chapter 1: Thinking About Values

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chapter 1 Thinking About Values
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This introductory chapter outlines the growing
interest in moral issues, and discusses the
concepts of ethics, morals, and values on the
background of our psychosis over terrorism. A
brief section introduces the concept of debating
moral issues with emphasis on proper reasoning,
and some of the most familiar logical fallacies
are outlines. The concept of storytelling as
teaching tools in ethics is introduced
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Main Points

• A terrorist under every teacup

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• Thoughts on how the moral debate has been
• affected by the events of September 11

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The Best of Times, the Worst of Times?
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• The hot moral debates prior to
• September 11, and the growing attitude of
  cynicism after 9/11.

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Ethical Age
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• According to psychologists, a child must
• have developed a sense of values by the
• age of 7 in order to become an adult
• with a conscience.
• According to contemporary neuroscience, values
  are hardwired.

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Morals, Values, and Ethics
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Should schools teach values?
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• The difference between ethics and morals
• Morality refers to moral rules we follow,
• whereas ethics refers to theories about
• these rules questioning and justifying
• the rules.

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• Exploration of the issue of reason vs.
• emotion in ethics

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• The concept of values Can only philosophy can
  evaluate whether peoples values are justified?

Values, in an adequate neuroscience, are
appropriate for a given set of outcomes.
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Why Be Moral?
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• The basic questions Is morality a matter
• of the heart, or does it come from reason?
• Is morality a biological fail-safe, are
• we all egoists at heart? Rosenstand is old
  fashioned on this issue. How should one
• solve moral dilemmas? Reference to Part 2
• and its main question, What should I do?

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Debating Moral Issues
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• A brief overview of the beginnings of ethics, in
  Western traditions

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Religion as a guide to ethics
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• Logic as a tool of ethics Inductive and
• deductive arguments, and the most
• common logical fallacies
• Debating Moral Issues
• logical fallacies
• Authority
• Dichotomy
• strawman
• ad baculum
• ad hominem
• red herring
• pity

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The role of emotions in ethics
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Stories and Morals
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Novels and films as illustrations of moral
problems
Could they do more? For example, allow us to see
why moral attitudes were formed?
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• The plot outlines in The Moral of the Story
• have two purposes
• (1) to supply a foundation for discussion, and
• (2) to inspire the students to experience
• the stories in their original form.

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Stories as Survival Mechanisms
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• A citation from Ilya Ehrenburg about the
• survival value of remembering good stories.
• Even within film and literature the
• importance of storytelling is sometimes
• made explicit, such as in Fahrenheit 451.

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• The current revival of storytelling carries
• a note of urgency Because of growing
• cultural diversity we need to learn about
• each other and each others values
• through stories.

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Martha Nussbaum Living Other Lives
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Nussbaum is interested in the emotional value
ofStories
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• Emotions have cognitive value and
• are, as a rule, not irrational, nor
• do they happen at random.

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• Why have philosophers refused to deal
• seriously with emotions until recently? Because
• when humans experience emotions they
• are immersed in life that affects them
• and cant be considered rationally autonomous,
  says Rosenstand but shes wrong.

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• Emotions allows us to access to values,
• and their clearest manifestation is
• in narratives. Rosenstand things emotions are our
  best access to values but she is pushing her old
  fashioned ideology.

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• There are different narratives in different
• cultures, but this need not lead to
• cultural relativism.

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• Why stories, and not designed
• philosophical examples instead?
• Because the rich texture of the story
• is what we relate to, and narratives
• are more open-ended than philosophical
• examples, according to Rosenstand. But, again,
  she pushing her ideology. Plato tells stories.
  Much of Philosophy is read as literature out of
  philosophy class.

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• Quote We need stories in order to live
• other lives vicariously, because
• we have never lived enough to
• understand life and each other.

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• Also, it is sometimes easier to discuss
• stories with others than to talk
• about private moments in our own lives.

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• Martha Nussbaum, Loves Knowledge (1990),
• excerpt. Nussbaum argues that stories
• are well suited for giving an emotional
• lesson in moral issues. We can learn from
• the lives of others, and fiction provides a
• shortcut for understanding the range of
• human experiences.

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Narratives

• Smoke Signals, film (1998). Two young American
  Indians, Thomas and Victor from Coeur dAlene,
  travel to Arizona to bring home the ashes of
  Victors father, who left his wife and child
  years ago. Thomas is a storyteller, and Victor
  has problems with his Indian identity and
  memories of his father. During their journey,
  Victor begins to understand his father better and
  to see his own disjointed life as a meaningful
  story. The story illustrates the power of
  storytelling as a creation of meaning.

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Big Fish

• Big Fish, a film, (2003) is the story of a father
  and son who learn more about each other. Will,
  Eds son, learns the truth about the stories his
  father has been telling since Will had been born.
  Was it fantasy or truth? Should Will appease
  his fathers memories? Questions like these
  offer conflicting responses based on our ethical
  and moral foundations.