Chapter 1 Flashcards
Realism
Morality expresses objective truths about the world and is a valid and legitimate enterprise. It holds that certain things are right and wrong, good and evil, and that morality does lay claim on what we do and how we should live.
Ethics
study of morality, including an analysis of the concepts of good and evil, right and wrong, justice and injustice, duty, responsibility, character, and successful living.
Anti-realism
skepticism
skepticism
maintains that ethics is in some way false or illusory, being an interesting fact of human nature or social evolution, but something without binding force or claim on the individual’s behavior.
Emotivism or non-cognitivism
special version of anti-realism or nihilism that says that moral statements are merely expressions of subjective feelings, attitudes and preferences with no factual content.
Absolutism or universalism
says that there are some objective, universal moral truths that apply regardless of culture or conscience
soft universalism
has been introduced in an attempt to create a more culturally inclusive absolutism.
relativism
morality is relative to culture or conscience
Cultural relativism
maintains that acts are right or wrong are defined by what the majority of a given society believes or practices.
Subjectivism
on the other hand, maintains that morality is relative to conscience or an individual’s moral code, even if it conflicts with his or her society.
Divine command theory
asserts that the right act is that which is in accord with the will of God.
Egoism
believes that the right act is that which furthers an individual self-interest.
Social contract theory
maintains that there is an implied contract between the individual and the community or State which serves his enlightened self-interest. In other words, the right act is the legal act.
Utilitarianism
holds that the right act is that which maximizes happiness (not just for oneself but for the total amount of happiness in the world).
Deontology
maintains that the right act is that which respects absolute moral truths, which have no exceptions.
Virtue ethics
suggests that instead of basing morality on defining the conditions under which an act is right or wrong, we should base it on the good qualities of character (virtues) of an ideal individual which make him successful in life.
