GED4: ETHICS

Prepared by:Judalyn J. Forro

Joseph N. Butad

Adapted from the book:

ETHICS
By:

Marc Oliver D. Pasco

V. Fullente Suarez
Agustin Martin G. Rodriguez

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Course Overview
This course is intended to provide basic level of ethics awareness including
basic understanding of ethical human behaviour, ability to recognize ethical dilemmas
and the use of decision - making model to solve human dilemmas. Students will be
acquainted with philosophical study of morality, including the theory of right and
wrong behaviour, the theory of value (goodness and badness), and the theory of virtue
and vice. This will help students develop their abilities to read, explicate, analyze, and
evaluate philosophical literature as they make their own ethical position about ethical
issues observed and experienced. It is hoped that this course will guide the students in
their quest for understanding authentic human behaviour and live with it.
The modular exercises and learning sessions in this course are presented in an
outcomes-based format. These activities aim to develop critical thinking, confidence,
self-esteem, and empowerment to students as they lived their lives grounded with
ethical principles and moral standard behavior.
To ensure that the learners will acquire the competency in this course the course pack
has been structured into 5 modules as follows:
Module 1: Introduction to Ethics
Module 2: Western Ethical Theories and Principles
Module 3: Eastern Theories and Principles
Module 4: Part 1 – Special Topics in Ethics
Module 5: Part 2 – Special Topics in Ethics

At the completion of this course pack, learners should be able to:

• articulate an understanding of the meaning of ethics and what it means
to be ethical
• identify the different philosophical traditions to have a broader
perspective of creative and insightful human behavior
• understand the theoretical underpinnings for ethical behaviour and moral
decisions
• apply the code of ethics, using a decision-making model to solve an
ethical dilemma
• demonstrate critical and reflective thought in integrating the various
theories in defining moral and immoral act

Students in this course are encouraged to go through each lesson in every module
sequentially to acquire meaningful learning experience. They should work all of the
exercises to understand better all the concepts of each topic on every lesson.
They may ask for help from their parents, peers, tutors, or friends to maintain
collaborative learning.

This course pack is adapted from the book Ethics written by Marc Oliver D.
Pasco, V. Fullente Suarez and Agustin Martin G. Rodriguez published in 2018 by C &
E Publishing. Inc. Quezon City, Philippines.

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 Table of Contents

Course Overview......................................................................................................i
Table of Contents.................................................................................................... ii
Module 1: Introduction to Ethics
Module Overview ................................................................................................... 4
Lesson 1: The Study of Ethics and Cultural Conceptions of Good......................... 5
Lesson 2: The Academic Ethical Traditions ………............................................ 13
Module Assessment .............................................................................................. 19
Module Summary ................................................................................................. 20
Module References ............................................................................................... 21
Module 2: Western Ethical Theories and Principles
Module Overview ................................................................................................. 22
Lesson 1: Virtue Ethics: Aristotle………………………...................................... 21
Lesson 2: The Natural law: St. Thomas Aquinas…………………….................. 36
Lesson 3: Deontological Ethics: Immanuel Kant……………............................... 43
Lesson 4: Utilitarianism: John Stuart Mill…………….……............................... 48
Module Assessment .............................................................................................. 60
Module Summary ................................................................................................. 61
Module References ............................................................................................... 62
Module 3: Eastern Philosophies and Principles
Module Overview ................................................................................................. 63
Lesson 1: Asian Ethical Traditions……………………………………….............64
Lesson 2: Discourse Ethics…………………………………………….................73
Module Assessment ...............................................................................................84
Module Summary...................................................................................................85
Module References.............................................................................................. 86
Module 4: Special Topics in Ethics Part 1
Module Overview ................................................................................................. 87
Lesson 1: Environmental Ethics……………………………………….................88
Lesson 2: Business Ethics……………………………………………...................98
Lesson 3: The Question of Women and their Emancipation……………….........107
Lesson 2: Biomedical Ethics……………………………………………............. 118
Module Assessment ............................................................................................ 124
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Module Summary................................................................................................ 127
Module References.............................................................................................. 129
Module 4: Special Topics in Ethics Part 2
ModuleOverview................................................................................................. 131
Lesson 1: Crimes Against Ethics………………………………………........... 132
Lesson 2: Love Your Neighbor…………………………………………….......146
Module Assessment ............................................................................................ 155
Module Summary................................................................................................ 156
Module References.............................................................................................. 157
Appendices
Appendix A –Essay Rubric ................................................................................ 158
Appendix B – Case Analysis Rubric................................................................... 159

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 Module 1

Introduction to Ethics

Hello! Welcome to the first module of this course. This module seeks to define
and understand ethics and defining the ethical behaviour one must exhibit for an action
to be considered acceptable in the norms of the society. Several fields are also included
to give you better picture and perspective in applying ethical principles and ethical
considerations as you follow course of action needed in decision making.

This Module contain the following lessons:

Lesson 1: The Study of Ethics and Cultural Conceptions of Good

Lesson 2: The Academic Ethical Traditions

The major learning outcomes of this module are to:

• explain the implications of human freedom and the basis for acting in a way
that recognizes and honors that freedom;
• identify the ethical aspect of human life and the scope of ethical thinking;
• explain the concept of good and moral;
• differentiate the different applied fields in ethics;
• work collaboratively with peers to fully understand the essence of ethics; and
• describe and internalize the principles of ethical behavior in modern society
at the level of the person, society, and in interaction with the environment and
other shared resources.

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 Lesson 1

The Study of Ethics and

Cultural Conceptions of Good

OBJECTIVES

At the end of this module, you will be able to:

1. define ethics and morality of human acts;
2. differentiate ethics and morality; and
3. identify the moral spectrum of defining the good.

INTRODUCTION

What do people think about when they think ethically? What is the experience on
which ethical reflection is grounded? Ethics has something to do with realizing the
fullest potential as free persons acting in the world and doing right for others. But not
all actions are inherently ethical. Human being sense that there is this thing they call
the good which they are bound to realize to genuinely be human and to build better
societies. In this lesson you will learn how philosophers have tried to explain the
mysterious intuition of the good and what they understood were the paths to realizing
a life lived according to the good.

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 ACTIVITY

The Daily Dilemma

By Charis Denison

Ben said good-bye to his friends and started heading for home. He was in a great mood.
He had two weeks off from school for winter break, he had just passed the test for his
driver’s license, and with no homework he could hang out with his friends whenever
he wanted to. Things couldn’t be better. He turned his iPod up and smiled. As he passed
the last row of stores before the hill leading to his house something caught his eye at
the bank. Something was sticking out of the ATM machine. As he got closer, he saw it
was cash.
Ben looked around. There was nobody. No cars, nobody walking nearby. Someone
must have just used the machine and then forgotten to take the money. Whoever it was,
was gone now. He walked over to the machine and took the money out. Sixty dollars.
There was also a receipt sticking out.
Ben looked around again. Still no one. He could turn the money in at the bank
tomorrow—it was after hours now. But really, it was sixty bucks! Probably not much
to the customer, but it would make a difference as to how many Christmas gifts he
could get for his family. or new music for his iPod. Does it really count if you only do
something like this once? Ben thought this over. It’s not like he’s a thief or anything.
Someone messed up by leaving the cash there in the first place. He felt pretty good
about taking it. It’s a one-time deal. And no one ever needs to know. He put the money
in his pocket, crumpled up the receipt, and walked away.
As the next song started playing, Ben remembered something his grandfather always
said, ―Every time you lie, you get closer to being a liar.” But this wasn‘t the same
thing. Was it? He turned up the volume and headed up the hill to home.

ANALYSIS

1. Trade places with Ben. What would you do?

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2. Have you ever done something you knew was wrong because nobody was
watching? How did you feel when you did it? Would you do it again? Why or
why not?
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3. What do you think about what Ben’s grandfather says about being a liar? Do
you think the same principle applies to Ben’s action?
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4. What happens when you apply Ben’s grandfather’s words to cheating? Do you
agree that every time you cheat you come closer to becoming a ―cheater?”
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5. Think of a choice you made recently that might affect more people than just you.
Now imagine that everyone in this world did the same thing. What would the
world be like? Would you want to live there?
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 ABSTRACTION

What is Ethics?
Ethics is defined as the philosophical science dealing with the morality
of human acts. It provides the principles on the morality of human acts. Studying
ethics is a must for each person because he has to live a moral life. Human may do good
because it is a duty, pleasure and happiness. It harmonizes with nature, the
commandment of God to attain eternal life and whatever maybe humans’ reason they
have to act morally because they are human being– a rational animal.
If ethics deals with morality of human act, then let us define the meaning of
morality of human act. Morality of human acts means the goodness or badness, the
rightness or wrongness or the acceptability or unacceptability of human acts.

Difference between Ethics and Morality o E t h i c s - it provides the theory or

principles of right or wrong or goodness and badness on the morality of human acts. It
provides man with the theoretical knowledge of the morality of human acts. Remember,
there is a big difference between KNOWING and DOING and not all men follow what
he knows.

o M o r a l i t y - it actualizes the theory. Therefore, Morality has nothing else

but doing ethics.

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 Understanding Ethics

Is morality objective?

• Different people have different moral views, b ut that’s not

the same thing as saying that all those views are equal.
Morality is relative: all moral views are on a par with regard
to their truth or
rationality
• Morality is objective: not all moral views are on a par

If morality is objective, then how do we decide what is ri ght?

There are 5 ―” camps”:

(1) Utilitarian
(2) Rights-based
(3) Duty-based
(4) Virtue-based
(5) Compromise (mixed)

Utilitarian
➢ Typically, we should seek to maximize preference satisfaction (pleasure) over
preference dissatisfaction (pain).
➢ To matter must be capable of having preferences.
➢ The interests of different individuals can be added together. This means that it is
generally better to save many lives rather than merely one life.

“The greatest happiness of the greatest number is the foundation of morals and
legislation‟ (Jeremy Bentham)

~Peter Singer~

Duty-based
➢ We have duties to protect the important interests of individuals
➢ All humans are equal (either from conception or from a later point)

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 ➢ The interests of different individuals cannot be added together. This means that
saving one life is generally just as important as saving many lives.

“One must never intentionally kill an innocent human being, even with his or her
consent‟ (John Keown)

~Immanuel Kant~

Rights-based
➢ We have rights imposing duties on others, but may release others from a duty
they owe to us (i.e. consent to them harming us)
➢ Those who cannot exercise rights (consent) count for less.
➢ The interests of different individuals cannot be added together. This means that
saving one life is generally just as important as saving many lives.

“I have rights to freedom and well-being‟ (Alan Gewirth)

Virtue-based
➢ Utilitarian, duty-based and rights-based camps are wrong to focus on conduct
(i.e. what we do or do not do)
➢ What matters is whether one‘s character or motive is virtuous. This means that
what matters is whether the person making a decision acts for virtuous motives.

“The human good turns out to be the soul’s activity that expresses virtue‟ (Aristotle)
What is Good?
According to proponents a situation or an action may have two moral spectrums:
o First, considered that goodness lies in an action itself which is the position of the
so-called deontologist.
o Second, considered that goodness in the consequences of an action, which is the
position of the so-called consequentialist.

According to Aristotle the goodness of an action lies in the action itself whatever
consequences it may incur. For instance, the act of ―truth telling, whatever
consequences it may incur, it is good in itself. We need to understand this idea of good
because there are situations where some of our actions accrued negative consequences
even though we have good intention in performing the action.
For Aristotle, the human good can be achieved through and by action, especially
when it is a good action, also the good is a human act and not an abstract idea. It is
significant to know precisely the proper function of man and whatever we do that can
flourish our ability to at rationality is good for man.

The Moral Act

Unlike other organisms that are simply driven by the survival instinct, human
beings experience the world in a variety of ways through a variety of perspective
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capacities. Apart from our rational capacity which allows us to reckon reality with
imaginative and calculative lenses, our feelings also play a crucial part in determining
the way we navigate through various situations that we experience.
We have the capacity to reflectively examine a situation before proceeding to act
with respect to how we feel. Feelings seek immediate fulfillment, and it is our reason
that tempers theses compulsions. Feelings without reason are blind. Reason sets the
course for making ethical and impartial decisions especially in moral situations
although it is not the sole determining factor in coming up with such decisions.
Reason and feelings must constructively complement each other whenever we are
making choices. It must be noted that reason in and by itself is also not a sufficient
instrument in assessing moral situations. Moral situations often involve not just one but
others as well. Morality involves impartiality because it ensures that all interests are
accounted for, weighed rationally, and assessed without prejudice.

(7) Seven - step Moral Reasoning Model

1. Stop and think. This involves a step-back from the situation to make sure that
you do not act out of impulse.
2. Clarify goals. Clarify your short-term and long-term aims. Sometimes, in the
heat of the moment, short-term wants eclipse long-term goals.
3. Determine facts. Make sure you gather enough information before you make a
choice.
4. Develop options. Clear your mind and try to think of other creative ways of
clarifying your motives and implementing your actions with the least ethical
compromise.
5. Consider consequences. Filter your choices and separate the ethical from the
unethical choices bearing in mind both your motives and the potential
consequences of your action.
6. Choose. Make a decision. If the choice is hard to make, try consulting others
who may have knowledge or experience of your situation.
7. Monitor and modify. Monitor what happens after your decision and have enough
humility to modify your action or behavior as necessary.

Three elements comprise Moral Act

❑ Object ❑ Intention
❑ Circumstances Object.
This is the finis operas or end of the act. Literally, it is the aim or goal of a
certain action. To make an act morally good, its object or aim must conform to the law
of God or the conscience of the agent or the doer of the action must attest to it.

End or Intention of the Agent.

If object is the goal or aim of the agent, end or intention is the means of attaining
the object.
Relativists or Subjective Moralists contend that the object is the factor that
determines whether our actions are morally good or morally evil. They maintain that
the end justifies the means. Even if the means is evil as long as the object is good there
is no sin.
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 But Christian teachings particularly those of the Roman Catholic state that there
are intrinsically evils in acts regardless of the object. Evil means cannot make a good
result. This is why the church never acknowledges abortion for the object of saving the
mother. Killing, itself, is evil and abortion, regardless of its object, is an act of killing
hence evil.

Circumstances
These are the environments or conditions prevailing when the action is done.
These are the "who" "what" "where" "when" "with whom" "under what condition" and
"why" the action was performed. "What was the condition of the agent when they did
the action? "Was the action done out of fear?" "Was the stealing of bread by the boy
done out of hunger?
Circumstances including the result of the act contribute to the increasing or
diminishing moral goodness or badness of the Human Act. Examples are the amount of
the stolen item and if the act was done out of hunger.

Different Applied Fields in Ethics

Bioethics/Biomedical Ethics
 Concerned with the rightness or wrongness of procedures that are performed in
the practice of medicine and the provision of health care system.
Environmental Ethics
 It covers acceptable or unacceptable actions affecting the environment.
 This ethical field promotes the welfare of human beings by promoting the well-
being of the environment since we are part of it.
Business Ethics
 Concerned with what is acceptable and unacceptable business code of conducts
are affecting the business enterprise.
 This field measures and establishes guidelines for the economic dynamics as a
whole, including the moral aspect of the supply and demand, the benefits-cost
profit ratio rule of competition and fair opportunity for the consumers.
Legal Ethics
 Norms of conduct or standards that law practitioners, such as, judges, lawyers,
notary public, law makers, must follow in the practice of the profession.

APPLICATION

A. Research
➢ From the internet, magazine or newspaper look for cases where a
politician is accused of corruption and/or bribery. Name at least three (3) people
involved and the outcome of the case. Use the space below for your report.

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B. Case Analysis

It is time to elect the world leader, and yours is the deciding vote. Here are the
facts about the three leading candidates:

Candidate A: Candidate A associates with crooked politicians, and consults

with astrologers. Candidate A had two illicit affairs and chain smokes and
drinks up to ten Martinis a day.
Candidate B: Candidate B was ejected from office twice, sleeps until noon,
used opium in college and drinks a large amount of whisky every evening.
Candidate C: Candidate C is a decorated war hero. Candidate C’s a
vegetarian, doesn't smoke, drinks an occasional beer and hasn't had any
extra-marital affairs.

Which of these candidates would be your choice? Why?

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 A Wonderful! You have finished lesson 1. You may
now proceed to the next lesson. This time, we are going to talk
more about ethics from the different perfective of some well -
known philosophers!

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 Lesson 2

The Academic
Ethical Traditions

OBJECTIVES

At the end of this lesson, you will be able to:

1. explain the differences of gawa and gawi;

2. explain other terms related to ethics; and
3. describe Plato’s insight and concept about good.

INTRODUCTION

In most contexts, the concept of good denotes the conduct that should be
preferred when posed with a choice between possible actions. Good is generally
considered to be the opposite of evil, and is of interest in the study of morality, ethics,
religion and philosophy. In this lesson we were going to talk about the concept of good
in the lens of Plato and Socrates as well as other related terms to help us understand
better ethics and ethical traditions.

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 ACTIVITY

Read the story in title “The Ring Gyges” by Plato and

answer the questions that follow.

ANALYSIS

1. What are the three types of good? Give at least 3 examples of each.
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2. Do you agree that justice is a result of a social contract as described in the story?

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3. Do you agree in this statement: “For all people believe in their hearts that
injustice is more profitable to the individual than justice”? Explain your answer.

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ABSTRACTION

Gawa and Gawi Habituation

In Filipino, the words and gawa can give a sense of what philosophers mean
by ethical action. Filipinos distinguish between thoughtless, instinctive manners and
reflexes from gawa (action) and (inclination). In reflecting on how Filipinos use these
words, one understands that human actions are different from mere bod movements.
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 Freedom figures closely into action and inclination. Freedom here means not
only the ability to act free from outside influences or the independence from the
impediment to one's wishes. It is the willful act and decision that give form and shape
to the actions and inclinations of people. This freedom is oriented toward the wherefore,
the what for, the whom for of the doings of people.
These are the common aspects of human action that Filipinos understand as
action and inclination: that free human acts are governed by reflection and are freely
decide such that they are not determined by internal or external forces.
However, gawa and gawi are not identical. Gawa refers the free action that is
oriented toward a particular end. For example, a worker uses one’s free imagination
and will bring about services and products that contribute to the well-being of society.
As one governed by free decision making, the creative worker embraces all the
information one’s can gather effectively realize one’s purpose. A process of
discernment accompanies the creative work. The carpenter, for instance must learn
many details about wood: its feel, its hardness and pliability, as well as its strength.
People should know about the qualities that will help them accomplish the task at hand
very well. Part of this knowledge is the knowledge about the body's movement in
accomplishing this work. The carpenter should study how heavy or light the hand
should move over certain kinds of wood, what tools to apply so that the wood yields
the best piece: a stool, a table, or the wheel of a cart.
The word gawi also refers to a free kind of work. However, instead of focusing
on a particular end like a product or fulfillment, gawi refers to the kind of acts that
people are fused to accomplishing. Gawi does not only refer to particular 'facts of a
person. A person's kagawian or habitual action reveals truth about them. While the
beautiful table and the intricately designed chair are products of a carpenter that has
gotten used to being one, in person kagawian, a person can reveal one’s identity as a
good or a bad person. A worker who produces for the society is judged skilled or
unskilled. But a person is judged good or evil, right or wrong based on kagawian or
habituation. Kagawian is the Filipino equivalent of ethos in Greek and mos or moris in
Latin.

Ethics and Ethos

The term ethics comes from the Greek word ethos, which means custom, a
characteristic, or habitual way of doing things, or action that is properly derived from
one's character. The Latin word mos or moris (and its plural mores) from which the
adjective moral is derived is equivalent to ethos.
From a purely etymological point of view, ethical and moral are, therefore,
synonymous. Also, restricted to such root word considerations, ethics and morality may
only be a "simple description of the mores or ways of behaving, whether of the human
person in general or of a particular population." a field of study, ethics need not be
"normative" in guiding human action and it is even seemingly imperative to preserve
an attitude of neutrality that excludes all judgments of value. Etymologically, ethics is
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but a survey of patterns of behavior that is done by the human being in general or a
society in particular.
Looking closely, however, human action ought to be understood clearly in a
very strict sense. As considered above, human action has to do with human movements
that are ruled by one's freedom. Given that freedom is not only the independence from
what could hinder also a consideration of the of the action, ethics cannot be limited to
pure description. Since goals are inherently directional, they imply normativity.
In the same manner that gawi for the Filipino is different from gawa, Aristotle
differentiates between human actions that are "praxis" and "to poiein." What is
important for the human agent who engages in "to poiein," gawa for Aristotle, is to
successfully complete particular work be it artistic or technical: that the tabletop is
smooth, the carvings are precise, and the chair's legs are balanced. The human person
themselves is significant only in considering the result in matters of "to poiein" or gawa.
Ethics, on the other hand, not only has such "normative" considerations as to the end
product of the actions.
Ethics, as concerned with "praxis" for Aristotle properly focuses on the human
agent that is revealed through his/her actions. Ethics is normative with regard to its
being a practical science. It does not only limit itself to the description of human actions
but also aims to guide them. Students who study ethics are not to stop at pure description
of human mores but ushered it into a disciplined science that guides them human
patterns of behavior. Ethics proposes considerations, and norms to provide advice and
rules the way of right living and its practice are clarified.
If kagawian the Filipino equivalent of the Greek ethos and the Latin mors /
moris, gawa is "to poiein" and is "praxis". Ethics for Filipino students is philosophy of
human action that allows them to learn the art of living. It is an art that enables them to
be reconciled with their freedom and that which expected of them (by others and
themselves). Thus, ethics is a way for them to find happiness.
Ethics also considers that which is worthy of a human being. This means that
living rightly is not only about searching for happiness but living as one ought to live
as a human being. In living rightly, people receive contentment and approval both from
others and themselves, and in living wrongly, they deserve blame (from others and from
themselves). Such an ethics not only serves as a path to happiness but also reaches out
in fullness of reflection for that action which is an obligation for a human being. The
gravity of such an ethical consideration is given voice in the Filipino saying, madaling
maging tao, mahirap magpakatao.
The effort in living rightly, though a task, need not exclude the promise of the
gift of happiness. There is no reason to presuppose why a life that is consistent with
what the human person ought to do should not bring one’s happiness. The Filipino
student is, therefore, invited to outgrow kung saan ka masaya suportahan kita and get
to sa dapat mong gawin talaga kung saan ka masaya.

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Plato’s Insight into the Good
An academic introduction to the discipline of ethics is incomplete without the
reference to Plato. Even the word ― “academic” itself harks back to the academia, the
institution of learning established by Plato for philosophers, lovers of Plato’s followers
who later will be called philosophers, lovers of wisdom. Ethics, being discipline of
study in universities that fall under the umbrella of philosophy, can also trace its roots
back to Plato as the systematic thinker who grappled with the question of that which is
good.
A serious claim faced by Plato was given voice by a thinker named Protagoras who
said that "man is the measure of all things." The implications of such a claim sit well
with those who easily let go of the validity of traditional mores and ethos to arrive at a
conclusion that is relativistic. This easy relativism holds that human, being the measure
of all things, can only hold on to beliefs and truths that are for themselves or their
society only. It denies the possibility of ever arriving at truth that can be shared by all.
Man, as the measure of all things, came to be understood simplistically on the concept
that "to each one’s own."
Socrates on the other hand, taught Plato about the difficulty of coming to
knowledge of the truth. This difficulty, however, did not mean impossibility for
Socrates. Socrates instilled this rigorous questioning to the students and did not shy
away from interrogating even the traditional leaders of Athens. This confrontation
between Socratic inquiry and easy lack of thought is portrayed in the allegory of the
cave that is found in Plato’s The Republic.
Plato directs humanity to the nobility that is reachable through the knowledge
of the good. Plato’s confidence in knowing the good as acting upon it reaches out to
every age that grapples with the question of what is proper human action. This
confidence in the human person's ability to know the good and act in accordance with
it started the academic history of ethics. Plato's claim is, however, not only made in the
past as they are recorded in dated documents that survived history. Plato continues to
address us today and with Plato’s voice builds confidence in our own ability to know
the good and act ethically.
All age, however, has a particular way of interrogating Plato's assertions and
further give nuance to what is known and how to act. Thinkers who come after Plato,
for example, will challenge a necessity that seems to have been so confidently lodged
between knowledge and action. Does knowing the good automatically lead to acting on
the wonderful thing about a course in ethics is that the voices of thinkers who spent
time researching such questions are still heard and understood up to our present time
and to challenge what we know about the good and how we act pursuant to it.

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 Application

A. Read through the values listed below. Relate your top five personal values with
no.1 being the most important.
____ family time ____ independence
____ health ____ fame
____ wealth ____ religion
____ education ____ honesty
____ creativity ____ community
____ helping others ____ prestige
____ leadership ____ security
____ achievement ____ environment
____ social life (friends) ____ lifestyle
____ other (please specify) ____________________

B. Group Sharing. List three do’s and don’ts of good citizenship. Share your output
to the group and consolidate your answers to list down 3 best do’s and don’ts of
good citizenship.

DO’s OF GOOD CITIZENSHIP DONT’s OF GOOD CITIZENSHIP

1. 1.
2. 2.
3. 3.

C. Create an infographic or web concept map about your understanding of Plato’s

concept of good. Make sure you relate your personal experienced.

Refer to Appendix A for the rubric of this module assessment.

Wonderful! You have finished Module 1. You may

now proceed to module 2. Let’s continue to know more about
ethics in the lens of other philosophers.

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 Module Assessment

Part A. Moral Dilemmas

The following are some moral dilemma scenarios for you to ponder. Each scenario
is characterized by the need to make a difficult decision. As with all moral dilemmas,
there is no right or wrong answer. Answer the following and think carefully before
responding.
1. The Life Boat
You are on a cruise and the ship encounters an unexpected storm. The storm
continues to rage and eventually you and the other passengers are told you must head
to the lifeboats and abandon ship. As people begin to line up, you realize some lines
have fewer people, some have families, and some seem to have younger, single people.
You know you are strong and capable. Do you choose to help a group composed of
three families with a few young children, a group of seniors who obviously could use
your help, or go with the young, strong people, with whom you might have a better
chance of survival?
2. Hit and Run
Late one night you are driving home in a bad rainstorm. A drunk reel out in front
of your car and you try to stop, but you hit the homeless drunk. Nobody sees you. The
drunk reel looks and smells as if one’s is homeless. You check to see how badly one’s
hurt and realize that the drunk reel is dead. You have never even had a speeding ticket
and are an upright, professional, with a family and are well-known and respected in
your community. Do you make a report anonymously, confess your crime, or drive on
home and forget about it, knowing no one is going to pursue the death of a homeless
drunk?
3. Salamat Shopee!
You receive a package at your home that was delivered to the wrong address. The
shipping label indicates it is a favorite item that you cannot afford to purchase yourself.
Do you keep it or notify the person it was intended for?

Part B. Give at least three (3) examples of an ethical dilemma that you have experienced
before or currently experience and explain how you deal with it.
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 Module Summary

You have completed the first module of Ethics covering Introduction to Ethics. Key

points covered in the module include:

• Ethics deals with morality of human act, then let us define the meaning of
morality of human act. Morality of human acts means the goodness or badness,
the rightness or wrongness or the acceptability or unacceptability of human acts.
• Five (5) ―” camps” on how do we decide what is right: (1) Utilitarian; (2)
Rights-based; (3) Duty-based; (4) Virtue-based; and (5) Compromise (mixed)
• Two (2) moral spectrums: First, considered that goodness lies in an action itself
which is the position of the so-called deontologist. Second, considered that
goodness in the consequences of an action, which is the position of the so-called
consequentialist.
• Seven (7) – steps of Moral Reasoning Model: (1) Stop and think. This involves
a step-back from the situation to make sure that you do not act out of impulse.
(2) Clarify goals. Clarify your short-term and long-term aims. Sometimes, in the
heat of the moment, short-term wants eclipse long-term goals. (3) Determine
facts. Make sure you gather enough information before you make a choice. (4)
Develop options. Clear your mind and try to think of other creative ways of
clarifying your motives and implementing your actions with the least ethical
compromise. (5) Consider consequences. Filter your choices and separate the
ethical from the unethical choices bearing in mind both your motives and the
potential consequences of your action. (6) Choose. Make a decision. If the choice
is hard to make, try consulting others who may have knowledge or experience
of your situation. (7) Monitor and modify. Monitor what happens after your
decision and have enough humility to modify your action or behavior as
necessary.
• Three (3) elements of moral act: (1) Object; (2) Intention; and (3) Circumstances
• Gawa refers the free action that is oriented toward a particular end while gawi
also refers to a free kind of work.
• Ethics for Filipino students is philosophy of human action that allows them to
learn the art of living. It is an art that enables them to be reconciled with their
freedom and that which expected of them (by others and themselves). Thus,
ethics is a way for them to find happiness.

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 • Plato was given voice by a thinker named Protagoras who said that "man is the
measure of all things."
• Plato directs humanity to the nobility that is reachable through the knowledge of
the good. Plato’s confidence in knowing the good as acting upon it reaches out
to every age that grapples with the question of what is proper human action.

Reference

Aristotle. Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics. Trans. Robert C. Bartlett and Susan D.

Collins. Chicago: Chicago University Press, 2011.

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 Module 2

Western Ethical Theories and

Principles

Hello! Welcome to module 2 of this course. This module seeks to study and
understand the different theories and principles which concerned with right action and
being good as a basis of ethical and moral behaviour. Also, to learn and apply the
different philosophical concept originated from the Western beliefs and practices, like
how to live happily, the significance of having a good character, choosing good and
avoid evil, and making choices that will produce the greatest good for the greatest
number of people.

This Module contains the following lessons:

Lesson 1: Virtue Ethics
Lesson 2: Natural Law
Lesson 3: Deontological Ethics
Lesson 4: Utilitarianism

The major learning outcomes of this module are to:

• explore the different ethical theories that pay high regard on the good act and the act
which more people will benefit accordingly
• demonstrate critical, reflective thought in integrating the various concepts in
determining ethical and moral action
• identify the different ethical concepts and principles that served as the basis of
identifying ethical and moral act
• collaboratively examine the significant influence of the following ethical concepts
that served as guiding principles to human being.

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 Lesson 1

VIRTUE ETHICS:
ARISTOTLE

OBJECTIVES

At the end of this lesson, you will be able to:

1. recognize the meaning of eudemonia or happiness and its relation to ethics;

2. differentiate the parts of the soul in relation to their respective functions,
3. appreciate and articulate the role of virtue in crafting an ethical life;
4. determine the role of habit in the formation of a virtuous character; and
5. articulate the difference between philosophical knowledge and practical
wisdom.

INTRODUCTION

Hello! Welcome Back learner. Are you ready for your quest to understand and live a
life of moral character? Well good to know that! Be ready to know this character-based
25
approach to morality that assumes that we acquire virtue through practice. As well as
by practicing being honest, brave, just, generous, and so on, a person develops an
honorable and moral character.

ACTIVITY

Moderation Dilemmas
Dilemma 1
Both you and your friend have cell phone plans with unlimited texting, but
that doesn't mean your time has no limits! Your friend texts you all throughout the day,
even during school hours and late into the night. They get upset if you don't hit them
back within five minutes, but you cannot stop everything to respond to so many texts.
You want to keep them as a friend, but their texting needs are driving you up the wall.
What should you do?

Dilemma 2
Crack cocaine and powder cocaine are two forms of the same drug. Both are
illegal. Yet, the law has treated them differently. Crack cocaine, the only drug for which
there is a federally mandated minimum sentence for mere possession, carries a
minimum five-year prison sentence for possession of five grams. However, you would
need to possess at least 500 grams of powder cocaine to get the same sentence. A 2006
study found that 82 % of Americans sentenced for possession of crack are black, even
though they comprise only 30 % of users. Crack is the form of cocaine used more often
by blacks and people with lower incomes, as opposed to powder cocaine which is more
expensive. Most people would say our justice system should be fair, balanced—
moderate. Would you agree that the sentencing policy for crack cocaine possession
shows moderation?

26
 ANALYSIS

1. Does this remind you of other dilemmas you have encountered or heard of (real, or
fictional)?
_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________

2. How could moderation play as part in this dilemma?

_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________

ABSTRACTION

Introduction
People are often most remembered by their most significant character traits.
These traits are the product of a consistent display of a particular behavior. Some people
are known to be courageous, some as quick-witted, while others are remembered for
their diligence and work ethic. To a certain extent, a person is defined (at least in the
minds of others) by what one’s and how a person lives one’s life. On one hand, character
traits such as thoughtfulness, temperance, and respectfulness are often seen in positive
light. On the other hand, cowardice, laziness, and shamelessness are generally frowned
upon by most who consistently exhibits certain behavior in various situations gains
peculiar identity that somehow determines how others sees as a person. For example,
people associate nickname Bertong Tigasin (Bert "the formidable") to a person who has
consistently displayed strength and grit in character.
We build our characters through how we make choices in different situations
we face in our lives. In meeting and speaking to different people, facing various
problems, and handling different day-to-day tasks, we develop a certain way of being,

27
unique style of being a person. Through the constant interaction of thought and action
as prompted by various situations that call for one's decision, a person comes to know
one’s self as a certain type of character or personality. Being a certain way or having a
particular personality implies a certain understanding of the good. Personality or
character is an approach or a way of reckoning the different situations that one faces in
one’s life -- a way of navigating one's way towards one’s flourishing as a human person.
Character is not merely a theoretical construct but a product of action in the world -- a
constant doing or way of being that is made apparent by the possession and
actualization of particular virtues or vices.
In one's journey towards self-realization and self- flourishing, there is an
implied necessity to understand what a person is actually aiming for one’s life. In
aiming for the person must also first understand what one’s actually is and is potentially
capable of. Self-actualization is not attained through theory but by practice: character
is a product of practice. But what does it actually mean for a human person to flourish?
What is the goal of our existence as human beings and what does character have to do
with?
The Greek philosopher Aristotle 1384-322 wrote one’s Nelcomachean Ethics
with these questions in mind. As one of Plato's most prolific students, Aristotle shares
with Plato the fundamental assumption that what radically distinguishes the human
person from other forms of being is one’s possession of reason (logos). For both of
these thinkers, the ultimate purpose cannot be fully understood without understanding
the place of reason in ordering one's life. However, if Plato firmly believes that
ignorance is solely responsible for committing immoral acts, thinking that once one
truly knows the good, one will inevitably do the good, Aristotle believes otherwise.
Aristotle considers that morality is not merely a matter of knowing the good but actually
doing or practicing the good habitually. We become what we are by what we do and
not merely by what we know. For Aristotle, we can only fully actualize our potential as
human beings once we understand what being human essentially aims to and do the
necessary things to fulfill our function (ergon) in the most excellent way possible.
Aristotle raises significant issues for the study of ethics. Important questions
regarding what is good or bad for the human person with respect to one’s ultimate goal
of being fulfilled are raised. Aristotle elaborates the conditions upon which self-
realization becomes a practically attainable. The ethics Aristotle believed in is grounded
in the formation of one's character-- a way of being and living in harmony with the
human person's proper end. Just as Aristotle believes that other things have a specific
function and end, for instance, a pair of scissors, whose function and end is to cut things,
Aristotle also believes that such a purpose also exists for human beings. To fulfill this
function in the most excellent way possible is to live ethically, that is, to achieve a way
of flourishing suited to us.

Ethics as the Art of Living Well

Eudaimonia

28
 Aristotle assumes the any activity, practical or theoretical, aims towards some
end or good. The following examples are given to elucidate this proposition: health for
the practice of medicine, ship for shipbuilding, and victory for generalship in war,
among others. However, these ends are still provisional to another. If for instance, the
practice of medicine to promote and maintain health in society, can we not ask further
why we dot to be or us one healthy? Does one seek health for its own sake able to fulfill
seek it perhaps because one would like to be one's duties as a parent well because one
wants to raise good children? But what is the end goal of having good children? One
does want to have good children? Perhaps because one cares enough for one's society
that one does not want to contaminate it with useless citizens in the future. But why
does one value society this much? As one can see, almost all ends are not ends in
themselves but mere conduits for a further or deeper end.
Aristotle is not simply interested in finding out the different ends or purposes
for human life. Aristotle wants to find out what our chief end is. One’s is interested in
finding out what all our lives essentially and ultimately aim. The chief good for the
human person must not be something one aims at for the sake of something else. It
cannot be wealth, for wealth is merely a means for possessing things such as houses or
cars. Neither can it be fame nor honor for they are just instruments for feeding one's a
servant of pride.
Aristotle names the chief good for the human person as happiness or eudamonia.
For him, happiness is the self- sufficient, final, and attainable goal of human life. It is
self- sufficient because to have it makes human life complete. It is final because it is
desired for itself and not for the sake of something else, and it is attainable because, as
shall be explain later, it is not mere theoretical construct but something that one actually
does practically.
Happiness above all seems for we always choose it on account of itself and
never on account of something else. Yet honor, pleasure, intellect, and every virtue we
choose on their own account --- for even if nothing resulted from them, we would
choose each of them but--- we choose them also for the sake of happiness, because we
suppose that, through them, we will be happy. But nobody chooses happiness for the
sake of these things, more generally, on account of anything else?
Eudemonia is sought for its own sake. All other ends, such as health, wealth,
and power, are sought because they are perceived to be instrumental in one's
flourishing. Eudemonia as the proper end of human, is not some kind of inactive state
but is actually something that one does. For Aristotle, our chief good is not something
we merely possess but something that we continually actualize (in practice). According
to Aristotle, "Eudemonia is an activity of the soul in accordance with virtue." In
addition, the chief good is not achieved by one grand act or one big decision, for it is
something one constantly strives for. One says, "One swallow does not make a spring
nor does one day. And in this way, one day or a short time does not make someone
blessed and happy either." This implies that happiness is a lifelong activity. One cannot
be complacent in times of good fortune because happiness is more than one's fate --- it
is something we decide to do for ourselves.

29
 Aristotle acknowledges the fact that it would not hurt if one were born into more
favorable circumstances, such as being 'brought up in a good family, having access to
proper education, having the company of good friends, and being beautiful in physical
appearance. These external goods contribute to the attainment of one's happiness, but
they do not guarantee it. At the end of the day, happiness is still something one does
and not merely who or where someone is. Hence, some people are rich but seemingly
unfulfilled in their lives. Others have good friends but have not cultivated these
friendships enough to have one's friends hold a positive impact in one's life.
Obviously, therefore, happiness is not mere self-indulgence or pleasure-seeking
for Aristotle. It denotes an activity that essentially corresponds to the proper nature of
the human being. At this point, it is crucial to understand how Aristotle comprehends
the nature of the human person so that the precise meaning of happiness may be
explained. We must also investigate the meaning or virtue, for it is contained in the
definition of happiness. What is the human person for Aristotle and what does one’s
happiness entail as such? Secondly, what is the role of virtue in the achievement of
one's end?
The Soul
Aristotle postulates that happiness is an activity of the soul. The obvious
question is, of course, what one’s means by "soul." For Aristotle, the soul is the part of
the human being that animates the body. Body and soul are inseparable for Aristotle,
but one’s emphasizes the role of the soul than that of the body in elucidating one’s
ethics. The soul is composed of both rational and irrational elements.
The rational part of the soul is divided into two parts the speculative
(responsible for knowledge) and the practical (responsible for choice and action). The
speculative part concerned with pure thought and is essentially the base contemplation,
while the practical intellect is in charge action and the practical determination of the
proper to attain a specific end.
The irrational part of the soul also has two parts the vegetative and the
appetitive. The vegetative part is in charge of the nutrition and growth of the human
being. This part of the soul takes care of all the involuntary functions of the body, from
breathing to digestion and the like. Aristotle says that this part of the soul is not relevant
in discussing happiness or virtue. 'Since this is also found in any other living being, it
is not distinct to the human person. However, the appetitive part, according to Aristotle,
shares in the rational element in the soul. It cannot itself reason, but it does share in the
rational element in that it can be influenced by it. For example, passions, such as sexual
urges and desire for wealth, and recognition are quite difficult to control' It is the, of
the rational part of the soul to reign in such passionate demands that seek fulfillment
oftentimes without any rational and practical consideration of all the factors involved
in its desire for satisfaction. The desiring element of the soul, albeit irrational, can be
reasoned with, so to speak. Hence, if a person suddenly feels the urge to eat all the food
on the table that is meant for an entire family, it is possible that a person stops one’s
self from doing so once a person realizes that such an act is grossly unfit for a proper
human being. Examined under an Aristotelian lens, this person's decision to keep one’s

30
greed in check is influenced by practical reason which determines the proper thing to
do in a given situation.
It is, therefore, important to remember that there is a part of the soul that calls
for reason's governance. Giving in to raw and unchecked appetites is oftentimes the
reason a person commits immoral acts. A person's raw biological and psychological
desires blind a person from the implications of what one’s does to the fulfillment of
one’s end, which is happiness. In other words, giving in to passions a person from
flourishing and derails a person end as a person. Aristotle is not saying that it is wrong
to have such desires. It is only natural to have such passions for they are a constitutive
part of having a soul. However, people who to be happy must be responsible for such
desires and keep them in check. For Aristotle, moral virtue is necessary in making sure
that desires do not control the behavior.
Virtue, the Mean, and Practical Wisdom
The Greek word for virtue is arte which means excellence. By excellence, the
Greeks thought of how a thing fulfills its function (ergon) in accordance with its nature.
For instance, if a knife cuts excellently, is sharp, durable, and dependable for different
tasks, then it may be said that it is an excellent knife --- it does what it is supposed to
do in the best way possible. It fulfills its essence as a tool for cutting and slicing. It may
then be called a "virtuous" knife. To be virtuous, in other words, is to exhibit one's
capacity to fulfill one's essence or purpose in such a way that one's potentiality as a
particular being may be said to be actualized in the most excellent way. Following this,
it can be said that a racehorse that consistently wins races is a virtuous horse and so is
a guard dog that barks at the sight of an intruder.
Two Kinds of Virtues
In the case of human beings, Aristotle says that there are two kinds of virtues -
moral and intellectual. Briefly, moral virtue has to do with excellence in the
performance of decisions relating to moral and practical activity, while intellectual
virtues have to do with one's capacity to harness reason's contemplative capacity for
arriving at knowledge. Intellectual virtue owes its existence and development to
teaching, while moral virtue arises from habitual practice (ethos).
Virtue, then, is twofold, intellectual, and moral. Both the
cominginto-being and increase of intellectual virtue result mostly from
teaching -- hence, it requires experience and time -- whereas moral virtue
its name [éthiké] by a slight alteration of the term habit [ethos]. It is also
clear, as a result, that none of the moral virtues are present in us by nature,
since nothing that exists by nature is habituated to be other than it is. For
example, a stone, because it is borne downward by nature, could not be
habituated to be borne upward, not even if someone habituates it by
throwing it upward ten thousand times. Fire, too, could not be borne
downward nor could anything else that is naturally one way be habituated
to be another. Neither by nature, therefore, nor contrary to nature are the
virtues present; they are instead present in us who are of such nature to
receive them and who are completed through habit.
31
 Aristotle emphasizes the role of practice and habit in the formation of moral
virtue. No person is born morally virtuous. However, all persons have the latent
potentiality to be if only they habitually do excellent deeds. But what are excellent
deeds? What are virtuous actions? How does a person develop the capacity to bring
these virtues out of the realm of possibility to the realm of actuality?
It is only in practice that we come to know that we truly know how to do
something. It is only in running that we come to know how fast we can actually run and
gain the right to call ourselves runners. It is only in trying to solve math problems do
we find out if we are good at mathematics and have the capacity to be mathematicians.
Analogously, Aristotle declares that we become morally virtuous by doing morally
virtuous acts. We become just by doing just acts. We become temperate by doing
temperate acts. We become courageous in doing courageous acts.
Virtue is a state of character which makes person good and capable of fulfilling one’s
end (Telos) as human person. By state of character, Aristotle emphasizes a certain
consistency or constancy in one's character in facing different situations. Consistency
is not stagnancy. Aristotle is not saying that a virtuous person is incapable of adjusting
to various situations. On the contrary, it is precisely the person's capacity to read
situations that makes a person virtuous. In reading situations, the virtuous person is able
to arrive at a decision or perform an action that may be considered as an intermediate
between deficiency and excess, which Aristotle calls the mean or mesotes.
By this, Aristotle does not merely point to mathematical mean, such that six
would be the mean in scale of one to ten. It is a mean that is relative to the person facing
a moral choice. By relative, Aristotle means that depending on the particular
circumstances of a person, the mean would correspond to the most appropriate response
given the demands of the situation. For example, if you and your friend decide at around
10:00 to meet in a mall to watch a movie at 2:00 p.m., several things have to be
considered when you try and decide how much time you will give yourself to prepare
to avoid being late and show respect for your friend's time:
1. The travel time from your house to the mall
2. How much time it usually takes you to take shower and get clothed
3.Other appointments you might have to attend to before going to the mall
4. The mode of transportation you will use to get to the mall
5.The location of the cinema relative to the entrance door of the mall
6. If you are typically slow and sluggish in making preparations
7. If there are other. shops you plan to visit before meeting your friend
8. If you have a physical disability which would make travel challenging
9.Your mood on that day
Many other things may be added to this list. The point, though, is that it is not
merely a matter of 'finding the mathematical mean between 10:00 and 2:00 p.m., which
32
would then be 12 o'clock that determines the time you should allot for yourself to
prepare for your meeting without being late. A virtuous person neither prepares too
early nor too late, not only in terms of the actual time-the time of preparation. A person
is actually determined by one’s reckoning of the demands of the situation and one’s
relative standing to it as an individual. The mean is not a fixed point but rather a moving
target. Applied to the previous example, if you p.m., are planning to meet your friend
at the mall at 2:00 you have to take into account not just logistical matters, but perhaps,
more importantly, your knowledge and experience of yourself in dealing with such
matters. It is actually your ability to adjust yourself to the situation which determines
whether you may be considered virtuous or not in that situation. If you agree to meet
with your friend without taking the things mentioned above into consideration, then you
may be called an inconsiderate friend. On the other hand, to overthink and over-prepare
can also be seen as excessive and can lead to over punctuality which may strain your
friendship, especially if you expect your friend to do the same without considering that
a person is not the same person as yourself.
Hence, it may be said that to feel or act in certain ways that are neither deficient
nor excessive relative to oneself and the situation may be considered as the state of
character that recognizes the mean. To be morally virtuous, one must be able to respond
to situations not just with the correct feeling or action but in the proper degree, at the
right time, towards the right people, and for the right reasons. In the example, if you
arrive considerably early for your meeting, would it be considered virtuous for you to
call your friend and command a person to come immediately because you are not good
at waiting? Should you be angry towards your friend if one’s arrives 30minutes late
because the MRT one’s was riding in broke down?
Should you scold a person for being inconsiderate towards you? Would it not be
considered excessive if you take a person lateness against oneself? All these questions
point to a more fundamental issue: How does one become a good or virtuous friend? In
other words, what is the proper disposition necessary in being friends with another
person? How does one make demands to the other properly? How does one show
concern for the other's welfare? It is clear that for Aristotle, the answer is disclosed in
actual practice. One's theoretical knowledge of the meaning of friendship does not
guarantee that a person can be a good friend. Virtue is developed in practice. Aristotle
defines virtue as follows:
Virtue, therefore, is characteristic marked by choice, residing in the mean
relative to us, a characteristic defined by reason and as the prudent person would define
it. Virtue is also a mean with respect to two vices, the one vice related to excess, the
other to deficiency; and further, it is a mean because some vices fall short of and others
exceed what should be the case in both passions and actions, whereas virtue discovers
and chooses the middle term. Thus, with respect to its being and the definition that
states what it is, virtue is a mean; but with respect to what is best and the doing of
something well, it is an extreme.
For Aristotle, virtue is state of one's character that is the result of choice. This
choice is governed by prudence or practical wisdom (phronésis). Phronésis is the
human person's instrument in dealing with moral choices. It is a kind of knowledge that

33
deals with practical matters and not just with ideas or concepts. Practical wisdom
participates in the capacity of the rational part of the soul to reckon situations without
easily giving in to the push and pull of the various desires which emanate from the
appetitive part of the soul. Phronésis is the intellectual virtue responsible for bringing
the human person closer to one’s chief good in the realm of morality. In other words,
practical wisdom aids one in being happy. It is comprised both of knowledge and action.
One's capacity for choice and action must be guided by the intellectual virtue of
practical wisdom or phronésis in pursuit of the mean or the mesotes for one to be able
to call oneself morally virtuous. It may be said that prudent actions are actions that are
guided by reason and not just driven by passion. These actions and decisions exhibit
one's state of character whether one is truly courageous, temperate, friendly, or just.
Practical wisdom guides the human person in choosing the mean between the extremes
of excess and deficiency. It constantly adjusts its reckoning based on the shifting
conditions that permeate a specific situation, relative to oneself.
Hence, it may be said that if mesotes is a moving target, phronésis would
correspond to the excellence of an archer in hitting this target in various situations, akin
to Hawkeye in the Avengers movies. If one can recall, Hawkeye has an arsenal of
different arrows adapted to hit various targets. Phronésis would correspond to one’s
rational reckoning of the various conditions that may or may not affect a person
marksmanship, like the number of enemies one’s has to hit, their speed and agility, and
a person position and distance relative to them. Hawkeye also understands his own
limitations
(since one’s has no superpowers like Thor or the Hulk), and, therefore, assesses one’s
role in the Avengers accordingly. Hawkeye is then rightly assigned the role of archer in
the team because one is an expert, someone who is excellent in the craft of archery.
Aristotle is somehow saying that for one to attain chief good, the person must
continually bring oneself to situations where one’s mettle and skills may be tested.
Surely, even an archer as excellent as Hawkeye was not born an expert archer, a person
became so through constant practice until one’s developed the necessary skill set for
carrying out one’s function as an archer.
In the moral realm, for instance, one becomes courageous only through practice.
Courage is a learned intellectual and practical skill. Reason guides one in calibrating
the right degree of courage in facing, for example, a situation where one's life is being
threatened by an attacker. After assessing the various factors (such as the attacker's level
of aggression, the weapon used, the amount of money and valuables at stake, the
presence of others in the vicinity), one asks oneself the prudent thing to does one simply
hand over one's belongings and hope the attacker leaves? Does one resist given that one
had martial arts training in one’s teenage years? Does one try to reason with the attacker
hoping that a person convinces the latter to not go through with the deed? Or does one
simply run away and scream for help? What is the prudent thing to do? For Aristotle,
there is not one universally correct response to this situation that may apply to everyone
in all situations. Sometimes, it may be more prudent to retreat than to move forward.
Courage is not always bold and brazen. Courage is a thinking person's virtue. There is
not one way of being courageous. Courage is not haphazardly fighting the attacker
without regard for one's life (for this seems to imply that one's belongings are worth
34
more than one's life) nor is it freezing in total fear where one gives up the capacity to
deliberate upon one's options. Courage is the mean between rashness and cowardice.
However, it still depends upon the person to choose the appropriate response to the
situation. In other words, it is up to the person facing the situation to essentially define
the meaning of courage as it applies to a person at that moment. Since the mean is a
moving target, phronésis is necessary in skillfully making the right decision. To choose
either an excess or deficiency constitutes a vice for Aristotle. It is to miss the mark as
it were. It is to under-perform or over-perform with respect to one's function (ergon) as
a human being. It is to act in opposition to one's ultimate which is eudaimonia.

The principal Virtues and Vices

Excess (vice) Mean (virtue) Deficiency (vice)
Rashness Courage Cowardice
Self-indulgence Moderation Insensibility
Prodigality Liberality Meanness
Vulgarity Magnificence Paltriness
Vanity Proper pride Smallness of soul
Ambitiousness Proper ambition Lack of ambition
Irascibility Good temper Lack of spirit
Boastfulness Truthfulness Self-depreciation
Buffoonery Wittiness Boorishness
Obsequiousness Friendliness Surliness
Bashfulness Modesty Shamelessness
Envy Proper indignation Malice

A truly virtuous action is performed by someone who is not simply compelled

to do. A person does virtuous act and chooses to act in such a way for the sake of being
virtuous. This choice comes from certain firmness of character that is not easily swayed
by one's passions or influenced by certain factors in a given situation. A virtuous person
is someone who has been so used to acting virtuously that it becomes tremendously
difficult for anything or anyone to convince a person to act otherwise. To a certain
degree, vices are no longer an option for a truly virtuous person. Such a person actively
keeps oneself disposed towards the mean by way of habituation (ethos). Only a virtuous
person can perform truly virtuous actions because one’s initially predisposed towards
virtue.
It should be noted that certain actions admit no middle- point or mesotes. Some
actions are simply bad, and so there is no "virtuous" way of performing them. Acts like
adultery, theft, and murder are bad in themselves and cannot be deemed virtuous in any
situation. There is no right way of committing adultery, with the right person, at the
right time Adultery is simply wrong. The mean only applies to actions and dispositions
that are not bad in and of themselves.

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Contemplation and Philosophical Knowledge
For Aristotle, the main functions of the intellectual virtues, namely, phronésis
and Sophia, are to aid human persons in matters concerning moral choice and the
attainment of knowledge of first principles or eternal truths respectively. If practical
wisdom serves as a guide for action in everyday life, the act of contemplation is a
pursuit of philosophical wisdom. Aristotle subordinate’s practical wisdom to
contemplation because one’s believes that it is the kind of activity most proper to human
persons considering the fact that reason is humans most defining attribute
Philosophizing, according to Aristotle, is the most pleasant of virtuous activities
because it does not rely on anything else for its fulfillment other than the desire to do
it. It is the most self-sufficient act. Practical virtues such as courage and temperance
need specific conditions to be attained, while philosophy is something a person can do
by oneself anytime. For Aristotle, contemplation is an act that can be loved for its own
sake because it has no other aim than to reveal the most fundamental truths of existence.
In other words, no person may be considered happier than a person who has the time
and the leisurely disposition for contemplation However, it must be remembered that
human life is not exclusively devoted to thought; it is most of the time engaged in action
and practical matters. Thus, phronésis still plays a crucial role in the attainment of one's
chief good, which is eudaimonia. For Aristotle, the contemplative knowledge of the
good does not automatically translate to its performance. Being virtuous in the practical
sense is still cultivated through practice and habit (ethos). Living well means having
the complementary disposition of intelligent conduct and a thirst for philosophical
wisdom.
Conclusion
Ethics is matter of living well through the habitual practice of virtue which
essentially translates into having a virtuous or excellent character. Happiness, being the
chief good of the human person, is attainable through the proper exercise of reason,
both morally and intellectually is an activity of the soul that purposively attempts to
choose the mean between two extremes in the realm of morality. As the saying goes,
"You can't put a good man down." This seems to resonate with Aristotelian ethics. For
Aristotle, a good man, a person who has cultivated the proper virtues and has imbibed
these in one’s thoughts and deeds, will always flourish. A person of virtuous character
always finds a way to stay intact even in dire times. That person does not compromise
the dictates of reason in exchange for the immediate fulfillment of one’s passions. In
other words, in being habituated to choose the mean, a person remains virtuous and,
therefore, happy in every circumstance. It is the person's ability to adapt while
remaining true to oneself as a rational human being which allows a person to flourish
in various environments. For example, according to Aristotle, a person who has
cultivated the virtue of honesty throughout one’s life will not be influenced by a corrupt
system. In fact, it would not even occur to that person that taking bribes or signing
dubious contracts are an option because a persom has been so habituated to always
choosing neither excess nor deficiency, but always the mean which is the choice proper
to a person that stays true to oneself as a rational being.

36
 Aristotle teaches us that character is the most essential component of ethics. A
virtuous character is the result of the proper combination of practical wisdom
(phronésis) and habituation (ethos) in the pursuit of the mean (mesotes). Being ethical
is all about being excellent in being human, which is, being excellent in fulfilling one's
essence as a rational being that has cultivated an excellent character and is, therefore,
capable of making the most prudent decisions in all circumstances.

APPLICATION

A. Evaluate the table of the principal virtues and vices. Identify and reflect on your
personal experiences where you may have engaged in some of the vices listed
there. What factors led to you having such dispositions in these experiences?

B. Do a research and find a movie in which Aristotle's virtue ethics is exemplified.

37
 Wonderful! You have finished lesson 1 of Module 2.
You may now proceed to the next lesson. Let’s continue to know
more about ethics in the lens of other philosophers

Lesson 2

THE NATURAL LAW

OBJECTIVES

At the end of this module, you will be able to:

1. recognize the meaning of natural law and its relation to ethics;
2. explain how natural is an imprint of the Divine Will in the free person;
3. appreciate and articulate the role of natural in crafting an ethical life; and
4. discuss conscience and how this is defined by natural law.

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 INTRODUCTION

Our present age is not impervious to such attacks of absurdity, frustration, and
near desperation. History, however, is gracefully replete with people who have exerted
effort in pointing out a viable way out of such darkness and confusion. One of the
options, if one wants to call it that, was arrived at through the meeting between
Philosophy and a religion of revelation that is Christianity. The best representative of
this integration and arguably also, an excellent thinking through of a reasonable way
that addresses the questions of the human person, is the philosophy of St. Thomas
Aquinas. In this lesson we will going to talk about Thomas' systemic approach that
served as moral guidelines followed and lived out by religious believers who belong to
the Catholic tradition and how it guides moral act.

ACTIVITY

Read the story en titled ― “The Myth of Sisyphus” by Albert Camus and answer the
following questions below.

ANALYSIS

1. Based on the story, what do think is the real purpose of life?

_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
_________________________________.
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 2. What does the rock symbolize in the story?
_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
_________________________________

3. If you were in the situation of Sisyphus, how would you make your life meaningful and
worth living?
_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
_________________________________

4. Were there times in your life that you felt like you were given the same punishment as
Sisyphus?
_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
_________________________________.

ABSTRACTION

Etsi Deus non daretur

Thomas Aquinas begins from the standpoint of
one’s perspective presupposes the existence of a God
who is the author (source) and the (end) of all reality.
This Creator for Thomas, however, relates in freedom
with the human person and so enables one’s in freedom
to recognize through reason, the very principle of
foundations of all things. In accordance with this
foundational knowledge, the human person can choose to
act in such a way that is worthy of one's very reality.
One who can reach the wisdom at the very heart of all things is obliged to act in accordance
with one’s dignity. The human being then is said to be gifted with the ability to know the highest
good" that engages a person freedom in "choosing to act on the good that one’s ought to do."
Freedom here is knowing the best goal and being able to reach for it through decisive action.

40
This is interiorly, that is the very heart, of every human as the dictate of "doing good in and
avoiding evil.”
For Aquinas, God reveals the Goodwill as the Eternal Law of in the order of reality.
Relating with Law as governing all is relating with God himself emanates to govern is founded
on the will all that is. The reality of life as growth, nutrition, and reproduction as that is eternal.
Even the reality in accordance of sensitive consciousness as ruled by instinct that is true of
animals is also in accordance themselves with the same will. That "plants persist to carry
themselves out to the fullness of being plants" does an imprint of the governing will that comes
to human understand as law. That ―animals governed by instincts a way is also recognized by
the human person as following the dictate of a law that guides all of creation.
The reality of the human person who is able, through one’s intellect, to decide in
freedom and, through a person will, to move oneself voluntarily in accordance with the good
that a person can know follows the very will of God who has "created human in God’s own
image". Human in God’s fullness shares life with plants and animals but goes beyond them in
one’s voluntary action and freedom in decisions.
Human freedom for St. Thomas, therefore, is an imprint off in the very being of the
human person. This sharing of human reason in the eternal will or divine law is for oneself the
natural law. The relationship between Eternal and natural law for a person is expressed in the
Sacred book for Christians thus, ―since the creation of the world God's invisible Will-his
power and nature has been clearly seen being understood from what has been made visible so
that people are without excuse” (Romans 1, 20). The divine will, according to this quote, can
be understood as governing all that is; human’s task is to act in such a way. that one’s
participation in the full unfolding of nature directs it to fulfillment.
This law impinges on the very freedom of the human being who can know one’s options
and voluntarily will to take action. The rational human person's participation, ability to discern
what is good from what is not, is the very presence of the dictate of the law within a person, and
is also the imprint on a person of the Creator (Divine will).
The human person then, who is able to draw up specific laws that govern oneself, one’s
society, and one’s relationship with all creation, is also the author of positive laws. Natural law
necessarily takes precedence over positive laws. Not all that is legal in human society reflects
the law that dictates on the human person as ethical in accordance with natural law what is legal
then is not always necessarily moral.
This ethics of natural has gained wide acceptance at one point in the history of western
civilization that it has come to be espoused even if one prescinds from the faith system that has
engendered it. Esti Deus non daretur is an expression that highlights the validity of this ethical
system with or without faith in the Creator God. Literally, Esti Deus non daretur means "even
if there is no God." This implies that the wisdom of the ethical system that is natural law is valid
and binding for the human person even if we bracket belief in God.
Those who came up with the expression Esti Deus non daretur do not advocate atheism
or protest against the faith. They simply mean that the deposit of knowledge or "divine wisdom"
that comes to us as "natural law" is valid in itself and is, therefore, the reasonable code of
conduct even for a human of goodwill who may be without faith. Even the Sacred Scriptures of
Christians reflect this, "For when non-believers who do not have the law by nature observe the
prescriptions of the law, they are a law of themselves even though they do not have the law.
They show that the demands of the law are written in their hearts".

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Conscience and Natural Law
The ability of a person to know is important in one’s acting ethically. Hence, one
follows St. Thomas' discussion on conscience, one is inclined to conclude that "it is the proper
functioning of reason in moving the human person towards an end that is fitting of one’s
dignity." One cannot do the right thing if one does not know what it is. The famous dictate then
to follow the conscience absolutely is tied to an obligation to educate it. Not knowing St.
Thomas is not an excuse. Even if one does not know, a person is obliged to know. If one acts
badly out of ignorance and does not act to rectify the situation by bothering to learn, that person
is to be held accountable according to the Angelic Doctor.
While the conscience absolutely binds us in doing the good and avoiding evil,
conscience as reason is also absolutely tasked to be given formation. The conscience, therefore,
can be mistaken, and being so does not exempt the human person from culpability. If a person
is able to know but fails to act in one’s obligation to do so, then this person is not free from
blame and responsibility for what was done.
There are different kinds of conscience that may lead us to wrongdoing: callous,
perplexed, scrupulous, and ignorant. The uninformed conscience simply lacks education,
while the perplexed one needs guidance in sorting out one's confusion. The callous and
scrupulous are binary opposites but both are malformed in being too lax or too strict.
Callousness of the conscience results in the long-time persistence in doing evil that the self is
no longer concerned whether what a person does is good or bad. Scrupulousness, on the other
hand, fails to trust one's ability to do good and, hence, overly concerns itself with avoiding what
is bad to the point of seeing wrong where there really is none. If one thinks about it, these
different consciences that lead to badness in action can readily be rectified by education. Putting
effort in forming one's own conscience helps a person to exit from such malformations.
Given such propensity to error of the human conscience, can we then disobey the
dictates of our conscience? St. Thomas Aquinas still insists, ―absolutely not!" Conscience
remains to be our proximate norm that bids us to do the good and avoid evil; simply put, going
against one's conscience is doing the contrary of the dictate of what one knowingly elects as
good. If the extent of what one knows determines what the good to be done is and the evil to be
avoided, the self is obliged to act accordingly, i.e., "act on the good and shun the bad." These
occasions again show the importance of the commitment to educate one's conscience basically
because one cannot do good if one does not know it and since one's norm for acting is the
obligation that is set by one's conscience: acquisition of knowledge as what ought to be done
through education is critical for ethical living, according to St. Thomas Aquinas. Though
separated by centuries, the psychologist Lawrence Kohlberg later echoes St. Thomas in
insisting that "education is crucial for moral living

Three Contemporary Questions

There are relevant questions that can help the Filipino student appreciate Thomistic
Natural Law. If we follow what has been earlier said, that natural law is human's participation
in the execution of the good and avoidance of evil through the use of one’s reason and will, then
three questions that originated from the writing of Alasdair Macintyre can be appropriated to
highlight the relevance of Aquinas today; Who am I? Who do I want to be? How can I get there?

42
 Who am I? Thomistic Natural Law interrogates the identity of the human person. If
one is endowed with his/her own facticity, history, and abilities, his/her present reality is
accessible to him/her through self-knowledge and reflection. This assessment of one's own
strengths and weaknesses is critical in being able to do good and avoid evil. This ethical task is
not only an outward truth. Doing good determines the actor in a reality that is good and doing
bad malforms a person too. The reality of human identity is that it is something defined yet also
always in process. Ethics for Aquinas is primarily a question of human identity. "All human
acts are moral acts," Aquinas said. Since it is through one’s acts that human defines oneself, the
ethical human is the task of one’s free acts.
Defining the self gives one a chance to clarify oneself hence, it is important to raise the
second question Who do I want to be? The human person's self-knowledge is dynamic, that is,
it is always open to the direction set by what one wants to make of oneself. Self-knowledge
here is malleable towards self-determination. Ethical acts give direction through freedom to
build up the self towards particular goal.
The human reason is so gifted that it is able to discern through options and daily
realities. Decisions are the basis of one's freedom in choosing what one wants to be. The self
also considers the truthful transition to what one ought to be. Given this knowledge of oneself
and the ability to evaluate one’s options and possibilities, the self can also better give direction
to one’s being.
The third question is not very far from the other questions. In truth, how can I get there?
also fully utilizes the sound judgment of human reason and evaluates the best route to get to the
goal decided upon. The last question breaks down the task to be done into the particulars of
actions and daily routine. Self-knowledge and self- determination are here bridged by self-
governance.
The human person does not only access reason to assess one’s personal identity and
personal a person is also gifted with the will to command the self to go through the steps and,
hence, be able to do the transition from knowledge to a fully determined self. Goal setting
through reason and decision is complemented by the ability to freely move the self and
command the body in action. It is in orchestrating the actions to be consistent with the end in
mind that the self reaches improvement.
For instance, if one wishes to get to the goal of finishing a degree, one starts with the
reality of the self. Knowing what one needs to improve on supports the goal of graduating. A
sound decision helps the student to maximize the training and studies that go with being enrolled
in the university. One knows in honesty that a paper diploma that reflects a degree is hardly of
value without true knowledge and mastery of what one is expected to know. Hence, if one's
goal is to graduate with competence, one elects the daily, monthly, semestral, or even yearly
tasks that ought to be completed. Professors’ lectures, and even exams are then seen in this light
as aids in reaching the goal. Furthermore, the self is not only a passive receiver of what
transpires externally; one designs the path and cooperates with the situation to reach end that
has been reasonably set by the self.

The Relational and Perfection of Love in Aquinas

Although we have suspended God-talk to make the case that natural law is relevant
even for the human person without faith, the discussion of Thomistic ethics is incomplete if it
43
does not end with the love that is directed towards God. Thomistic natural law is not Christian
simply because it is an ethics reconcilable or compatible with faith. lt is a disciplined system
that finds ultimate foundation and perfection of the reality of God. While through esti Deus non
daretur we are afforded the autonomy of a reasonable ethics independent from faith, ultimately
this ethics is given full meaning and perfection in a relationship with God.
The autonomy of ethics from faith afforded level of at enables human to not only copy
the perfection that is God and apply it to oneself and one’s surroundings. The in ethical order
also allows the human person in particularity the to be oneself as the singular subject that one’s
is. That is, through personal reflection, decisions, setting and praxis, the human person attains
the full realization of who a person is. In this sense, the human being is not merely stand-in for
the Creator God. One is not a robot who learns the direction from everything else and applies it
to oneself to function as a tool for Deus machine, or the God of the machine. The subjectivity
of human and one's search for fulfillment readily rest on the decisions and voluntary willing
that one makes.
On the other hand, however, the Divine Will and also the entirety of all creation cannot
be limited by the scope of satisfaction that is exclusively chosen by human. One cannot, given
one's limits, be the fulfillment of everything. Here a protest may arise. Is not one’s goal setting
inclusive of "the desire to be everything?" Truly, a person may have the longing, even the
potential, to be what one’s wants to be, stretching it so far as embracing through one’s desire
all that is. This potential, however, derives from what is actual in the reality of being; wanting
to be all in all is not the same as truly being all in all. Yet the desire for this has to come from
somewhere. Human beings are not capable of desiring all in all because they are limited. Who
evokes this thirst in the human person? This desire, therefore, has to come from somewhere or
someone else who awakens this in a person.
Here the relational that is inherent in the natural order finds value. The human person
is not only bound to find full maximum capacity of one's being in a search for self- actualization.
A person is not designed to find perfection on oneself but thoroughly relates with other human
persons and all of creation. A person is not designed to be a Pharisee who is perfect unto oneself.
A person is open to be in all and to exist for all. One's therefore, is not only to be the "self-made
human" but, in one’s full effort, "be open and available for everything else" and "be open for
the love or fullness that is beyond oneself."
Ultimately, as held by St. Thomas himself, the true the homo human lies in a gratuitous
perfection that is beyond freedom in person yet relates with oneself thoroughly in freedom and,
therefore, in fullness of love. This relationship and loving invitation exceed the possibilities of
achievements and realizations that are reachable by the human person. It may be called spiritual,
beatific, or heavenly but in the expanse of what is reasonably attainable by the human person.
It is available for a person only through relating with someone who is beyond oneself. The
highest perfection of human for St. Thomas is in a person wanting to be with God. In other
words, that are used by believers, "The ethical human is not the perfect human but one who
wants to be saved by cooperating in freedom with what go attainable for oneself."

44
 APPLICATION

Research and discuss the following topics guided by the natural law of St. Thomas Aquinas.
Explain how they can help you decide one of the following:
➢ whether abortion is morally acceptable and in what circumstances

➢ whether contractual labor is morally acceptable and why or why not

➢ whether one can charge interest for a loan and why or why not

➢ whether one can revolt against a tyrannical government administration

Good job! You have finished lesson 2. Expected

that you have now understand the concept about ethics that
says human being possess intrinsic values that govern our
reasoning and behavior.

45
 Lesson 3
DEONTOLOGICAL
ETHICS

OBJECTIVES

At the end of this module, you will be able to:

1. recognize the meaning of deontological ethics;
2. explain the categorical imperative;
3. appreciate and articulate the role of duty in crafting an ethical life; and
4. apply the principle of the categorical imperative in moral dilemma.

INTRODUCTION

―”Do unto others as you would have them do unto you”, a golden rule that
best described this moral philosophy. This philosophy views human as autonomous and
most oneself as not subject to external conditions, results, and mandates. This ethical
system declares its systemic independence from religion and even asserted that it is
religion that is in need of foundational ethics and not vice versa. In this lesson we are
going talk about ethical theory insisted that the foundation of norms for the good should
be rooted in human reason alone and moral rule meant to be followed in all situations,
for everyone to live moral lives.

46
 ACTIVITY

Create a list of examples of right and wrong actions. Discuss them with your family,
friends or classmates. Find any common actions that you agree on and also actions that you’re
not agree.
withe.

ANALYSIS

1. How do you define right action and wrong action?

_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
____________________
2) What is your basis in defining right action and wrong action?
_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
________________

ABSTRACTION

Autonomous Reason, Goodwill, and Duty

Kant insists that every time we confront moral situations
there are formally operative a priori principles that can be brought
to the fore. Highlighting these a priori truths can better help the
learner of ethics sort through one’s task of living ethically. Kant's
research on ethics has named these as reason, goodwill, and duty.
These are, for Kant, respectively, the foundation (reason), source
(goodwill), and motivation (duty) of ethical living.
47
 The foundation of a sound ethics for Immanuel Kant can only be the authority of human
reason. The voice of God is not heard directly today while human is living in this passing world.
Voices of ministers and priests who claim to speak for God are but other human beings who
make use of their own reason in trying to understand what goes on around them. This common
human reason is also what they use as they comprehend the revelation that is said to be the
foundation of their particular religion. Given that they share the same humanity with everybody
else including the students of ethics, what they say ought to pass through the norm of reason
that is internal to the moral subject oneself. Otherwise, arbitrariness holds sway in their claim
to authority and what they capriciously hold as binding or gratuitously free.
The person who acts in accordance to drawn-up lists of what one should do complies
through the use of one’s reason that they are indeed an obligation for a person. The reason,
therefore, elects such and such as morally binding and thus acts in accordance with what a
person thinks is one’s reason, therefore, functions as the very effort to think through moral
principles and apply what a person knows to get to the right thing to do. In fact, this internal
authority of human reason is operative and takes precedence every time the human person
confronts a particular moral situation. This is human rationality that is discursive, i.e., humans’
reason by "talking to themselves," according to one of the Philosopher- readers of Kant named
Hannah Arendt.
What is ethical necessarily always implies the use of reason. Human acceptance of
external mandates also makes use of this same reason. Kant then tells us that reason in itself
can only be the sensible foundation of what is ethical for man. Kant then bids his students sapere
aude that is "dare to think for yourselves." Autonomous reason ventures to know what is ethical
not on the authority of what is external to the self but grounded on (reason) itself. The loudness
of external authorities cannot bend the autonomy of reason that on its own knows what should
be done. What others say in turn is only acceptable if it is found to be reasonable by the use of
one's autonomous reason.
If reason is the foundation of what is ethical for Kant, III turn its source can only be
goodwill. This simply means that what is morally binding is rooted in reason as "doable for the.
human person." The moral authority for Kant is immanent in human, that is, the origin of ethical
obligation for man is his/her own goodwill.
Instead of looking at the good as external to human, Kant locates the good in the very
interiority of the self. The good that is relevant to the person who through themselves reason
knows what one ought to do, is that which a person is can do and known as good. This goodwill
implies the achievability of what is known through reason. One who claims what one says is a
moral obligation can do so by being free of impositions from outside. That is, a person of oneself
doing able to carry out one’s obligation. It can only oblige a person insofar as oneself through
a person’s own reason knows it as an obligation. In the same way that it is an obligation insofar
that it is something that one’s can manage to do.
Kant calls "duty" the obligation that follows what reason deems as the action which is
most worthy of our humanity. This duty is founded on human reason, that is, it passes through
the sorting out made by our autonomous and discursive reason. Our duty is that which the reason
determines as our obligation. In as much as duty is the doable obligation for the human person,
it is not a duty if it is impossible for human to do it. Duty, therefore, presupposes our ability for
otherwise it is only a bother to the human person. Duty, therefore, is a doable good for the
human will. Duty, while founded on human reason for determination, is at the very same time
originating from the goodwill as a voluntary action that is doable for the human being:
48
 Duty or obligation is the motivation for reason and goodwill of the human person. If
one asks why a person had to do what one’s ought to the answer can only be because it is a
person duty. Reason tells the human person to do the obligation that is-doable for the goodwill
again since it is one’s duty. The good that is reachable for the will of the human person is,
therefore, owned by oneself as a duty. This then excludes any other external or internal
motivation for the human person for doing what one’s ought to whether a person likes it or not;
be it success or failure; whether it comes with applause or accusation; one’s reason and good
will simply binds a person to do what one’s ought to do because it is a person’s duty. Obligation
is Understood as “Human as an End in Oneself,’ Autonomous, and Universalizable
Obligation for the human person is something one's reason elects and a person goodwill
owns simply as something one’s ought to do. Obligation is simply must, ―categorical
“imperative” or a duty that is defined by reason as doable for human's volition and, therefore,
should be carried out by the human person. In this sense, "Human as an end in oneself" means
the obligation cannot be passed on to others. That is, if confronted by a particular situation, the
human person in one’s integrity as reason and goodwill is obliged to do one’s duty as the agent
of action.
"The buck stops here," that is, the human person themselves is the center of action and
responsibility in a given ethical situation. A person’s obligation is oneself and it is one’s
participation in this particular ethical event. A person is autonomous in reasoning and willing
the execution of one’s defined duty.
If one remembers, however, reason as earlier mentioned is always discursive in its
execution. One’s autonomous reason, being thinking that is talking with oneself, presupposes
dialogue. Dialogue with the self-approximates a reaching out beyond the confines and
determinations of oneself only. The human person in reasoning out and determining one’s
personal duty is in this sense nonetheless tied up with other reasonable beings before whom a
person is accountable. Is one's obligation as defined by one's autonomous reason acceptable to
other reasonable beings who can stand in one's shoes? One's reason is also the presence of other
reasonable beings one ought to strive to be in' accord with. One's definition of duty or one’s
obligation ought to be universalizable in this sense.
"Human as an end in oneself" conjoined with this responsibility to reach for duty that
is universalizable necessarily demands that other human persons ought to be treated not as
instruments in the execution of what one should to do but as fellow reasonable beings, ends in
themselves. They are reasonable human beings too before whom the self stands accountable.
Kantian Ethics and Religion
Immanuel Kant fully established the independence of his ethics from religion via the
recognition of reason as the foundation, goodwill as the source, and duty as the motivation of
what obliges the human person. In Kant’s essay "Religions within the Limits of Reason", Kant
went as far as setting up his ethical system as that which is definitive in the recognition of true
religion.
A "religion is not true to itself," according to Kant, if it goes against what human "ought
to as define by a person’s autonomous reason and goodwill that reaches for universalizability.
Only false religion or cult falls unreasonably to superstition and does away with duty as an
obligation for one’s goodwill. It is, therefore, such Kantian ethics that is foundational for
religion and not vice versa.

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 Kant, however, is not against religion. For him the value of religion rests on its reality
as openness to "what one can hope for." Religion for Kant is the very openness of ethics to the
complementary strength that is provided by hope. Unlike Aristotle, Kant does not define
"happiness" as the motivation for his ethics of duty. What is ethical is indifferent to happiness
for Kant and is purely motivated by duty itself. One does the obligation to reach for happiness,
that will be self-serving for Kant and self-interest here moves away from the Purity of duty.
Happiness, however, is understood by the human reason as reasonably related to ethics.
"A person who has lived justly by doing one’s obligation dutifully is the most fitting for
happiness." This truth, the human reason knows and even goes as far as protesting the reality
of just human living miserably. "Happiness ought to be related to the ethical task of human,"
reason asserts in protest.
It is clear, however, that happiness cannot be a motivation for the ethical obligation of
man, according to Kant. He, therefore, suggests the determination of "happiness as gift” for the
ethical human. That is, "he/she who has lived justly is worthy of the gift of happiness." Human
cannot give this gift to oneself and therefore in one’s striving to live ethically opens oneself in
hope. Kantian ethics, therefore, need not be hard-hearted in the pure preoccupation of duty as
obligatory. The ethical person is open to happiness one’s cannot give to oneself. A person’s
duty can also be an expression of hope that "one’s can make oneself worthy of happiness."
For Kant, the ethical human person is like someone who in courtship the person one
likes. One’s cannot oblige the other to give oneself a positive answer to one’s offering of love
and devotion. A person can only make oneself worthy of a "yes." Responding to a person love
is a gift he/she can only receive from the other. The answer cannot be forced in the same way
that happiness is something one expects to collect after a lifelong striving of doing one's duty.
Happiness is a gratuitous gift that one recognizes as within the realm of hope. Different religions
for Kant express this balance between the task of doing the duty and the hope for what one
cannot give to oneself. Religion for Kant is the reconciliation of ethics and hope, the task of
fulfilling one's duty and the gift of happiness that one cannot gain by one's efforts alone.

APPLICATION

Read the newspapers (ex. Philipppine Daily Inquirer, Brigada, Medianet, etc.) or
online news article for one week and identify at least three (3) moral issues where you can use
the categorical imperative to discern the duty of the persons involved. Write and discuss your
identified moral issues.
____________________________________________________________________
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 Good job! You have finished lesson 4 . Expected that
the concept about yourself and the
natural ability that is hidden in you. Unleash the talent within you!
Kudos! Strive hard! Work in Progress Ahead!

you have no w understand

Lesson 4

Utilitarianism

OBJECTIVES

At the end of this module, you will be able to:

1. articulate the meaning of a consequentialist ethics;
2. analyze the Greatest Happiness Principle;
3. examine the objections to Mill's position and one’s responses to each of
them; and
4. evaluate ethical decisions from the point of view of utilitarianism.

INTRODUCTION

Human decisions always have consequences. Whenever one decides to do

something, one's actions affect other people in ways beyond how one thought it would.
Decisions continually affect the configuration and integrity of various forms of human
relationships because in deciding to do something, for instance, one actually brings
something new into the world that has never existed before. Decisions have particular
consequences that correspond to how one's motives translated into action through a
decision. In making decisions, one either looks to one's motives and to the foreseeable
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consequences of one's actions. Oftentimes, decisions are judged as good if they are
brought about by good and just motives and result in good consequences. If one judges
the morality of an action based on its consequences, what categories can a person use
to judge whether the act did produce good consequences? How can one say that an
action did produce desirable consequences? Does the end justify the means? Does the
goodness of the consequences, for instance, have more bearing than the way, the
method, or modus operandi, with which such consequences are delivered? In this lesson
you will learn the concept of moral action based on its possible consequences and
putting into consideration the welfare of the majority.

ACTIVITY

A “thought” experiment: The Runaway Train

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 ANALYSIS

Please explain your reasoning

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 ABSTRACTION

Among the famous proponents of Utilitarianism is John Stuart Mill

and considered by many to be the most influential. His utilitarian
theory of morality is a development and clarification of the earlier
form of the theory authored by Jeremy Bentham and espoused by
his father, James Mill. James Mill homeschooled John Stuart on the
Benthamite doctrine, which essentially states that it is the greatest
happiness of the greatest number that is the measure of right and
wrong. Happiness in this context is understood as the predominance
of pleasure over pain. John Stuart Mill later on revises this doctrine
by highlighting a distinction between qualities and quantities of pleasures and pains.

Mill's moral theory is considered as consequentialist in that it judges the rightness and
wrongness of actions based on their consequences. As opposed to deontological theories of
morality like Kant's, which emphasize the motivation of duty, and virtue ethics, which
emphasize the character of agents, utilitarianism judges’ actions based on the quality and
quantity of pleasure they are able to extend to as many people as possible. In other words, Mill
holds that happiness (the predominance of pleasure over pain) is the goal of morality. One
deliberates and reflects upon what is right before acting because one takes into account the
potential effects of one's actions on other people's happiness. One therefore sees the importance
of community in making moral choices. Deciding on one's happiness is not a solitary affair but
an act which essentially brings to the fore one's relationship with others.

Bentham's Felicific/Hedonistic Calculus is a method/guide to

balance the pros and cons of a proposed course of action in
relation to the balance of pleasures and pains it potentially
produces. These are some guide questions to measure it.
1.Intensity: How strong is the pleasure?
2.Duration: How long does the pleasure last?
3.Certainty or uncertainty: How likely or unlikely that the
pleasure will occur
4.Propinquity or remoteness: How soon does the pleasure
occur?
5.Fecundity: What is the probability that the action is folio
by sensations of the same kind?
6. Purity: What is the probability that it is not followed by sensations of the opposite kind?
7. Extent: How many people are affected?
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The Greatest Happiness Principle
In Mill's ethics, actions are understood as right with respect to their capacity to promote
happiness and wrong when they tend to promote the opposite of happiness. Happiness, as
defined by Mill, is pleasure and the absence of pain, while unhappiness is pain or the absence
of pleasure. For Mill, the Principle of Utility or the Greatest Happiness Principle is the supreme
measure of morality. Pleasure and the freedom from pain are the only things desirable as ends
and all desirable things are desired either because they are inherently pleasurable or because
they contribute to the prevention of pain.
One of the foremost objections to such a doctrine is that it seems to degrade the nature of the
human person by reducing morality to a pleasure-driven activity, not unlike that of an animal's
life that seeks only to multiply pleasure and avoid pain. Objectors point to the fact that it is a
doctrine suited for the followers of the Ancient Greek philosopher Epicurus [341-270 who
thought that the purpose of philosophy is to attain happiness and tranquility in life. Epicurus
believed that happiness corresponds to ataraxia and aponia, the peace and freedom from fear
and the absence of pain, respectively. However, followers of the Epicurean doctrine respond
that it actually their accusers that present the human person in a degrading light by implying
that human beings are incapable of experiencing any other form of pleasure other than that
comparable to an animal's. Mill adds that there is no Epicurean or any such-related doctrine
which does not assign to the pleasures of the intellect, feelings, and the imagination a higher
value than pleasures that derive from mere physical sensations. In other words, Mill's utilitarian
doctrine makes a concrete distinction between higher and lower forms of pleasure. It does not
advocate a life of reckless abandon and non-stop partying. Some kinds of pleasures are more
desirable and valuable than others. How does one determine which pleasures are higher than
others? Mill explains:
If I were asked what I mean by difference quality in pleasures or what makes one
pleasure more valuable than another, merely as a pleasure, except its being
greater in amount, there is but one possible answer. Of two pleasures, if there be
one to which all or almost all who have experience of both give a decided
preference, irrespective of any feeling of moral obligation to prefer it, that is the
more desirable pleasure. If one of the two is, by those who are competently
acquainted with both, placed so far above the other that they prefer it, even
though knowing it to be attended with a greater amount of discontent, and would
not resign it for any quantity of the other pleasure which their nature is capable
of, we are justified in ascribing to the preferred enjoyment a superiority in quality,
so far outweighing quantity a to render it, in comparison, of small amount."
If Bentham's version of utilitarianism focuses on the potential amount or quantity of happiness
that an action can potentially produce for it to be considered right, Mill’s ethics makes a sharp
and nuanced division of higher and lower forms of pleasure in terms of quality. Happiness
should not be measured solely on the basis of how long or how intense the feeling of pleasure
is for a person or to those affected by an action as Bentham, for instance, had thought. Although
both agree that an action's rightness or wrongness must take into account the number of those
that shall be affected, Mill says that even if more people benefit from the action’s consequences,
but the kind of pleasure they experience is considered lower or baser than the consequences of
all action that pleases a lot less people, but please them in a more human way, then the latter
course of action is deemed more right, in that it promotes the greatest happiness of the greatest
number while considering the fact that some pleasures are more befitting of a human being than

55
others. Mill says that the pleasures of a higher quality are those that employ our distinctively
human faculties, such as the intellect.
However, it should be noted that Mill is not saying that people who have experienced both the
pleasures of sensation and pleasures of the intellect consistently prefer the latter on every
occasion. Mill is not saying that competent judges of pleasures always prefer the higher forms
of pleasure, say, reading a good book over having a night of drinks with friends. He says that
these people would not choose a manner of existence that includes a greater number of lower
pleasures than higher pleasures. While it is reasonable to think that someone of experience of
rational competence would sometimes prefer to go out and party with friends on some nights,
it would go against reason for them to go out every night to party at the expense of experiencing
higher forms of pleasure, albeit of a smaller quantity. In other words, a wise human would not
exchange one’s lot for that of a fool's even if a person were promised the pleasure's befitting of
a fools for lifetime. This is precisely because a competently experienced human recognizes that
the pleasures of wisdom, though fewer in quantity, far outweigh that of a fool. Mill does not
assert that the exercise of distinct human faculties like the intellect has a greater intrinsic value
than the exercise of those that promote the pleasures of sensation. What one’s claims is that the
pleasures derived from uniquely human activities such reading, conversing with others, and
philosophizing have superior value than other forms of activities.
For example, if one is faced with the choice of playing online games all day for a week and
studying school lessons for at least three hours a day for a week, one must ask oneself which
course of action fulfills one's higher faculties more. One should also ask how many people can
benefit from such choice compared to the other, as well as the kind of happiness it can bring
these people. Let us thus examine the case:

Playing online games all day for a week Studying three hours a day for a week
• immediately satisfies one's search for • tedious, yet allows a person to
fun and excitement develop one’s intellect and virtue of
• allows one to hang out with friends perseverance in learning important
• let’s one enjoy oneself while lessons for school
escaping the everyday pressures of • the discipline of focusing on
daily like household chores, etc. relevant tasks related to one's
• essentially satisfies one and one's education con go o long way in
one's future endeavors
gaming friends immediately
• relatively solitary
has the potential to bring
pleasure to one’s family by
showing one's gratitude for
their gift of education

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When one carefully examines the kinds of pleasures at stake the possible consequences of one’s
decision, one realizes that studying, while seemingly ―painful relative to
one's desire for immediate gratification, bears more potential the long run compared to playing
to bring happiness for instance that playing online games. Hence, even if we say a more online
games brings more pleasure to more people in immediate manner, one still has to ask what form
of pleasure it brings them. Are these pleasures long-lasting? What happens after a week of
camaraderie the online gaming shop? Are the bonds created their bonds of true friendship
provisional bonds of usefulness your alliances created and judged based on your ability to play
the game such that if you are a terrible player there any guarantee that people would want to
play with you still?)? Does the pleasure of fulfillment or winning in a game bring you authentic
human is the pleasure transitory and empty at the end of the day?
On the other hand, if one chooses to instead use a shorter amount of time studying, one also
has to ask if the pain of school work is worth the pleasure it potentially creates for oneself and
others. Even if there is no guarantee studying automatically translates into higher grades in
school the activity still worth doing? What life skill does one from persevering through pages
and pages of lessons? Notwithstanding that this choice might bring pleasure to less people (to
just one's parents and oneself, for instance), might it not be said that the quality of pleasure is
significantly higher than the pleasures derived from playing online games all day? Is not the
potential of deepening and expanding one' knowledge and exercising one's intellect worth the
pain of the activity? Would not the possibility of exceling in school and eventually getting a
good job benefit more people in the long run and in more fulfilling ways?
Now, one might say that Mill might conclude that studying is always better than playing.
However, one may argue that one also learns useful skills in play computer games and that the
development of friendships more important than getting a good job after graduating from
school. Mill must not be interpreted hastily. He is not saying that lower pleasures must always
give way to higher forms of pleasure. Mill’s does not envision persons as one-dimensional. One
way of looking at the matter is this. First, one must ask oneself this question before making the
choice: Is there a way to strike a balance between the two activities such that the importance of
experiencing the higher pleasure is not completely compromised by choosing the other option?
Secondly, if one were really just restricted to choose one activity, one must ask oneself which
of the two options one would be truly happy and content in doing exclusively in the context of
being a human person. Third if one were allowed to experience the maximum amount of
pleasure derived from playing online games, one’s be amenable to be consigned to an entire
life of just playing online games than a life of developing one’s intellectual faculties? Fourth,
would a competent judge, who has had considerable experience of the two options, prefer to
have one’s immediate desires fulfilled by lower pleasures than to postpone a person’s
gratification for the purpose of reaping the happiness involved in cultivating one’s higher
faculties?
Mill says that a human being whose capacity for enjoyment is low has a greater chance of
having one’s pleasures satisfied than a person predisposed towards experiencing higher forms
of pleasure. The development of one's capacity for enjoyment (capacity to appreciate the
difference between higher and lower pleasures) is either inherent in a person or more commonly
due to the lack of opportunity to experience the higher pleasure. Mill does not believe that a
person who has had experience of both lower expense and higher pleasures would prefer the
former at the expense of losing the opportunity to enjoy the latter.

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 Mill presents important point in his utilitarian theory of morality. He recognizes a person's
embeddedness in a social, cultural, and historical context that plays a crucial role in his/her
capacity to recognize varying kinds of pleasures. If one is, for instance, born and raised in a
society that ultimately favors the cravings and desires of the flesh over other pleasures, then it
is likely that one will have a preference for these experiences since one does not know any
better. Returning to our earlier example, if one lives in a household which does not nurture and
encourage the discipline of studying and learning, it is but commonsensical to assume that this
person is more susceptible to favor feelings which relate to activities that contain in themselves
the prospect of immediate gratification, for instance, playing online games. The fact that most
people associate happiness with sensual gratification and prefers this over other forms says
something about the culture and values of society itself. A society with systems and institutions
that legitimize and reward a life of excess is likely to produce citizenry that insensitive, if not
blind, to a higher calling for humanity.
One of Mill's most famous quotes runs as follows: "It better to be a human being dissatisfied
than a pig satisfied, better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied. And if the fool or the
pig is of a different opinion, it is because they only know their own side of the question.”
Happiness according to the Greatest Happiness Principle, must be pursued in direct proportion
to the form of the being which desires it. In other words, a pig prefers pleasures befitting of its
nature and would be clueless to the possibility of experiencing other or higher forms precisely
because it is a pig and not a human being. A person, however, has the capacity to realize a
higher form of happiness because one’s nature as a rational being permits a person to do so. A
fool, therefore, is a person who has no idea that being human allows oneself to experience
wisdom and so a person relegates one’s existence as comparable to that of pig’s as it were. In
other words, Mill is saying that the forms of pleasures that are considered higher, like the
pleasure of gaining wisdom, because they are more difficult to attain and are to a certain extent
more difficult to access, are oftentimes looked over in favor of pleasures that are easier to access
and immediately gratifying. Ultimately, one must defer to the verdict of competent judges who
have experienced a wide spectrum of pleasures in order to secure a guide for moral judgment.
Mill’s says, "On a question which is the best worth having of two pleasures or which of two
modes of existence is the most grateful to the feelings, apart from its moral attributes and from
its consequences, the judgment of those who are qualified by knowledge of both, or if they
differ, that of the majority among them, must be admitted as final.”
One may, therefore, say that in matters of diet, for instance, one ought to seek the opinion
ofperson who has experience both sickness and health to find out whether eating fatty, high-
cholesterol foods is preferable over vegetables and fruits. One who has not known due to a bad
diet cannot have a wise appreciation important one's health is over the satisfaction of one's this
person, therefore, tells one that experience has in the importance of eating a balanced diet, one
or less be certain that a person knows what one’s is about, and that oneself opinion matters.
To restate, the Greatest Happiness Principle, as the end of action, sponsors the view that
morality fostering an existence that is exempt from pain as possible and one that is capable of
enjoying pleasures of a human person in terms of both quantity and which benefits not just
oneself but others as well. If one is in a quandary regarding which option offers of the greatest
happiness for the greatest, one must, aside from one one's use of reason, consult the wisdom
that have experienced a broad range of pleasures considered capable of assessing the value of
every alternative.

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Replies to the Objections
To the objection that happiness is unattainable
There are some who object to Mill's proposition by saying that happiness is unattainable. Many
things such as poverty, and failure thwart one's attempt at being happy. Mill responds by saying
that if his objectors define happiness as a continuity of highly pleasurable excitement, then it is
true that such a life is indeed impossible. Pleasures often only last for a certain period. The
pleasure derived from eating only lasts until one experience hunger once more, while the
pleasure derived from being with one's friends often only lasts for as long as one is in good
terms with them. However, Mill that the life of happiness defined in his theory is not life of
rapture but an existence made up of a few, transitory pains different pleasures with a decided
predominance of pleasure over pain. It is a kind of happiness which does not expect from life
more than what it can realistically provide. He adds that history has shown us that a satisfied
and happy life is mainly composed of a balance between tranquility and excitement. Those who
find no happiness in such a state, he says, are generally those who care for no one but
themselves. On one hand. those with no friends soon see that their selfish excitements are
essentially meaningless in the face of death. On the other hand, those who have cultivated
friendships and have left a lasting legacy of fellow feeling for mankind retain their happiness
in any circumstance whether it be in lively moments or on the eve of death. Another reason why
some experience difficulties in being happy is lack of mental cultivation. A person that has
developed and harnessed one's mind to find pleasure in the realms of nature, poetry, art and
science continually finds sources of joy in his/her life, no matter the circumstance. Happiness
is therefore, attainable if understands it realistically and lives one's life in solidarity with others
and cultivates one's deeper capacity to enjoy that which endures in the transitory.

To the objection that Utilitarian morality is incompatible with self-sacrifice

Another objection to Mill's theory is that it does not recognize the value of self-sacrifice. Mill
answers this objection by saying that utilitarianism does recognize the goodness of self-sacrifice
which places the welfare of others one's own but only to the extent that it is done for the sake
of promoting the greatest happiness of the greatest number, and for no other reason is it
acceptable other than this. If self-sacrifice is merely done for its own sake, then utilitarianism
sees it as waste. The kind of sacrifice Mills finds reasonable is the kind which produces that
benefit more people other than oneself. He reiterates that utilitarianism not only promotes the
happiness of the agent but of all concerned who potentially experience of the agent's act. A
person must be as possible in weighing one’s happiness against that of others. He ascribes to
Jesus Christ's teaching to love one’s neighbor as oneself, expressing how utilitarianism values
the other person as much as oneself. In an ideal setting, the interest of an individual is achieved
in harmony with the good of society. Utilitarianism upholds the belief that truly moral person
always tries to incorporate the good of others decision one’s makes. Thus, in the case of self-
sacrifice, it is morally acceptable so long as it is done for good of the sake of the greatest
number.

To the objection that social concern is a rare motive for action

The last objection Mill deals with in his treatise is the relating to the question whether people
actually have society mind whenever they choose a course of action. For Mill, distinction must
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be made between the motives and the sequences of one's actions with respect to which the basis
for judging an act to be moral or not. From his perspective, it really is too much to expect that
people always act from the motive of their duty towards others. Most actions are not done for
this reason. One must distinguish between the rule of action and the motive. If one saves fellow
human person from being tricked by conman for the sake of gaining favors from the act and not
simply because is motivated by duty to look after one's neighbor, the morality of the act is not
diminished in the least. In other words, from the utilitarian perspective, the motive has nothing
to do with the morality of an action. Of course, it is ideal to always have the good in mind in
every decision, but far as morality is concerned, the act itself is moral so long as it promotes
the good of the greatest number. The motive says something about the kind of person doing the
act, but it does not say anything about the morality of the action one decides to undertake. In
addition, Mill says that a great number of actions are meant to benefit individuals rather than
the greater majority. Given the fact that not everyone is in a position to have one's actions
directly affect the happiness of the whole in terms of public utility, Mill asserts that one needs
only attend to the good of the few who shall potentially reap the benefits of one's actions. In
short, one cannot fault someone for having a small sphere of influence for this does not curtail
her capacity to still put the welfare of others (no matter how few) over his/hers.

The Ultimate Sanction

Although external sanctions like those that emanate from social and supernatural sources
enforce the utilitarian principle, they do not compel one to follow it. By themselves they cannot
bind persons fully to any moral principle because they are only truly bound to a principle if they
feel in themselves that they have to abide by it. Ultimately, according to Mill, it is “human’s
―feeling for humanity” that constitutes the ultimate sanction of the principle of utility. This is
the internal sanction of the principle of utility.
One of the external sanctions that provide the impetus for moral conduct is one's fear of
displeasing God (if one believes in a God). A believer's moral compass is oftentimes determined
by a person desire to please one’s creator, for a person feels that one’s owes Him this much,
seeing as He is considered to be the source of everything that exists. If one trusts in the goodness
of God, then those who think that a good act is that which promotes the greatest happiness of
the greatest number must also believe that this is what God approves. The other external
sanction is the fear of disapproval from other people. Mill says that such a fear is allayed when
one understands that one's actions coincide with the desire of others, so long as one estimates
that one's action contributes to the general happiness. If one does what is right because one fears
the she will be punished by society in whatever way, be it legal (fined, imprisoned) or extra-
legal (social ostracization, marginalization), Mill finds that such a motive is compatible with
the doctrine of utility for it essentially aims for the happiness of the greatest number. Such a
motive takes into account the opinions of others with respect to what is advantageous or
disadvantageous for them before one act and may, therefore, be seen as coherent with the
principle of utility.
Mill then proceeds to explain that although external sanctions do promote the welfare of the
whole, it is still the internal sanction of conscience that is considered as the ultimate sanction
of morality. This is the feeling associated with one's violation of duty towards Others when one
selfishly looks after one's happiness exclusively. Conscience is the internalization of the
external sanctions of morality that feels remorse each time one acts without considering first
the effect or consequences of one's actions in other people's lives. This feeling of fellowship
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with other people is what ultimately drives one to persevere to be moral. As a social being, the
human person has the ability to gauge the morality of one’s action in the context of preserving
the harmony between one’s pleasures and the pleasures of others. In the end, one can only sleep
well at night when a person has a clear conscience, that is, when one is certain that a person did
everything to promote not just one’s own happiness, but that of everyone’s.

Conclusion
Utilitarianism espouses the Greatest Happiness Principle, which states that actions are right
when they promote the happiness of the greatest number and wrong if they cause the opposite.
The principle of utility judges the morality of actions based on consequences. If an action leads
to the happiness of more persons, then that action is considered moral. However, Mill makes
an important distinction between the quantity and quality of happiness or pleasure. He holds
that utilitarianism is not only interested in promoting the happiness of the greatest number of
persons, but it also takes account the kind or quality of happiness an action is likely to produce.
In other words, if one aims to do the right thing, one also has to take into account what kind of
happiness one's action will bring into the lives of others. Pleasures of the mind are considered
higher than the pleasures of the flesh. With respect to matters of deliberation on what forms of
pleasure are to be regarded as higher than others, Mill points to the opinions of competent judges
who have both knowledge and experience wide spectrum of pleasures which make them
capable of truly appreciating the differences and varying degrees and qualities of pleasures. The
aim of utilitarianism, therefore, is to promote a moral way of life that considers the welfare of
the community and not just one's own such that Mill declares that it is the internal sanction of
conscience which serves as the ultimate sanction of the principle of utility. To think of the
consequences of one's actions (both quantitatively and qualitatively) in the context of the
community is to be moral. To contribute to the pleasure of others and to decrease the measure
of pain that afflicts them is one's realization of a truly moral life.

APPLICATION

A. Imagine that the Philippine National Police Agency gets wind of a plot to set off a dirty
bomb in a major city of Manila. Police officers capture a suspect who, they believe, has
information about where the bomb is planted. Is it permissible for them to torture the
suspect into revealing the bomb’s whereabouts? Can the dignity of one individual be
violated in order to save many others? Justify your answer.

B. Terrorists are holding you and 70 other people as hostages inside a building. The only
exit has been blocked and three of the hostages have been strapped to the door, attached
to explosives. The terrorist leader offers you a choice.

Either

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(i) You can activate a detonator that will blow up the exit, killing the three hostages
strapped to it but allowing the others to escape, or
(ii) you can decline and the terrorists will kill everyone
You believe that the terrorist leader is sincere. What should you do?
C. WORK BY PAIR. Together with your partner, come up with a situation (either real
or imagined) in which utilitarianism has an implication that goes against commonsense
morality. You may not use any of the situations already discussed, although you may
come up with a situation that is similar. The situation must involve a person who has
to make a choice between two main alternatives, each of which has very different
consequences. After coming up with your example, do the following:
1. Describe the situation in writing and state the two alternatives that must be
chosen between. State which alternative utilitarianism seems to favor and why.

2. State the commonsense moral principle that utilitarianism appears to conflict

with. Write a response on behalf of utilitarianism, using the Denial strategy
(Here you are trying to convince someone that utilitarianism actually agrees
with commonsense morality, despite appearances to the contrary).

3. Write another response on behalf of utilitarianism using the ―biting the bullet”
strategy. (Here you are trying to convince someone that utilitarianism really
does give us the right answer, and that commonsense morality is wrong on this
point).

Awesome! Good job! You have finished lesson 4.

Expected that you have now learn and understand the concepts and
principles of defining what is good act and how live a moral life.

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 Module Assessment

Part I. Essay
A. How do you understand the meaning of character? How is character relevant in
making moral choices?
_______________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________________
_____________________________
B. Can you think of a real-life example of a virtuous person? Why do you consider
a person to be so?
_______________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________________
_____________________________
C. Why is it possible to hold the natural law as a framework for living a good life
even if one does not believe in a god?
_______________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________________
______________________________
D. Why is the love of God considered as the perfection of the ethical life?
_______________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________________
______________________________
Part II. Poster Making
A. Create a poster, chart or some other type of graphic organizer that compares and
contrast deontological ethics and utilitarianism.
Part III. Ethical Analysis
Baby Theresa was born anencephalic with cerebrum and cerebellum as well as
the top of her skull missing; she had the brain stem. In the United States, most cases of
anencephaly are detected during pregnancy and aborted. Of those not aborted, half are
still born. About 350 each year are born alive, and they usually die within a few weeks.
Because Theresa had no brain, she was not able to feel any pain or have any other
mental states.
Knowing that their baby will die soon anyway and that she could never be
conscious, her parents made a request to use her organs to help other children. Because
Florida law prohibits harvesting organ before the donor has died, Theresa's organs were

63
not taken. "By the time Baby Theresa died, nine days later, it was too late --her organs
had deteriorated too much to be harvested and transplanted".
A. What is the ethical problem in the case of Baby Theresa?
B. Would it be ethically wrong to kill Baby Theresa in order to save the
lives of other children? Defend and explain your answer using the concept of
Deontology and Utilitarianism.

Module Summary

You have completed the first module of Ethics covering Introduction to Ethics. Key
points covered in the module include:

• Ethics is matter of living well through the habitual practice of virtue which
essentially translates into having a virtuous or excellent character.
• Happiness, being the chief good of the human person, is attainable through the
proper exercise of reason, both morally and intellectually is an activity of the
soul that purposively attempts to choose the mean between two extremes in the
realm of morality.
• Aristotle teaches us that character is the most essential component of ethics. A
virtuous character is the result of the proper combination of practical wisdom
(phronésis) and habituation (ethos) in the pursuit of the mean (mesotes). Being
ethical is all about being excellent in being human, which is, being excellent in
fulfilling one's essence as a rational being that has cultivated an excellent
character and is, therefore, capable of making the most prudent decisions in all
circumstances.
• Thomas Aquinas showed us that the universe was determined by an order of
love that ought to define the sense of the good of human beings. Whether one
believes in the transcendent, loving god or not, he showed how people could
intuit an order to things that was inherent to all beings that existed. Whether one
was a believer or not, one could see that there is this order which is the ground
of people's wholeness and self-realization.
• Deontology is an ethical study of duties, obligations, and rights, with an
approach focusing on the rightness or wrongness of actions themselves and not
on the goodness or badness of the consequences of those actions.
• Kant's ethics provided for a ground for legislating norms of rational behavior
for autonomous persons. His ethical system emerged at a time when Western
civilization sought for a foundation for moral behavior that did not depend on
faith or tradition.
64
• Kant provided that and in effect gave the justification and possibility for reason
being the sole ground for determining the good.
• Utilitarianism espouses the Greatest Happiness Principle, which states that
actions are right when they promote the happiness of the greatest number and
wrong if they cause the opposite.
• Pleasures of the mind are considered higher than the pleasures of the flesh. With
respect to matters of deliberation on what forms of pleasure are to be regarded
as higher than others.
• The aim of utilitarianism is to promote a moral way of life that considers the
welfare of the community and not just one's own such that Mill declares that it
is the internal sanction of conscience which serves as the ultimate sanction of
the principle of util

65
 References

Lesson 1
Aristotle. Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics. Trans. Robert C. Bartlett and Susan D. Collins.
Chicago: Chicago University Press, 2011.

Lesson 2
Aquinas, Tomas. Summa theologiae: Critical essays edited by Brian Davies, Oxford: Row
ran & Littlefield, 2006.
de Finance, Joseph. An Ethical Inquiry. Roma: Eitrice Pontifica Universita Gregoriana,
1991.
Keenan, James. Goodness and Rightness in Thomas Aquinas. Washington DC:
Georgetown University Press, 1992.
Pinckaers, Services. Sources of Christian Ethics. Washington DC: Catholic University of
America Press, 1995.

Lessson 3
Kant, Immanuel. Kant's Critique of Practical Reason and Other Works on the Theory of
Ethics, Translated by Thomas Kingsmill Whitefish, NY: Kessinger, 2007.
Loude, Robert. Kant's Impure Ethics. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000.
Reyes, Ramon. Ground and Norm of Morality. Manila: Ateneo Press, 1989.
Savater, Fernando. Apóstatas Razonables. Barcelona: Mandragora, 2007.
Savater, Fernando. Etica per un Fidelio. Roma: Laterza, 2007.

Lesson 4
Mill, John Stuart. "Utilitarianism," In Utilitarianism and Other Essays. New York: Oxford
Publishing, 1998.

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 Module 3

Eastern Philosophies

and Principles

Hello! Welcome to module 3 of this course. So far you have learned moral
theories that are Western in their origin. In this module, you will be introduced to how
East envisions a moral way of life. Gandhi’s dictum of non-violence, Buddha’s path to
enlightenment, and Confucian ethics are all discussed in the hope of expanding and
deepening your historical appreciation of moral questions.

This Module contain the following lessons:

Lesson 1 Asian Ethical Tradition
Lesson 2 Discourse Ethics

The major learning outcomes of this module are to:

• apply various ethical concepts of Eastern in defining ethical and moral behavior;
• distinguish various Eastern philosophers such as Confucius and Buddha;
• define key vocabulary terms such as concepts of karma, dharma, Brahma, Tao, yin,
yang, nirvana, Ren, and Li; and

67
• demonstrate an understanding of the similarities and differences between Western
philosophy and Eastern philosophy through group works and small group
discussion.

Lesson 1

Asian Ethical Tradition

OBJECTIVES

At the end of this lesson, you will be able to:

1. articulate the basis for ethical behavior for Buddhists;

2. analyze how the concept of the oneness of all things in the Brahma serves as
a basis for moral behavior, and
3. examine how Confucianism founds ideal human behavior on the ideas of Ren
and Li.

INTRODUCTION

The students of this course may not realize it but many people in the Philippines are
deeply influenced by or have great commonalities in the ethical way of thinking of
Asian traditions. For instance, people believe that if they do bad things, they could be
victims of misfortune because of Karma. Others believe that one ought to live in a way
that honors their ancestors. Most people believe that the world is ordered by Heaven
and that if one wishes to have a good life, one must understand that order and live one's
life according to it. These are all beliefs that echo or are derived from Indian and
Chinese traditions. It would be profitable to study these traditions because they are
closer to Asian moral sensibilities and have shaped them.
Without further ado let’s get started!

Quotes Interpretation
ACTIVITY
68

Read and interpret the following quotes from famous philosopher and try to
relate it to your personal experienced.

1. ― Everything has beauty, but not everyone sees it.

2. ―What the superior human seeks is in oneself; what the small
human seeks is in others.
3. ―It does not matter how slowly you go so long you do not stop.

ANALYSIS

Give your interpretation and explanation of the quotes from famous philosophers.
Write your answer in the space provided.

_________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________
________________________

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 ABSTRACTION

These Asian traditions share some general characteristics. Manuel B. Dy

identifies six common themes which can be drawn from the great Asian spiritual
and intellectual traditions. Firstly, one can immediately notice that religious
thought is intertwined with philosophical and ethical thinking. There is no real
separation of beliefs about the transcendent and the cosmos, including the
traditional mythical beliefs. Beliefs about Dharma and Karma, the Dao and the
gods, frame the critical understanding of the great Asian Philosophical traditions
regarding the good and the good life. At heart, there is a quest to define what it
means to live a good human life and their reflections could not be extricated from
their greater belief about how the gods or the greater order of Heaven govern the
universe and keep order, or their intuition that there is a transcendent order that
rules human flourishing but is not and cannot be defined by the intellect. Also, at
the heart of this union of faith and critical thinking about the good is a quest for
emancipation Do says that at the heart of all Asian philosophical thought quest
for emancipation: "be it from moral degradation as in the case of Confucianism,
from misery as it is in and Buddhism, and from finitude as in the case of
Hinduism."

Dy then notes that a second theme which binds these intellectual traditions is
"love and compassion." Since every system seeks to realize human emancipation
and fullness, a human' fullness that is rooted in the transcendence of suffering,
finitude, disorder, strife, and maybe even death, it becomes important that people
live with love and compassion. Compassion and love, they intuit, are paths to
tranquility, peace, and being whole. Connected with this is the third theme which
is the connectedness of personal cultivation and social responsibility. Realizing
one's goodness is sometimes tied to fulfilling one's duty to one's family, one's
clan, and one's government.

Enlightenment is the fourth theme. Each of the great Asian traditions, more or
less, outlines a path to enlightenment. This means an awakening to the true order
of the universe which leads to an awakening to the order to which human beings
align their existence. Thus, these traditions give human beings a path to
awareness of the true order of all things, unclouded by human desire and folly,
in order to become what they ought to be.

A final characteristic is that these great teachings offer paths of "harmony with
oneself, with others, with nature- with a Transcendent." Because the fullness of
human becoming is central to all these traditions, they all have teachings related
to the harmony of self with all being's, especially the transcendent. For these
traditions, the existing transcendent order is the very basis of all forms of
existence. Human suffering and disquiet are rooted in the person's inability or
inadequate participation in the order of things. Thus, various Indian schools of
thought speak of the need for human beings to be enlightened in the ways of the
one order of the universe and align one's way of being to that order.
The Vedas and Upanishads

Indian philosophy is not discussed extensively in this section. Buddhism is the

focus of this discussion but only because it is the aspect of Indian thought most
relevant and most useful to the local students. However, the discussion begins with
some aspects of ancient Indian philosophy that give the reader the foundational
thought of this tradition.

The Vedas are some of the oldest philosophical writings in the world. These
series of hymns to the most ancient gods are a poetic articulation of the structure
and meaning of the universe. Here, there is a family of gods for whom the hymns
are composed. The hymns themselves are considered direct revelations that speak
of the most sacred knowledge about the world, its creation, and the principles of
reality. And the most basic insight of these writings is that Rita is the foundational
principle of all things. Rita is the right order of the universe. Human beings
experience this order through the presence of the gods to whom they dedicate the
performance a manifestation of the embodied in rituals. Each God is a manifestation
of a force or principle of the universe and the singing of their hymns leads to the
realization of a good life aligned to the order of the cosmos and the forces that keep
it like the Rita. More popularly, this means the performance of rituals according to
how priests define perfection. And unfortunately, be a handbook of prescribed most
people take the Vedas to rituals. The focus is on the external rituals to realize good
fortune, which leads to a rethinking of the revelations of the Vedas collected in the
Upanishads.

The writers of the Upanishads seek to understand the fullness of human

becoming by realizing the deepest insight about the true nature of the universe. They
seek to articulate why and how human beings could come to fullness through
enlightenment about the transcendent, unchanging reality of being. The expression
of the path to enlightenment is through poetic deliberations on the nature of being
and the human realization of self in this universe.

Beyond rituals, the authors of the Upanishads share a path of spiritual

enlightenment. The first idea is Samara or reincarnation. All human beings are born
repeatedly in different forms of life. It is not just a process of repetition but one of
purification. In each incarnation, a person has a chance to live a more enlightened
life. In the teaching of Karma or actions and their consequences, the actions of
persons have just consequences. The way persons live their lives redounds on what
happens to them, and more importantly, it determines their reincarnation.
Reincarnation is not a mere repetitive process, where one is arbitrarily reborn
without reason. The process is one of enlightenment and liberation. One seeks to go
beyond the Karmic cycle of rebirth and, in a sense, entrapment in the life of the
finite body. The Upanishads teach that by living a life of meditation and
purification, one achieves a state of spiritual enlightenment that will allow us to live
in genuine accord with the order of the good. If one lives well, Karma will lead one
to a better life. Thus, one must live well according to one's Darma, which is the duty
that one has based on one's station or station in life. There are duties given one's cast
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 or status in the social order, and if one fulfills all one's given duties, one can escape
the Karmic cycle which is the state of Moksha or liberation

To achieve Moksha, one must come to the insight that all things are one in the
Brahman. All things that exist are from the Brahman, and ultimately all things return
to the Brahman. That simple realization leads to Moksha or the state of
enlightenment that liberates persons from the cycle of birth and rebirth to a state of
stillness and a rootedness in the eternal. This is because the direct insight into this
truth allows one to lose one's egotism and sense of the importance of the individual
self. The fullness of human existence is to find one's oneness which is one's eternity
with the Brahman. The realization that "all is Brahman" correlates to the greater
insight that "Brahman is Atman" and "Atman is Brahman." Atman is the self that
underlies all being. It is the eternal self which is all ourselves. And so all things are
one being in Brahman and they are all oneself in Atman." To achieve Moksha is to
come to the deepest awareness of this truth and to realize it in one's way of being.
This insight can be achieved if one purifies oneself of material needs and desires
and meditates on the truths revealed through the Vedas and Upanishads. One needs
direct access to this truth through insight, thus the need for purification and
meditation. All this exercise aims to experience "the absolute within oneself." And
with that, one finds the eternal and still center of existence that is finite and comes
to an end.

Here we can see how the religious/metaphysical/rnythical/ can be the foundation

mystical principles of Indian philosophy for an ethics. If we ask the question ―How
does a good person live her life?", then the answer is to live in a way that leads to
the insight that all things are Brahman, and Brahman and Atman are one. This means
good human life is one of purification. One must act in a way that does not detract
from insight and enlightenment. Also, one must be careful of one's actions so it does
not incur negative Karma which keeps one imprisoned in the cycle of rebirth. Indian
philosophies and religions seek to articulate how to live in such a way that one
fulfills these basic insights. Buddhism is one development of this worldview.

Buddhism

Buddhism was born from the enlightenment of

Gautama Buddha who lived between the 6th and 4th BCE.
A sheltered prince, Buddha sought the meaning of existence
when he realized that human life is suffering. The Buddha’s
lifelong search led him to extreme asceticism. However, he
discovered that enlightenment and salvation could be
achieved in the ordinary human life if people are enlightened about the nature of
suffering. People who seek to arrive at a higher level of enlightenment, where one can
see "beyond birth and 'death," need to realize four truths called Chatvari-arya-satyani.
The first truth is that life is suffering or dukkha. In the cycle of death, life, and
rebirth, there is constant suffering." The second truth is that action or karma is the cause
of this suffering, particularly "nonvirtuous action, and the negative mental states that
motivate such actions." These afflictions of the mind such as desire, hatred, and
ignorance are which are rooted in the wrong 'valuation of self or Atman. The extreme
valuing of the self, the desire to preserve the I is the cause of suffering. People only
72
need to awaken to the truth that there is no self to preserve. And a long as people keep
believing that it is the human being's task to cultivate the self, people will be trapped in
egotism and selfishness.
The third truth is that there is an end to suffering and the path beyond suffering is
to transcend this illusion and enter the state of nirvana. Nirvana is the dissolution of
suffering which is the fruit of the surrender of the ego. In this way, they surrender hatred
and desire because hatred and desire are the fruits of the fact that there is no individual
self.
Clearly, the path to Nirvana offers foundation for living good life and acting
according to the good. It requires disciplined form of life in order to realize human
fullness. This is explained in the fourth truth-how human beings ought to live life free
from suffering by following the Eightfold Path or Astangika-marga. Again, Donald
Lopez provides concise description of this path:

In brief, the eight elements of the path are:

1) correct view, an accurate understanding of the nature of things, specifically the
Four Noble Truths;
2) correct intention, avoiding thoughts of attachment, hatred, and harmful intent;
3) correct speech, refraining from verbal misdeeds such as lying, divisive speech,
harsh speech, and senseless speech;
4) correct action, refraining from physical misdeeds such as killing, stealing, and
sexual misconduct;
5) correct livelihood, avoiding trades that directly or indirectly harm others, such
as selling slaves, weapons, animals for slaughter, intoxicants, or poisons;
6) correct effort, abandoning negative states of mind that have already arisen,
preventing negative states that have yet to arise, and sustaining positive states
that have already arisen;
7) correct mindfulness, awareness of body, feelings, thought, and phenomena (the
constituents of the existing world); and
8) correct concentration, single- mindedness."

Clearly, Buddhism provides a way to understand what good human being ought to
do to come to the fullness of human life. The Eightfold Path provides guideposts to
acting in this world. If one seeks to act mindfully, these signposts are exactly a way to
discern if one's actions are creative anti non-destructive to others. In fact, they provide
a framework for living in a way that avoids the destructive or evil ways of human
beings.
With these examples of Indian thought, we can see that their ethical tradition is not
only a quest to articulate good action but a way to realize genuinely human existence
leading to the fullness of transcendence.

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Chinese Philosophy and Confucian Ethics

Confucianism is a system of thought attributed to the

teacher Kongqui known in the West as Confucius. He
was an aspiring civil servant who lived his life as a
teacher of governance ethics, and ritual, and was able to
gather a following around him. His main preoccupation
the possibility of building a harmonious ordered society.
He took his inspiration for building a just kingdom from
the ancient sage rulers, King Wen and King Wu and
their virtuous regent the Duke of Zhou. He believed that if people were able to
internalize or take as their own the ways of these virtuous people, then the state would
be ordered because it would reflect the order of Heaven. This is what he taught
people: the way to bear the order of heaven in one's conduct.
At some point, his followers compiled a book of conversations known in the West
as the Analects, the main source of Confucian teaching. They are a series of
conversations, anecdotes, and responses of the teacher to his students' queries that are
not arranged in any particular order. Later disciples worked on his thought and
systematized and deepened it. If one desires to understand the foundations of this
thought, there are three other books that stand as a source for this: The Book of Mencius,
the Doctrine of the Mean, and The Great Learning

There is one basic aspiration for any Confucian, that is, to be a person who has the
virtue of 'ren, to be a person who has internalized the way of Heaven. Heaven here does
not indicate the abode of God. It is the source of order and balance, the way of life and
nature, the way of justice and proper relationships. It is the order that must govern one's
way of being for people to find their peace. A person of ren knows how to act properly
or with propriety in all situations giving all situations and things their due, but it is also
about being human and the relationships between persons. Manuel B. Dy explains that
"Ren is made up of two characters, ren, meaning human being, and erh, meaning two,
indicating thus that ren is the virtue that governs interpersonal relationships. Ren is
translated as 'benevolence,' 'kindness, 'human-heartedness,' 'humanity,' and when
Confucius was asked for its meaning, he said, 'Ren is to love human beings"
In order to realize the ethical nobility or human exemplarity which makes one
person who bears the virtue of ren, it is necessary to live according to the way of
Heaven. And the path for the master was that of ritual or Confucius held the ancient
ways sacred because for him, these bore the wisdom of ancestors who still understood
the ways of heaven. These ancestors governed the state and acted in their personal life
in ways attuned to the order of Heaven or Dao. The way to attunement is to focus on
traditional ways because "filial piety, a respect for and dedication to the performance
of traditional ritual forms of conduct, and the ability to judge what is the right thing to
do in the given situation. were codified in rituals and customs. For Kongqui, the person
aspiring to nobility must master and follow these codes of conduct because as they are
mastered, one's nature becomes one with the Dao. Li or custom and ritual are not only
empty actions that are handed down from the ancestors but the embodiment of the Dao
realized in daily life so that a person who follows Li can become one with the Dao. A
person must be able to live according to the way which is the very order of the universe
74
which, among other things, is the measure of what is appropriate, of what is just, and
the balance which is the basis of harmony. A person must cultivate oneself so that one
is upright and lives according to the true order of all things.
For instance, much store is placed by the Confucians on filial piety. This means
being able to support one's parents and take care of them. Keep close to them and
support them. Do not despoil their name and make sure that one's actions do not bring
shame to their reputation. This also means that One should make sure that when they
die, one must carry out properly the rituals that honor them in the prescribed ways.
Many of these rituals were important to Kongqui because they preserved harmony,
order, right relations, and were manifestations of respect. More than that, they reflected
the wisdom of the noble rulers regarding the relationship with one's parents in a way
that accords with the Dao.
The perfection of the realization of the Li fully attunes oneself to the Dao to the
point that one no longer needs to think about it. One should aim at realizing the rituals
with, what the master calls "harmonious ease" (1.12). In the Analects, he says:
The Master said, age fifteen I set my heart upon learning; at thirty I took
my stand; at forty I became free of doubts; at fifty I understood the
Heavenly Mandate; at sixty my ear was attuned; and at seventy I could
follow heart's desire without overstepping the bound of propriety."

In this quote, one can see the whole objective of Confucian emphasis on Li. To seek
the harmonious realization of custom and ritual leads one to live attuned to the ways of
Heaven. As one becomes attuned to the ways revealed by heaven to virtuous men, one
becomes attuned to the workings of the Dao. As one becomes more attuned to the
workings of the Dao, one no longer needs to think about the Dao or make an effort at
living the Dao because attunement means that one's self is open to and responsive to
the ways of Heaven. Thus, Kongqui speaks of his own development in the way. His
quest for truth is his deepening knowledge and practice of Li. Then it becomes a stand,
then it becomes intimate knowledge, which eventually leads to perfect attunement such
that his very heart, his will, becomes one with Heaven. His heart will never desire to
act in a way that oversteps Heaven's order because it is completely one with it.
To cultivate a greater realization of Ren, a state needs good education and moral
leadership. Good education for Kongqui meant an education of the heart and virtues.
This one could clearly receive from an education in the ancient rituals and customs that
leads to attunement with the Dao. Moral leadership in a society is particularly important
because people need exemplars to live a life according to the way. The sage realizes
that in a corrupt society where the Dao is not practiced, there will be disorder or people
will only comply with the orders of the rulers because of fear. However, if the rulers
practice virtue and are people who have Ren, then the people would be drawn to live
according to the Dao because their social order is founded on it. Also, exemplars show
the people how to live according to the Dao which in turn inspires them to be virtuous.
As mentioned, there are other philosophies that respond to Confucianism, like
Daoism. Daoism puts more emphasis on the opening to the Dao that makes itself
present in the natural order rather than in the ways of the state, the family, and rulers. It
is a mystical philosophy that is too deep and profound to explain in this short space.
However, it is worth noting that although it has a different path, its main concern is for
the human being to reach human fullness by living in attunement with the Dao. Their
path is one of meditation that leads one to full attunement with the Dao such that one
could act in a way that is Wu is to act without effort, or in a way that is so attuned to

75
the Dao that one acts perfectly with its flow. No human action becomes contrary to the
way of Heaven once one is so attuned to the very order of the nameless and unknowable
Dao. But first, one must accept that the Dao transcends all-knowing and articulation,
and with that realization somehow finds a way to gain insight into that ground of all
things.
Here we see the heart of these ancient Chinese ethical systems. They all seek perfect
attunement to the Dao in order to realize genuine humanity. Confucians spell out a
system of rituals and customs so that there is a frame that can guide people to that
profound attunement. Daoists offer a more complex path of mysticism that is worth
studying in depth because of its poetry and profundity. But to understand their insight
requires a lifetime of meditation and to understand the insights of Kongqui requires
some immersion into Li

Conclusion

This section only seeks to give the student sense of what the main trends of Asian
ethical thought are. Buddhism and Confucianism are only two of the major traditions
from this continent and its long history of philosophizing. These two are the most
relevant to the student given their influence among the Filipino people.
They are also worth exploring in this chapter because they give a general insight
into the ethos of the great Asian traditions. And this is what is most notable. When
Asian thinkers philosophize about doing the good, they do not think about rules or
guidelines for deciding what is a good action or what makes a norm universal. They are
not so keen about articulating rules and norms for autonomous persons to decide what
is an acceptable act for a rational, free, and autonomous person. Their main concern is
how to live a good life and be good person by gaining an insight into the transcendent
and eternal order of the universe, and from that insight how to attune one's life to that
order. Whether it is the Dao or the Brahma and Atman, one needs a deep intuition of
the good and from that intuition live in attunement.
Asian ethical systems are less about becoming an autonomous, rational legislator of
one's own laws. Rather, they are a quest to articulate human connectedness and oneness
to the deepest order of reality. Thus, much of their codes of behavior are concerned
more with the process of coming to attunement with the source of order and harmony.
And the good person, therefore, is a person in communion with one’s fellow humans,
with fellow beings, and with the ground of reality itself. Once the communion is
attained, one begins to act as a good person, a person whose self-realization is
immediately harmonious and non-destructive.

76
 APPLICATION

A. Read the Buddha's first sermon where he reveals the Four Noble Truths. Write a
paper on how these Four Noble Truths affect one's decision on behavior ethically.

Awesome! Good job! You have finished lesson 1.

Expected that you have now learn and understand the Eastern
Philosophies and Principles.

77
 Lesson 2

Discourse Ethics

OBJECTIVES

At the end of this lesson, you will be able to:

1. articulate. why discourse ethics was a necessary development;
2. explain the principles of (U) and (I) as the foundations of discourse ethics;
and
3. discuss the principles of fair and just discourse and how these principles lead
to a shared we-perspective.

INTRODUCTION

Most people assume that they know what is right and wrong. People can
easily judge right and wrong based on their common sense. For instance, it is almost
an instinct to know what is proper and improper dressing for all human being. No
one has to think too deeply about that. No one also has to think too deeply about
their judgment about stealing, killing, and the beating of human being and children.
People have an instinctive and, most of the time, unshakable moral judgment about
these things. In this lesson you will learn a perspective on morality based on
communicative and multiverse rationalities

78
 ACTIVITY

Cite a scenario or real-life situation where you have to make a crucial decision,
involving in the decision-making process maybe your family, friends, workmates
or classmates.

ANALYSIS

1. How you deal with those people you work with in the decision making
process?

________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________
_______________________

2. Were you able to come up the best solution to address and solve the issue? How did
you do it?
________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________
_______________________

3. What are the difficulties you have encountered (individually and as a group)?
________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________
_______________________

ABSTRACTION

Often, people do not think about moral issues as problematic because they have
ethical framework from which to interpret actions. This something they do not
usually construct with awareness but accept from their cultures and societies. Their
understanding about the relationship between with their partners, the duties of each
79
to the other, the roles they play, and the relationships of power and authority they
have (including what they can and ought to do to and for each other) are accepted
from their cultures. They have accepted this way of seeing good and evil from their
infancy from the way people act, talk, and think about things. However, not
everyone looks at things in the same way. One has way of understanding reality
depending on one's social status, ethnicity, generation, historical situation, and
gender. Thus, there are many ways of understanding and articulating the good. This
does not mean, however, that there is no faithful or unfaithful interpretation of the
good. Neither is the good necessarily relative, depending on one's perspective and
needs. But people's perspectives on the good are particular. And human beings feel
that some conceptions of the good are more fruitful and more creative for living a
human life. It is even possible that some conceptions of the good actually violate
the integrity of human existence. But how can we tell whose sense of the good and
whose sense of the just is closer to what is creatively human?

This is an important question for ethical thinking because we need to live together,
we have to have a shared basis conception of the good. And if that is what is the
basis of the shared conception of the good? In pre-modern times - this just means
before the West entered the Renaissance and imposed its values upon the world
through colonization-it was easier to have shared conception of the good. People
believed that the Gods or the cosmos imposed a natural law and the good was based
on the transcendent order. It did not matter what people believed; the universe had
its own order and the good was based on that order. Free human beings, one way or
the other, only had to understand how human actions were defined by that order and
all would be well. The great religions already defined how the natural law was the
foundation of the good. When civilizations could universally accept the authority
of the transcendent, they could universally accept a universal, natural law on which
to base their existence.

However, when the Western world began to emphasize the autonomy of the human
being from the will and intelligence of transcendent god, people lost the basis of the
good that everyone could agree with. The primary task of Western men was to find
the basis of the conception of the good that did not rely on a transcendent order.
They realized that the human person was an autonomous being who had reason and
using this reason could legislate the good for oneself. Because human reason was
universal for all persons, then they could devise rules for reason that would ensure
that reasonable persons could arrive at an understanding of the good that was
acceptable to all human being. As long the autonomous humans had rules for
legitimately legislating for themselves an understanding of the good that everyone
could accept as rational, then there would be a universal conception of the good that
was not dependent god or the cosmos. And so, stealing is not good because it
violates the commandments of God but because if human beings all believed that
stealing was right or an acceptable practice, then societies would be thrown into
chaos and violence. That stealing is forbidden is an acceptable ethical law because
it would make sense to all persons of reason.

This whole theory was simple and provided Europeans and Anglo-Saxons a very
clear basis for understanding the good without having to believe in anything but
human reason. However, as the West pushed further into the territories of other
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 peoples with other ways of understanding the good, they realized that it was possible
that such faith in a universal reason that could legislate the good for everyone was
not so simple. What if the other ways of understanding the good of other peoples
were equally as valid as Western ways of understanding the good? They did not
even have to look very far from Europe and the United States to encounter other
ways of understanding the good. The women's movement was at this time asserting
itself, and white women were beginning to realize that they had different ways of
valuing reality that were equally legitimate but different from men. And so, ethical
thinking was faced with the reality of multiple cultures and possible conceptions of
the good. Given the possible conflicts between possibly legitimate conceptions of
the good, how do we arrive at a shared conception of the good in a multicultural
society?

This is the reason why discourse theory emerged. Discourse theory is a theory that
shows rational people how to arrive at a shared conception of the good using reason
alone. In this case, though, reason meant the various forms of reason of people from
different cultures and systems of values. Discourse theory sought to articulate the
basic principles for arriving at a consensual understanding of the good so that people
in shared world could live with each other. One of the most important philosophers
of discourse theory is Jürgen Habermas.

Competing Conceptions of the Good

As discussed, the foundational idea that brought about the emergence of discourse
ethics is the idea that there are competing conceptions of the good in modernized
societies. This means that societies today are no longer homogeneous and people
have different forms of reason, including moral reasoning. In large societies where
the multiplicity of people’s needs to be accommodated, conflict and injustice cannot
be avoided.

Injustice is a particular danger in multicultural societies. Any society needs a

dominant system to guide free and autonomous people regarding what is acceptable
behavior. The dominant system also determines what is acceptable and
unacceptable behavior, what can be expected and what duties persons have to each
other and to society. And so, it is easy to see how people's lives can be determined
by the dominant ethical thinking about the good. It frees People to act but it also
limits people from realizing themselves of their conception of the good is seen as
contrary to the dominant system.

How does a dominant system come about? Often dominant systems evolve. When
human beings come together, to live together and survive with each other, ways of
living together and doing things evolve. Everything evolves from a shared
understanding of planting rice to building houses, using of waste, burying people,
and dressing. The sense of d and evil, right and wrong, and proper and improper
also evolves. These ways evolve as we go about experimenting with what works,
what is fair, what is more creative. and what makes us better people by ourselves
and with each other. Eventually, these ways are codified in an unspoken system
define our lives. In small societies that grow with each other, these dominant
systems are not experienced as unjust limiting, that is, until conditions change.
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 Many rules that govern people make sense while the conditions that make them
useful exist. But if conditions change, then sometimes these rules become
oppressive. For instance, when people do not think of themselves as subjects
separate from their families and romantic love is not valued a way of realizing
happiness, arranged marriages are a problem. That is the best way of pairing people
and king sure alliances are built, as well as making sure the best genes are
propagated. However, when things change and individualism and the pursuit of
individual happiness becomes important value for people, then arranged marriages
do work and eventually, the system becomes outdated. But while it exists, it can be
oppressive for those who no longer that it serves their human flourishing.

Thus, dominant systems are generally useful guides for a behavior, especially in a
community. And dominant systems are not generally problematic in communities
that share the same perspective on reality and where general conditions for human
dwelling remain unchanged. However, human communities in our time are large in
scale and quite cosmopolitan. People from all cultures come to share the
communities that they live in with others. For people who come from other cultures
and are not part of the evolution of the dominant culture, the conceptions of the
good that rule them could be oppressive. Simple things such as manner of dressing
and everyday courtesies could be misconstrued to be violations of good conduct.
More troublesome things such as criminal behavior or sexual conduct could even
lead to trouble.

There are very tragic examples of this kind of oppressiveness. For instance, because
the people who belong to traditional cultures do not understand the systems of
ownership imposed by the Westernized states of colonized parts of the world, they
are considered squatters in the lands they dwell in. Certain religious practices are
frowned upon or even persecuted because they violate community sensibilities like
the sacrifice of certain animals considered by Westernized people as pets. Here we
see how important it is for nations and states to have a shared conception of the
good where there are competing conceptions of the good. This is especially urgent
when we consider that in most of the world, the dominant legal and ethical, not to
mention cultural and economic systems, were imposed by colonizers through
violent invasions of the worlds of people who had their own cultures which provided
them with their own cohesive shared conception of the good. We see such problems
Asia and Africa, especially in countries with strong traditional communities, where
the people are poor and marginalized by their own governments because these
institutions were imposed by the Western colonizers. In many of these countries,
civil wars, terrorism, as well as the corruption and failed governance, persist
because the majority of their populations still refuse to accept the dominant system
as defining the good for them. It is thus important to find ways of building
communities with a shared conception of the good without violence. And even if
the issue of imposed dominant systems does not exist, the fact that the conditions
for human dwelling generally evolve demands that we come to shared conception
of the good that does not alienate any memberse0f our society.
Discourse theory was conceived to provide way of creating a system of shared
conceptions of the good in societies where there are competing conceptions of the

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 good. It is helpful because it can provide human beings with a basis for accepting
laws and ethical systems as valid for autonomous, rational beings.

"Legislating" for Autonomous Rational Beings

The basic idea of discourse theory is that human beings are rational and
autonomous, and as such need to legislate for themselves their rules of behavior.
This means that they are free beings who usually act when these actions make sense
to them. There are many reasons why certain actions make sense to people. One
reason is practicality. One should do something because the outcome is beneficial
to oneself. It makes sense to work hard for the psychic or economic rewards that
working hard brings. A person also acts because one is fearful of or desires to avoid
negative consequences. It makes sense to follow the law, even the ones that are not
so clear, because one could be punished. People also act based on authority. They
do things because the persons they respect or recognize as the bearers of the
community say so. For instance, they follow teachers, managers, and government
officials because these people embody the will of the community.

However, human beings are truly most free when they act because they are
convinced that an action is good and that it ought to be done. This is when it can be
said that people act according to their free will. In such instances, they basically
willed themselves to do the good because they are usually following maxim, a
universalizable ought which they have accepted as justified and reasonable. For
instance, one follows the law because it is good. It ought to be followed by human
beings who desire to realize themselves as good.

People have a need to realize their potential as free beings. But they are not just free
beings but beings who seek to realize their fullest potential. This fullest potential
can be called the good. In order to guide themselves in realizing the good, human
beings need norms of behavior. They need guide to understand what they ought to
do and how to make norms that guide them in new and specific activities. If people
do not have a transcendent god to tell them what to do and if they do not have a
universal reason to determine what to do, then there must be a way to formulate
norms of behavior that one can expect from rational and autonomous beings. These
are not norms of behavior for the most practical ways of going about things neither
are these norms of behavior that reflect our preferences. Rather, these are norms of
behavior that people expect human beings to follow if they are rational, free, and
responsible. In contemporary times, it becomes more difficult to specify these
norms on one's own. After all, one is not the bearer of a rationality that reflects the
rationality of all peoples. There is a multiplicity of conceptions of the good which
guides and defines how all these various peoples live, and all these conceptions of
the good for them are justified and rational. And so, there must be a way of arriving
at conception of the good that is valid not just for an individual but for one's
community as well.

Habermas is one of the philosophers who has helped sort out the principles for
formulating conceptions of the good in solidarity with others. The need for the
communal process is twofold. Firstly, human beings act in a community. Norms of
human behavior have to be acceptable to all the community for people to be able to
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act together and have an ordered society. But more importantly, when they articulate
conception of the good, the persons in dialogue are seeking the authenticity of what
it means to be a human being. One person alone, with the perspective of his/her
particular culture and rationality, cannot define the good, and cannot exhaust the
mystery of being human. And so, one needs the perspective of others to articulate
the possibilities of human existence in the world.
How then do people proceed to articulate norms of human behavior? Firstly, they
must understand that they need a process of justification through which they can
explain to one another the basis for their norms. It is a process of explaining to each
other why they believe what they do. Secondly, they need to accept that this is a
process of consensus building. It is what we can call a process of opinion and will
formation. The outcome of this is a shared understanding of the good not a
compromise based on what is convenient by the powerful but a shared or
communally accepted understanding of the good.
What Habermas seeks to articulate is how human beings can come to a shared
understanding of the good to which the community can subscribe. Being
autonomous law-giving individuals, there ought to be a maxim that can guide their
way of articulating reality. Kant formulated this categorical imperative on which to
base the legislation of one's duty "Act only according to that maxim by which you
can at the same time will that it should become a universal law," is how Kant"
formulated the foundation for legislating the ought This be the most precise
formulation for how autonomous individuals decide what to do in a concrete
situation, but concretely it gives a formula for articulating fundamental maxims
which people can base the nought.
This formulation certainly works as a basis for universalizable norms of human
behavior if people can agree that there is only one shared form of human rationality.
However, humanity has already seen that people from various backgrounds,
cultures, and societies have produced various forms of rationality with their own
conception of the good. Thus, Kant's formula does not acceptable norms of behavior
in multicultural societies if it means that a single person by himself/herself can
legislate norms of behavior acceptable to all persons in a community. Thus, using
the same principle of reasonable persons legislating for themselves, Habermas
comes up with a modification of the categorical imperative.
He proposes the following condition for the acceptability of a norm: (U) All
affected can accept the consequences and the side effects its general observance can
be anticipated to have for the satisfaction of everyone's interests (and these
consequences are preferred to those of known alternative possibilities for
regulation.)"

In proposing this condition, Habermas is offering a more communal form of norm

formulation. Unlike Kant's categorical imperative, where it is possible for norms to
be formulated by a single person imagining what is justifiable to all rational people,
(U) proposes that a norm can only be valid if all affected can accept the
consequences. One person, no matter how insightful and rational can imagine the
consequences and their acceptability of the observance of norms. Thus, Habermas
comes up with the principle of discourse ethics.
―(D) Only those norms can claim to be valid that meet (or could meet) with the
approval of all affected in their capacity as participants in a practical discourse‖.

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 Instead of the categorical imperative, Habermas gives this principle for process for
norm creation.
Here the aim is still to formulate universalizable norms, but there is the acceptance
that no one person bears the rationality of all people universally. And no one person
can imagine what norms will be acceptable to all. lt becomes important then for all
affected by any norm or rule to participate in a practical discourse to deliberate its
validity. Practical discourse means a "cooperative process of argumentation." This
means that for a society to be able to articulate and be bound by universalizable
norms, there must exist processes where people can freely justify to each other why
they believe the norms of their actions are valid for all persons who are bound and
affected by it.

If people are able to engage each other in the creative Process of deliberation, then
they are able to explore together what the basic principles of their moral beliefs are.
The process also allows them to become aware that their own moral beliefs are not
as universal as they believe because people from other cultures have various moral
certainties. If they are engaged genuinely open and free discourse, then they are able
to explore unacceptable can be understood and accepted. This creative process is a
process of mutual justification because people have to explain to each other why it
is rational or reasonable to believe what they believe. If the participants are open to
each other, it is possible for them to expand or broaden their conception of the good.
In this way, people get to clarify to themselves what is humanizing and creative
most probably because it reflects the order of reality. But for Habermas, the true
value of cooperative discourse is that it can lead to a shared opinion and will.

The Basic Characteristics of Discourse Procedures

• The process must take place in argumentative form or through the "regulated exchange of
information and reasons among parties who introduce and critically test proposals."
• "Deliberations are inclusive and public." No one is excluded and those who may be possibly
affected are given an equal chance to take part.

• Deliberations are uncoerced and participants are "bound only by the presuppositions of
communication and rules of argumentation."
• "Deliberations are free of any internal coercion that could detract from the equality of the
participants... The taking of yes/no positions are motivated solely by the unforced force of
better argument."

• "Deliberations aim in general or rationally motivated agreements and can in principle be

indefinitely continued or resumed to any time."

• "Political deliberations extend to any matter that can be regulated in the equal interest of all."
• "Political deliberations also include the interpretation of needs and wants and the change of
pre-political attitudes and preferences.

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 Shared Opinion and Will-Formation

What is shared opinion and will? People live in harmony and peace with each other
when, despite their competing conceptions of the good, they are able to reconcile their
differences and together articulate a conception of the good that they can equally accept.
Once they have a shared conception of the good, then they can act together to realize this
good in the world. Their shared conception of the good becomes their shared norm for
acting together.

Total consensual agreement on the good is almost impossible to realize. After all,
there are multiple perspectives in one society. However, the process itself of cooperative
discourse creates a certain process where people gain what we can call, borrowing from
Habermas, a we-perspective. A shared we-perspective is a community's shared horizon
of understanding that is born from the free and fair engagement of persons who bear
different frames for understanding the good. Creative dialogue is really founded on
mutual justification because here people come together to explain to each other why they
believe what they believe. If this process is engaged in with openness and goodwill, then
it can be a process of mutual clarification and deepening. Because as they justify to each
other what they understand to be the good, the participants in creative discourse begin to
understand that not all conceptions of the good are acceptable to all people. And if the
participants genuinely open, then they will ask themselves what the sources of difference
and disagreement are and how they enrich their own perspective about the good with this
engagement with other conceptions of the good.

For example, when people with competing conception of land ownership together
because they have to formulate policy with regard to indigenous people owning their
land, they need to engage in a constructive process of discourse, Indigenous people who
live according to non-Westernized lifeways believe that land cannot be owned. One is
born to the land. One's community belongs to the land. The spirits of the land are known
to one's people and they help with misfortune, good harvest, and can be spoken to and
negotiated with. The land is essential to one's life and it is sacred because it is alive with
spirits, and even the trees and the land are persons. Thus, it cannot be bought and sold
It cannot be partitioned. And one cannot do whatever one wishes to the land and its
inhabitants.

Modern westernized people think of land as belonging to the state. The state of the
nation does not belong to the land. It is a territory partitioned from other peoples and
defensible by one's people. It can be further partitioned for private ownership for people
to use and do with as they please. They can build on it, plant on it, make it lie idle, or
manipulate it. It is seen as a source of livelihood, investment. and inheritance. It
sometimes has sentimental value but mostly it has economic value. And so, it does not
matter what one does with the land as long as one owns it.

These valuations of land are very different from each other. The indigenous people
view their land shared territory of their tribe and they are stewards of their land. They
do not look at it as something to maximize and make profit from. Meanwhile, the
dominant economic system views their land as idle because it is not maximized. Forests
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are uncut, mountains unmined, and rivers undammed. One who comes from the
dominant system views the ancestral lands of the indigenous people as something to
acquire in order to expand the exploitable resource base. The indigenous people on the
other hand, see the acquisition of their land as act of sacrilege and violation. And how
does one go about this conflicting conception of the good? Who has a right to the land?
What does it mean to own the land and alienate it? What does it mean to exploit the
land and who has the right to it.

These are just a few of the questions that these conflicting conceptions of land
ownership need to face. And it is essential that the people that share this nation come
to a shared understanding of what it means to own land and have a right to it. Thus, it
is important for people of goodwill to engage in a process of mutual justification and
clarification, as much as they work for mutual understanding and respect. Such process
of mutual exchange of conceptions of the good is the only way that they can rationally
decide if there is a way of coming to norms of land stewardship and ownership that is
not only agreeable to all persons affected but will lead to a genuinely creative
engagement with the land.

It is hoped that in these processes of communicative action, the participants will

become a we. The participants in constant engagement of goodwill eventually become
a we. Partly, this is because they are called on to listen to each other and try to imagine
where each person is coming from. Such imagination draws people from their natural
egotism to an actual opening to the other. The participants in constant engagement of
goodwill build camaraderie and have a deeper sense of fellow-feeling because they
begin to understand the good in shared ways or at least can come to a consensual
understanding of the good more easily because they have explained to each other their
positions and points of view. And so, when faced with necessary decisions regarding
the good, members of this community are a we who are invested in the process of
mutual understanding and consensus building.

Consensus building is different from making compromises. Making compromises

entails accepting the positions of others because of practical needs coercion,
acquiescence or the simple recognition of the power persons have over one's self. To
come to a compromise with regard to the norms of the goods means to surrender with
one’s judgment and autonomy in order to be able to reach an agreement with another.
One does not necessarily agree that the compromise position actually reflects the good
but one accepts it for practical purposes, including the manipulation of the person with
one is compromising. In compromise, may think that one is still right but is willing to
surrender one's insight into the good just to be able to achieve certain goals.

The intention of consensus is different. Consensus is born out of the mutual

recognition that the position arrived at is the best that all participants can agree on given
what they know and can know at the moment. It has to do with the building of a shared
conception of the good that all persons involved can agree on. Thus, a consensus is a
position arrived at by a community engaged in creative communication practices. Their
practice is founded on the desire to arrive at the best understanding of the good given
the multiplicity of conceptions of the good in a given society. It seeks to understand
what is acceptable to all as their shared position not because it seeks to arrive at a

87
practical action or outcome but because it seeks to articulate the best understanding the
people can come to regarding the good.

Of course, it is difficult to arrive at a sense of solidarity born from such a

communicative situation. Can an ideal communicative situation exist given the realities
of influence and power? However, Habermas presents what lie understands to be the
best way to come to a shared conception of the good given the reality that modern
societies are founded the multiplicity of rationalities. And so, he articulates the
conditions for the possibility of coming to a consensus on the good based on a shared
we-perspective. The processes for consensus building and creating a shared we-
perspective requires systems that ensure fairness so that all participants feel that they
are part of a process where the outcome reflects their accepted understanding of what
is the best position to take. In other words, the shared opinion on the good is the product
of a fair process where even people whose positions are not taken can accept the
dominant position because it is the most reasonable and makes most sense. Thus, he
proposes basic principles to ensure fairness.

First, all affected must be part of the process of deliberation. In our time, when
societies and nations are highly populated, they have to resort to some process of
representation. But this must be genuine representation where, at every level, all
affected may engage in public discourse. Second, the process must be fair such that all
external influence like power and money are suspended and only the force of the better
argument has influence over the participants. Third, all decisions or agreements have a
"for now" characteristic. This means that all decisions made are the best decisions given
the existing knowledge and the arguments engaged. However, these decisions can
change when better arguments are arrived at. This way, even those who have to concede
to the dominant norms understand that their position can still be valid if they can show
that it is more reasonable.

APPLICATION

A. Study the pressing issues in your community or school. Choose a situation where
discourse ethics can be applied. Make sure it is an issue that involves competing
conceptions of the good: tuition fee increases or the imposition of a strict dress code.
Form groups where members can take the roles of different stakeholders. Engage in a
process of discourse playing these roles and observe how people argue for their position
and arrive at a consensus or a compromise. Explain how Haberrna’s principles are
reflected in this process.
_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
_______________________

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 Awesome! Good job! You have finished module 3 .
Expected that you have now learn and understand the foundations
of discourse ethics.

Module Assessment

A. Essay

1. Discuss how Hindu worldviews shape the Asians' conception of the good and
how it determines the way people act. Can you sympathize with their
conception of Karma and the necessity to come to a deeper insight into the
truth that all is Brahman?

2. Do you think that Buddhism is a good guide for free and autonomous human
beings to shape their actions in the world? How does it shape their conception
of genuine human action?

3. Discuss the principles of genuine discourse. Do you think that they allow for
the fair exchange of ideas and concerns? Does it make the discourse principle
of (D) possible?

4. What is the value of discourse ethics in the modern world? Is discourse ethics
particularly responsive to multicultural or multinational societies?

B. Film Viewing

Watch the movie entitled ―” Kung Fu Panda” and identify the elements of Buddhism,
Confucianism and other Chinese philosophy that you note in the film.

Refer to Appendix A for the rubric of this module assessment.

89
 Module Summary

• Asian thinkers philosophize about doing the good, they do not think
about rules or guidelines for deciding what is a good action or what
makes a norm universal. They are not so keen about articulating rules
and norms for autonomous persons to decide what is an acceptable act
for a rational, free, and autonomous person.

• Asian philosophies main concern is how to live a good life and be good
person by gaining an insight into the transcendent and eternal order of
the universe, and from that insight how to attune one's life to that order.

• Asian ethical systems are less about becoming an autonomous, rational

legislator of one's own laws. Rather, they are a quest to articulate human
connectedness and oneness to the deepest order of reality.

• Good person is a person in communion with one’s fellow humans, with

fellow beings, and with the ground of reality itself. Once the communion
is attained, one begins to act as a good person, a person whose self-
realization is immediately harmonious and non-destructive.

• Discourse theory is a theory that shows rational people how to arrive at

a shared conception of the good using reason alone.

• Habermas provides us with reasonable norms which can guide

humanity’s quest to arrive at universalizable norms in a multiverse of
rationalities. His criteria for fair and reasonable discourse can be used in
shaping our systems of governance at every level, as well as in our
processes for creating consensus in seeking norms to define the norms
of our shared lives.

• Discourse theory has been applied to studies for understanding

democratic institutions and their reform, building just societies, and
even assessing institutions for peace building.

90
 References

Lesson 1

Dy, Jr., Manuel B. Short Note on Integrating Con Ethics In Business Ethics,"
unpublished manuscript.
Ferriols, Roque J. The "Psychic Entity" in Aurobindo's The Life Divine. Quezon City:
Ateneo de Manila University Press, 1966.
Ivanhoe, Philip J. and Bryan W. van Norden. Readings Classical Chinese Philosophy,
eds and introductions. New York: Seven Bridges Press, 2001.
Lopez, Donald S. "Eightfold Path," Encyclopedia Britannica, URL: Eightfold-Path,
accessed June 20, 2017.
"Four Noble Truths," Encyclopedia Britannica, Noble-Truths, accessed 20 June
2017.
Religions Asia Practice: An Anthology. New Jersey: Princeton University
Press, 2002.
Olive, Patrick, trans., The Upanishads. Oxford worlds classics. Oxford: Oxford
university Press, 2002.
Renou, Louis ed., Hinduism. New York: George Braziller, 1962.

Lesson 2

Habermas, Jurgen. Between Facts and Norms: Contributions to a Discourse Theory of

Law and Democracy. Cambridge, Mass: The MIT Press, 1998.
. "Discourse Ethics: Notes on a Program of Philosophical
Justification," Moral Consciousness and Communicative Action. Cambridge,
Massachusetts: The MIT Press, 1990.
. . Justification and Application: Remarks of Discourse Ethics.
Cambridge: MIT Press, 1993.

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 Module 4

Special Topics in Ethics

Part 1

Welcome to module 4!
Since you are done taking western and eastern theories and principles. You will now
proceed to the special topics in ethics. You will now start applying the basic
principles learned in the previous lessons to the issues that will be covered in this
module. With each topic or issue we cover; you will be expected to apply ethical
principles and reasoning to ethical problems or dilemmas related to or constituting
those issues. Your quest for understanding concerning the practical concerns of
ethic will become clearer as you continue.

Ecology, medical ethics, business ethics, and other fields featured here. It is the aim
of this module to expose the you to the main currents of the foundational theories
in these fields, give you a perspective from which to read these realities, and have
enough basic theory with which to understand on your own on the evolving theories
you may want to study on.

This Module contain the following lessons:

Lesson 1: Asian Ethical Tradition
Lesson 2: Discourse Ethics

The major learning outcomes of this module are to

1. recognize the value of environmental ethics especially in the context of
the contemporary era;
2. compare the stockholder, stakeholder, and social contract normative
theories of business ethics;
3. recognize how women's rights are abused and articulate possible paths
to emancipation and equality’s;
4. work as a group to explain the essence of equality in the learning
environment; and
5. articulate what a moral dilemma is in the medical field.
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 Lesson 1

Environmental Ethics

OBJECTIVES

At the end of this chapter, you should be able to:

1. recognize the value of environmental ethics especially in the context of the
contemporary era;
2. show an understanding of the position of animal rights activists and the
philosophy behind;
3. discuss biocentric outlook on nature and compare and differentiate it from the
land ethic;
4. trace the philosophical foundations of ecological problems such as climate
change; and
5. exhibit an understanding of what it means to be dweller in nature.

INTRODUCTION

This chapter contemplates the human person's ethical relationship with the natural
environment. Starting from one's duty to animals, the issues expand to one's duty
93
 towards all that have life and ultimately to the entire land or biotic community. As
the current generation of humanity faces more natural catastrophes that threaten
not only human life but all that exists on this planet, environmental ethics is now,
more than ever, crucial in adopting a way of life that is less destructive and more
in tune with one's essential place in nature.

ACTIVITY

The following are the statements regarding your interpersonal relationship with the
environment. For each statement, write check if you strongly agree or strongly
disagree.
Strongly Strongly
Agree Disagree
1. Some animals have more feelings than others,
and we should care for those with the most
feelings first.
2. I have mourned the loss of the plants.
3. it is okay to pick one flower in class
4. It is okay to pick 50 flowers in class.
5. I have secretly set insects free from the house so
they will be not be killed.
6. Would pick a bouquet of flowers, even they
would die because of it.
7. Would harm human property in defense of a
forest system. (i.e., bulldozers)
8. Would harm humans in defense of forest of a
forest ecosystem (i.e., chaining myself to a tree).
9. I would harm myself in
10. The death of a household pet has been more
traumatizing than the death of humans.
11. Other animals should be afraid of humans
12. I have no problem with eating meat.
13. Will eat meat even if I don’t know how the
animals was treated during its life.
14. I would to like kill a dear for a source of meat.
15. I would like to kill a deer just to help control
population.
16. I would like to kill a deer for a trophy.
17. It’s better to test cosmetics and medicine of
non-humans before humans than the other way
around.
18. The world would be better without mosquitos.

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19. The world be better without dogs and cats.
20. The world be better without humans.

ANALYSIS

1. How do we treat non- human?

2. Does one have moral duties towards natural things?

3. How must one manage one's existence with respect to the finitude of resources?

3. If one is to be ethical in one's treatment of animal. How the human person views
them as beings that have inherent value.?

_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________

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 ABSTRACTION

Various Approaches to Environmental Ethics

Peter Singer and Tom Regen on the Ethical Treatment of Animals

Peter Singer's book, Animal Liberation (1975), is one of the most influential works
with respect to philosophies which tackle the ethical treatment of animals. Singer
advocates equal treatment for all sentient beings, from animals to human beings. He
argues that in the same way that some people are prejudiced against other people that are
different from them in terms of race, gender, or sexual orientation hey can also be accused
of unjust prejudice against animals. He observes that human beings have been treating
non-human animals in a radically different manner as they do human beings like
themselves. Singer names this behavior speciesism--the unjustifiable privileging of one’s
own species over another. People often use the level of intelligence as a measure of
discriminating against other animals, presenting them with a justification to treat animals
merely as food or as any form of means to an end. However, Singer argues if we use this
criterion, there is essentially no valid for us to kill for food or use chimpanzees for various
medical experiments unless we include very young children for the same purposes, for it
may be argued that they are less intelligent than adult chimpanzees. If one argues against
Singer and says that it is the potential for developing a higher form of intelligence that
should be used as the criterion, it can still be argued some young chimpanzees possess a
higher potential for intelligence than some brain-damaged human beings.

Where then does one draw the line? What would be the moral criterion that can
determine what sort of beings must be included in one's moral deliberations? Is it immoral
to step on grass? Should it be considered unethical to eat vegetables in the same way that
Singer seems to be hinting at the fact that it is in a specialist way of thinking that we feel
justified in consuming poultry and meat? Singer holds that it is being’s sentience or
capacity to suffer that must serve as the basis for including its interests in making moral
choices. If a being cannot feel, then it has no interests, and therefore, to kick a dog is
morally wrong, while crushing a stone is not. Hence, if a being has the ability to suffer or
feel pain, then its species must not get in the way of its being included in the moral sphere.
All beings with the capacity to suffer equally should have an equal standing from a moral
perspective. Here, we see how Singer's doctrine is consistent with the utilitarian doctrine.
The happiness of all beings that can feel pleasure and pain has equal weight in moral
matters. Singer thus advocates vegetarianism and stands against animal experimentation
because these practices tend to inflict suffering on nonhuman animals. In other words, if
one’s action causes painful consequences on sentient beings (both human and non-
human), then Singer holds that this act is morally wrong.

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 Tom Regan, a Kantian deontologist, has a different approach from Singer's
utilitarian perspective. He holds that certain non-human animals have actual rights, which
make them morally considerable, and oddly enough it is not rationality that makes them
so for him. For him it is a being's being an experiencing subject of a life that makes it
count as morally considerable. This means that a being's capacity for having:

….beliefs and desires; perception, memory, and a sense of the future, including their
own future; an emotional life together with feelings of pleasure and pain; preference and
welfare interests; the ability to initiate action in pursuit of their desires and goals a
psychological identity over time; and an individual welfare in the sense that their
experiential life fares well or ill for them, logically independently of their utility for others
and logically independently of their being the object of anyone else's interests.

If a being possesses these traits, then Regan says that such a subject of a life has
inherent value and should be treated as a rights-holder. Hence, for instance, it is wrong to
kill animals for sport, experiment on them or use them in commercial agriculture once it
is proven that they do experience themselves as a subject of a life.
More than anything, these two authors have shown human beings should not want
only exercise their domination over other species. At the very least, humans must consider
the amount of pain they may be inflicting on other sentient beings no matter what the
motivation. One must also try to see other animals as beings of inherent value that deserve
respect. In other words, if one is to be ethical in one's treatment of animals, one must
continually come up with ways of lessening their suffering or view them as beings that
have inherent value and, therefore, deserve to be in the sphere of moral deliberation.

Paul Taylor and Biocentrism

Paul Taylor extends moral consideration from the sphere of sentience and puts
forward an argument for the moral protection of all beings that may be considered as
teleological centers of life. Whether a being is conscious or sentient is not the sole
determinant of its moral considerability. For Taylor, outlook protects the rights of all
living organisms, including plants and microorganisms, to seek out their good and well-
being. As a Teleological-center-of-life, an organism exists for the sake of furthering its
existence by undergoing changes and processes that improve its well-being. In other
words, all organisms move towards fulfilling their own ends. Insofar as plants need water
and sun for nourishment, to willfully deny them these things would constitute a violation
of their rights as Teleological center-of-life. Hence, for Taylor, human beings, much like
their plant counterparts are non-privileged members of the earth's community of life.
Humans, like other organisms are contingent, biological beings that cannot absolutely
guarantee their survival. Human beings share a bond of kinship with other living
organisms because it is the same natural processes that brought all of us to life. In fact,
human beings are relatively newcomers to the earth. The planet has been teeming with
life way before humans came into the scene, and yet, we act like we are the sole purpose
and end of natural evolutionary processes. In a manner of speaking, humans act like they
own the place even if a lot of other beings have been residing and securing their place in
the natural environment millions of years before humans existed. In fact, we depend on
plants and animals for our survival, but they do not depend on us for theirs. It may be
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argued that we are the most needy and capricious of all living organisms on earth. In other
words, biocentrism, at the very least, questions the common view that human beings are
the highest or most important members of the environment. It espouses the view that all
living organisms have equal rights from an ethical perspective.

Because all living organisms have welfare interests (goods of their own), they may
be considered as having a non-subjective point of view that human beings can adopt in
judging actions as good bad relative to the welfare of the organism in question. Hence,
one can say that even if crushing the roots of trees with bulldozers does not hurt the trees,
it does harm them because it is in their interest to further their existence. Even if plants
do not have preference interest (conscious wants or desires), their possession of welfares
interests includes them in the sphere of moral considerability.

To argue, therefore, that humans are superior species is considered as an unjustified

bias from the perspective of biocentrism. As the name suggests, all that has life should be
treated with impartial respect. To say that humans have capacities that are more valuable
than those of other beings, such as their capacity for algebra, is to unfairly judge the value
of capacities possessed by other beings. What would the use be of algebra for a dog or a
tree? Their capacities are suited for the purposes of protecting their own welfare as such
beings. To say that we are a better species than them is to make the mistake of
distinguishing what each species needs to be able to survive. Tree climbing is worth to
monkey than the capacity to solve math problems.

Unlike Taylor's egalitarian outlook, Robin Attfield proposes a revision of

biocentrism by arguing for a hierarchical view, which holds that even if all beings that
have a good of their own possess inherent value, some beings, namely persons, have
greater intrinsic value. Hence, for Attfield, although all living organisms have inherent
value, some organisms may be considered as having more inherent worth than others.

Aldo Leopold's Land Ethic

Aldo Leopold, in his A Sand County Almanac, holds that ―a thing is right when it
tends to preserve the integrity, stability, and beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong
when it tends otherwise." According to this view, the land itself, or what Leopold calls
the biotic community, is considered as the locus of intrinsic value. If Singer, Regan,
Taylor, and Attfield place value on individual beings, Leopold thinks that it is the very
ecosystem, including sand, rocks, minerals, and various natural processes that deserve
moral consideration. A concrete implication of this view is that the welfare of an
individual member of an ecosystem is not valuable as the preservation of the integrity of
the whole biotic community. For example, if an invasive species of rats lays waste to a
vegetable farm which sustains the life of human beings and other species of animals, then
the land ethic permits the most humane way of extinguishing the rat population in that
area, bearing in mind that the good of the community is paramount to that of an individual.

The land ethic places human existence in the context of community as part of an
ecological whole. As such, human beings must not be viewed as conquerors but as
members of a life-giving system. In this regard, Leopold holds that in order to establish
an ethical relationship with the land, humans must develop not only their rational but also
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their emotional intelligence. For him, it is only when humans learn to feel their
belongingness to the land that they develop a love for it, a bond that compels them to
respect and admire the beauty and complexity of the biotic community. He proposes that
humans develop an "ecological conscience" that extends social conscience from
interpersonal relationships to one's relationship to the land. He posits that such a way of
thought can drastically challenge and revise the time-honored distinction between humans
and the rest of nature.

For Leopold, the land is not merely but a fountain of energy flowing through plants,
animals, humans, and back. Food chains sustain life; it is a biotic pyramid that
systematically produces and distributes energy flows from one source to the next, thus
sustaining all life in the process. Nutrients are shared by all and every member of the
community that benefits from these various ecological processes, such as photosynthesis.
Leopold suggests that if humans only learn to think not just with their minds but with their
hearts, then they cannot but be grateful and respectful of the community they belong
Ecological conscience is key in appreciating one's duties towards the environment.
Ecological wholes deserve proper respect, for everything that happens to human beings
happen by virtue of the life-sustaining processes inherent in the land itself.

Climate Change and Sustainable Development

When the World Commission on Environment and Development (WCED) came out
with the Brundtland Report in 1987, it became clear that the vital planetary resources and
processes necessary to sustain life were under strain. The report raised a very important
question: Is it equitable to sacrifice options for future wellbeing in favor of supporting
current lifestyles? The report declares that it is not equitable for future generations to
experience a considerable reduction of options for the sake of sustaining the needs and
wants of the present. It was in this report that the idea of "sustainable development" was
first used. Sustainable development means "development that meets the needs of the
present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs."
This notion, albeit still anthropocentric in its essence, nevertheless puts the issue of human
greed to the fore. As developed countries continue to use up most of the planet's ecological
capital with no regard for the welfare of the other developing nations with little access to
such resources, the very biological existence of future human generations becomes
threatened. The very idea of equity brings up the issue of having fair and just systems of
production and consumption that take into amount one's responsibility not just towards
other human beings but towards nature itself.

As most countries continue on this path of unmitigated production and consumption,

it becomes clearer that humanity has become addicted to acquiring and consuming that
the idea of "enoughness" becomes an alien concept. This insatiable drive is what Aristotle
named as the vice of pleonaxia or insatiable acquisitiveness. The question is whether such
a drive is sustainable in the context of securing the future welfare of the various
ecosystems that essentially subsidize this drive towards accumulation. By continuing such
an ultra-consumerist way of existence, humanity is shooting itself in the foot, as it were,
blindly pushing forward without realizing that we are in auto-destruct mode. It is not only
the future of the future generations of human beings that is at stake, but the existence of
the very web of life or the biotic community, which is the primary source of life for all.
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In other words, if one advocates the idea of sustainable development, then one must
account for one's actions with respect to the environment, not only in the context of its
actual effects in the present but perhaps, more importantly its potentially harmful effects
in the future.

Human beings continue to exist with such insatiability the earth's temperature has
gone up. In the polar regions for instance, average air temperatures have increased by 5
degrees centigrade in the last 100 years. The continuous burning of fossil fuels (coal, gas),
compounded by the destruction of forests (which absorb carbon dioxide) has dramatically
increased the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and as the temperature of the planet rises,
extreme weather Phenomenon has become an almost normal occurrence. There is now
more flooding and drought in the planet and these have a dramatic impact not just on the
lives of human beings but the entire ecosystem. As the oceans get warmer and the arctic
glaciers melt, sea levels rise threatening coastal populations. Experts have said that 1.5
degrees ‘centigrade average rise in global temperature may put 20% to 30% of species at
risk of extinction. The Montreal Protocol (1989) and the Kyoto Protocol (1997) are
international treaties that seek to decrease the emission of greenhouse gases that cause
damage to the ozone layer. However, as one observes, the human population is still
experiencing the effects of rising global temperature. In fact, experts say that nations
should act to limit global warming to less than 2 degrees centigrade if they want to
mitigate the long-term harm of global warming to various ecosystems. One needs only to
remember the effects of typhoons Ondoy and Yolanda to understand how serious a
problem global warming is.

One may therefore ask, how did it come to this? How has such a young species laid
waste to such a vast and complex environment in such a short time? The answers to these
questions are not merely empirical but philosophical in nature. In essence, human beings
may be seen as dwellers that have become tremendously inept in living their lives
prudently. Humans seem to lack what Aristotle has called practical wisdom in living in
its own home, Earth. Erazim believes that it is only by recalling and re-establishing our
essential place in nature as dwellers can we initiate genuine change and reclaim our
rightful place in the biotic community. It is only by dwelling ethically that human beings
can begin to live harmoniously with nature once more.

Kohák and the Human Being as Dweller

The thinker Erazim Kohák thinks it is the forgotten meaning of ―culture‖ that is at
the root of the human being's alienation from his/her environment. Culture is not merely
the collection of artifacts or the Manifestation of people's tastes and appreciation of
beauty. According to him, culture traces its etymological roots from the Latin,
―cultus”, which means "the yielding of respect, honoring the sacredness of all that is.”
Culture is not originally opposed to nature but is essentially understood as the human
being‘s role in it. To be a person of culture is to be someone who recognizes the nobility
of being. He adds, "the homo humanus of ancient Rome, the man of culture, is one who
cultivates his life, not leaving it at the mercy of his momentary whims and their
gratification but ordering it according to its moral sense. One sees how Aristotle's
notion of virtue wisdom is echoed in this quotation. In such context, the human being
may be considered as a rational being that has given in to the immediate demands of

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 physical gratification at the expense of his/her capacity to rationally locate his/her
essential place in the natural environment.

Most times, human beings perceive nature as the world devoid of human existence,
a pristine environment ruled by natural selection. This world is interpreted as world of
culture and civilization where skyscrapers paint the horizon and marvels of engineering,
science, fill cities with artifacts of innovation and progress. Operating within the purview
of such a dichotomy, the human being is seen as an invader of nature, as a being who
corrupts what is natural and desecrates what is unspoiled by intentions of greed or
covetousness. The human person may be linked to a bulldozer that levels nature for the
purpose of building and erecting his/her monuments that serve as a testament to the
undisputable reign of reason over all that exist. Seen in this light, to be ethical seems to
imply the necessity of limiting or minimizing the human person's presence in nature.

However, as Kohák mentions, culture is actually the human being’s role in nature.
It involves the cultivation and the recognition of the value of all that exists. To be a person
of culture is to be ethical.

One learns from Aristotle that being ethical has to do with coming up with the
correct course of action relative to the demands of a situation and his/her standing in it. It
is in being habitually accustomed to choosing the mean or the mesotes wherein the human
being is most excellent in being himself/herself. Over the past two centuries, the human
being seems to have lost control over his/her appetites and la unthinkingly give in to the
desires of material production and capital accumulation. Such a disposition has put not
only the natural environment in peril but has also endangered the human species pushing
it further to the brink of self- annihilation. As progress lays waste to nature, one sees how
the human person has gradually lost his/her moral sense with respect to how he/she is
supposed to manage his/her motives, desires, and actions in the context of being a dweller
in nature.

Kohák claims that it is only by understanding one's essential and moral place in
nature as a dweller can one begin to mend the wounds of avarice inflicted upon nature. In
relation to this, he asks human beings to reflect on how their very expensive existence in
nature may be justified. Given that the human person asks so much from nature, in terms
of natural resources which he/she uses to subsidize his/her needs and wants, how can one
say that one's existence in nature is not only practically, but perhaps, more importantly,
morally justifiable?

A dweller is someone who resides in particular place and calls this place his/her
home. Someone who dwells is someone who recognizes the value inherent in being
afforded the comfort of being received and welcomed by a place. There is a reason why
the adage, "There's no place like home," resonates with human sentiment. A home
nurtures one's existence for free. A home does not ask for anything other than respect. In
showing respect for one's home, one recognizes the value inherent therein and cultivates
its capacity to serve as a dwelling place not just for oneself but for others as well. In other
words, to dwell is to cultivate one's place; it is to take the responsibility for the upkeep of
that which embraces and sustains one's existence providing one with the sense of security
and acceptance that may not be found anywhere else. To dwell is to recognize the innate
value of one's home and allowing such recognition to guide one's actions in it. One does
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not destroy what one values. One does not abuse what one loves. In this context, one
understands just how much one owes to one's dwelling such that a person allows this
insight to guide one’s actions towards one’s home.

The natural environment is the human being's only home. It is complex system that
allows one to explore a person possibility and sustain one’s needs even beyond the
biological kind. Nature inspires artists, offers new questions to the scientific-minded, and
openly offers itself to the demands of material production. In the course of the human
being's journey towards knowledge and control, a person has lost sight of one’s essence
as a dweller, as the one who has been entrusted the responsibility not only of exploiting
nature for its use but of cultivating it in a way that is proportionate to its inherent worth.
Culture becomes a thing instead of an act Culture may be, therefore, seen as the human
person's ethical task in nature. It is the way one ought to dwell in nature It is in fulfilling
the demands of culture that one becomes a virtuous dweller, thereby justifying one's place
in one’s home. In Aristotelian terms. to dwell is to be an excellent human being with
respect to the demands of one's very situatedness in the natural environment.

APPLICATION

Essay
1. How is Singer's ethical position both similar to and different from Tom Regan's?
2. What is biocentrism? What are its main claims?
3. Is Leopold's land ethic just an extension of the biocentric outlook on nature?
4. What does Leopold mean by the term "biotic community?"

A. The students will be tasked to draw their own biotic community and then they will
be grouped online to share their drawings. They will discuss the possibility of
creating such a community in your nation. Where would it be? What would it be
like?
B. Make an artwork which portrays the nature of the human being as a dweller.
C. With a partner, design a campaign advertisement OH the value of environmental
ethics in today’s modern world.

Good job! You have just finished Lesson 1 of this

module. Now if you are ready, please proceed to Lesson 2 of this
module which will discuss about business ethics.

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 Lesson 2

Business Ethics

OBJECTIVES

At the end of this chapter, you should be able to

1. examine the ethical dimension of business, its relevance, and necessity;
2. compare the stockholder, stakeholder, and social contract normative theories of
business ethics;
3. recognize the implications of corporate social responsibility in running a business;
and
4. show understanding of the various stages of organizational moral development.

INTRODUCTION

The world of business is oftentimes seen as an amoral world. It is viewed as a world

solely driven by the profit motive and business people are often portrayed as ruthless,
self-interested individuals. This chapter tries to shed light on how ethics may be
effectively integrated to a business's operation. How can business fulfill its goal of making
without compromising its ethical responsibility? What are some normative models that
can be used in assessing business’s moral development?
Simply put, how can the profit motive and ethics co-exist?
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 ACTIVITY

Reflect on the quote below and create a drawing reflecting the quote. You are
free to be creative as much as you can.

“The business of business should not be about money. It should be

about responsibility. It should be about public good, not private greed.”
- Anita Roddick

ANALYSIS

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 1. What did you draw?

2. Why did you choose to represent the quote in that way?

ABSTRACTION

It is not uncommon to hear the criticism that those who theorize and teach
business ethics have little or no experience in the actual practice of business.

Normative Theories of Business Ethics

Some argue that deontology, virtue ethics, and consequentialist morals are esoteric
philosophical theories that are inapplicable to real-life business situations. Some say that
if one is fully engaged in the workings of the business world, one realizes that it is not
world of abstractions but a world of simple and practical problem-solving. In this case,
one realizes that business ethics, if it is to be reliably applicable to such a context must
negotiate a way of speaking the language of business It must translate the language of
normativity into a language that can be understood and accepted by those in the business
community. The following is a brief explanation of the three basic normative theories in
business ethics mainly derived from an article by John Hasnas.

The Stockholder Theory

This theory states that "businesses are merely arrangements by which one group of
people, the stockholders, advance capital to another group, the managers, to be used to
realize specified ends and for which the stockholders receive all ownership interest in the

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venture."'' In this theory, it is the people who invested money in the company that as the
main source of business decisions. Managers act as agents that serve at the pleasure of
investors. They are not allowed to divert funds away from the business plan that has been
expressly approved by the stockholders. In other words, the stockholders have the final
say in everything that happens the business. As Hasnas explains, "If the stockholders that
the business should not close a plant without giving its employees 90 days’ notice, should
have no dealings with country with a racists regime, or should endow a local public
library, the management is obligated to carry out such directive regardless of its effect on
the business' bottom line."

In most cases. however, stockholders do not issue such directives and simply order
the managers to maximize their financial returns. Nonetheless, the stockholder theory
holds that managers pursue their bottom line by legal and nondeceptive means. Hasnas
adds, "Far from asserting that there are no ethical constraints on a manager's obligation to
increase profits, the stockholder theory contends that the ethical constraints society has
embodied in its laws plus the general ethical tenet in favor of honest dealing constitute
the ethical boundaries within which managers must pursue increased profitability.” This
implies that it is the society's responsibility to restrict businesses from dealing unethically.
If the stockholders want to increase their profits, they must delegate the operational aspect
of such motive to the manager's own interpretation of how business ought to be run in the
context of being tied up in various legislative and legal impositions by society in general.
From this perspective, businesses have no other moral obligation to fulfill other than to
maximize profit for the stockholders legally and honestly. This means that if managers
spend the stockholders’ money to accomplish social goals, such as vulgarity events,
endowments, without the prior approval of e stockholders, then they are in violation of
the agreement because they are effectively spending other people's money without their
consent. For example, if a manager deems it morally necessary to spend 10% of the
company's earnings on socially oriented activities involving children of employees
(feeding program free medical check-ups, academic scholarships) but does this without
the knowledge and approval of the stockholders then the manager acted in violation of
his/her contractual obligation to the stockholders. In other words, even if one nothing
wrong in what the manager did, or even finds it laudable, the stockholder theory prioritizes
the 1nanager's financial and executive obligation to the stockholders. Even if one were to
argue that such an act increases the happiness of the greatest number, the act itself (apart
from its consequences) is deemed wrong in this theory. Put in ethical terms, one's duty to
honor one's contractual agreements overrides one's duty to promote the happiness of the
greatest number.

The Stakeholder Theory

This theory "holds that the management's fundamental obligation is not to maximize
the firm's financial success but to ensure its survival by balancing the conflicting claims
of multiple stakeholders.” A stakeholder is defined as any group or individual that stands
to benefit or suffer from decisions made by a corporation. This obligation, according to
Hasnas, is based on the two principles of stakeholder management:

1. Principle of corporate legitimacy. The corporation should be managed for

the benefit of its stakeholders: its customers, suppliers, owners, employees and the
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 local communities. The rights of these groups must be ensured, and further, the
groups must participate, some sense. in decisions that substantially affect their
welfare.

2. Stakeholder fiduciary principle. Management bears a fiduciary

relationship to stakeholders and to the corporation as an abstract entity. It must act
in the interest of the stakeholders as their agent, and it must act in the interest of the
corporation to ensure the survival of the firm safeguarding the long-term stakes of
each group.

These principles seek to ensure that all interests related to the firm are given a voice,
especially in decisions that have potentially injurious effects on those that have a stake in
the firm. Business performance is rated in relation to how it maximizes the gains and
minimizes the losses of all stakeholders. This principle may be derived from the Kantian
principle of treating people not merely as means but as ends as well. This requires one to
respect other people's autonomy and their capacity to design and pursue their own ends
as persons. To treat the stakeholder as an end is to recognize his/her right to not just be
treated as a means for accumulating funds, extracting labor, and raw materials from.
According to the stakeholder theory, stakeholders' interests must be properly represented
in business decisions. Each stakeholder must be afforded a fair say in company policies
and decisions. In other words, the management's task is to manage the business such that
various interests are balanced in an optimal way.

If a manufacturing firm, for instance, sources its raw materials from an indigenous
tribe in an underdeveloped community, the stakeholder theory obligates the firm to make
sure that the people are fairly compensated for their product. It is unethical to buy their
goods at an unfairly non-competitive price even if these people do not really know how
the market works. It is grossly prejudicial to treat these people merely as means for
manufacturing the firm's products. The rules of the market must be applied fairly to all
stakeholders.

In another case, if a factory opens its operations in a local community, it must make
sure that the health of the people in the surrounding areas is not compromised by the firm's
operations. This applies to cases where hazardous chemicals are manufactured in an area
that is relatively close to populated residential neighborhoods. Even if the community is
not really a direct stakeholder to the firm, it must still be ethically considered whether the
firm's operations will have an effect on the people living around its base of operations.

The Social Contract Theory

This normative theory states that "all businesses are ethically obligated to enhance
the welfare of society by satisfying consumer and employee interests without violating
any of the general canons of justice.” This theory posits an implicit agreement between
businesses and society that the latter only tolerates the existence and operation of the
former under the supposition that it can benefit from it. This theory is formulated in the
spirit of the traditional political social contract theories crafted by Hobbes, Locke, and
Rousseau. Imagining a state of nature where individuals live without any political
governance, these thinkers think of what conditions must be met before citizens agree to
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form a government. The terms of the agreement are the canon upon which are specific
obligations of the government to its people drawn from. In the same manner, the social
contract theory imagines a scenario where there are no formed businesses but only
individual producers, and then proceeds to ask conditions must be met before businesses
are allowed to be formed.

When businesses are legally recognized as agents, society "authorizes them to

own and use land and natural resources and to hire members of society as employees."
The "price" of being given access to these privileges is the mandate to improve the welfare
of the community. Corporations, with its resources and functions, must be exploitable for
the betterment of society. Hasnas enumerates how businesses may enhance the welfare of
society from the perspective of the social contract:

1. Benefit consumers by increasing economic efficiency, stabilizing levels of

output and channels of distribution, and increasing liability resources
2. Benefit employees by increasing their income potential, diffusing their
personal liability, and facilitating their income allocation.
3. Minimizing pollution and depletion of natural resources, the destruction of
personal accountability, the misuse of political power, as well as worker alienation,
lack of control over working conditions, and dehumanization.

The existence of businesses can be an enabling factor in a citizenry's economic life

by inducing new possibilities of interactions that generate opportunities for expanding
earning capacities and integrating leisure time to an otherwise tight working schedule. If
businesses conduct their affairs fairly employees stand to benefit from the stability
provided by a regular salary. So long as companies respect workers' labor rights, the
latter's productivity may be channeled to various endeavors that essentially support the
economic apparatuses of society. Within the ambit of justice and fairness, society stands
to gain a lot from the existence of various business enterprises.

Reidenbach and Robin's Conceptual Model of

Corporate Moral Development

R. Eric Reidenbach and Donald P. Robin argue that there are certain organizational
behaviors that exhibit a business' level of moral development. While it is true that profit
is the main goal of any business enterprise, society demands that corporations also try to
contribute to certain social goals. It cannot be denied that there is a certain culture that
may tolerate unethical behavior on the part of business enterprises. It is, therefore,
necessary that there be an objective measure or standard against which the prevailing
ethical culture business may be judged as either ethical or sub-ethical.

The following classificatory variables are used for Reidenbach and Robin's model
of corporate moral development: "management philosophy and attitudes, evidence of
ethical values manifested in the business's culture, and the existence and proliferation of
organizational cultural ethics and artifacts (codes, ombudsmen, reward systems)."

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 There are five stages that comprise the model: amoral, legalistic, responsive,
emerging ethical, and ethical. The model is inspired by Lawrence Kohlberg's Stages of
Moral Development. Reidenbach and Robin assert that a direct application of Kohlberg's
model is not possible since individuals do not develop in the same manner as
organizations. Briefly, Kohlberg's model is as follows:

Level 1: Pre-conventional morality

Stage 1: Obedience and punishment: behavior driven by avoiding punishment
Stage 2: Individual Interest: behavior driven by self- interest and rewards

Level 2: Conventional morality

Stage 1: Interpersonal: behavior driven by social approval
Stage 2: Authority: behavior driven by obeying authority and conforming to social
order

Level 3: Post- Conventional morality

Stage 1: Social Contract: behavior driven by balance of social order and individual
rights
Stage 2: Universal Ethics: behavior driven by internal moral principles"

Kohlberg's model shows how an individual's moral development progresses from

being based on external factors to one that is founded upon internal moral motivation. Just
as not all individuals pass through the six stages, the same holds true for business
organizations, according to Reidenbach and Robin. In addition, corporate moral
development is not necessarily a continuous process. As management or new mergers
occur, an organization experiences a sudden change in ethical climate that signifies either
progression or regression in its moral development.

The Stages of Organizational Moral Development Stage 1: The amoral organization

This type of organization is defined by a "winning at any cost" attitude. Ethics is the
least of its concerns. It is an enterprise completely absorbed in productivity and
profitability. It only thinks about ethics when it gets caught in some wrongdoing. For this
type of organization, the only social responsibility of a business is to make a profit. As
Reidenbach and Robin say, "Top management rules by power and authority and
employees respond by acquiescing to that authority and power through a reward system
which supports a 'go along' type of behavior." Those who obey the rules without question
are rewarded, while those who dare to question management are ultimately punished by
expulsion from the organization. Employees are treated as mere means for productivity
and profit for the enterprise. Reidenbach and Robin "The ethical culture of a stage one
organization can be summed up in the ideas that 'They will never know,' 'Everybody does
it,' 'We will not get caught,” and 'There is no way anyone will ever find out.‖ From this
perspective, the owners and investors are the most important stakeholders.

Stage 2: The legalistic corporation

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 Firms in stage two "exhibit compliance with the letter of the law as opposed to the
spirit of the law." An organization in this state of moral development exhibits a respect
for laws, codes, and regulations. This firm is concerned with following state rules, placing
a premium on the legality of an action over the morality of it. It places a great deal of
responsibility on its legal team to make sure that corporate policies are executed in
accordance with the laws of the state, so as to avoid any legal complications. From this
perspective, what is legal corresponds to what is right. While it shares the principality of
the profit motive with stage one, stage two is concerned with the legality of the way by
which profit is gained.

Stage 3: The responsive corporation

This type of corporation begins to acquire values other than profitability and
legality. These firms have it in their interest to do right, but it considers more as an
expediency rather than an end in itself. In other words, these types of corporations are
inclined to give in to societal demands and, therefore, realize that business has an
obligation to operate with society in mind. They have a code of ethics that seeks to align
corporate goals with societal demands. As Reidenbach and Robin clarify, "Concern for
other stakeholders begins to manifest itself as managements begin to realize the
importance of employees and the community in which they operate. This nascent concern
is not motivated by of doing right for right's sake but rather is a recognition of the
organizations greater social role." At this stage, doing good is a matter of expediency.

Stage 4: The emergent ethical organization

This type of organization actively seeks greater balance between profit and ethics.
It recognizes the existence of a social contract between business and society. The ethical
consequences of any corporate decision are given weight along with its potentiality for
profitability. Various instruments are designed to make sure that the firm and its various
agents conduct business ethically. There are handbooks, policy statements, committees,
ombudsmen, and ethics program directors that seek to manage and ethically account for
the conduct of the organization with respect to its various responsibilities to different
stakeholders. Reidenbach and Robin give the example of Boeing and General Mills to
illustrate what happens at this stage. Boeing facilitates ethics training programs and has
installed a toll-free number for employees to report ethical violations. General Mills
recruits individuals that share the same cultural and ethical values with the company. It
also has a set of guidelines for dealing with vendors, competitors, and customers.
However, Reidenbach and Robin note that, "While responsive corporations begin to
develop ethical mechanisms to increase the probability of ethical behavior, these
organizations not yet fully comfortable with their implementation. Top management
recognizes the importance and value of this type of behavior but lacks the experience and
expertise to make it work effectively." In other words, although stage four firms recognize
the value of ethics, they lack the necessary proficiency in administering and maximizing
the potential of ethical mechanisms. Nonetheless, there is a real effort in making sure that
profits are earned morally.

Stage 5: The ethical organization

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 Reidenbach and Robin say that they do not know of any business organization that
has reached this stage of corporate moral development. They describe this type of
organization as follows

Stage five behavior is characterized by an organization-wide acceptance of a common

set of ethical values that permeates the organization's culture. These core values guide the
everyday behavior of an individual's actions Decisions are made based on the inherent
justness and fairness of the decision as well as the profitability of the decision. In this sense.
there is a balance between concerns for profits and ethics. Employees are rewarded for
walking away from actions in which the ethical position of the organization would be
compromised.

At this stage, normative moral theories are used as guides for designing various
organizational activities. There is also a continuing ethical training program that is
integrated with the employees' technical training program. This kind of culture has a deep
sense of duty and obligation to what is right and fair. The job is evaluated from a moral
standpoint, highlighting dimensions that pertain to social responsibility, fairness, and
justice. The main difference between stage four and stage five is the level of dedication the
company exhibits in funneling its resources towards the goal of making the firm truly ethical
in all aspects. Stage four heavily relies on the ethical mechanisms to enforce ethical
behavior, while stage five has already imbibed ethics in its corporate culture In stage five,
there is perfect harmony of the correct action and the ethical action. One, therefore, sees
why he/she would have a difficult time finding companies that have reached this level of
moral development.

These five stages illustrate how corporations vary in their understanding and
appreciation of ethics and its relation to the profit motive. As firms progress up the stages,
ethics becomes more integrated in their operations. The stages help one understand how
different companies try to inculcate ethical behavior in their various dealings with various
stakeholders. As the profit motive becomes more balanced with the obligation to be ethical,
a company is shown to be less concerned with itself and, therefore, more attentive to its
societal obligations. entity that pools various resources from different sources, both human
and non-
human, it realizes that it has a responsibility to make sure that its operations do not hinder
the flourishing of these stakeholders. In the course of its ethical maturity, it also realizes
that its existence has profound effects on the welfare of citizens and the natural
environment.
The theories presented in this chapter show how ethical a achieved business. Codification
of rules and manual for ethics are integral in achieving a higher level of moral development
in a company. As these rules become normatively instilled in the business environment, the
ethical climate in the workplace evolves from being a place purely motivated by profit at
all cost into an environment that seeks to gain this profit in the most just and fair way
possible. Such a change may incur costs for the business, but since it IS now working with
an ethical horizon in view, it sees ethics as part and parcel of doing business and not just an
ad hoe recourse to save it from lawsuits. While ethics may not be the prevailing motive of
an ethical company, it seeks to frame its profit-making agenda within just and fair practices
that are conscious of all stakeholders, including the natural environment.

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 APPLICATION

Part 1: Essay
1. How is the stockholder theory similar to and different from the
stakeholder theory?
2. How is the concept of legality related to the social contract theory of
business?
3. Can an amoral organization be ethical? If so, how? If not, why not?
4. What are some notable differences between a legalistic corporation and
a responsive one?

Part 2: Group Activity

A. With your group, simulate business board meeting and perform the
difference between the stakeholder theory and the social contract theory. Come up
with actors and scripts to demonstrate this in class.

B. With a partner, research on companies that have a reputation for being

ethical in running their business. Come up with a list of their practices that exhibit
their advanced organizational moral development.

Good job! You have just finished Lesson 2 of this

module. Now if you are ready, please proceed to the next lesson of
this module which will discuss about the question of women and
their emancipation.

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 Lesson 3

T he Question of Women and

their Emancipation

OBJECTIVES

At the end of this chapter, you should be able to:

1. explain the necessity of feminism;
2. discuss and articulate the idea that women's rights are human rights; and
3. recognize how women's rights are abused and articulate possible paths to
emancipation and equality.

INTRODUCTION

In this lesson, we reflect on the questions posed by feminist ethics. It is branch of

ethical thinking framed by women to confront the challenges women face. It is a theory
of the good and justice that puts into focus the abuses and injustices that women have
to suffer and theorizes why these injustices exist and how we can address them. But
more than just a theory about injustices and abuses and how to address these, feminist
theory presents a way of theorizing the good from the perspective of women.
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 The movements toward the emancipation of women in a sustained and global
manner is only a recent phenomenon. There are many theories about why women are
oppressed and how they should be emancipated. The theories continue to develop and it
is important for students to know the basic issues and the foundational theories of
feminism.

ACTIVITY

Look and observe the picture and answer the questions indicated in the analysis.

ANALYSIS:

1. What do you think of when you hear the word ―Feminism?

_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________

2. Do you know any social groups or organization that promotes the rights and welfare of
all human being? What are these groups? What are their functions?
_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________

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 ABSTRACTION

Why Feminist Ethics?

To large extent, feminist ethical theory can be understood as both response to and
a movement against, a historical tradition of abstract, universalist, ethical theories such as
utilitarianism, deontology, and in certain respects, contractarianism and virtue theory,
which tend to view the moral 318 either as an autonomous, rational actor, deliberating out
of a calculus of utility or duty, or else an often disembodied and decontextualized ideal
decision- maker, unburdened by the non-ideal constraints of luck (moral and otherwise),
circumstance, OF capability (Nagel 1979; Brennan 1999; Nussbaum 2000). Specifically,
feminist ethicists contend that this top-down, juridical, principalist theorizing has largely
neglected the centrality of physical, social, and psychological situatedness, power
differentials, and, importantly, the voices of women whose lived experiences have simply
not been part of any ongoing moral debates (Young 2005; Jaggar 1992; Walker 1997;
Lindemann Nelson 2001; Held 1990; Tess ran 2005). As Alison Jaggar argues, traditional
ethics emphasizes male-centered issues of the public and the abstract while dismissing
the private and the situated. As a result, women, and "women's issues" that have to do
with care, interdependent relationships, community, partiality, and the emotions, are de-
centered, and relegated to the margins of serious intellectual (and specifically
philosophical) inquiry (Tong and Williams 2014; Jaggar 1992).

It is true that many of the theories studied in the first half of this book presuppose
that the ethical person must be trained to act as an individual whose ethical mind is
autonomous and not dependent on anyone but his own rationality. The basis of acting on
the good is a set of criteria which guides us in calculating the good act from an abstract
perspective. Abstract deliberation means thinking about the good based more on what
rules or laws it follows. These could be rules of social cohesion and order. For instance,
how do stealing and cheating violate principles of private property or ownership? If one
steals, is social order not disturbed? Are the principles of private ownership, which is the
keystone to much economic activity, not violated and disrespected? The rules could also
be rules of deliberation. For instance, how does one properly think about stealing? What
are the proper steps in coming to a moral understanding of stealing? Is one's own decision
about this particular case of stealing consistent with the kind of decision arrived at by one
who follows the proper steps for genuine moral thinking?

The reason why these rules are important to traditional ethics is because these male-
defined frameworks think about people as independent or autonomous individuals, who
act using their reason which calculates the good based on clear formulas that certainly
lead the free person to a clear decision on what is acceptable as good to all rational, free
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persons. The emphasis on traditional ethics was to find a way for free and autonomous
persons to have a systematic process for arriving at a universal conception of the good on
which to base action. The quest for ethical theorists was to have a systematic process at
arriving at socially binding conceptions of the good.

This method of arriving at a conception of the good was concerned mainly with
questions of the good in the public sphere and in acts that shape the historical unfolding
of civilizations or the development of nations and communities. Thus. ethics was
preoccupied with questions regarding justice profit and business relations, crime and
punishment the relations between citizens and the state, and the dealings of people with
each other. It became necessary, therefore, for ethics to think about abstract, universal
bases for deciding the good.

Women ethical theorists recognize as well the value of abstract ethical thinking as
guide to thinking about the good. However, they would like to demonstrate how women
have another voice or another ethical rationality that is not confined to these traditional
theories. Rather than decide from purely abstract rationality, they wish to show that
women's conception of the good is relational and situated or concrete. In Carol Gilligan's
groundbreaking book, In Another Voice, she shows that women decide the good based on
their concern for preserving relationships and for their concern for the welfare or feelings
of others. Rather than focus on abstract, universalizable rules, they decide based on the
concrete needs of the persons involved and how their decisions cultivate or harm their
relationships with other people. Women have another way of articulating the good which
deserves to be recognized as another way of moral deliberation.

Concretely, this means that when some women think about stealing, they do not
think about how an autonomous, rational being ought to think about stealing but they
would think about it like a person whose meaning and worth are tied in a community of
persons whose well-being is founded on those relationships. Thus, their main concern
when they think about the good is who will be harmed by one's actions and decisions.
And the harm, of course, concerns the interests and wellbeing of people, but it also
considers if relations will be preserved and if the interests of the parties concerned can be
preserved and cultivated. Often, this is known as the ethics of care because of its interest
in deciding for what is best, such that everyone is cared for.

The famous example used by Carol Gilligan is the male and female response to the
Heinz dilemma. Heinz poses this dilemma: If one's wife was sick and could only be saved
if one steals the medicine from the druggist due to lack of money, should he steal the
medicines? Males would typically argue that the husband should because the principle
was that the right to life overrides the right to property. Or that he should not because
stealing is a crime that violates the rules of the state. However, women reason otherwise.
They argue that instead of stealing, the husband should plead with or negotiate with the
druggist. This way everyone is cared for, is allowed to realize their goodness, and
relationships are preserved.

This discovery and articulation of the ethics of care is a breakthrough in ethical

thinking because it balances the way people think about the good. The canon of ethical
thinking only represents calculative, abstract thinking about the good and does not
articulate how we can arrive at the ought using concrete, relational care for the other-
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based thinking. With feminist ethics, Philosophy has come to realize that ethical
deliberation must learn to take into consideration the well- being of all concerned from a
more holistic and particular perspective.

Equality and Discrimination

The primary concern of feminist ethics is the question of equality. For as long as the
dominant world civilizations have existed, women have been treated as the lesser that has
to suffer abuse and discrimination. This takes on many forms, the most Pervasive of which
are sexual exploitation, confinement to only a few as s in society which are not equally
compensated, the prevention from taking on significant leadership roles in the family and
public sphere, and the expectation to rear children while by s the often bearing the burden
of Providing for their sustenance.

This is not to mention the various forms of violence that women have to contend
with such as domestic abuse, rape, and fatal neglect. There are truly some things women
suffer just because they are women. For instance, women are almost always the victim of
rape; widows are exiled or burned, and female children are neglected to die or killed just
because they are female.

The reason for such abuse is that women are not considered as valuable as men and,
therefore, can be used, neglected, and abused without remorse. Women have been so
conditioned to this degradation that they often cooperate with it. Mothers hold down their
own daughters as they are circumcised. Women gossip about and ostracize those women
who choose to focus on their careers and share childrearing tasks with their husbands or
their parents. Women themselves facilitate in the trafficking of other women. On the
whole, women have accepted their lower status and do not challenge it. They have
embraced the double burden of childrearing and housework even if they have a high status
in society.

The reason for this acceptance of women's marginalization is because people have
taken this lower status to be ordained by the gods or by nature. And women themselves
do not think that the removal of a clitoris or the sewing up of a vagina so it does not feel
sexual pleasure is bad. In fact, they seek it for their children because it is the only way for
their daughters to find a husband and security. Little girls themselves look forward to the
day of their circumcision. Women believe that because they bear children, they should be
solely responsible for the raising of their children even if in some circumstances they are
responsible for providing as much, if not more, of the family's sustenance.

Why is the inequality of women accepted and propagated by society? Feminist

thinkers have shown that the acceptance of women's inequality lies in how the
discrimination is inscribed in culture and social structures. For instance, circumcision is
accepted because certain societies value the fidelity of women to their husbands. This has
much to do with the passing of property to one's own heirs. In a patriarchal society where
the ownership of land is assigned to the men. they have to be sure that the inheritors of
their land are males of their own genetic line.

Women today are defined by how their bodies are shaped according to how media
have determined their desirability. The main traits of desirable women are thinness,
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firmness that is still defined by soft lines, flawless skin, silken hair, and whiteness and, to
some extent firm, round breasts. Women are generally so obsessed with this standard of
universal womanhood that they go on starvation diets, engage in exercise regimens, and
the application of numerous whitening, smoothening, polishing, and reducing processes.
Men do not subject themselves to such processes and do not feel the necessity to be
defined this way. The reason for this is because in most contemporary societies, women
have been determined to be objects of the male gaze. They exist to be desired, owned, and
shown off as trophies of successful men. Women are often objecting for men to act upon.
This is supported by the mass media and is portrayed in their commercials every day.

All our social structures support this image. Dolls either teach girls that they have
to be pretty and present themselves to men like Barbie, or that only they should be trained
to care for babies. As they grow up, mothers constantly nag daughters about how they
look and how people perceive them and not really about their academic or athletic
performance. In their teenage years, they are valued by how many boys they attract. In
the world of work, they are rarely assigned to take management or leadership positions
and are expected sell to take on jobs where they care for children and the sick, or sell their
products or services using their feminine charms or bodies.

There is no social support system for mothers who want to work unless other women
are employed to care for her children. Women are taught the value of nurturing
relationships and peacebuilding while in the economic realm, aggressiveness and
competitiveness are the values that define success. Society supports inequality, and,
because inequality is built into our societies, it is accepted as natural.

Thus, a very important theme of Feminist ethics is to emancipate women from social
structures that keep them oppressed and unequal. The struggle for justice and liberation
has focused on certain themes which reflect the different aspects of emancipation for
women.

The first phase of their struggle for liberation was the struggle for equal rights, which
took the form of the suffragette movement. Here, women demanded for the equal right to
vote, and later expanded to the demand for equal rights in various aspects of social life.
This phase began around the turn of the 19th century until about the latter part of the 20th
century. This was the time when women were able to participate in different occupations
and proved they were as capable as men. After women had institutionalized the respect
for their rights, they next focused their work on the analysis of the social structures that
oppressed them.

In this phase of the liberation struggle, women were able to examine how oppressive
the social systems were because these defined them as housewives and caregivers, objects
of men's sexual desires and ownership, and as non-productive citizens whose contribution
was limited to keeping the home functional. It was at this phase when women realized
that by should not only want to have equal rights as men but also that they wanted to be
recognized as different and equal to men. They had different ways of ethical reasoning
but it should be recognized as equally valid and necessary to a society's articulation of the
good. They had different ways of knowing, valuing, and governing, and these should be
recognized as equally valid and equally valuable in shaping our shared values and
systems. This was a time for analyzing how all our social systems oppressed women and
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how they should be reformed to serve women's ways and develop women's capacity to
build society. Many development agencies focused on setting up programs that gave
women equal opportunities to earn an income, explore their role in society, and take
leadership.

It was also at this time that Western women discovered that their own aggressive
definition of what it meant to be women and what women should want was oppressive to
non- Western women. Women from Asia and Africa asserted that their own analysis of
how their own definition of womanhood was different but equal to that of Western
women. And so, the voices of more women were emancipated and different ways of being
a woman were celebrated and supported. Filipina feminists at this time explored how their
traditional cultures should be embraced for how they celebrated the centrality of women's
roles as nurturers and healers, as much as they celebrated their role as warriors and
community leaders. There are numerous examples of women leaders such as Gabriela
Silang, Gregoria de Jesus, and the countless babaylan who were the precursors of the
Filipina activists, development workers, politicians, and educators of today.

How We Con Work Toward Emancipation

Today, the women’s emancipation movement is an ongoing project with women

continuing the struggle for equality while discovering various and creative ways of being
women. The aims of the movement continue to evolve with more and more women
exploring social realities and exposing how economic, communication, governance, and
cultural systems oppress women. As before, feminists of all genders explore how women
can continue to push against the boundaries of oppression. Despite this, it is still clear that
women are not fully equal in our shared world. Thus, we must ask ourselves how to think
about the good with a mind to realize gender equality and genuine liberation.

There are many areas to consider when thinking about doing the good using a
woman's ethical perspective. The first, of course, is to protect the rights of women. As
women activists rightly remind us, women's rights are human rights. This means that the
first thing we must do with regard to the liberation of women is to ensure that all their
rights are preserved. The right to life, the right to the means of survival, the right to
education, the right to bodily integrity, the right to access health care -these are all very
basic rights. However, these rights are easily violated for women.

For instance, the right to education is important because it prepares people to

intelligently and freely participate in the life of their community. Through education we
become creative people who can participate in the task of building our shared world. But
many women are denied the most basic education and thus are deprived of the knowledge
about how their government works, about their economic systems, and the goings on in
the world around them. In some countries, women are kept from getting any kind of
education because of certain cultural beliefs that take on the form of religious dogma.
This puts women at a great disadvantage because the deprived of the capacity to creatively
participate ensure the right in their societies. It is very important to of women to education
that allows them to become creative persons.

The bodies of women are also violated all the time for various reasons. Some
cultures believe that husbands can use their wives sexually without her consent. Other
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societies believe that women can be kidnapped and treated as sex slaves and indentured
servants just because they are unprotected. So many societies believe that rape is a weapon
of war and that men can violate the bodies of women to sow fear in a community. The
right of women to their bodily integrity and to their dignity as human beings must be
respected and protected. But it seems that because they are women, it is easy for many
people to forget that women's rights are basic human rights. Other than their basic human
rights, there are rights that need special attention and protection. For instance, the right to
their reproductive health. Women who bear children have a right to medical treatment
that pertains to their health from pregnancy to motherhood. This means access to prenatal
medicines and care, access to safe childbirth methods, and mother and child health care.
It may also mean access to birth control methods because having too many children may
be dangerous for women. In some cultures, women are deprived of this basic care because
they are too poor and are not prioritized by their government. It is also possible that they
are just not valued as much as men and do not receive equal support. Whatever the reason,
reproductive health must be prioritized by a society.

Violence against women is another special area of concern. Because of the status of
women as a lower form of humanity and because they are often seen as property, women
are subjected to all kinds of psychological and physical abuse. Other than rape, they are
prone to physical beatings and psychological torture from abusive spouses. Thus, there
must be a special focus on the analysis of the roots of this violence and legislation and
social reform to prevent it. There are laws specifically addressed to prevent violence
against women and there are organizations that educate the public about the violence and
counsel its victims. If society is made aware of what acts are effectively violent against
women and women are counseled to realize the abuse that they do not have to suffer, then
the violence could end.

Finally, it is important to engage in critical thinking with regard to women's issues.

Every society needs to explore and reflect on itself. Why are they so prone to do violence
against their women? What function does the oppression of women fulfill? Why is it
necessary? Usually, the practices that propagate violence against women are rooted in
some practice that was useful for a society. And so, we must ask why is it necessary to
circumcise women. How does it help to build those civilizations that Why do we like to
keep women from active participation in the governance of the state? Why is prostitution
necessary? What functions does it realize? We need to find this out and critically examine
if these practices serve anything but the suppression of more than half of the world's
population.

Another thing to do is analyze social institutions and practices to expose the violence
they commit against women. Some institutions seem benign but actually propagate
violence. For instance, the institutions that enshrine women's purity and honor may
actually end up enslaving them by keeping them away from the public sphere. The
adoration of women's bodies in fine arts could actually reinforce the continued
objectification of women as decoration or objects of desire. The celebration of women's
virtues for care, patience, and gentleness could limit their self-realization and their choice
of vocations. People need to critically examine the institutions, traditions, and ways of
life that could effectively limit the possibilities for women. This means that we should
genuinely appreciate those that prove to be empowering and reform those that work
against women's interests.

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 Of course, this is difficult work. It seemed easier in the 20th century to judge how
societies treated their women based on standards that Western women set. For instance,
Western feminists determined that all forms of unpaid domestic work and housewifery
were a form of enslavement. The choice of full-time motherhood was a choice that only
uneducated, enslaved women would make. Wearing the is a form of enslavement that
only traditional women are willing to do. However, women from non-Western-dominated
cultures have objected to this ethnocentric view of reality. Some women argue that the
burqa is liberating and deepens their spiritual experience. There is agreement now that it
is possible for domestic work to be a creative life choice and the raising of children is not
fundamentally enslavement if it is recognized as creative work. If we are sincere about
our desire to critique our cultural practices and assess their liberating potential, then
people must engage in the critical engagement of societies in a way that is not judgmental
but dialogical. Human beings must engage in a dialogue of equals where modern and
economically powerful do not equate to more advanced and liberated and traditional and
non-Western do not amount to enslaved and impoverished. Women and men come
together and allow the meeting of their horizons to show each other how their practices
have destructive and creative potentials for the liberation of women.

Women should not be discriminated

Women should not be discriminated against. based on their contribution to human civilization and its continuing
development, misogyny and chauvinism do not make se women bear the brunt of child rearing and introduce children
into the ways of their civilization.in the many societies they raise their children while earning a traditional society,
women ore depended especially in ensuring the well -being of all fifth in most developing countries (which mean women
manage family farms which produce the poorest people. They also preserve the world the onslaught of monoculture
factory farming by working on these small farms and keeping the traditional farm the preservation of these methods,
they are also preserving low-carbon, sustainable food production and process. Women are clearly as valuable as men
in the furthering of human life and civilization. It does not make sense that they are treated as lesser humans.

There are studies that demonstrate how women were actually the dominant gender in early human history until about
1500 BC. There was a time when human being’s mysterious bearer of life. Fertility was a creative forced that belonged
to the womb of the earth. This womb brought forth life, and the source of food for all people was dependent on this
fertility which was often depicted as women.

As long as women were associated with the powers of fertility, they were revered and thought of as the superior sex.
There were even cults where men would undergo painful genital mutilations so that they could become like women.
However, there was a turn in human history at about 1500 BC when penis worship replaced womb worship. The theory
for this shift is that at this point, human beings were developing agriculture and were learning more about the
fertilization of eggs. In other words, they realized that the male principle was essential to the development of life.
Unfortunately, began to believe that they were the active so were the passive receivers. Thus, the penis was revered as
powerful and somehow women were looked down on and even oppressed.

The reason for the oppression may be to repress the cult of women worship. Perhaps, some theorists claim men were
so jealous of their newfound status as dominant that they needed to suppress the possibility of the return of womb
worship. Whatever the reason it is clear that the status of women as oppressed is the result of historical developments.
It is not a necessity of nature that women are treated as the second sex and men the superior sex. It could be true that
men are thought to be superior because generation upon generation of certain societies have built institutions that
favor men over women.

Drawn from Rosalind Miles, who cooked the Last Supper? The Women’s History of the World (New York: Three Rivers
Press, 1988)

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 The Babaylan in Philippine History

Women played a very prominent leadership role in pre-Hispanic Philippine society. Along with the datu and the
blacksmith, they were important persons in society because only they could communicate with the spirits. The spirits
were persons from the other realms of the earth who could help with a bountiful harvest, cure sickness, or cause
discomfort or death. They were able to bring good fortune or misfortune.

The babaylan were women who the sprits chose to communicate with them through some process of initiation. For
whatever qualities they were chosen, the babaylan were very important to the community because their welfare
depended these women. If people were suffering from physical, spiritual psychological maladies. the babaylan would
help guide them through it. And they were suffering misfortune, the babaylan would guide them through it. The
babaylan were the priests, poets, counselors, and myth keepers. When the Spaniards come, the babaylan also led the
people in resisting the invaders. They would lead revolts or gather communities to live according to their way of life,
away from the influence of the Spaniards.

It is unfortunate that the Spaniards finally succeeded in hunting down and killing the lost babaylan leaders. The
coming of these invaders signaled the beginning of the lowering of the status of women in Philippine communities.
Henceforth, women were made to retreat from the public sphere and Western, male values were imposed on the
people.
However, the babaylan were never totally suppressed and up to this day, we find them in various communities among
our different religions. And with the overthrow of the Spaniards, we find resurgence of women in the public sphere as
leaders, healers, and culture keepers

Drawn from Fe B. Mangahas, "The Babaylan Historico-Cultural Context," Centennial Crossings: Readings Feminism
in the Philippines, edited by Fe B. Mangahos and Jenny R. Llaguno (Quezon City: C & E Publishing Inc., 2006)

APPLICATION

Part 1: Poster Slogan Making

Create a poster slogan showcasing the importance of equality in the learning

environment in the 21st century. Explain your poster-slogan in not more than five sentences.

Part II:

A. Peer Work. Watch an episode of your favorite telenovela or a movie. Identify the
lead characters. Discuss what roles they play and what characteristics they have. Are
they lead actors? Do they drive the story or do they react to things? Can you consider
them to be strong characters? Are they mere caricatures or do they present real
person and stories that are worth considering and admiring? Knowing what you do
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about feminist theory, how do you assess the treatment of these characters by the
director and; writer. Share your answer with your peer and create a short reflection
based on your output.

______________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________

Good job! You have just finished Lesson 3 of this

module. Now if you are ready, please proceed to the next lesson of
this module which will discuss about the biomedical ethics.
.

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 Lesson 4

Biomedical Ethics
OBJECTIVES

At the end of this chapter, you should be able to:

1. articulate what a moral dilemma is in the medical field;
2. give examples of possible medical moral dilemmas; and
3. apply at least one philosopher's theory to a particular issue in medical ethics.

INTRODUCTION

In this lesson, we’ll see the sights of some of the problems of bioethics through
we’ll be taking a look at some of the most important and sometimes controversial topics
in the field of bioethics. Ethics can hardly keep up with the fast and confusing
advancement in the fields of genetics, medicine, and pharmacology. Biomedical ethics
has table grounding if it holds the inviolable, inherent, and intrinsic value of the person,
as well as one’s relational and communitarian realities.

You will be expected to learn how to take a position on some issue in

BIOMEDICAL ETHICS and to support your position using ethical principles and
reasoning.

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 ACTIVITY

Read and study the case presentation below.

Moral Problems and Questions

A physicist who had done research on x-rays for 30 years was suffering terribly from
skin cancer. Part of his upper nose and left hand were lost, growth had been removed
from his right arm and two fingers from his right hand. He was blind and in constant and
excruciating pain. Only surgery and continued suffering awaited the patient, who the
doctors felt had about two years to live. Eventually, the sibling of the patient, a man of
36, took a pistol and, after an afternoon and early evening wandering and drinking in
local bars, returned to the hospital during visiting hours and shot his brother to

ANALYSIS

Direction: Write your analysis on the case study regarding some of the problems and
issues of biomedical ethics.

1. If you were the youngest brother or sister, would you have done the same thing?

2. Would you approve of the means employed, or would you have preferred a more
subtle, nonviolent, and painless method? Justify your position

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 3. Evaluate the case in the light of any ethical theories of your own choice, whether you
approve of them or not.

ABSTRACTION

Ethics of "Prenatal Personhood

Heated discussion among ethicists always begins with the question: "When does
human personhood begin?" Locally discussion is grounded on the Philippine
constitution that upholds the protection of life of both the mother and the unborn

child. The Philippine Medical Association also released a document signed by Dr.Bu C.
Castro and Dr. Oscar Tinio clearly assuming that the human person exists at the point of
fertilization/conception. Even the culture supports such serious valuation of the unborn in that
a pregnant (buntis) woman is also said to be nagdadalangtao or childbearing (literally
humanbearing). Given such bedrock of certainties, the debate persists. For instance, if
conception is considered as a process, there has to be a point of readiness for the body to be
able to support the reality of the self as a person. Given that the body is not accidental to the
integrality of the human being, does it not need this particular stage of readiness to be able to
support personhood?

Such questions, however, are not enough to disprove the claim that human personhood
does not begin at the point of conception. At best, these considerations remain simply as
questions for discussion; they are not proofs. A more nuanced position which holds that since
it cannot be proved or disproved as factual that the human being begins to exist at the very point
of human conception, nevertheless "the fertilized or fetus ought to be treated as a human
person." This nuanced position passes on the burden of proof to those who raise such questions
as to the personhood of fetuses. If one thinks about it more, a pragmatic support is also found
in the fact that each one of the participants in the "ethical discussion of the start of personhood"
all went through the same process of conception or fertilization in the womb of his/her mother.
The issue cannot be made light of simply because it is a matter of philosophical discussion.

Ectopic Pregnancy and the Principle of Double Effect

James Keenan reported a discussion on the question of ectopic pregnancy as early as 1893.
An interesting point was raised in the discussion of the theologian named Aloysius Sabbetti
(1839-1898). If the fetus is said to be where it should not be in the case of ectopic pregnancy
(i.e., outside the and is threatening the life of the mother, can it be treated as an unjust aggressor?
A more precise nuanced is even arrived at by presenting it as a "materially unjust aggressor,"
that is, even without intention simply because it is in the wrong place, the immature fetus is a
grave threat to the life of the mother. It is likened to someone under the influence of drugs or
alcohol who may be so that clear intentions are no longer present but nonetheless severely
threatens to kill. A better analogy is even presented in a case when the soldier who belongs to
an invading army is detected by a sniper who is defending a particular territory. While unseen,
the sniper is not intentionally threatened by the soldier but simply because he is in the place
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where he should not be, self-defense demands action (not excluding fatal shooting) on the part
of the sniper. Given such logic of "self- defense" against a "materially unjust aggressor", is
abortion ill of the fetus acceptable?

Ethicists who belong to the Catholic communion were given an instruction clearly
defining that it is a matter of faith for this particular Church that it is not allowed to use the
category of aggressor, formal or material in questioning involving fetal life. abortion is also
defined as an intrinsic evil act that is acceptable in any direct and intended form as a human
action. The case then of ectopic pregnancy occasions the principle of double effect. This
principle is applied in the case of an action that is seen to have two results: one is known as
good and hence that which we can only intend; another simultaneous effect is bad, however,
but since we do not intentionally do it for that purpose, this can be considered as a mere
byproduct of the action. The bad effect is willed to not have occurred at all only if such an
instance is possible.

The originating act ought to be deemed good or at the very least morally neutral. Applying
this to the case of ectopic pregnancy, it is unacceptable that the medical professional directly
aborts the fetus; hence, his/her action of surgically cutting the fallopian tube that is clogged is
a more tolerable option. Such a surgical intervention saves the mother but sadly also results in
the indirect removal of the misplaced fetus.

If personalist ethics is applied to biomedical issues, in this instance, the option that
upholds the value of the fetus as that who "ought to be treated as a person" should be
maintained. It may be considered that imputing aggression albeit materially (without intention)
to a fetus is indicative of an objectification of one who is deserving of better consideration.
Emmanuel Levinas, in his critique of just war, once said that his reservation regarding
justification of wars is that in being justified one loses his/her conscience or conscientiousness.
The same can be said here; a justified self-defense may push one to erringly shun that "the fetus
ought to be treated as a person."

Child-Bearing Enhancements, Self-Improvement, and General Well-being

The applications in the field of medicine have put forward wonders in the area of
enhancement of human beings. Those who had difficulty in having children, for instance, are
now given options to better improve their chances of conceiving a child. The Human Genome
Project has promised personally designed drugs that can better improve one's health or recovery
from sickness. Given the advancement of human genetic mapping, predispositions to particular
sicknesses and syndromes can be detected the earliest (as discussed above even during the first
10 to 12 weeks of pregnancy). While these breakthroughs and applications are not evil in
themselves, personalist ethics provide us with a larger view in considering the relational and
communitarian dimensions of the human person.

The cost of child-bearing techniques until now is exorbitantly high. While this may not
be an issue for those who can afford them, the number of adoptees and children born in poor
families deserve to also be considered in the decision. Is the cost of childbearing that benefits
from the interventions available in high-end hospitals "acceptable in justice" for a country that
still indicate 40% self-reported poverty? Perhaps the traditional consideration of "common
good" is also in place in this instance. If there are so many children who are orphans, don't they
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deserve priority over such costly means especially if the cost of having a single child can in
effect support 2 or 3 children in their rearing to adulthood?

Another issue to be considered in the present state of childbearing enhancements has to

do with the so-called ―Spares." Present techniques of child-conceiving enhancements involve
the harvesting of egg cells from the mother. Since it is impossible or costly to store these
without fertilizing them, what are frozen in that give such services are human embryos or
fetuses that are awaiting womb implantation. The 100% success of a single implantation is not
yet reached so a number of fertilized eggs or embryos are frozen as "spares." An important
question that is occasioned by this process has to do with the "spares" that are left after a
successful pregnancy up to the full term is achieved.

Maintaining the principle that the fetus "ought to be treated as a human person," a careful
monitoring of the "spares" is in order. The Philippines has boasted recently of local doctors'
ability to engage in stem cell therapy. While stem cell research has reached developments that
most no longer make use of human embryos, the history of this research betrays the fact that it
does not exclude such methods. The absence of laws defining "spares" as deserving of treatment
as human persons simply mean that the "spares" are not out of the reach of unconscientious
therapists. Embryos in the first 14 days are known for their totipotency (multipotency), that is,
germane in the "spares" are the cells that make up every organ in the human body including
gray matter that is important for the brain. This is hardly negligible especially given the
presence of massive monetary support for researches that address debilitating diseases such as
Parkinson's and Alzheimer's that hit retired and financially influential first-world citizens. The
awareness of these issues is too low and the temptation to enter into it too strong that the
victimization and objectification of these "spares" may already be happening in our country.

Other self-enhancements and general well-being improvements that are now available to
those who can afford them ought to be evaluated also along the lines of personalist ethics. While
personal improvements such as the intake of glutathione for aesthetic improvements can hardly
be branded as evil or bad, ethicists warn of the objectification that is peddled by such "self-
actualization" products. Most concerting are the products that purport to improve the well-being
or intelligence of children. While these may truly be beneficial for them, the question should
be raised: "Is it contributing to the view that children are like projects that should follow the
designs deemed relevant by parents?" This objectification affects personal regard between them
and leads to intolerance of personal differences between family members.

Other products or techniques (including surgery) that sell self-enhancements should be

countered or balanced with an appeal to personal growth that is not only physical. Bodily
aesthetic or self-actualization directions ought to be inclusive of interior values such as
kindness, solidarity, and compassion. While a moneyed person may have access to such
services or products, justice and the traditional concept of common good demand a mitigation
(individual as well as communal evaluation) of these commercialized self-enhancements.

Extraordinary Means, Euthanasia, and the Significance of a Living Will

A brief examination of end-of-life ethical issues continues the view that is consistently
personalist in orientation.

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 Euthanasia or mercy killing is the, direct murder of another human being and is thus
unacceptable at this point in the Philippines. The value given to persons is inherent and
inviolable for personalist ethics that it excludes the direct and Intentional killing of a non-
aggressor. End of life care ought to be improved to ensure the dignified dying that is worthy of
human persons. Pain management and hospice care, particularly for those who suffer, should
be explained clearly, made researchable and available, especially for the poor country. A
distinction, however, should be made between euthanasia and termination of ―extraordinary
means‖ that simply allow the process of dying to take its course. The stoppage of extraordinary
means, without which the sick person is simply allowed to have a dignified death, is not passive
euthanasia. Extraordinary means are additional or artificial ways that extend the life of a person,
e.g., respirator. If the chances of recovering are deemed by doctors as slim and the family no
longer has the means to continue the costly use of these means, taking away the respirator does
not mean the sick person who can no longer breathe on his own. The process of death in this
instance is permitted to follow its course, and the person is simply allowed to go through the
process of a dignified death.

The writing of a living will be, therefore, relevant to give guidance to loved ones in the
remote possibility that an accident or sickness renders someone "brain dead," comatose, or in
a persistent vegetative state. Personal autonomy is given priority even in such instances that the
living will (that is left behind) is significantly considered. Is the person open to organ donation
and to what extent of organ harvesting for the life of other persons is permissible? Hospitals
put up DNR not resuscitate) cards in accordance with a patient's living will (else the wishes of
the next of kin is followed). Again, DNRs are different from euthanasia. It is the rescinding of
CPR (cardiopulmonary resuscitation) or other means of resuscitations in the event of a fatal
crash of the patient. DNR allows for dignified death. The writing of living wills permits the
resolution of confusion that may arise in families regarding such difficult decisions. Personalist
ethics also stresses the communitarian dimension in the writing of living will. Other persons
can also be saved through the willingness of the brain-dead patient (expressed in the living
will one’s have left behind) to them with an extension of life through organ donation.

APPLICATION

Part 1: Essay
1. What is moral dilemma in the field of medical ethics? Provide examples of
medical moral dilemmas.
2. How relevant is the personalist perspective in the consideration of biomedical
ethics?
3. Explain the significance and nuance of the mandate, "Embryos ought to be treated
like human persons."

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Part II

Research on a particular ethical dilemma presented in this section or choose one of your
own research. Try to explain a possible response to the dilemma using any of the
philosophical systems presented throughout this course. Explain why you chose this.

CONGRATULATIONS!

You have just finished studying the lessons in this module. You
may now proceed to the last module which will feature more of
the crimes against human life.

Module Assessment
A.
Reflect on this quote from Kohák using either Singer’s or
Regan’s ideas

Are we a "higher" species? A disinterested observer, coolly

examining the evidence and assessing humanity's impact upon the globe,
would not likely come to the conclusion. The works of humans have left o trail
of devastation across the face of the Earth. Nor have we served our own kind
well. Even without invoking mushroom clouds, the daily inhumanity of
humans to each other

makes any claim to superiority suspect. Porcupines do not covet,

they bear no false witness, they do not commit adultery and they do no
murder. How can we claim superiority? At best, we are one species among
others. But then, what justifies the totally disproportionate cost of our
presence?
Ask it for once without presupposing the answer of the egotism
of our species as God might ask it about his creatures:
1. Why should o dog or a guinea pig die an agonizing death in a
laboratory experiment so that some human need not suffer that
same fate?

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 2. Would not any answer you give justify experimentation on
carefully selected humans-convicts were occasionally used,
Watson used foundling children-as well?

3. Why, in the perspective of eternity, should the life of a human be

more precious than that of a dog?

4. Why should the dog's suffering weigh any less in the moral
balance of the cosmos?
5. Why should a woodchuck die, wasted by the side of the highway,
just so that a human should not be inconvenienced in his headless rush to
nowhere?

B.

Corporate Social Responsibility

Corporate Social Responsibility, commonly
referred to as CSR, is a company's strategic initiative to
contribute to the well-being of society and the
environment. Also known as corporate citizenship, CSR
aims to positively contribute to the reduction of waste
and pollution in the environment and contribute to
social welfare causes, such as educational programs for
the poor. These initiatives have short-term costs for the
company that are ideally not aimed for profit, but
instead promote sustainable environmental and social
development.

C.

If you were a film director and you were making a film about
the everyday practices of a certain tribal community where
animal sacrifice is prevalent, how would you go about directing
the film if you wish to follow Singer's or Regan's arguments? Is
there on ethical way of making your film?

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 Module Summary
You have completed the fourth module of Ethics covering Special Topics in Ethics.
Key points covered in the module include:
• The natural environment understood as the complex biotic community that
serves as the primordial source of life, deserves to be treated ethically, perhaps
now, more than ever.
• Tom Regan. He holds that certain non-human animals have actual rights,
which make them morally considerable, and oddly enough it is not rationality
that makes them so for him. For him it is a being's being an experiencing
subject of a life that makes it count as morally considerable.
• Singer advocates equal treatment for all sentient beings, from animals to
human beings. He argues that in the same way that some people are prejudiced
against other people that are different from them in terms of race, gender, or
sexual orientation hey can also be accused of unjust prejudice against animals.
• For Taylor, outlook protects the rights of all living organisms, including plants
and microorganisms, to seek out their good and well-being. As a Teleological
center-of-life, an organism exists for the sake of furthering its existence by
undergoing changes and processes that improve its well-being.
• Robin Attfield proposes a revision of biocentrism by arguing for a hierarchical
view, which holds that even if all beings that have a good of their own possess
inherent value, some beings, namely persons, have greater intrinsic value.
• Aldo Leopold, in his A Sand County Almanac, holds that ―a thing is right
when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability, and beauty of the biotic
community. It is wrong when it tends otherwise."
• Ethics is the study of how one ought to conduct oneself in relation to others.
Business, as most people see it, is a world that seems to be exempt from the
ought since it is quite understandable that business people seek only the good
for themselves.
• A stakeholder is defined as any group or individual that stands to benefit or
suffer from decisions made by a corporation.
• The normative theory states that "all businesses are ethically obligated to
enhance the welfare of society by satisfying consumer and employee interests
without violating any of the general canons of justice.”
• Corporate Social Responsibility, commonly referred to as CSR, is a company's
strategic initiative to contribute to the well-being of society and the
environment.
• Euthanasia or mercy killing is the, direct murder of another human being and
is thus unacceptable at this point in the Philippines.
• Using the advancements in medicine to improve the well-being of persons
may be very attractive but also misleading if we treat physicality as an end in
itself.

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• Man in his/her freedom is the very height of his/her being. How he/she uses
that freedom in biomedical issues is not only a concern about the limits of how
far he/she can go but is first and foremost a question of who he/she is or what
is he/she to become given his/her biomedical decisions.
• "Treating the embryo as a human person" not only ensures the dignity and
value of the fetal life that is being studied; the principle engages the medical
practitioners and researchers themselves.
• Autonomy of the human person is respected in hospitals that the living will is
of utmost importance and posts are ensured to be consistent with them.
• The women’s emancipation movement is an ongoing project with women
continuing the struggle for equality while discovering various and creative
ways of being women. The aims of the movement continue to evolve with
more and more women exploring social realities and exposing how economic,
communication, governance, and cultural systems oppress women.
• Feminist ethics demands an opening of our perspectives about the meaning of
being human in a way that does not discriminate against but celebrates the
different possibilities of womanhood.

133
 Module References

Lesson 1
Carson, Rachel. Silent Spring. London: Hamish Hamilton, 1963.
Erazim. Hurnan's Place in Nature." In Between the Embers and the Stars. Chicago:
Chicago University Press, 1984.
Regan, Tom. The Case for Animal Rights. Berkeley: University of California Press,
1983. http://library.thinkquest.org/11353/facts.htm http://climate.nasa.gov/vital-
signs/global-temperature/
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/ethics-environmental/#TraEthTheConEnvEth

Lesson 2
Hasnas, John. "The Normative Theories of Business Ethics: A Guide for the
Perplexed," Business Ethics Quarterly 8.1 (1998); 19-42.
Reidenbach, R. Eric and Donald P. Robin, Conceptual Model of Corporate Moral
Development," Journal of Business Ethics 10 (1991): 273-284.
Vellasquez, Manuel. Business Ethics: Concepts and Cases. 7th ed. New Jersey: Pearson
Education, 2012.

Lesson 3
Antrobus, Peggy. The Global Women‟s Movement: Origins, Issues and Strategies (Global
Issues). London: Zed Books, 2004.
Freedman, Estelle. The Modern Scholar: Feminism the Future Women. Recoreded Books,
2008
Gilligan, Carol. In a Different Voice: Psychological Theory and Women‟s
Development. Cambrige, MA: Harvard University Press, 1982.
Gotlib, Anna, ―Feminist Ethics and Narrative Ethics,” http://www.iep.utm.edu/fem-
en/
Kristof, Nicholas D. and Shery WuDunn. Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into
Opportunity for Women Worldwide. New York: Vintage Books, 2010.
Mangahas,Fe B."The Babaylan Historico-Cultural Context," Centennial Crossings:
Readings on Babaylan Feminism in the Philippines, Fe B. Mangahas and Jenny R.
Llaguno, eds. Quezon City: C E Publishing, Inc., 2006.
Miles, Rosalind. Who Cooked the Last Supper? The Women's History of the World.
New York: Three Rivers Press, 1988
Santos Marian, Alda F. "Do Women Really Hold Up Half the Sky?: Notes on the
Women's Movement in the Philippines," Essays on Women, revised ed. Mary
John Mananzan, OSB, ed. Manila: The Institute of Women's Studies, St.
Scholastica's College, 1989.
Shiva, Vandana. Staying Alive: Women, Ecology, and Development. Berkeley,
California: North Atlantic Books, 2016.
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Lesson 4
Edmund Pellegrino, Edmund, and A. I. Faden. eds. Jewish and Catholic Bioethics.
Washington DC: Georgetown University Press, 1999.

Cahill, Lisa Sowle. Theological Bioethics: Participation, Justice and Change.

Washington DC: Georgetown University Press, 2005.

Walter, James, and Thomas Shannon. Contemporary Issues in Bioethics. New York:
Row ran and Littlefield, 2005.

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 Module 5

Special Topics in Ethics

Part 2

Welcome to module 5!

You are almost done with this course pack! Are you ready? Go ahead and move to
lesson 1, and we’ll get started!

This module will help you understand the different types and concepts of crimes
against human life. crimes can be committed even at peacetime, often called victimless
crimes, unlike other crimes such as war, rape, and robbery, and crimes against property,
etc. Also, you will explore in this module the different application of Justice:
commutative, distributive, legal, and social. These types of justice have important
implications for political, civil, and criminal justice at both national and international
level Justice is an action in compliance with the conditions prescribed by law.

As you complete the module you will have many opportunities to make decisions
which will influence the nature and scope of your learning activities. The more energy
you put into it, the more benefit you will derive from it.

This Module contain the following lessons:

Lesson 1: Crime Against Human Life
Lesson 2: Love Your Neighbor

The major learning outcomes of this module are to:

1. Explain the connection of drug addiction and morality;

136
 2. Explain the two primary arguments regarding selling organs for
transplant;
3. Differentiate the different types of Justice and its important implications
for socio-economic, political, civil, and criminal justice at both national
and international level; and
4. Explain the different forms of self-defense and its legal application to
defend oneself.

Lesson 1

Crimes Against
Human Life

OBJECTIVES

At the end of this chapter, you should be able to:

• Explain the connection of drug addiction and morality;
• Discuss the effects of alcoholism in physical, psychological and social aspects
of individual.;
• Differentiate the different types of abortions and when it can be considered as
moral or immoral; and
• Explain the two primary arguments regarding selling organs for transplant.

INTRODUCTION

The ethical perspective sees crime as the result of a moral failure in making decisions.
Crime takes place when a person fails to appreciate the wrongfulness of an act or its
137
impact on the victim. It might not surprise you to learn that the literal definition of crime
is the violation of criminal laws but it's not always so easy to say what is a crime and what
is not a crime. Defining crime presents us with a series of difficulties and complexities
because what we consider to be a crime is a social construction it's dynamic, contested,
and contingent. In other words, what is crime may vary over time and place. It isn't a
universally agreed fact or a constant it's a socially constructed and shifted reality.

ACTIVITY

Analyze the comic below and answer the questions following it.

ANALYSIS

Write your observations regarding the different crimes against human life.
1. What is the morality of the situations above?

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 2. What do you think is the ideal human behavior?

ABSTRACTION

1. Suicide

Suicide literally is derived from Latin word "suicide", combining the pronoun for
"self" and the verb for "to kill". The earliest usage of the word suicide could be traced in
1651 though people have been committing this act for centuries. Suicide, in essence, is an
act of human being intentionally causing his or her own death.

Suicide is committed for many reasons like out of despair, or attributed to some
underlying mental disorder, which includes depression, alcoholism, and schizophrenia
and drug abuse. Financial difficulties, interpersonal relationships and other undesirable
experiences or situations play significant role for its commission.

The methods of suicide vary between countries. The leading methods in different
regions include hanging, pesticide poisoning, and firearms- Worldwide, 30% of suicides
is from pesticide poisoning.

Other methods of suicide include:

1. Blunt force trauma (jumping from a building or bridge, self-
defenestrating, stepping in front of a train, or car collision, for example).
2. Exsanguinations or bloodletting (slitting one's wrist or throat
3. Intentional drowning
4. Electrocution
5. Immolation
6. Intentional Starvation

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 Suicide and Morality

People who are immersed in Christian doctrine would always say that suicide, as an act
is never moral. On a closer examination of the premise however, the morality of suicide is
relative to the culture and religion of the individual committing the act Japanese people have
their concept of "hara-kiri" where ritual suicide is deemed by their society as an honorable act.

To the Japanese, if one fails in a very important undertaking, "hara-kiri" is a viable

alternative so as to save face and to save the family honor (even the honor of the emperor)
Before the close of the World War II, the Japanese even took the concept ot"'hara-kiri" further
when they displayed collective ritual suicide. This act is now known as kamikaze" literally
meaning the wind of gods. This is the act where Japanese warplanes instead returning to their
battle carrier literally crashed their planes on to the American carriers.

To the outsiders (or gaijin), the act of intentional death is foolish while to the Japanese,
the very act of dying for the glory of Japan and for their emperor is heroic. This notion could
be traced to the tradition of the samurai where they would rather die than surrender. Japanese
are not unique in this perspective, people who subscribe to the teaching of Islam also have their
own concept about self-inflicted death.

In the Middle East, especially Israel, in Palestine and even in the American held territory
- Iraq, there is suicide bombing happening on a regular basis. The concept here is that if one
dies for the glory of Allah (sabil allah), one would immediately go straight to paradise.
Based on the Christian doctrine however, suicide is deemed as mortal sin. Meaning, if
one commits suicide- he would spend eternity in hell. There is no forgiveness in suicide. Suicide
is a direct violation of the Ten Commandments, specifically the fourth commandment "Thou
shall not kill". In fact, it involves the rejection of love of self and the renunciation of the
obligation of justice and charity towards one's neighbor, towards the communities to which one
belongs, and towards society as a whole. In its deepest reality, suicide represents rejection of
God's absolute sovereignty over life and death.

In our country, the two major causes of suicide are poverty and family problems. But
whatever reasons maybe, it is condemned by the church and people who are believed to have
committed it were not given a Christian burial. Suicide can never be moral under Catholic
teachings.

2. Sterilization

Sterilization refers to the procedure performed to stop fertility permanently in all human
being. It is considered as the most reliable and most commonly used type of contraception.
Fertilization takes place when man's sperm reaches and joins the egg released from the ovary
of a woman. The released egg is picked up by one of the two fallopian tubes, which transports
it to the uterus. Fertilization usually occurs in the fallopian tube, fertilized, the egg then implants
into the wall of the uterus to establish pregnancy. Sterilization interrupts this process
permanently, either by preventing the release of sperm or by stopping fertilization by blocking
the fallopian tube.
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 Sterilization is done either to the male or female through operation. Operations on women
are commonly called ligation", as the procedures aim to occlude or 'ligate' the fallopian tubes.
The majority of operations described involved cutting the fallopian tube and over sewing the
cut end so that it is hidden.

Male sterilization on the other hand, is achieved by the operation of vasectomy: cutting
or legating, on both sides, the vas deferens, which transports sperm from the testicles to the
penis. The major advantage to a couple of a vasectomy is that it is a much simpler Operation
than female sterilization, due to the easy access to the vas within the scrotum. Vasectomy can
easily be performed as an outpatient operation under local anesthetic. After the operation the
man must wait for around twelve weeks before the sperm count falls to sterile levels. Normally,
doctors ask for two sperm samples to check the operation has worked before alternative
contraception can be abandoned.

Sterilization and Morality

Without question, the couple intentionally disregard the Church's teaching on contraception and
did so by being surgically sterilized. Under the Christian teachings, "Fecundity is good, a gift
and an end of marriage. By giving life, spouses participate in God's fatherhood". Sterilization
destroys this goodness of marriage, i.e. having children. While contraception is in itself contrary
to the moral law, another moral issue here is the purposeful act of direct sterilization,
intrinsically evil an act.

Before addressing the morality of sterilization, the moral foundation upon which the
teaching is built must be remembered first. Each person IS made in God's image and likeness
with both a body and a soul. Vatican II 's Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modem
World asserted that, "man, though made of body and soul is a unity. Through his very bodily
condition he sums up in himself the elements of the material world. For this reason, man may
not despise his bodily life. Man is rather obliged to regard his body as good and to hold it in
honor since God has created it and will raise it up on the last day". Saint Paul reminds every
Christian that our bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit and, therefore, we should not degrade
our bodily dignity by allowing the body to participate in the act of sin. Moreover, such sin hurts
the body of the Church.

Therefore, man is responsible to care for his bodily needs with proper nourishment, rest,
exercise, and hygiene. A person must not do anything purposefully to harm the body or its
functions. For example, at times, we take medicine over-thecounter as well as prescribed to
preserve our bodily health. However, we must not bring harm to our body by abusing legitimate
drugs or using drugs known to be harmful.

Circumstances arise when a person may need surgery. To preserve the well-being of the
whole body and really the whole person, that is dis eased or functioning in a way t at arms the
body may be hh an organ removed or altered. For instance, surgery to remove an appendix that
is about to rupture is perfectly moral as is surgery to remove a mole which appears to be "pre-
cancerous." However, cutting off a perfectly healthy hand, thereby destroying not only that
bodily pan but also its functions is an act of mutilation and is morally wrong.

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 Direct sterilization means that the purpose of the destroy the normal functioning of a
healthy organ so as to future conception of children. The most effective and least dangerous
method of permanent sterilization is through vasectomy for man and ligation of the fallopian
tubes for a woman. Such direct sterilization is an act of mutilation and is therefore considered
morally wrong. Regarding unlawful ways of regulating births, Pope Paul VI in his encyclical
Humane Vitae in 1968 asserted that direct sterilization should be condemned whether of the
man or of the woman, whether permanent or temporary The Roman Catechism also states,
"Except when performed for strictly therapeutic medical reasons, directly intended
amputations, mutilations and sterilizations performed on innocent persons are against the moral
law".

However, indirect sterilization is morally permissible. Surgery, or some protocol, e.g.

drug or radiation therapy, is not intended to destroy the functioning of a healthy organ or to
*prevent the conception of children rather, the primary intention is to remove or to repair a
diseased organ Unfortunately, such a surgery or therapy may "indirectly" result in the person
being sterilized. For instance, if a woman is diagnosed with a cancerous uterus, the performance
of hysterectomy is perfectly legitimate and moral. The direct effect is to remove the diseased
organ and preserve the health of the woman's body, the indirect effect is that she will be
rendered sterile and never able to bear children again. The same would be true if one of a
woman's ovaries or if one of a man's testes are cancerous or functioning in a way which is
harmful to overall bodily well-being Keep in mind, to be morally right, the operation or protocol
must be truly therapeutic in character and arises from a real pathological need.

Pope John Paul II in his encyclical letter "Gospel of Life" warned on "scientifically and
systematically programmed threats" against life He continued, "we are in fact faced by an
objective 'conspiracy against life,' involving even international institutions, engaged in
encouraging and carrying out actual campaigns to make contraception, sterilization and
abortion widely available. Nor can it be denied that the mass media are often implicated in this
conspiracy, by lending credit to that culture which presents recourse to contraception,
sterilization, abortion, and even euthanasia as a mark of progress and a victory of freedom,
while depicting as enemies of freedom and progress those positions which are unreservedly
pro-life".

Catholic Church respects the dignity of the individual in both his person and action but it
remains firm in its stand against artificial methods of family planning, which it considers
immoral.

3. Euthanasia

Euthanasia usually refers to the act of quickening death for merciful motive. Euthanasia,
however, is different from suicide because death is not a 'certainty (and not the only option) in
while the opposite is true for euthanasia (i.e. death is certain) Essentially. there are two types
of euthanasia. One is known, a "passive euthanasia" while the other one is "active euthanasia".
Though both euthanasia results in death, passive euthanasia is more widely accepted. Passive
euthanasia simply refers to the right of the patient to refuse life support (medicines and
procedures). It is said that this is more accepted because there is no local or international law
that forces an individual to receive involuntary life support. in fact, the New Jersey Supreme
Court in 1976 even ruled in essence that doctors might disconnect a mechanical respirator that
is keeping a comatose patient alive from dying with decency and dignity. in 1990, the US
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Supreme Court ruled that dying patients have the right to discontinue life-sustaining treatment.
This ruling opened the door for family members or court appointed surrogates to make the
decision for dying patients.

This type of euthanasia redefined death because with the present strides of science,
machines can artificially sustain life where clinically dead individuals could still continue to
breathe and have their heart function.

Active euthanasia, on the other hand, is more controversial and as such remains illegal
worldwide. Active euthanasia simply pertains to the voluntary agreement between the physician
and the dying patient to pursue acts that eventually lead to death.

In this context the temptation grows to have recourse to euthanasia, that is, to take control
of death and bring it about before its time, "gently" ending one's own life or the life of others.
In reality, what might seem logical and humane, when looked at more closely is seen to be
senseless and inhumane. Here mankind faced with one of the more alarming symptoms of the
"culture of death", which is advancing above all in industrialized societies, marked by an
attitude of excessive preoccupation with efficiency and which sees the growing number of
elderly and disabled people as intolerable and too burdensome. These people are isolated by
their families and by society, which are organized almost exclusively on the basis of criteria of
productive efficiency, according to which a hopelessly impaired life HO longer has any value.

Furthermore, when one denies or neglects relationship with God, man thinks he is his own
rule and measure, with the right to demand that society should guarantee him the ways and
means of deciding what to do with his life in full and complete autonomy. People developed
countries act this way: they feel encouraged to do because of constant progress of medicine.
By using highly sophisticated systems and equipment, science and medical practice today are
able not only to attend to cases formerly considered untreatable and to reduce or eliminate pain,
but also to sustain and prolong life even in situations of extreme failure, to restore patients
whose basic biological functions have undergone sudden collapse, and to use special
procedures to make organs available for transplanting.

Euthanasia is a grave violation of the law of God, since it is the deliberate and morally
unacceptable to kill. This doctrine is based upon the natural law and upon the written word of
God, transmitted by the church's tradition.

4. Drug Addiction

World Health Organization defines drug addiction as a state of periodic and chronic
intoxication detrimental to the individual and to society, produced by the repeated consumption
of a drug (natural or synthetic). Its characteristics include:
1. An overpowering desire or need (compulsion) to continue taking the drug and to
obtain it by any means.
2. A tendency to increase the dose.
3. A psychic (psychological)and sometimes a physical dependence on the effects of
the drug.

This definition of drug addiction includes many drugs such as hypnotic and sedative
(barbiturates, alcohol, amphetamine and mescaline.
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 The Bible teaches that Christians should care for their bodies and use them to serve God.
It is wrong simply to please self or others and to do things that can reasonably be expected to
harm our health and lives. One's body and life belong to God and are only entrusted to humans
to use it to accomplish His will like a stewardship. Humans are responsible to care of the
property that belongs to someone else but has been entrusted to him for a purpose. It must be
used based on the purpose of the owner, not destroy it for selfish purposes. We will give account
to the owner for how we used his property.

When simply acting for the sake of pleasing self or his friends, a Christian participates in
activities that are known to harm his health, that person has abused his stewardship and misused
his God-given health. Yet this exactly what happens when people use prohibited drugs.

Taking prohibited drugs is annihilation one's body and the IS committing injustice to God,
to himself and to his family. Everyone is expected to value life and to live a healthy life. If
suicide is taking one's life instantly, drug addiction is destroying life slowly. To live life to the
fullest and to live a meaningful life cannot be attained is using prohibited drugs, it defeats its
very essence of one's existence. Taking prohibited drugs therefore is wasting life.

Addiction and Morality

Drugs without doctor's prescription are considered illegal. Using for social purposes,
personal pleasure, to get a high, to escape reality, etc., is illegal. To disobey civil law is to sin
against God. God ordained governing authorities. To resist them is to resist God's ordinance.
The authorities may punish those who disobey, but they also have harmed their conscience
toward God. This ought to settle the matter for every true believer. Drug abuse, including
tobacco use, is therefore sinful.

Mind-altering drugs weaken the mind's ability to think clearly, distinguish right from
wrong, and exercise will power. Note that this refers to loss of will power, not just when one
is "high" or intoxicated. This effect becomes progressively worse with continued use.
Actions for the sake of personal pleasure, which will hinder moral judgment or weaken our
self-control, must be avoided. Being sober is the opposite of being drunk and is associated with
being alert and watchful. Being sober, up the loins of your mind so you can avoid lusts and be
obedient and holy. This requires being alert. Being sober we can guard and resist evil.

Bring our bodies into subjection to our minds, exercising temperance (self-control) like
athletes in training, so our bodies will be properly guided by our minds. Keep our heart (mind)
with all diligence because it must decide the issues of life. Struggling against evil is difficult
and dangerous at best, even with the clearest of faculties. That is why most religions have
forbidden intoxication. There are other ways to violate these principles, but drug 8bU88 is
surely one way. We aspire and pray for good health. Part of it is protection of our health and
cure of diseases and so we cannot turn around and practice things that will harm our bodies.
Christians should have compassion for the sick and care for them. People who knowingly harm
their health for self-pleasure, are working contrary to Christian goals. Should we knowingly
harm ours. health and then expect other Christians to have compassion on us when our habits
destroy our health.

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5. Alcoholism

The Greek word for "drunk" refers to "intoxication, drunkenness is to get drunk, to
become intoxicated. Alcoholism is drinking alcoholic beverages at a level that interferes with
physical health, mental health, and social, family, Of' job responsibilities. Alcoholism is
considered as a type of drug addiction. People who are dependent on alcohol spend more time
drinking alcohol, and getting it.

Dependence on alcohol involves:

• A need for increasing amounts of alcohol to get drunk or achieve the
desired effect (tolerance)
• Alcohol-related illnesses
• Memory lapses (blackouts) after drinking episodes
• Withdrawal symptoms when alcohol use is stopped

The most severe drinking behavior includes continuous drinking that leads to mental or physical
problems. Some people are able to gain control over their dependence in earlier phases before they
totally lose control. But no one knows which heavy drinkers will be able to regain control and
which will not. There is no known common cause of alcoholism. However, several factors may
play role in its development. A person who has an alcoholic parent is more likely to become an
alcoholic than a person without alcoholism in the immediate family.

World Book Encyclopedia notes that there are disastrous results of overindulgence in
drinking alcohols like ailments such as cirrhosis of the liver, tragic accidents, financial min,
family abuse, and harm to the unborn. Probably because of such terrible consequences, "many
religious denominations taught that drinking alcohol is immoral".

Noteworthy is the fact that the Bible associate’s drunkenness with gluttony, directing that
both be avoided. If it were intended that should not drink any alcohol at all, would that not also
indicate that any eating of food is wrong as well? Rather, it is excess to the point of intoxication
and gluttony that the Bible says is wrong -not eating and drinking in moderation.

Clearly, the Bible does not prohibit the drinking of alcoholic beverages. What it does
condemn, however, is drinking to excess and drunkenness. In the Biblical verse it states "cast
off the works of darkness, walk properly, not in drunkenness. Make no provision to fulfill the
lusts of the flesh". People, who are guilty of drunkenness, will not inherit the kingdom of God.
If a church member commits drunkenness and refuses to repent, he should be disciplined so we
don't keep company with him. There are so many reasons to condemned intoxication as humans
face many serious temptations. In order to distinguish right from wrong and then have the will
power to resist evil, our minds must think clearly and control our bodies, it is called sobriety
and self-control.

Similar to drug addiction, alcoholism destroys human faculties. Although its immediate
effect is personal, it affects the family and the society as a whole. Relatives of alcoholics are
deprived of time, money, care, attention and many other things and to include also that crimes
and accidents are also related to alcoholism. Alcoholism will always be regarded as immoral if
it is a habit.

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6. Abortion

Abortion is the termination of a pregnancy by the removal or expulsion from the uterus
of a fetus or embryo resulting in or caused by its death. An abortion can occur spontaneously
due to complications during pregnancy or can be induced, in humans and other species. Before
determining when abortion is considered moral or immoral, it is imperative to distinguish
abortion first according to its types.

Types of Abortion

There are different types of abortions these are: spontaneous, induced, therapeutic elective
or voluntary and legal and illegal.

• Spontaneous Abortions. A large percentage of the products of the union of

an egg and a sperm never become infants. If there is something seriously
wrong with the fetus, the uterus often expels it. This may occur very early in
the pregnancy, with the woman only experiencing a larger than usual blood
flow around the time of her expected menstrual period, or it may occur later
in the pregnancy. This latter event is commonly called a miscarriage, but
technically it is a spontaneous abortion if it occurs before twenty weeks
twenty weeks of pregnancy. Spontaneous abortions are often the body‘s way
of preventing the birth of a defective child, although sometimes they are due
to maternal health problems.
• Induced Abortions. In contrast, induced abortions humans planned
interruption of a pregnancy. Throughout recorded history, humans have
taken a variety of steps to control family size. Before conception of the by
delaying marriage or through abstinence or contraception, or after the birth
by infanticide. Induced abortion falls temporally between these two
extremes by preventing a conception from becoming a live birth.
• Therapeutic Abortions. This term refers to abortions thought necessary
because of fetal anomalies or to protect the health of the mother when a birth
might be life threatening or physically damaging.
• Elective or Voluntary Abortions. Interruption of a pregnancy before
viability at the woman's request for reasons other than fetal anomalies or
maternal risk is often referred to as elective or voluntary abortion. Such
abortions often result from social problems, such as teenage pregnancy or
non-marital births, economic difficulties, such as insufficient income to
support a child, or inappropriate timing.
• Legal and Illegal Abortions. Induced abortions may be legal or illegal. A
legal abortion is procedure, performed by a licensed physician or someone
acting under the supervision of a licensed physician that was intended to
terminate a suspected or known intrauterine pregnancy and to produce a
nonviable fetus at any gestational age." An illegal abortion may be self-
induced, induced by someone who is not a physician or not acting under her
or his supervision, or induced by a physician under conditions that violate
state laws governing abortions.

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 Abortion and Morality

Human life finds itself most vulnerable when it enters the world and when it leaves the
realm of time to embark upon eternity. The word of God frequently repeats the call to show
care and respect and above all where life is undermined by sickness and old age. Although
there are no direct and explicit calls to protect human life at its very beginning, specifically
child not yet born, and life nearing its end, this can easily be explained by the fact that the
mere possibility of harming, attacking, or actually denying life in these circumstances is
completely foreign to the religious and cultural way of thinking of the people of God.

Human life is sacred and inviolable at every moment of existence, includil18 the initial
phase, which precedes birth. All human beings, from their mothers belong to God who
searches them and knows them who looks who forms them and knits them together with his
own hands, who looks on them when they are tiny shapeless embryos and already sees is
the adults of tomorrow whose days are numbered and whose vocation There too when they
are still in even now written in the ―book of life‖ their mothers' womb-as many passages
of the Bible bear witness they are the personal objects of God's loving and fatherly
providence.

Among all the crimes, which can be committed against life procured abortion has
characteristics making particularly serious and deplorable The Second Vatican. Council
defines abortion together with infanticide, as “unspeakable crime.” But today, in many
people's consciences the perception of its gravity has become progressively obscured. The
acceptance of abortion in the popular mind. in behavior and even in law itself, is a telling of
an extremely dangerous crisis of the moral sense which is becoming more and incapable of
distinguishing between good and evil, even when the fundamental right to life is at stake.
Given such a grave situation, we need now more than ever to have the courage to look at the
truth in the eye and to call things by their proper without yielding to convenient
compromises or to the temptation of self-deception. In this regard reproach of the Prophet
is extremely straightforward ―Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put
darkness for light and light for darkness‖. Especially in the case of abortion there is a
widespread use of ambiguous terminology, such as ―interruption of pregnancy‖, which
tends to hide abortion’s true nature and to lessen its seriousness in public opinion. Perhaps
this linguistic phenomenon is itself a symptom of an uneasiness of conscience. But no word
has the power to change the reality of things.

Procured abortion is the deliberate and direct killing, by whatever means it is carried out,
of a human being in the initial phase of his or her existence, extending from conception to birth.
The moral gravity of procured abortion is apparent in all its truth we recognize that we are
dealing with murder and, in particular, when we consider the specific elements involved. The
one eliminated is a human being at the very beginning of life No one more absolutely innocent
could be imagined. In no way could this human being ever be considered an aggressor, much
less an unjust aggressor. He or she is weak, defenseless even to the point of lacking that minimal
form of defense consisting in the appealing power of a newborn baby s cries and tears. The
unborn child is totally entrusted to the protection and care of the woman carrying him or her
womb. And yet sometimes it is precisely the mother herself who makes the decision and asks
for the child to be eliminated, and who then goes about having it done.

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 It is true that the decision to have an abortion is often painful for the mother, insofar as
the decision to rid herself of conception is not made for purely selfish reasons or out of cony
out of a desire to protect certain important values such as her o a decent standard of living for
the other members of the family it is feared that the child to be born would live in such
conditions would be better the birth did not take place. Nevertheless, th and others like them,
however serious and tragic, can never deliberate killing of an innocent human being.

In the Philippines, to avoid unwanted pregnancies, the abortion is widespread.

Government lacks initiative to prevent observed that abortive goods are being sold even in front
of Quiapo and Baclaran - two of the most visited churches in the country. Abortionists take
advantage on the persons' moral weaknesses our youth- for they are the most vulnerable to this
type of practice. Abortionist can be moral only if it is intended to protect the life of the if it
done to protect the reputation due to unwanted pregnancies or convenience - it is immoral.

7. Selling Organs for Transplants

Should people be allowed to sell their organs? Currently, exchanging organs for money
or other "valuable considerations‖ is illegal, but some members of the medical and business
communities would like to change that. There are two primary arguer offered for this: a person's
organs belong to them (so theyshould be able to do with them as they wish) and the shortage
of available organs means we need radical solutions in order to make available and save more
lives.
A number of arguments against selling organs get bandied about, but there are two, which
lie behind most of the others address both of the above arguments. The first concerns organs
lead to the commoditization of human bodies and concern the exploitation of the poor for the
benefit of the are difficult arguments to explain and are not convincing t but they cut to the
heart of what we want our society ultimately to be like.

Commoditization and Ownership: It is not clear that j the only possible "owner" of an
organ is the person in who_ exists that, therefore, this same person should also be able the
highest bidder. You own your body as a whole as we that mean you can sell yourself into
slavery? Human being cannot be made into commodities. There are even restrictions on how a
person made into commodities. sell their labor, such as laws concerning minimum wages.
A commodity is something that "can be turned to commercial or uses their body for themselves
other advantage‖. A person certainly and their benefit but they cannot tum that body over to
others for their own permanent use and benefit. Restrictions on the. Ability to transfer
ownership and control are not only common, but in fact inherent in how ownership is defined.

In modem society, the "ownership" a person exercises over their body is treated as unique
in that it cannot be legally transferred to any other party. Merely observing that you "own
something does not also confer the right to transfer ownership and control to anyone else and
in any manner you wish.

An important social reason why the ability to transfer "ownership of one's own body is so
restricted because it gives opportunity for the rich to exploit the poor. Rich people have not
sold themselves into slavery, the poor have. Rich people are not protected by minimum wage
laws, the poor are. Laws against selling organs do not protect rich people, the poor are. In each
case, it is the rich who would most benefit by moving laws into the opposite direction, not the
poor. lf one's organs become simply another commodity that can be bought and sold, like cars
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or furniture, and are part of an estate, like houses or stock, doesn't that mean they should be
consistently treated as such? If a person goes into bankruptcy, would the value of their organs
be considered in the final value of their estate? If a person dies and property has to be sold in
order to pay off debts, might the person's relatives be forced into selling his organs? Even those
who favor some system of selling and buying organs will normally balk at such prospects and
would favor regulations that would prevent just such things from happening. Once that happens,
however, it is an admission that organs are not "just like any other property" and should not be
treated as such. If such admission is made, though, the case for allowing the purchase and sale
of organs in the first place is weakened.

Even those who favor some system of selling and buying organs will normally balk at
such prospects and would favor regulations that would prevent just such things from happening.
Once that happens however, it is an admission that organs are not "just like any other property"
and should not be treated as such. If such an admission made, though, the case for allowing the
purchase and sale of organs in the first place is weakened

In addition to case that the selling of organs would create an there are also very
inappropriate commoditization of the human body selling organs would strong arguments for
the idea that buying and Selling a lead to the exploitation of the poorest segments of society.
organ is dangerous, so why should people be pressured into doing it?

There are two possible forms which selling organs could take selling organs of the living
and selling organs of the dead. Having a kidney removed is a difficult painful and dangerous
process It hurts a lot and the pain continues long after the surgery Like any surgery the process
itself is dangerous and it is possible that the patient will not wake If they do there remains the
problem of post-operative infection, which can kill, and the muscles of their abdomen may
never regain their former strength and elasticity.
Finally, there is no guarantee that the person really will be able to live with just one kidney,
disease or injury later on could be fatal for a kidney donor. This is even more likely with the
poor because of their health. behavior, where they live, etc.

Given the above circumstances, why would anyone sell a kidney. The rich don't do it, and
neither does the middle class only the poor are likely to do it, and it is without question an act
of desperation. When such desperation is the motive for selling a kidney, to what degree can
we argue that the decision is genuinely voluntary?
In a just society, no person should have to sell off pieces of his or her body in order to survive.
Do we really want to start flying poor people from Africa or Asia to Europe and North America
so that they can sell a kidney to the wealthy? This, then, is why these issues cut to the heart of
what we want our society to be like: will it be just enough that selling organs is something
people can but never feel they need to do.
• Paying for Organs Means Increasing Costs: Organ transplantation is
already an expensive process - so expensive that many poor people are
unable to have it done and they simply end up dying. Paying people for the
organs of deceased relatives may make more organs available, but it would
also increase the cost of the process, shutting out more poor people and
increasing the cost for those who do have enough insurance to pay.
Neither of those results is desirable and both can occur not simply when
paying living people for organs (like kidneys) but also paying for organs
taken from the deceased. If one of the reasons for allowing the sale of organs
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 is to make more organs available and save more lives, it can't be done in a
way that effectively prevents many people from ever obtaining an organ at
all.
• Pressuring the Sick: There are already serious ethical concerns when it
comes to doctors recommending that a person on life support be taken off the
machines and their organs donated. These questions will increase money
changes hands. Will families be tempted to have their relatives denied
medical care in order to sell the organs" Will hospitals be tempted to withhold
treatments for the sake of money"
• Compromise: A general policy against selling organs does not necessarily
mean that such sales should not be allowed in a very narrow circumstance or
in the context of special exceptions. For example, it might be legitimate for
two families to "trade," perhaps a kidney for a bone marrow transplant. This
sort of trade is also prohibited as a type of sale, but it is not an unreasonable
exception.

Narrow allowances for selling would have to ensure that the poor have other, genuine
options in order to prevent exploitation. There would have to be safeguards to prevent things
like bidding wars and "organ markets" which would cause problems with the general costs of
transplantation. Finally, there would have to be sound measures to ensure that no one is
pressured or tempted to allow others to die for the sake of money. All of these would be
difficult, but without it, the ethical problems would be unregulated and unmanaged trafficking
in human organs would be enormous and unacceptable.

In the Philippines, donating organs for family members or love one's without monetary
considerations is both moral and legal. Just like Jesus Christ who sacrificed HIS life to save
mankind and so humans can also do the same. It is not immoral to die for others by sharing
one's organ. As long as organs are not sold like commodities, it is acceptable to the society.
Donations of organs at the time of one's death to other people were never challenge morally by
church and legally by the government.

APPLICATION

A. Points of discussion: Answer the following questions and write your answer on the
space provided.
1. Why is drug addiction considered immoral?

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2. Does a mere taking of alcoholic beverages be regarded as an immoral act? Explain
your answer.

3. What type of abortion is accepted and not considered immoral? Why?

4. How should you answer this question: ―should people be allowed to sell their
organ? Explain your answer.

5. Does the bible forbid organ donation? Explain your answer.

Good work! Indeed, you‘re so good by finishing

Lesson 1 of this module. Should there be some parts of the lesson
which you need clarification, please ask your instructor during
your virtual meetings.

Now breathe again and say ―I can do this!”

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 Lesson 2

Love of Neighbor

OBJECTIVES

At the end of this chapter, you should be able to:

• Differentiate the different types of Justice and its important implications for
socio-economic, political, civil, and criminal justice at both national and
international level.
• Enumerates the different ways on how to love one’s neighbor.
• Explain the different forms of self-defense and its legal application to defend
oneself.
• Discuss the different arguments related to Death Penalty.

INTRODUCTION

Justice is an action in compliance with the conditions prescribed by law. Whether these
rules are grounded in human consensus or societal norms, they are intended to ensure that all
members of society receive fair treatment.

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 ACTIVITY

Think of the words or ideas that you associate with the word justice. Write these on
the white circles. After filling up all the circles, blend all the ideas to come with a
brief definition of the word justice.

My definition:

ANALYSIS

1. What is your understanding of justice?

2. What are your ethical considerations of justice?

3. From your perspective, what is justice trying to achieve?

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 ABSTRACTION

Justice
Merriam Webster Encyclopedia defines justice as "maintenance or administration
of what is just especially by the impartial adjustment of conflicting claims or the
assignment of merited rewards or punishments,"

Different Application of Justice Commutative Justice

Commutative justice is a type of justice that controls and harmonizes the exercise
of rights between men to his fellow man. It covers private Persons as well as juridical
persons (communities or associations) to render to each other according to the principle
of reciprocity. This means that the exchange of anything shall be based on equal value.
The business Transaction of equitable pricing of goods is an example of commutative
application of justice.

Distributive Justice
Distributive justice is a type of justice that regulates the exercise of Fights between
the Individual and the commun1ty- The objective end of this form of justice is the private
or particular good of each member of the community. Distributive justice therefore
regulates the acts of the public authority or of the state in relation to the rights of the
individual citizen or party. It presupposes these rights as something which public authority
or society must preserve and respect. It regulates the imposition of taxes, fees or privileges
by the community upon the individual member. Likewise, the individual members
practice distributive justice by accepting uncomplainingly the equitable distribution of
charges, burdens and privileges.

Legal Justice
Legal justice is a type of justice that regulates the exercise of rights between the
community and the authority charged with the general welfare of the community. The
objective purpose of legal justice is the common good. "Common good" refers to the total
conditions of social living necessary and contributory to the development of man within
the community. The imposition of laws derives from legal justice. Legal and distributive
justice compliments each other. "In the measure in which the individual devotes his
powers and resources to the common welfare, the community must show its concerns for
his particular welfare.

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Social Justice
Social justice is a type of justice that presupposes commutative justice as a
condition. But it goes beyond the requirements of commutative justice. Its objective
purpose is the common good, and is thus also called 'justice of the common welfare" or
justice of the community". Where commutative justice depends on the law or legal
contracts between individuals, social justice draws its force from the solidarity of men
living in the community of persons.
The model of social justice is the solidly united family where the common interest prevails
and where it is self-evident that the members have just claim on the stronger ones and on
the solidarity of all.
In the political stability the state has the duty to safeguard every member of the
community, life, sustenance, and the opportunity of work. in the individual level, social
justice imposes the obligation to assist those¢ in need so that they too are able to live in
the manner worthy of their dignity as a person.

Love of one's Neighbor

American Catholic Quarterly Review enumerates some ways how to love one's
neighbor, these are:
1. Even apart from civil society men are bound to reciprocal duties in virtue of the
likeness of their specific nature and the identity of their end. All men have the
same origin and the same end. This establishes a kind of affinity among them
which, apart from civil society, they impose reciprocal duties.

2. The foundation of all duties to one's neighbor is t the precept; Thou shalt love
thy neighbor as thyself. Love of one’s neighbor is not a mere natural inclination
resulting from likeness of specific nature, but it is a precept of reason. For order
demands that other men have the same human nature as ourselves, we should
wish them the blessings that we desire for ourselves. Yet because the bond of
identity or substantial unity is stronger than that of likeness of specific nature,
we should indeed love our neighbor as ourselves, but not as much as ourselves.
The precept of loving our neighbor imposes both negative and positive duties.
The former is contained in the maxim, "Do not to others what you would not
have them do to you," the latter, in the maxim, "Do to others as you would that
they should do to you."

3. From love of one's neighbor results the duty of doing nothing that injures his
moral dignity, or impedes or perverts the lawful exercise of his free will. The
moral dignity of one's neighbor is impaired by scandal, which gives him an
occasion of falling into evil, by seduction, which deceives him in order to draw
him into evil, in a word, by whatever turns him from his duty. All these acts are
a manifest violation of the love of justice due to our neighbor. But if a man of
evil habits has a good name, and thereby takes occasion to injure the rights of
others, it is lawful to reveal his true character, but so far only as is necessary to
protect the innocent.

4. From the love of one‘s neighbor arises the duty of doing no violence to his
intellect by deceitfully leading him into error. Veracity is indispensable to
society. Take away from speech its nature as sign of thought and you destroy all
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 intercourse among men. Besides even if lying would not harm society, it would
still be an evil for God has given speech to man as a means of expressing his
thoughts and communicating with his equals, therefore, to use it to deceive is to
oppose nature. Hence lying is never permitted.

5. From love of one's neighbor results the duty of not attempting his life or
maltreating his body. Life is a most precious boon to man for it enables him to
work out his present destiny and to prepare for his future state, hence homicide
is one of the greatest crimes that can be committed. The interdict laid upon
homicide extends to every action that impairs the integrity of the human
organism such as mutilations, wounds, and blows.

6. From love of one's neighbor arises the duty not merely of doing him no harm,
but even of doing him good. We ought to love our neighbor as ourselves, now,
we wish not only that others did us no evil, but also that they do us good. Hence
besides negative or perfect duties, we have also positive or imperfect duties
toward our neighbor. We should enlighten his mind, strengthen his will in the
practice of good, help him in need, and defend his good name. Positive duties
are either humane or beneficent. They are duties of humanity if they are rendered
our neighbor without any personal sacrifice, they are duties of beneficence if
they involve some personal inconvenience or loss. They are, therefore more
meritorious than the former class. Yet though both kinds of positive duty are
commanded in a general way, they do not constitute a determinate obligation in
this or that particular case their obligation being only moral and not juridical, no
one can he forced to fulfill them. They become a strict and imperative duty only
in case of our neighbor's extreme need, owing to the presence of imminent and
deadly evil to soul or body.

Self-Defense Defined
Self-defense (also called, when it applies to the defense of another alter ego defense,
defense of others, defense of a third person) is the right for civilians acting on their own
behalf to engage in violence for the sake of defending one's own life or the lives of others,
including the use deadly force.

Legality of Self Defense

In most laws, when defense succeeds, it operates as a complete justification provided
the degree of violence used is comparable proportionate to the threat being confronted,
and so deadly force should only be used in situations of "extreme" danger. The defense
would fall if a defendant deliberately killed a petty thief who did not appear to be physical
threat. Sometimes there is a "duty to retreat" which invalidates the defense. On the other
hand, such "duty to retreat" may be negated in situations involving abusive relationships
and in burglary situations, given the so-called castle exception (protecting one's home),
namely that one cannot be expected to retreat from one's own home, namely, man's house
is his castle," and "each man's home his safest refuge") which brings self-defense back
into play.

In some countries, the concept of "pre-emptive" self-defense is limited by a

requirement that the threat must be imminent. Thus, lawful "pre-emptive" selfdefense is
simply the act of landing the first blow in a situation that has reached a point of no hope
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for escape. This pre-emptive approach is recognized by many self-defense instructors and
experts believe that if the situation is so clear and that violence is unavoidable, the
defender has better chance of surviving by landing the first blow and gaining the
immediate upper hand to quickly stop the risk to their person.

Self-defense cannot be considered as immoral. It is normal and natural reaction for

every human being to protect himself against any threat or harm to his body. Provided,
however, that the act of killing is done because it is the only available means to protect
oneself and there is no way to evade the danger. But if killing is done despite superiority
of strength, arms or despite the available means to escape such threat to life, then in legal
perspective, it may be regarded as homicide or murder, by which both are considered
immoral.

Capital Punishment
Capital punishment, also referred to as the death penalty, is the legally ordered
execution of a prisoner as a punishment for a serious crime, often called a "capital offense
or a capital crime". The term "capital" comes from the Latin "capitali" meaning "head."
Thus, capital punishment is the penalty for a crime so severe that it deserves decapitation
(beheading).

In the past and even at present under certain systems of law, the death Penalty was
applied to a wider range of offenses. In the Philippines, it was imposed before and those
sentenced to death are usually those who committed heinous crimes. Heinous Crimes as
defined by the repealed Republic Act No.7659 are crimes punishable by death for being
grievous, odious and hateful offenses and which, by reason of their inherent or manifest
wickedness, viciousness, atrocity and perversity are repugnant and outrageous to the
common standards and norms of decency and Morality in a just, civilized and ordered
society. Examples of heinous Crimes are complex crimes like rape with murder or rape
with arson, rape with parricide, drug trafficking or plunder (large scale graft and
corruption) and other crimes.

Offenders who have been convicted to death are usually kept segregated from other
prisoners in a special part of the prison pending their execution. In some places this
segregated area is called "death row."

Arguments against Death Penalty

• Some of the major arguments used by those who opposed death penalty
include:
• Death penalty is killing. All killing is wrong; therefore, the death penalty is
wrong.
• Death penalty is a violation of human rights.
• Torture and cruelty are wrong. Some executions are botched and the executed
suffer extended pain. Even those who die instantly suffer mental anguish
leading up to the execution.
• Criminal proceedings are fallible. Many people facing the death penalty have
been exonerated, sometimes only minutes before their scheduled execution.
Others, however, have been executed before evidence clearing them is
discovered. Whilst criminal trials not involving the death penalty can involve
mistakes, there is at least the opportunity for mistakes to be corrected.
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• Since in many cases at least the defendants are financially indigent and
therefore end up being represented by court-appointed attorneys whose
credentials are often highly questionable, opponents argue that the prosecution
has an unfair advantage.
• lt is not a deterrent because anyone that would be deterred by the death penalty
would already have been deterred by life in prison, and people that are not
deterred by that wouldn't be stopped by any punishment. It was also shown that
states that have implemented the death penalty recently have not had a
reduction of violent crime.
• It has also been argued that the death penalty does not deter murder because
most murders are either "crimes of passion" or are planned by people who don't
think they'll get caught (however this argument could be used for any penalty).
• Some people argue that the death penalty brutalizes society, by sending out the
message that killing people is the right thing to do in some circumstances.
• There is some evidence, though further studies are needed, that the death
penalty psychologically harms the executioners, in some cases contributing to
"Perpetration-Induced Traumatic Stress".
• It is plausible that killing a helpless person in a situation in which the
executioner is not in danger is not an exercise of courage (the way that some
instances of killing in war might be), but on the contrary may lead to moral
harms to the executioner, such as decreasing the executioner's sense of the value
of life. It can then be argued that -when capital punishment is not absolutely
necessary to defend society, society has no right to ask executioners to
undertake such risks to their own virtue.
• Abolitionists variously argue that statistics show the death penalty either makes
no difference to the number of murders, or actually causes them to increase.
• It denies redemption, in a non-religious sense. Some hold that a judicial system
should have the role of educating those found guilty of crimes. If one is
executed, he will never have been educated and made a better person.
• Even if we have not ourselves physically committed murder, quite possibly we
have fantasized about crimes of that sort: we are ourselves, guilty of many
things. Is it appropriate for the guilty to impose the most extreme kind of
punishment? (This argument is implicit in Jesus' saying: "Let him who is
without sin cast the first stone.")

Arguments for Death Penalty

• Key arguments for supporters of the death penalty include:
• People who committed heinous crimes (usually murder in countries that practice
the death penalty) have forfeited the right to life.
• Government is not an individual and is given far more powers.
• Death penalty shows the greatest respect for the ordinary man and especially the
victim's, inviolable value.
• It strikes fewer "innocent persons" than alternative penalties, as among prisoners
and ex-prisoners there are many who relapse into new crimes, which strike
"innocent persons".
• It provides peace of mind for many victims of crime and their families.
• It recognizes humankind's natural sense of equal justice, in this case, a life for a
life.

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 • It is the most effective way to protect society (its structures and its individuals)
from a crime.
• It is less cruel than prolonged sentences of imprisonment, especially under the
conditions that would be popularly demanded for heinous criminals.
• It shows how seriously society looks at the most heinous crimes.
• It may deter violent crime and murder. Many advocates do not hold that this is
a primary reason for supporting the death penalty.
• From an economical point of view, it is cheaper to put on an execution than to
house a prisoner for life.
• Just as the virtuous deserve reward proportionate to their good deeds, so too the
vicious deserve punishment proportionate to their bad deeds. One might even
hold, with Kant, that respect is shown to the criminal as someone who has
chosen a particular path in life by visiting the appropriate punishment on the
criminal. (Objection: Not all virtue needs to be rewarded. Likewise, there may
be good reason like mercy, say to refrain from imposing the full weight of a
deserved punishment.)
• Criminals may be led to rethink their lives and set their souls in order by the
pressing expectation of death.
• It upholds the rule of law, because it discourages vigilantism or self-help on the
part of the victim's family or friends (in the form of lynching or the retaining of
hit men). If not controlled, such self-help can lead to extremely destructive
vendettas or blood feuds.

There is an ongoing debate as to whether capital punishment reduces crime rates, ideally,
potential murderers (or other criminals) would be too scared of the punishment to commit
crime. The counterargument is that it doesn't affect crime rate, because potential criminals think
that they won't be caught, so they do not care about punishment until it's too late.
There are even studies that have concluded that the death penalty appears to encourage
murder. However, like many questions in social sciences, actual research data on this question
can be (and interpreted very differently by people with differing predispositions towards capital
punishment. In any event, the actual effectiveness (or lack of is largely irrelevant to many who
feel strongly about the debate their views are based on other factors.

Capital Punishment and Morality

In the above discussions about death penalty, both arguments (pros and cons) have their
own merits, legality IS not an issue because some activities are legal but may not be moral like
gambling and to add death penalty. In the issue of morality, most humans consider capital
punishment as immoral. Religious affiliation may vary, but conscience and natural law dictates
that it is unacceptable. To be human, it is expected that every individual should be cultured not
savage, refined not barbaric, and humane not like animals in terms of behavior. In civil society,
capital punishment will never earn its room for morality.

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 APPLICATION

Points of discussion: Answer the following questions and write your answer on
the space provided.

1. Discuss the different applications of Justice?

2. Discuss some ways on how to love one’s neighbor.

3. What is right to self-defense?

4. Discuss the legality of self-defense?

CONGRATULATIONS! You have completed the

last module of Ethics with flying colors! It is nice to know that
you finished until the end. It is quite relieving right?

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 Module Assessment

A. GROUP ACTIVITY: You will be grouped into five. Your task is to watch the I-
Witness: 'Kidneys for Sale,' a documentary by Jessica Soho (full episode) and
make a reflection on your thoughts and ideas whether the decision is good or bad.

Link: https://youtube.com/watch?v=hf5mbIOWG5k&feature=share

B. Research: Go to the internet and list down the Filipinos who have been sentenced to
death. Choose one them and research a little detail about a person’s life. Try to
highlight a point in one’s life or personality that may lead that person to do the crime.
For instance, does the person easily get angry?

C. Essay: Defend or Refute-Death penalty as a way to secure and safety of society.

D. Essay: Explain your stand on the controversial Reproductive Health Bill. Are you
for it or against it?

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 Module Summary

You have completed the fourth module of Ethics covering Special Topics in Ethics.
Key points covered in the module include:
• Euthanasia is the painless killing of a patient suffering from an incurable and
painful disease or in an irreversible coma. The practice is illegal in most
countries.
• Abortion is the termination of a pregnancy by the removal or expulsion from the
uterus of a fetus or embryo resulting in or caused by its death. There are different
types of abortions these are: spontaneous, induced, therapeutic elective or
voluntary and legal and illegal.
• Commutative justice is a type of justice that controls and harmonizes the
exercise of rights between men to his fellow man.
• Distributive justice is a type of justice that regulates the exercise of Fights
between the Individual and the commun1ty.
• Sterilization refers to the procedure performed to stop fertility permanently, in
either male or female.
• Social justice is a type of justice that presupposes commutative justice as a
condition. But it goes beyond the requirements of commutative justice.
• Commutative justice is a type of justice that controls and harmonizes the
exercise of rights between men to his fellow man.
• Legal justice is a type of justice that regulates the exercise of rights between the
community and the authority charged with the general welfare of the
community.
• Capital punishment, also referred to as the death penalty, is the legally ordered
execution of a prisoner as a punishment for a serious crime, often called a
"capital offense or a capital crime".

162
 References

Agapay, Ramon B. Ethics and the Filipino: A Manual on Morals for Students and
Educators, National Bookstore Manila 1991
Arcilla, Jose S. SJ. The Fine Print of Philippine History, Saint Paul Publication
Makati 1992
Babor, Eddie R.. Ethics: The Philosophical Discipline of Action, Rex Book Manila
1994
Corpuz, Ronald et al Ethics: Standard of Human Act, Mindshapers Inc. Makati 2006
Nabor, Imelda Pastrana.Ethics Katha Publishing Co., Inc. Quezon City 2003
Montemayor, Felix M. Ethics the Philosophy of Life, National Bookstore
Mandaluyong City 2004
Parillo, Vincent N. et Contemporary Social Problems, A Viacom Company
Massachusetts 1999
Pierce, Christine and Donald Van de Veer, People, Penguins and Plastic Trees,
Wadsworth Publishing Company London 1995

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 Appendices

Rubrics for essay

Category Excellent (15 Very Good (10 Good Poor Total

points) points (5 points) (1 pont) Points

Content At least 4 facts At least 3 facts At least 2 facts Only 1 fact is

(topic, are displayed in are displayed in are displayed in displayed in the
references , the the the infographic/w
argument) infographic/web infographic/web infographic/web eb concept
concept map. concept map. concept map. map.
Graphics Selection, Selection, Selection, Selection,
& Visuals color, shape, color, shape, color, shape, color, shape,
(graphics, size, and size, and size, and size, and
pictures, arrangement of arrangement are arrangement are arrangement
related to graphics eye-catching present but do are distracting
contribute
argument) and contribute not contribute to or
meaning to the
some meaning. the meaning misleading.
overall
message.

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 Name: _________________________________________________ Date: _________________

Comprehensive Exam Rubric

Directions: Your answers in the Comprehensive Examination will be graded based on

this rubric. Consequently, use this rubric as a guide when writing your answer and check
it again before you submit.

Traits Excellent Good Fair Poor

Focus & There is one clear, well- There is one clear, well- There is one topic. The topic and main

Details focused topic. Main focused topic. Main Main ideas are ideas are not clear.

ideas are clear and ideas are clear but are somewhat clear.

are well supported by not well supported by

detailed and accurate detailed information.

information.

15 12 9 6

The introduction
Organization The introduction is The introduction states states There is no clear

inviting, states the introduction,

main the main topic and the main topic. A structure,

conclusion is
topic, and provides provides an overview included. or conclusion.

an overview of the of the paper. A

paper. Information is conclusion is included.

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 relevant and presented
in a logical order. The
conclusion is strong. 9 9 6

15

The author’s The author’s

Voice The author’s purpose The author’s purpose purpose purpose of
of writing is
of writing is very clear, of writing is somewhat somewhat writing is unclear.
and there is strong clear, and there is some clear, and there is
evidence of
evidence of attention evidence of attention attention
to audience. The to audience. The to audience. The
author’s extensive author’s knowledge author’s knowledge
and/or experience
knowledge and/or and/or experience with with
the topic is/are
experience with the the topic is/are evident. limited.
topic is/are evident.

10 8 6 4

The author uses

Word Choice The author uses vivid The author uses vivid words The writer uses a
words and phrases.
The words and phrases. The that communicate limited vocabulary.
clearly, but the Jargon or clichés
choice and placement choice and placement writing may
be present and
of words seems of words is inaccurate lacks variety. detract
accurate, natural, and at times and/or seems from the meaning.
not forced. overdone.

5 4 3 2
Most sentences are
Sentence All sentences are well Most sentences are well Sentences sound

166
 constructed, but
constructed and have well-constructed and they awkward, are
Structure,
Grammar, varied structure and have varied structure
have a similar distractingly
structure repetitive,

length. The author and length. The author and/or length. The or are difficult to
Mechanics, &
author makes understand. The
makes no errors in makes a few errors in several author
Spelling
makes numerous
grammar, mechanics, grammar, mechanics, errors in grammar, errors
in grammar,
and/or spelling. and/or spelling, but mechanics, and/or mechanics,
spelling that
they do not interfere interferes and/or spelling
with understanding. with understanding. that interfere with
understanding.

5 4 3 2

167