Chapter Three: Ethical Decision Making and

Moral Judgments

Ayenew Birhanu(PhD)
• How Can We Make Ethical Decisions And Actions?
• commonly, these include rules such as ‘it is wrong to steal’, ‘it is
right to help people in need’, and so on.

• Underlying principles or rules might include:

 ‘I should do the best thing for my career in the long
run.’
 ‘It is OK to tell someone a lie if it prevents someone
from being hurt by the truth.’
 ‘I should always help someone in difficulty.’
 Moral intuitions and Critical
Reasoning

• The study of ethics involves reasoning about our feelings.

• In other words, it involves making sense of and rationalizing our intuitions
about what is ‘right’ or ‘good’.
• Almost all people, to a greater or lesser extent, are capable of experiencing
feelings of empathy towards others.
A. Rationalization
• Studying ethics, then, involves attempting to find valid reasons for the moral
arguments that we make.
• Most people already have general ideas – or what philosophers call ‘intuitions’
or ‘presumptions’ – about what they think is ‘right’ or ‘wrong’.
• But a philosophical approach to ethics requires people to think critically
about the moral ideas that they hold, to support or refute those ideas with
convincing arguments, and to be able to articulate and explain the reasons and
assumptions on which those arguments are based.
B. Types of reasoning

‘critical reasoning’
Three forms of critical reasoning:
1. ‘Reasoning by analogy explains one thing by comparing it to
something else that is similar, also different.
2. ‘Deductive reasoning applies a principle to a situation. For
instance, if every person has human rights, and you are a
person, then you have human rights like every person.’
3. ‘Inductive reasoning involves providing evidence to support a
hypothesis.
The greater the evidence for a hypothesis, the more we may
rely on it.’
C. Ethics and Religious Faith

• There is another important argument that people use when

making ethical arguments: religious faith.
• For many people, ’morality and religious faith go hand in
hand’.
• Rather than relying on rational arguments, some people view
actions as being right or wrong in terms of whether they are
commanded by a god.
D. Testing moral arguments

• We have an idea of what we think is right based on

our experience (our ethical presumptions), and we
explain those ideas to other people based on our
feelings (intuitions) and reasons.
• It is important and useful to develop the ability to
test your own arguments and those of others, both
to address the dilemmas that occur in our personal
lives, our communities and the organizations for
which we work.
There are three main ways of testing a moral argument.

(1) Factual accuracy. The 18th century philosopher David Hume (1711—
1776) argued that we should not derive an ‘ought’ from an ‘is’.
 This means that we cannot say that something is wrong or right
simply based on how things are.
 the accuracy of the factual content of a discussion is very important.
(2) Consistency. Arguments need to be consistent.
(3) Good will. This one is the most difficult criterion to quantify.
While arguments may be factually correct and consistent, they also
need to ‘exemplify good will’.
This involves resorting to our intuitions and emotions, which are
notoriously difficult to integrate with rigorous theoretical debate.
E. Fairness and Justice Approach

• The fairness or justice approach to ethics has its roots in the

teachings of the ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle who said
that “equals should be treated equally and unequal’s
unequally”.
• The basic moral question in this approach is:
 How fair is an action?
 Does it treat everyone in the same way, or does it show
favoritism and discrimination?
• The principle states: “Treat people the same unless there are
morally relevant differences between them.”
F. The Common Good Approach

• This approach suggests that the interlocking relationships

of society are the basis of ethical reasoning and that
respect and compassion for all others especially the
vulnerable are requirements of such reasoning.
• This approach also calls attention to the common
conditions that are important to the welfare of
everyone.
• This may be a system of laws, effective police and fair
departments, health care, a public educational system,
or even public recreation areas.
The Rights Approach

• Immanuel Kant and others like him who focused on

the individual’s right to choose for her or himself.
• According to these philosophers, what makes human
beings different from mere things is that people
have dignity based on their ability to choose freely
what they will do with their lives, and they have a
fundamental moral right to have these choices
respected.
 Con’t
• Among these rights are:
– The Right to the Truth: We have a right to be told the truth and to
be informed about matters that significantly affect choices.
– The Right of Privacy: We have the right to do, believe, and say
whatever we choose in our personal lives so long as we do not
violate the rights of others.
– The Right not to be injured: We have the right not to be harmed or
injured unless we freely and knowingly do something to deserve
punishment or we freely and knowingly choose to risk such injuries.
– The Right to what is agreed: We have the right to what has been
promised those with whom we have freely entered into a contract
or agreement.
To Whom or What Does Morality Apply?

• In discussing the application of morality, four aspects may be considered: religious

morality, morality and nature, individual morality, and social morality.
A. Religious Morality
Religious morality refers to a human being in relationship to a
supernatural being or beings.
B. Morality and Nature

“Morality and nature” refers to a human being in relationship to

nature.
Natural morality has been prevalent in all primitive cultures, such
as that of the Native American, and in cultures of the Far East.
 Con’t
• In the morality and nature aspect, he/she could be considered
either moral or immoral, depending upon his actions toward
the natural things around him/her.
C. Individual Morality
 Individual morality refers to individuals in relation to themselves and to
an individual code of morality that may or may not be sanctioned by any
society or religion.
D. Social Morality
Social morality concerns a human being in relation to other human beings.
It is probably the most important aspect of morality, in that it cuts across all
of the other aspects and is found in more ethical systems than any of the
others.
Moral Judgments

• Moral judgments refer to deciding what is right and what is

wrong in human relations.
• Individuals are continually judging their own conduct and
that of their fellows.
• They approve of some acts and call them ―right or ―good.
• They condemn other acts and call them ―wrong or ―evil
or bad.
• Moral judgments always have to do with the actions of
human beings and, in particular, with voluntary actions -
those actions freely chosen.
 Con’t
• Moral judgments are evaluative because they place value on
things or relation or human actions; determine what is right
or wrong, good or bad.
• They are also normative because they evaluate or assess the
moral worth of something based on some norms or
standards.
• In judging conduct or action we have to consider motives,
means, and consequences and sometimes the situation.
What Makes an Action Moral?

• The following are features that make an action moral:

A. A moral act involves an agent: If something is a natural event or
an action performed by animals, then it is morally neutral - it does
not appear on our moral radars. Humans can be moral agents.
B. A moral act involves intention: An intention here refers to our
motives that are important to determine the rightness or
wrongness of an action.
C. A moral act affects others: A moral action needs not only an agent
and to be deliberate but also needs to affect others in significant
ways, that is, an action that has harmful (be it physical,
psychological, emotional, or depriving others of happiness)
Why Should Human Beings Be Moral?
Among the more common answers are these:
Behaving morally is a matter of self-respect.
People won’t like us if we behave immorally.
Society punishes immoral behavior.
God tells us to be moral.
Parents need to be moral role models for their children.

• More specifically, the five social benefits of establishing and following moral rules
accomplish the following:
 Keep society from falling apart.
 Reduce human suffering.
 Promote human flourishing.
 Resolve conflicts of interest in just and orderly ways.
 Assign praise and blame, reward and punishment, and guilt.
End of chapter three!