MODIFIERS AND MORAL PRINCIPLES Flashcards
Characteristics of Moral Principles
Reasonability
Prescriptivity
Impartiality
Overridingness
Autonomous from Arbitrary Authority
Publicity
Practicability
Universalizability
Something is right and wrong regardless of what the majority decides or says
Autonomous from Arbitrary Authority
A moral rule should be applicable to everyone, without exception, provided of course that all people are in relevantly similar situations or context
Universalizability
Prime and ultimate importance
Overridingness
passions do not lessen voluntariness, but may even increase accountability. This is because they are the direct results of the will which fully consents to them instead of subordinating them to its control.
Consequent passions
negation of knowledge
IGNORANCE
Acts done because or out of intense fear or panic are simply _____. Moral accountability is extinguished because consent was not exercised when the act was performed. Actions in this sense exempts the agent from any moral and legal responsibility.
involuntary
We can always challenge on logical grounds the tyranny of numbers and tide of public opinion matters of right and wrong
Autonomous from Arbitrary Authority
essence of morality
Reasonability
Further means that ethical standards must not be over what an ordinary human is capable of doing
Practicability
renders an act involuntarily. A person cannot be held morally responsible or liable if he is not aware of the state of his ignorance.
Invincible ignorance
They are the factors that affect to a considerable extent man’s inner disposition towards certain actions.
MODIFIERS OF HUMAN ACTS
Moral standards must have hegemonic authority
Overridingness
Should not lay too heavy burden on people
Practicability
Moral standards are supposed to apply to everyone regardless of one’s status and situations in life
Impartiality
Any moral norm must be workable
Practicability
Self-interest does not have a place in a proper moral standard
Impartiality
The obvious reason for this is that principles are made and promulgated to render advice as well as assign praise or blame to certain behavior
Publicity
Keeping them in secret defeats the very purpose why they are created.
Publicity
You do not hide something that you really think is genuinely good and noble.
Publicity
Moral standards should stand on their own logic independent of the arbitrariness of the majority
Autonomous from Arbitrary Authority
Acts done with fear are ___________. This is so since the person acting with fear is acting in spite of his fear, still very much in control of his conduct. The person concerned remains responsible of his action.
voluntary
passions do not always destroy voluntariness, but they diminish accountability for the resultant act.
Antecedent passions
use or application of force or aggression
Violence
We want to make a genuine ethical claim, we must not allow our own invested interest to prevail and decide on matters of right and wrong.
Impartiality
This means that they should tower over all the other standards or norms of evaluation, whatever may be.
Overridingness
These modifiers affect human acts in the essentials qualities of knowledge, freedom, voluntariness and so make them _____ perfectly human.
less
5 modifiers of human acts
Ignorance
Violence
Passion
Fear
Habit
If moral principles are indeed impartial and of primordial value, then by all means, they have to be made public.
Publicity
Moral principles are intended to advise people on what to do or to avoid
Prescriptivity
This is significant precisely because the moral accountability of the doer of the action is also increased or decreased, as the case may be.
MODIFIERS OF HUMAN ACTS
strong emotion that influences human actions to strongly commit to do an act
Passion
readiness , born of frequently repeated acts, for acting in a certain manner.
HABIT
as a strong or powerful feeling or emotion. They are those bodily appetites or tendencies as experienced and expressed in such feelings as fear, love, hatred, despair, horror, sadness, anger, grief and the like.
Passion or concupiscence
Moral rules should not be impossible to achieve or else they are not for men but for angels
Practicability
For what use is a norm if it is simply impossible for anyone to follow
Practicability
The morally right thing to do is always the thing best supported by sound arguments
Reasonability
usual way of behavior that someone has unconsciously do
repetition of action
sometimes automatic and involuntary actions we normally do
Habit
Thus, moral rules are not subject to the whims and caprices of those in power.
Autonomous from Arbitrary Authority
Disturbance of mind; threat; harm
Fear
Moral rules should not advance the interest of the few or worse, of one person alone
Impartiality
Practical or action-guiding nature of morality
Prescriptivity
absence of knowledge or unaware of something or someone chooses not to learn something
Ignorance
Actions done by force of habit are ________ in cause, unless a reasonable effort is made to counteract the habitual inclination. This means that if the person will simply let his habit take control of his action without doing anything about it whatsoever, then we can say that one is morally accountable by allowing the habit to determine one’s act.
voluntary
They are not the only standard where human actions can be judged or assessed but they should take precedence over others
Overridingness
does not excuse a person from his bad actions;on the contrary it actually increases their malice
affected or pretended ignorance
Moral judgments must be backed up by good reasons or argument, if we want to discover the truth about what’s good and bad, we must let our feelings be guided as much as possibly by reason
Reasonability
It would be self-defeating therefore to just keep them from public knowledge
Publicity
it is deliberately aroused by the will in order to ensure a more prompt and willing operation
consequent passion
It tries to influence the way we act in accordance with certain rules of conduct
Prescriptivity
Any action resulting from violence is simply __________. The person whose physical external conduct emanates from and controlled by violence should always be in defiance in terms of one’s will.
involuntary
We can be confident that something is right if it is reasonable
Reasonability
should always be offered to unjust aggressors. But if resistanceis impossible,o r if there is a serious threat to one’s life,a person confronted by violence can always offer intrinsic resistance by withholding consent; that is enough to save one’s moral integrity.
Active resistance
it arises spontaneously before the judgment of reason and before the will can control the psychological situation
Antecedent passion
This simply means that moral rules and principles must be made public if they are to serve as guidelines for our actions
Publicity
