Ethics

Ethics Study Guide Locke, John (1632-1704 C.E.) comes from a different revolution than Hobbes. Shortly after Hobbes wrote, monarchy was restored. When it threatened to become inconvenient again, the English Parliament lost patience with their king, threw him out of the country, and invited Prince William of Orange, Prince of the Netherlands, to be their king. He was a good king. More to the point, Parliament had established that it and it alone, was the representative of the people, and had the right to control succession to the English throne. Despite all the flaws of democracy of the time, England was firmly in democratic hands. Locke’s writings celebrate that revolution, the Glorious Revolution of 1688. In his political theory, Locke carries on from Hobbes. Locke presented a gentler view of human nature, but with man of the same assumptions about human motivation and the consequences for human action. The primary objective of the social contract for Locke is the protection of property. In protection of property, he includes our notions of life and liberty (for a man’s body and freedom are, after all, his own). Life and liberty are most endangered, in the state of nature, in the form of physical property and its enjoyment. We need a civil society primarily for the safety of lands and industry; settling boundaries, setting regulations, and establishing judges for the inevitable disputes. Here the fundamental rights of the human being—life, liberty, and property— are established, along with the role of law in protecting those rights. Mill, John Stuart (1806-1873 C.E.) was a utilitarian. The greatest happiness for the greatest number was his goal. Mill also added that some kinds of happiness were innately greater than others, as was shown by people favoring one over the other. In his work On Liberty, Mill argued that free speech is crucial to the greatest happiness for the greatest number. He thought that restricting free speech prevented knowledge, and that happiness can only be achieved through knowledge. Free speech was necessary to promote knowledge and learning. Moral Justification is commonly used in two different senses, one positive and the other negative. The negative sense is the one which is typically accompanied by an accusation that the justifier is being insincere. It is, in this sense, that fast-talkers are sometimes accused of being able to justify anything and everything. The positive sense of justification, on the other hand, involves bringing others to see our actions as reasonable. In this sense, a course of action is justified if there are better reasons in favor of it than there are against it. Preferably, these reasons should be ones that other people could agree are good ones. It is this sense of justification that is important for morality. Moral justification, then, means showing that there are more or better moral reasons for a course of action than against it. Moral Legalism holds that the moral rightness of acts is determined solely by rules, principles, or commandments. Moral legalism can be either consequentialist or non-consequentialist in perspective. Examples of moral legalism are: 1. Kantianism – One ought always to act on maxims that can be universal. 2. Ethical egoism – One ought to always act to maximize one’s personal good. 3. Divine Command Theory – Whatever God commands is right. ©2018 Achieve Page 111 of 116