Philosophy Questions
1. Ross’ s Moral Theory is considered to stand between Kant’s strict deontological theory and theological theory of utilitarianism. According to the philosopher, there existed several prima facie duties that people had to hold in respect if they did not contradict one another. In case they conflicted, human’s intuition would help to make the right choice and find the weightiest and the most important duty. Ross stated that any prima facie obligation could be redefined by more important ones. While Kant saw all obligations absolute and exceptionless, Ross allowed maximization of the good as one of the prima facie obligations that could help to specify the appropriate behavior in any proposed situation.
The moral theory of Kant was mainly based on the concepts of good will and duty. Kant recognized good will as the only opportune option in moral decisions, irrespective of what is acceptable. It was fully controlled by humans and could suggest pure practical reasons of what had to be fulfilled. The philosopher saw duty as the first and foremost purpose of the good will that had to be done for its own sake and not to satisfy oneself or others.
Another important theory that views the right action completely in terms of consequences produced is known as utilitarianism. According to this theory, the principal aim of morality was to magnify the number of good things in the world and reduce the amount of bad things. In order to maximize the general good, it is even acceptable to add other’s kind actions as your own merit. Though it may seem like ethical egoism, utilitarianism is distinguished by the scope of just relevant consequences. Speaking about ethical egoism, this is some sort of moral doctrine that every person has to act to promote his or her own interests exceptionally. On the one hand, it may be concerned with selfishness and strong desire to neglect other people’s feelings just to satisfy own interests. On the other hand, selfishness cannot be the base of ethical egoism as helping humans and keeping from misdealing is in everybody’s self-regard.
Theories mentioned above are actually very connected with each other. They all propose useful and sophisticated ways of behavior that people had to imitate. Everybody just has to perform as many kind deeds as possible in order to maximize the universal good. Thus, the key difference between these theories and psychological egoism is that the latter describes the truth about people and how selfish they always are in real life, but not just instruct what principle will be the best to stick to in life.
2. Throughout the history philosophers presented various theories that had a tremendous impact on the entire philosophical world. Quite interesting are so-called deontological theories as well as utilitarian and ethical egoistic. The most influential versions of deontological theories were proposed by German philosopher Immanuel Kant and by British philosopher and Aristotelian scholar, Sir William David Ross.
There is clear difference between Kant’s and Ross’s main principles and those introduced by representatives of utilitarianism or ethical egoism. Utilitarian theory was trying to prove that each action is always evaluated as an action token. In other words, every action is perceived as some special act accomplished on a particular occurrence with some characteristic consequences accordingly. While deontological theories managed to take other people seriously, they though failed to take the promotion of good seriously enough. The ethical egoism that proved to be closer to utilitarianism, for example, succeeded in explaining the maintenance of good, but was not able to take other people seriously enough. The only difference that discriminated these two theories was based on the fact that utilitarianism was trying to provide general greater good, while ethical egoism was just about self-enrichment and satisfying personal needs.
According to all deontological theories and Ross’s ethics of prima facie obligations and Kant’s ethics on particular, people can evaluate any action in regards to some basic rules. Simply speaking, no matter what action was actually performed it would be judged simply as an act of lying, deception, killing, or stealing without taking into consideration any particular reasons. Utilitarian theory, however, will never allow employing any rules or generalizations from past experience and, on the contrary, will demand to consider new effects of all the actions and not just fully rely on the universal events.
Thus, Ross’s prima facie duties that put all things in the same footing when determining people’s specific actions together with Kant’s ethics that was characterized by universal acceptability, in fact heavily differed from utilitarianism and ethical egoism.
3. The primary purpose of most ethical theories was to promote some universally unique instructions that could be seen as morally accepted and would be easily copied by people around the world. Every theory was trying to show its idea in the best light and at the same time brings humankind closer to the ideal world. No matter what specific explanations they provided to realize their aim, it was always connected with decreasing of all the evil from the world and its transformation into purely created good.
Kant by his ethics, for example, was trying to demonstrate the significance of the right decisions, taking into consideration the solid standards of appropriate behavior. The philosopher emphasized the actions performed on the basis of right intentions, as well as highlighted the absolute value and greatness of each individual. As different emotions and feelings only spoilt the process of reaching just decisions, Kant’s ethics was determined to exclude them from moral decision making and also transform duty into the question of first rank.
Ross’s prima facie obligations also proposed certain way of behavior that every individual had to maintain in order to make the best of their lives. If the person found himself among two contradicted duties, the best decision was just to choose more significant one. The philosopher considered that the moral truth would always be recognized intuitively, in some subconscious level.
The theory of ethical relativism contradicted Ross’s suggestion that intuition was the most reliable guide for establishing moral truths, as well as Kant’s significance of right decisions and the promotion of the general good by philosophers of utilitarianism. It is a theory that stated that universally accepted ethical standards did not exist at all and that there was not even objective standard of right and wrong in principal. According to individual ethical relativism, there could not be better or more correct view among various individuals’ points of view. People could not claim that their attitudes are more accurate that someone’s other because ethical relativism did not recognize any objective standard of right or wrong against which it would be possible to evaluate the correctness. Morality, thus, was relative to the norms of specific culture only and the rightness or incorrectness of the action was fully dependent on the society in which it was practiced.
4. The biggest desire of every human being to become happy was fully analyzed by the most interesting and relevant philosophers of all times, Aristotle. In one of his works, The Nicomachean Ethics, he stated that happiness or flourishing considerably depended on the fulfillment of human nature. This highest good for all humans could not be entirely completed without moral virtues.
Virtues are considered to be some sort of the character’s excellence. They are habits of the soul that help everyone to act for the sake of what is good and noble. The first question that Aristotle was trying to answer was connected with what could make anyone a happy man. Some identified happiness with fortune and fame, while others with respect and pleasure. The philosopher, however, distinguished another reasons.
The same way as plants and animals found flourishing in their functioning well according to their natures, humans’ first and foremost function was to think and make decisions according to the appropriate reason. Such simple truth was actually the heart of the doctrine of moral and intellectual virtue. In the constant process of exercising their moral and intellectual virtue, that was surely the most important element of any living being, people were able to find their key to happiness.
Aristotle believed that happiness also consisted in obtained some goods that were necessary for living well. Such goods as health and friendship were inalienable components of happiness, while others – wealth or honor served only as embellishments. In conclusion, happiness tended to be a complex combination of elements over which people had greater control, known as virtues and other less controllable elements as health or fate.
5. Speaking about friendship, Aristotle distinguished three main types of friends, two of which could not even be called real. The true friendship for Aristotle was grounded on goodness, where both people admire one’s own company and help in need. Such friendship consists in complete admiration of each other’s character and combination of similar virtues. True friends are not only able to share moments of joy but become loving brothers in grief and life hardships.
As goodness is considered to be an enduring quality, friends who form their friendship on it will never fall apart. Though this friendship is really rare and extremely difficult to develop, it is definitely one of the best things in the world to possess. Aristotle believed that a lot of cities were held together because of the friendly relationship between their citizens. The philosopher was sure that fast friendship was only possible when each friend used to give as much as receive. Moreover, the friendship will become even faster when friends learn to love more than to be loved.
The first kind of friendship was just accidental meeting, in which people only used each other for some benefit. It was easily broken and never lasted long. This friendship only existed for the period needed for business partners to arrange a deal and after that it ended as suddenly as began. The second type of friendship was based on pleasure, where people were attracted by each other’s beauty, wit or some other qualities. If utility friendship of the first kind was happening because of some business trade or agreement, this type of friendship was characterized by passion towards another person and was often just a temporal feeling.
Thus, it is really hard to build a good friendship that will last all lifelong. However, the moment you found your soul mate, do all your best to save it and cultivate every new day.
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