Making Ethical Decisions (2)

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Making Ethical Decisions (2)
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A Systematic Approach

• Based on two questions
• WHO is to make the ethical decision?
• WHAT rules (criteria) should I use in making a
  relevant meaningful ethical decision?

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WHO is to make the decision????

• Two schools of thought
• Authoritarian decisions
• 2. Autonomous decisions

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AUTHORITARIAN DECISIONS

• Characteristics
• Right wrong are given/already made by
• Deity society family responsibilities
• Not product of personal experience
• Rules/Laws are immutable final
• People should know the rules and use them to make
  ethical decisions

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AUTONOMOUS DECISIONS

• Characteristics
• Arise from within
• Ethical decisions are inner motivated
• Grounded in genuine interest in the well being of
  others

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WHAT rules should be used in making ethical
decisions???

• What is the source of the information which I use
  in making an ethical judgment?
• FOR EXAMPLE The Six Pillars of Character
  
• ALSO
• 1. The formalist
• 2. The relativist
• 3. The contextualist
• See handout for explanations examples

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The formalist

• Universal laws (Kant) which apply to all
• People must be responsible to be informed of the
  rules ahead of time
• so they can be applied to concrete situations

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The Relativist

• Notions of right wrong are relative to a
  particular society
• What is right what works for that society
• What works is what is right for the society
• Person is ethically bound to obey a societys
  customs codes
• Meaningful ethical decisions only in social
  context

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The Contextualist