Catholic Schools.
 St. Thomas Aquinas on Virtue
• Thomas’ broad account of virtues as
excellences or perfections of the various
human powers formally echoes Aristotle,
both with regard to the nature of a virtue and
many specific values.
• The moral philosophy of St. Thomas Aquinas
(1225-1274) involves a merger of at least two
apparently disparate traditions: Aristotelian
eudaimonism and Christian theology.
 St. Thomas Aquinas on Virtue
• On one hand, Aquinas follows Aristotle in
thinking that an act is good or bad depending
on whether it contributes to or deters us from
our proper human end – the telos or final
goal at which all human actions aim. That
telos is eudaimonia, or happiness, where
“happiness” is understood in terms of
completion, perfection, or well-being.
 St. Thomas Aquinas on Virtue
•Achieving happiness, however,
requires range of intellectual
and moral virtues that enable us
to understand the nature of
happiness and motivate us to
seek in a reliable and consistent
way.
 St. Thomas Aquinas on Virtue
• On the other hand, Aquinas believes that we
can never achieve complete or final happiness
in this life. For him, final happiness consists
in beatitude, or supernatural union with
God. Such end lies far beyond what we
through our natural human capacities can
attain. For this reason, we not only need the
virtues, we also need God to transform our
nature – to perfect or “deify” it – so that we
might be suited to participate in divine
beatitude.
 St. Thomas Aquinas on Virtue
• Moreover, Aquinas believes that we
inherited a propensity to sin from our first
parent, Adam. While our nature is not wholly
corrupted by sin, it is nevertheless diminished
by sin’s stain, as evidenced by the fact that
our wills are at enmity with God’s. Thus we
need God’s help in order to restore the
good of our nature and bring us into
conformity with his will. To this end, God
imbues us with his grace which comes in the
form of divinely instantiated virtues and gifts.
 St. Thomas Aquinas on Virtue
• However, even though this beatitudo is
brought about supernaturally by the
power of God, it is not utterly foreign to
human nature. In effect, the
supernatural power of God elevates or
expands the powers of intellect and
will to a kind of contemplation beyond
themselves and yet not foreign to
them.
 St. Thomas Aquinas on Virtue
• So this distinction of a “two-fold
happiness” should not be thought of
as involving two fundamentally
distinct goals or ends of human life.
The second supernatural happiness is
seen as a kind of surpassing
perfection of the first (Bradley,
1997).
 St. Thomas Aquinas on Virtue
• This distinction of a “two-fold happiness” in
human life leads to a distinction between the
natural virtues and the theological virtues.
• Natural virtues are virtues that pertain to the
happiness of this life that is “proportionate”
to human nature.
• Theological virtues pertain to the beatitudo
that is not proportionate to human nature,
the supernatural good of life with God.
 St. Thomas Aquinas on Virtue
• Natural virtues are divided into moral virtues
and intellectual virtues.
• The intellectual virtues perfect the intellect
and confer an aptness for the good work of the
intellect which is the apprehension of truth.
• The moral virtues are the habits that perfect
the various powers concerned with human
appetites, including rational appetite,
conferring upon them an aptness for the right
use of those appetites (Hankley, 1987).
 Transcript of St. Thomas
Aquinas’ Definition of Law
Law – “an ordinance of reason
promulgated by competent
authority for the sake of the
common good.”
1. A just law is an ordinance
of reason.
• This means that a good law must be
reasonable; it must be a product of
careful and serious deliberation.
• For example: the law against driving
under the influence of alcohol is based
on concrete findings that alcohol
consumption causes loss of control and
coordination.
1. A just law is an ordinance
of reason.
• In addition, for a law to be
reasonable, it must also be
permanent. A law is considered as
permanent provided it is binding
and relevant for a long period of
time.
 2. A just law is properly
promulgated.
• For any law to be effective, it must be
clearly communicated to all people
concerned.
• Example: When a school or organization,
for instance, enacts a new set of policies,
they often provide students with
handbooks for them to know, understand
and follow these policies.
3. A just law must be decreed
by competent authority.
• Only persons with legitimate
authority have the power to create
and implement laws for their
respective communities. That is why,
church leaders cannot make laws for
the country nor can government
leaders enact church laws.
 4. A just law ought to be for
the sake of common good.
• This means that a just law, first of all,
presupposes the promotion of and
respect for the dignity and freedom of
each person. Secondly, it should foster
the social well-being and authentic
development of the community. Lastly,
it should promote true and lasting
peace.
 St. Thomas and the Natural
Law
• For the Thomistic ethics, it is centered on
the concept of natural law.
• For Aquinas, God in His Divine providence
plans all things and directs all things to their
proper order, to their purpose, or to their
proper end. This law is nothing but the
attainment of God’s purpose for all things
and guiding all these things in their proper
direction.
 St. Thomas and the Natural
Law
• The natural law, therefore, governs the
natural course of everything; plants
grow as what is supposed to be as a
plant; animal acts as they are naturally
designed to. This means that the whole
creation follows its nature. As to
humans, they are bound to follow the
natural moral law.
 St. Thomas and the Natural
Law
• This natural moral law is manifested by
humans in their ability to do good and
avoid evil guided by their practical
moral judgment. There is no need to
learn this law. Everyone would ought to
do what is good and avoid evil.
St. Thomas Aquinas’ Cardinal
Natural Virtues
•Prudence
•Temperance
•Courage
•Justice
 Cardinal Natural Virtues
• Prudence is an intellect virtue since it bears upon
the goal of truth in the good ordering of action.
• Temperance is the cardinal virtue that pertains to
the concupiscent appetite that inclines one toward
what is suitable and away from what is harmful to
human bodily life.
• Courage is the cardinal value that pertains to the
irascible appetite that inclines one toward
resisting those things that attack human bodily
life.
• Justice is a virtue of the rational appetite or will.
 Prudence
• Making good judgments about how we should
behave
• “Wisdom concerning human affairs”
• In order to make good moral judgments, a two-fold
knowledge is required: one must know (1) the
general moral principles that guide actions and (2)
the particular circumstances in which a decision is
required.
• It also involves the appraisal of concrete,
contingent circumstances.
 Prudence
• As cardinal virtue, prudence functions as a
principal virtue on which a variety of other
excellences hinge. Those excellences
include memory, intelligence, docility,
shrewdness, reason, foresight,
circumspection, and caution. In order to
make reliable judgments about what is
really good, our passions need some
measure of restraint so that they do not
corrupt good judgment.
 Temperance
• Concerns the moderation of physical pleasures,
especially those associated with eating, drinking,
and sex.
• Denotes a restrained desire for physical
gratification
• For Aquinas, the purpose of this is to refine the
way we enjoy bodily pleasures. Specifically, it
creates in the agent a proper sense of moderation
with respect to what is pleasurable.
 Temperance
• Aquinas insists that “sensible and bodily goods…
are not in opposition to reason, but are subject to
its instruments which reason employs in order to
attain its proper end.”
• There are a host of subsidiary virtues that fall
under this: chastity, sobriety, and abstinence
(retrenchment of sex, drink and food
respectively); meekness, clemency, and
studiousness (restrain anger, the desire to punish
and the desire to pursue vain curiosity
respectively)
 Courage
• Moderates the appetites that prevent from
undertaking more daunting tasks
• Restrains our fears so that we might endure
harrowing circumstances
• Does not only mollify fears, it also combats the
unreasonable zeal to overcome them.
• Curbs excessive fear and modify unreasonable
daring
• The courageous person will have patience and
perseverance.
Two Types of Courage

1. Physical Courage
2. Moral Courage
 Physical Courage
• Is the enactment of virtue through actual activity,
such as a police officer in pursuit of a criminal, a
lifeguard saving someone from drowning, or a
boxer taking on a foe twice his size.
• At times, such an act can be driven by
abstractions, like pride and honor. Through
physical courage can be principle-related, it is not
exclusively principle-driven (Kidder, 2006)
 Moral Courage
• Is never always demonstrated on a strictly physical
level. Instead, engaging in such acts serves mainly
to further typify the virtues one lives by.
• Unlike physical courage as exhibited, for instance,
by an athlete overcoming impossible odds to win
or a fireman rescuing an elderly couple from a
burning tenement, moral courage has no adoring
public to play to, for to muster it means to take
the road less travelled.
 Justice
• Governs our relationships with others
• Denotes a sustained or constant willingness
to extend to each person what he/she
deserves
• Legal justice: governs our actions
according to the common good
• Concerns not individual benefits but
community welfare
 Justice
• According to Aquinas, everyone who is a
member of a community stands to that
community as a part to a whole. Whatever
affects the part also affects the whole. And
so whatever is good (or harmful) for oneself
will also be good (or harmful) for the
community of which one is a part.
 Cardinal Natural
Virtues
• These virtues are called “cardinal” both because
of their specific importance, but also as general
headings under which the wide array of particular
virtues are classed.
• Temperance and Courage are ordered toward and
perfect the good of the individual as such, while
Justice is ordered and perfects the good of others
in relation to the individual.
 St. Thomas Aquinas on Virtues

• Infused Natural Virtues – the natural

virtues cannot be acquired by human
nature, although they may be
strengthened by it.
• Acquired Natural Virtues – the
corresponding virtues that can be
acquired by human effort without the
gift of divine grace.
 St. Thomas Aquinas on Virtue
• While Thomas acknowledges that
these acquired natural virtues can in
principle be developed by human
effort without grace, he thinks that
their actual acquisition by human
effort is very difficult due to the
influence of sin (De Young et.al,
2009).
 St. Thomas Aquinas on Virtue
•In addition, the infused
natural virtues spring from
Charity as its effect, and thus
bear upon its object, which is
the love of God and the love
of neighbor in God.
 St. Thomas Aquinas on Virtue
• A primary example for Thomas is Misericordia
which is the virtue that pertains to the
suffering with others and acting to alleviate
their suffering.
• It looks like Justice because it bears upon the
good of another. And yet it is different from
Justice because it springs from the natural
friendship that all human beings bear to one
another, and it requires that one take upon
oneself the sufferings of other human beings.
 St. Thomas Aquinas on Virtue
• Acquired Temperance is a mean
inclining a human body to eat
enough food to sustain his or her
health and not harm the body.
• Infused Temperance is a mean
inclining the human being through
abstinence to castigate and subject
the body.
 St. Thomas Aquinas on
Theological Virtues

• The theological virtues are Faith,

Hope, and Love. They bear upon eternal
beatitude and are simply infused by
God’s gift of grace. They cannot be
acquired by human effort.
 St. Thomas Aquinas on
Theological Virtues
• Even one mortal or grave sin destroys
both Charity and all the infused moral
virtues that proceed from it, while
leaving Hope and Faith as lifeless
habits that are no longer virtues. On
the other hand, a single sin, whether
venial or mortal, does not destroy the
acquired natural virtues.
 St. Thomas Aquinas on
Theological Virtues
• Charity – the love of God and neighbor in
God. It resides in the will.
• Hope – the desire for the difficult but
attainable good of eternal happiness or
beatitude. It too resides in the will
• Faith – intellectual assent to revealed
supernatural truths that are not evident in
themselves or through demonstration from
truths evident in themselves. So it resides in
the intellect.
 St. Thomas Aquinas on
Theological Virtues
Faith is divided into believing
that there is a God and other
truth pertaining to that truth,
believing God, and believing
in God.
 7 Deadly Sins
1. Pride
2. Greed
3. Gluttony
4. Lust
5. Sloth
6. Envy
7. Anger or Wrath
 Pride
• Unrestrained and improper
appreciation of our own worth
• Often leads to the committing of the
other capital sins.
• Manifested in vanity and narcissism
about one’s appearance, intelligence,
status, etc. and described as “love of
self perverted to hatred and
contempt for one’s neighbor”.
 Greed
• Also known as avarice or covetousness
• Immoderate desire for earthly goods,
as well as situations such as power
• Sin of excess
• Can further inspire such sinful actions
as hoarding of materials or objects,
theft and robbery, trickery and
manipulation
 Gluttony
• Comes from the Latin gluttirei – to gulp
down or swallow
• Refers to the sin of over-indulgence and
over-consumption of food and drink
• The manners in which gluttony can be
committed: eating too soon, eating too
expensively, eating too much, eating too
eagerly, eating too daintily, and eating
wildly.
 Lust
• Refers to impure desire of a sexual nature
• Refers to the impure thoughts and actions
that misuse that gift, deviating from
God’s law and intentions for us.
• Indulging in this can include (but is not
limited to) fornication, adultery,
bestiality, rape, and incest and can lead
to such things as sexual addiction
 Sloth
• Described as the sin of laziness
• The central problem with sloth as a capital
sin is spiritual laziness
• Means being lazy and lax about living the
faith and practicing virtue
• In general, means disinclination to labor and
exertion. As a capital or deadly vice, St.
Thomas calls it sadness in the face of some
spiritual good which one has to achieve.
 Envy
• Jealousy
• More than merely one person wanting what
someone else has
• Means one feels unjustified sorrow and
distress about the good fortune of someone
else
• The law of love leads us to rejoice in the
good fortune of our neighbor – jealousy is a
contradiction to this
 Anger or Wrath
• Catholic Encyclopedia: the desire of vengeance
• Its ethical rating depends upon the quality of the
vengeance and the quantity of the passion
• When these are in conformity with the prescriptions of
balanced reason, anger is not a sin. It is rather a
praiseworthy thing and justifiable with a proper zeal.
• It becomes sinful when it is sought to wreak vengeance
upon one who has not deserved it, or to a greater extent
than it has been deserved, or in conflict with the
dispositions of law, or from an improper motive.
• The sin is then in a general sense mortal as being
opposed to justice and chastity.
 Question:
Do you think that there is a reality
that cannot be known to man unless
man is given divine revelation? Or
this is just an excuse to not think
and blindly follow certain religious
doctrines? Explain your answer.
Immanuel Kant
 Story: Hiroshima and Nagasaki
Bombing
During the 2nd World War, a secret project
was launched called the Manhattan Project.
It is such a secret project that even the then
US Vice President Truman was not informed
until he became President after the death of
Franklin Roosevelt. This project’s ultimate
goal is to build and drop a bomb before the
Axis forces can do the same. Over two billion
dollars will be spent and around 130 people
will be employed.
 Story: Hiroshima and Nagasaki
Bombing
At that time and as the war raged on,
thousands and thousands of people continue
to die. One of the worst losses on the side of
the US was in Okinawa, Japan where around
48,000 Americans died. Thus, after
deliberating with his military advisors and
convinced that without the bomb, the war
will not end and the attack on Japan will just
be another Okinawa, President Truman gave
the order to launch the attack.
 Story: Hiroshima and Nagasaki
Bombing
Operation Olympic (the name given to the
atomic bombing) was set into motion. More
than 700,000 marines and soldiers will be
deployed. It was however, foreseen that the
dropping of the bomb will cause the death of
thousands of Americans and Japanese.
Despite this, it was decided that the benefit
of dropping the bomb outweighed the
foreseen cost.
 Story: Hiroshima and Nagasaki
Bombing
Therefore, on August 6, 1945, the bomb
called “Enola Gray’ was dropped on
Hiroshima, instantly vaporizing 60% of the
city and killing 70,000 people. The after
effects of the bomb took the lives of 140,000
more people. Despite that, Japan did not
surrender and another bomb was dropped on
Nagasaki. This time, the bomb too 20,000
lives (Lyons, 2007).
https://www.youtube.com/watc
h?v=5DG4Kxt3MpE
Immanuel Kant
 Trivia:
• The magnitude of Kant’s intellectual contribution
has fascinated a lot of people. When his body was
exhumed for transferring to another site, his skull
was measured and found that his forehead is larger
than that of ordinary German male. Whether the
size of his forehead has any bearing on his genius is
a matter of scientific explanation.
 Immanuel Kant on Good Will
• To act out of a “good will” for Kant means
to act out of a sense of moral obligation or
“duty”. In other words, the moral agent
does a particular action not because of what
it produces (its consequences) in terms of
human experience, but because he or she
recognizes by reasoning that it is morally
the right thing to do and thus regards him or
herself as having a moral duty or obligation
to do that action.
 “There is no possibility of
thinking of anything at all in the
world, or even out of it, which
can be regarded as good without
qualification, except a good
will.”
- Kant
 Immanuel Kant on Good Will
• In this respect, Kant’s view towards
morality parallels the Christian’s view
concerning obedience to God’s
commandment, according to which the
Christian obeys God’s commandments
simply because God commands them, not
for the sake of rewards in heaven after
death or from fear of punishment in hell.
 Immanuel Kant on Good Will
•In a similar way, for Kant, the
rational being does what is
morally right because he
recognizes himself as having a
moral duty to do so rather than
for anything he or she may get
out of it.
 Immanuel Kant on Good Will
• Kant’s analysis of common sense
ideas begins with the thought that
the only thing good without
qualification is a “good will”. The
idea of a good will is closer to the
idea of a “good person”, or, more
archaically, a “person of good
will”.
 Immanuel Kant on Good Will
• In Kant’s terms, a good will is a will whose
decisions are wholly determined by moral
demands or, as he often refers to this, by
the Moral Law. Human beings inevitably feel
this Law as a constraint on their natural
desires, which is why such Laws, as applied
to human beings, are imperatives and
duties. A human will in which the Moral Law
is decisive is motivated by the thought of
duty.
 Immanuel Kant on Good Will
• Kant’s pointed out that to be universally and
absolutely good, something must be good in
every instance of its occurrence.
• He argues that all those things which people call
“good” including intelligence, wit, judgment,
courage, resolution, perseverance, power,
riches, honor, health, and even happiness itself
can become “extremely bad and mischievous if
the will which is to make use of them… is not
good.”
 Choose:
1. Promises are made to be broken,
hence it is okay not to keep it when
one has a headache.
2. Promises should be kept even if one
does not feel like doing so.
 Categorical Imperative
Two questions are asked:
1. Can the act be applied universally? (The
universalizability test)
2. In doing the act, is the man treated as an end?
Robin Hood’s
Case
https://www.youtube.com/watc
h?v=ne7eStct3Fc
 Robin Hood’s
Case

Under the Kantian theory, is

Robin Hood’s action
morally good?
 Immanuel Kant on Rights
• Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) examined the
idea of human rights within politics in such
a way that it “is only a legitimate
government that guarantees our natural
right to freedom, and from this freedom,
we derive other rights”.
• Kant stresses that a society can only
function politically in relation to the state if
fundamental rights, laws, and entitlements
are given and enhanced by the state.
 As Kant teaches, these “righteous
laws” are founded upon three
rational principles:
1. The liberty of every member of the
society as a man
2. The equality of every member of
the society with every other, as a
subject
3. The independence of every member
of the commonwealth as a citizen.
 Immanuel Kant on Rights
•An interesting aspect of these
principles is that they are not
given by the state but are
fundamental in the creation
and acceptance of a state by
the people of the state.
 The book Metaphysics of Morals has
two distinct parts: the “Doctrine of
Right” and the “Doctrine of Virtue”.
Kant sought to separate political rights
and duties from what we might call
morals in the narrow sense. He limits
right by stating three conditions that
have to be met for something to be
enforceable as right (Byrd, 2010):
 Three Conditions:
1.Right concerns only actions
that have influence on other
persons, directly or
indirectly, meaning duties
to the self are excluded;
 Three Conditions:
2. Right does not concern the
wish but only the choice of
others, meaning that not mere
desires but only decisions which
bring about actions are at stake;
and
 Three Conditions:
3. Right does not concern the matter
of the other’s act but only the form,
meaning no particular desires or ends
are assumed on the part of the agents.
As an example of the latter, he
considers trade, which for right must
have the form of being freely agreed
by both parties but can have any
matter or purpose the agents want.
 Immanuel Kant on Rights
• In addition to these three conditions
for right, Kant also offers direct
contrasts between right and virtue.
He thinks both relate to freedom but
in different ways: right concerns
outer freedom and virtue concerns
inner freedom being master of one’s
own passion.
 Cosmopolitan Rights
• Relations among the states of the
world, covered above, are not the
same as relations among the
peoples (nations) of the world.
Individuals can relate to states of
which they are not members and
to other individuals who are
members of other states.
Cosmopolitan Rights
•In this, they are
considered “citizens of a
universal state of human
beings” with
corresponding “rights of
citizens of the world.”
 Cosmopolitan Rights
• Despite these sounding
pronouncements, Kant’s particular
discussion of cosmopolitan right is
restricted to hospitality.
• A citizen of one state may try to
establish links with other peoples; no
state is allowed to deny foreign
citizens a right to travel to its land
(Flikschuh, 2014).
 Cosmopolitan Rights
• Cosmopolitan right is an important component of
perpetual peace. Interaction among the peoples of
the world, Kant notes, has increased in recent
times.
• Now “a violation of right on one place of the earth
is felt in all” as peoples depend upon one another
and know about one another more and more.
Violations of cosmopolitan right would make more
difficult the trust and cooperation necessary for
perpetual peace among states (Hoffe, 2006).
 Rights
• A right is described as an entitlement or
justified claim to a certain kind of positive
and negative treatment from others, to
support from others or non-interference from
others.
• In other words, a right is something to which
every individual in the community is morally
permitted, and for which that community is
entitled to disrespect or compulsorily remove
anything that stands in the way of even a
single individual getting it.
 Rights
• Rights belong to individuals, and no
organization has any rights to directly
derived from those of its members as
individuals; and just as an individual’s rights
cannot extend to where they will intrude on
another individual’s rights, similarly the
rights of any organization whatever must
yield to those of a single individual, whether
inside or outside the organization.
 Rights
• Rights are those important conditions of
social life without which no person can
generally realize his best self. These are
the essential conditions for health of both
the individual and his society.
• It is only when people get and enjoy
rights that they can develop their
personalities and contribute their best
services to the society.
 NATURE
OF RIGHTS
 Laski’s (1935) concepts on the
nature of rights are enumerated as
follows:
1.Rights are the basic social conditions
offered to the individual who is an
indispensable member of the society;
2.Rights enable man to finally enhance
his personality; to achieve his best
self, in the words of Laski, they are
those social conditions without which
no man can seek to be his best self;
 Laski’s (1935) concepts on the
nature of rights are enumerated as
follows:
3. Rights are inherently social because
they are never against social welfare; the
rights did not exist before the emergence
of society; they are those fundamental
necessities that which are very much
social;
4. The state plays the role of recognizing
and protecting the rights by providing for
the full maintenance and observance of the
rights;
 Laski’s (1935) concepts on the
nature of rights are enumerated as
follows:
5. Rights are never absolute, the nature and
extent for the fulfillment of the rights are
relative; as long men endeavor for the
upliftment and betterment of the conditions
of life, rights continue to serve as mean for
the satisfaction and gratification of
individual’s needs; so there can be no rights
which are absolute in nature because absolute
rights are a contradiction in terms;
 Laski’s (1935) concepts on the
nature of rights are enumerated as
follows:
6. Rights are dynamic in nature
because the essence and contents of
rights vary according to change in place,
time, and conditions.
 Essential Properties of Rights
(Bauzon, 2002)
1. Coaction is the capacity of right to forcefully prevent
its violation, and to exact redress for unjust
violation.
2. Limitation is the natural limit or boundary of right,
beyond which it cannot be exercised without violating
the right of another.
3. Collision is the apparent conflict of rights. In this
case, the right which should prevail to which the
other gives way, is that which (1) belongs to a higher
or more universal order;(2) concerned with the graver
matter; (3) is found upon the stronger title or claim.
FUNDAMENTAL RIGHTS OF MAN
(SUMMA THEOLOGICA)

1.The Right to Life

2.The Right to Private Property
3.The Right to Marry
4.The Right to Physical Freedom
 KINDS
OF RIGHTS
KINDS OF RIGHTS
1.Natural Rights 7.Alienable Rights
2.Acquire Rights 8.Inalienable
3.Public Rights Rights
4.Private Rights 9.Perfect Rights
5.Positive Rights 10.Imperfect
6.Negative Rights Rights
 1. Natural Rights
• They are rights acquired by birth.
• Also called basic human rights
• Examples: right to life, to freedom,
to obtain properties, to education
 NATURAL RIGHTS
• Many researchers have faith in natural
rights. They stated that people inherit
several rights from nature. Before they
came to love in society and state, they
used to love in a state of nature. In it, they
appreciated certain natural rights, like the
right to life, right to liberty, and right to
property.
• Natural rights are parts of human nature
and reason.
 NATURAL RIGHTS
• Political theory maintains that an
individual enters into society with certain
basic rights and that no government can
deny these rights.
• John Locke (1632-1704), the most
influential political philosopher of the
modern period, argued that people have
rights, such as the rights to life, liberty,
and property that have a foundation
independent of the laws of any particular
society.
 NATURAL RIGHTS
• Locke claimed that men are naturally free
and equal as part of the justification for
understanding legitimate political
government as the result of a social
contract where people in the state of
nature conditionally transfer some of their
rights to the government in order to better
ensure the stable, comfortable enjoyment
of their lives, liberty, and property.
 2. Acquired Rights
• Those rights obtained by individuals
after fulfilling some requirements as
prescribed by law
• Examples: acquisition of citizen, right
to suffrage
 3. Public Rights
• Those rights given to people by the
ecclesiastical and civil laws.
 4. Private Rights
• Those rights granted by private
industries, institutions or organizations
who have formulated laws in
accordance with the civil law.
5. Positive Rights
• Those rights which confer upon a
person the power to do certain things
• Examples: right to marry, to possess
wealth
 6. Negative Rights
• These are powers of the person to
refuse to perform negative acts
• Examples: refusal to stealing,
intoxication drinking, killing, etc.
 7. Alienable Rights
• The rights that can be transferred or
renounced
• Examples: ownership rights, positive
and negative rights
8. Inalienable Rights
• The rights that cannot be transferred
or renounced
• Examples: religious rights or right to
life
 9. Perfect Rights
• These are mandatory or enforceable by
the law
• Example: right to collect payments
from debt
10. Imperfect Rights
• The rights which are not enforced by
law or not judicial
• Example: rights to give tips to ushers
 OTHER KINDS OF
RIGHTS
1.MORAL RIGHTS
2.LEGAL RIGHTS
What is legal is not always moral.
 MORAL RIGHTS
• Moral rights are based on human
consciousness. They are supported by
moral force of human mind. These are
based on human sense of goodness and
justice. These are not assisted by the
force of law. Sense of goodness and
public opinion are the sanctions behind
moral rights.
 MORAL RIGHTS
• If any person disrupts any moral right,
no legal action can be taken against
him. The state does not enforce these
rights. Its courts do not recognize these
rights. Moral rights include rules of
good conduct, courtesy, and of moral
behavior. These stand for moral
perfection of the people.
 MORAL RIGHTS
• Rights that the creator of a copyrighted
work has to ownership and control of
the work, as recognized by civil law
and some common law jurisdictions.
• Moral rights typically include the right
to integrity of the copyrighted work,
the right to publish anonymously or
under a pseudonym, and the right of
attribution.
 A. Right of Attribution
• Means that the author or creator of a work
is entitled to assert their authorship in the
work in any situation in which the work is
utilized, presented, reproduced, or
disseminated.
• To put it another way, every authority has
an ingrained and an unfettered right to be
recognized as the creator of the work.
 B. Right of Integrity
• Means that no one can change your
work without your permission; no
one can destroy your work without
first asking you if you want to take
it back; no one can show your work
in a way that damages its meaning.
 C. Right of Infringement
•Is when you have not been
properly named or credited
when your work is used.
•If someone has treated your
work in a way that hurts your
reputation, this is called
derogatory treatment.
 LEGAL RIGHTS
• Legal rights are those rights which are
accepted and enforced by the state.
Any defilement of any legal right is
punished by law. Law courts of the
state enforce legal rights. These rights
can be enforced against individuals and
also against the government. In this
way, legal rights are different from
moral rights.
 LEGAL RIGHTS
• Legal rights are equally available to all
the citizens. All citizens follow legal
rights without any discrimination. They
can go to the courts for getting their
legal rights enforced.
• Legal rights are based on a society’s
customs, laws, statutes or actions of
legislatures.
 DISTINCTON
BETWEEN MORAL
RIGHTS AND LEGAL
RIGHTS
 Similarities Between Human Rights
Legal Rights and Moral Rights
• All human rights legal rights and moral rights
pertain to the rights an individual can enjoy which
helps him to enjoy a free, just and fair life.
• Furthermore, both human rights and moral rights
can be identified and accepted as legal rights
according to the state’s needs, and then they are
given the nature and outlook of legal rights:
penalties and punishments for the violation of
them by any party.
 Similarities Between Human Rights
Legal Rights and Moral Rights
• Moreover, the law ensures that human
rights, legal rights as well as moral rights
are protected, leading to quality lives of
humans.
• Besides, moral rights stand as the basis for
human rights and legal rights.
• Likewise, moral rights and legal rights are
significant to understand the nature and the
application of human rights.
 Differences Between
Human Rights Legal
Rights and Moral Rights
 MORAL RIGHTS LEGAL RIGHTS
Natural: Moral rights are discovered, not Created: Our legal rights are created by
created. (This is a form of Moral legislation.
Realism)
Equal: Moral rights are equal rights; Can be unequal: There are many
there is no injustice in how they are situations in which the distribution of
distributed. legal rights in unjust.

Inalienable: Moral rights cannot be Alienable: Your legal rights can be taken
taken away from you without consent from you against your will.
(although you can voluntarily surrender
them).
Universal: Your moral rights are the Local: Your legal rights change when you
same no matter where you are. move from one jurisdiction to another.
What are these rights?
•The right to life
•The right to property
•The right to be free
 What are these rights?
• the right of attribution of authorship;
• the right against false attribution of authorship;
and
• the right of integrity of authorship (i.e. the right
to keep your work free from derogatory
treatment).
• the right to freely love and marry whomever one
chooses
• the right to prevent the studio from making a
'drama' into a 'comedy', if the author felt it was
wrong for their work to be so adapted.
 Reflections:
• Can there be morality without God? What would that
mean?
• Do you think being a member of LGBTQIA is morally
right?
• Is abortion morally right?
• Kant’s pointed out that to be universally and absolutely
good, something must be good in every instance of its
occurrence. Explain.
• Explain the telos of Aristotle. What does it mean?
• Will there be legal sanction if one violates moral law?
 Asynchronous Activity 1: KNOW
THE ISSUES
Read newspapers (can be online)
and look for 6 news stories that
center on COURAGE. List them down
(the Headline and the gist) on the
table and determine whether each
story falls under “moral courage” or
“physical courage”.
 PHYSICAL COURAGE MORAL COURAGE
News Story: News Story:

News Story: News Story:

News Story: News Story:

News Story: News Story:

 Asynchronous Activity 2: MY
HABITS
What are some of the habits that you
have? Have at least three (3). Do you
think that they lead you into
becoming a virtuous person?
My Habits Explanation
Habit 1

Habit 2

Habit 3
 FORMAT:

•Use Cambria 11, 1 x 1

margin.
•Save it as PDF.
•Upload it on teams. See
Asynchronous Folders
 Reminder:

Due Date of Ptask:

August 5, 2022
(Friday) @ 11:59 PM
 References:
• https://pediaa.com/what-is-the-difference-between-
human-rights-legal-rights-and-moral-rights/
• Agdalpen, R. & Francisco, J. (2019). Ethics: Ako at ang
kagandahang asal bilang isang Filipino. Intramuros, Manila:
Mindshapers Cor., Inc.
• Gallinero, W. et.al. (2018). Ethics. Malabon City: Mutya
Publishing House, Inc.
• Leaño, R. & Gubia-On, A. (2018). Ethics for college
students. Intramuros, Manila: Mindshapers Cor., Inc.
• Palean, E. et.al. (2019). Ethics: Exploring moral philosophy
with chapters on social media ethics. Mandaluyong City:
Books ATBP, Publishing Corp.