Renee P
15 March 2013
This week I started to explore the question “Who’s to say what’s right?” Every person
could answer this question differently. It can vary by culture or even within families.
This is where the “Golden Rule” can be helpful yet tricky to follow at the same time. There
might be customs in another culture that I don’t know about and while I could be treating
them one way, thinking I’m doing good, I could be doing something mean in their eyes.
The “Golden Rule” is an example of normative ethics of I studied three of its categories:
virtue ethics, duty-based ethics, and consequentialist ethics. In virtue ethics, one would
look at what their beliefs are and make their decisions based off of those. Does this
decision I’m about to make solidify my character? Duty-based ethics looks at an outside
source to tell one if the decision is right or wrong. What would my inner circle or society
think of this decision? This type of ethics doesn’t always seem noticeable to us because we
are always thinking about what is right or wrong based off of what society and the
government tells us. Just on Belmont’s campus, people are making the subconscious
decision to not smoke because they know it isn’t allowed. What they have been taught
growing up tells them that they should follow the rules. Consequentialist ethics looks at
how the end result would affect not only me but other people. Even consequentialism is
broken into smaller categories: utilitarianism, ethical altruism, and ethical egoism.
Utilitarianism looks at decisions from the viewpoint of, what would produce the greatest
good for the greatest amount of people? Ethical altruism says that the decision maker
should make a choice that is good for everyone else, not himself. Ethical egoism plays the
role of making the best decision for yourself and yourself alone. It is believed that most
people won’t become too selfish through this line of thinking because they know they have
to take other people into consideration if they truly want to be happy. I’m torn between
some of these choices and hope to delve in further throughout the semester to see just
where I sit. What do you think?
could answer this question differently. It can vary by culture or even within families.
This is where the “Golden Rule” can be helpful yet tricky to follow at the same time. There
might be customs in another culture that I don’t know about and while I could be treating
them one way, thinking I’m doing good, I could be doing something mean in their eyes.
The “Golden Rule” is an example of normative ethics of I studied three of its categories:
virtue ethics, duty-based ethics, and consequentialist ethics. In virtue ethics, one would
look at what their beliefs are and make their decisions based off of those. Does this
decision I’m about to make solidify my character? Duty-based ethics looks at an outside
source to tell one if the decision is right or wrong. What would my inner circle or society
think of this decision? This type of ethics doesn’t always seem noticeable to us because we
are always thinking about what is right or wrong based off of what society and the
government tells us. Just on Belmont’s campus, people are making the subconscious
decision to not smoke because they know it isn’t allowed. What they have been taught
growing up tells them that they should follow the rules. Consequentialist ethics looks at
how the end result would affect not only me but other people. Even consequentialism is
broken into smaller categories: utilitarianism, ethical altruism, and ethical egoism.
Utilitarianism looks at decisions from the viewpoint of, what would produce the greatest
good for the greatest amount of people? Ethical altruism says that the decision maker
should make a choice that is good for everyone else, not himself. Ethical egoism plays the
role of making the best decision for yourself and yourself alone. It is believed that most
people won’t become too selfish through this line of thinking because they know they have
to take other people into consideration if they truly want to be happy. I’m torn between
some of these choices and hope to delve in further throughout the semester to see just
where I sit. What do you think?
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