Ethical Ethics And Normative Ethics - 1078 Words

What is a right or obligation? What is good or bad? These two questions are examples of why mete-ethics and normative ethics exist. To be able to create an environmental ethic, one must have a sense of moral conclusion. Whether these morals are categorized through self-interest or obligation, meta ethics and normative ethics try to decipher these notions. To derive a normative ethic, meta-ethics needs to explain the language of morality, and how do humans come to a consensus of specific actions and thoughts. Ethics, by short definition, is how we (humans) relate to other beings (humans, animals, environment, etc.). Language such as, â€Å"right†, â€Å"wrong†, â€Å"good†, â€Å"bad†, and â€Å"obligation† are defined in different ways by different people,†¦show more content†¦I believe that individuals are granted the perception of free will under a higher authority, but there are overarching human rights that should be abided by. Normati ve ethics can be separated into two categories, utilitarianism and deontology. Utilitarianism can be defined by Jeremy Bentham in the book The Elements of Moral Philosophy as â€Å"morality, he urged, is not a matter of pleasing God, nor is it a matter of faithfulness to abstract rules. Morality is nothing more than the attempt to bring about as much happiness as possible in this world† (Rachels, 80). Bentham suggested that there is only one fundamental moral principle, the â€Å"Principle of Utility (Rachels, 80). Bentham describes the â€Å"Principle of Utility† as â€Å"whenever we have a choice between alternative actions or social policies, we must choose the one that has the best overall consequences for everyone concerned† (Rachels, 80). Utilitarianism is a scientific way of making decisions and objectively making decisions. Utilitarianism is views moral judgements based on a measurement of pleasure and pain. This can be interpreted as the greatest good for the greatest amount of people. Utilitarianism can be broken down into two sub categories, act utilitarianism and rule utilitarianism. Act utilitarianism considers only the consequences or outcomes of an action. Rule utilitarianism considers the consequences or outcomes that follow a rule of conduct. Deontology does not solely focus on the consequences of an act,Show MoreRelatedNormative Ethics And Ethical Ethics Essay1434 Words   |  6 PagesNormative ethics is defined as the study of ethical action, or in other words, the analysis of how one should act when faced with a dilemma, morally speaking. It evaluates the standards with regard the rightness and wrongness of an act. Descriptive ethics investigates moral beliefs while normative ethics evaluates actions. While descriptive ethics how many people believe that act is ethical, normative ethics investigate whether it is correct to have these beliefs. normative ethics therefore can aidRead MoreNormative Ethics And Ethical Ethi cs1586 Words   |  7 PagesNormative ethics is a study that tries to determine which things are good, which actions are right, which motives are worthy and which character traits are virtues. In other words, normative ethics is a philosophy about what we should morally do. Metaethics is a theory about normative ethics which is concerned about what exactly do normative ethics are claiming. This is a philosophy about the nature of moral claims, moral judgements and moral disagreements made by the normative ethics. Many theologiansRead MoreEthical Theories Of Normative Ethics1259 Words   |  6 PagesOver the last couple of weeks in Philosophy 103, we learned five theories concerning normative ethics: utilitarianism, duty ethics, virtue ethics, care ethics, and natural law ethics. While learning about those theories, I often thought about how the arguments for some theories included interesting ideas that I personally agreed with, but the methods of reasoning were somewhat lacking. Contrastingly, I encountered theories with arguments that were not thought-provoking ideas at first, but I becameRead MoreFeminist Ethics : A Better Alternative Than Traditional Normative Ethical Theories Essay1540 Words   |  7 Pagesthe question: Could feminist ethics provide a â€Å"better† alternative than traditional normative ethical theories? In order to answer this question, one must have an understanding of what feminist ethics is and what it aims to accomplish. According to Rosemarie Tong and Nancy Williams, feminist ethics is â€Å"an attempt to revise, reformulate, or rethink traditional ethics to the extent it depreciates or devalues women s moral experience.† An important point in feminist ethics is to understand how genderRead MoreNormative Ethics: Society Determines What Moral and Ethical Act or Action is Correct and Acceptable1446 Words   |  6 PagesNormative ethics are those ethical principles and values that are considered morally correct and e xpress principles of good character, actions that are viewed as right rather than wrong and are commonly accepted and reasonable. The prompt in this assignment refers to the requirement of â€Å"the existence of normative† requiring the practice of normative ethics in how individuals and society determine what moral and ethical act or action is correct and acceptable. Normative ethics embraces the philosophicalRead MoreEthics Paper1177 Words   |  5 PagesEthics Paper Week 1 Assignment Rheana Willis 01/08/2012 Dilemma Choice 2: A married couple, both addicted to drugs, are unable to care for their infant daughter. She is taken from them by court order and placed in a foster home. The years pass. She comes to regard her foster parents as her real parents. They love her as they would their own daughter. When the child is 9 years old, the natural parents, rehabilitated from drugs, begin court action to regain custody. The case is decided in theirRead More Ethical and Philosophical Questions about Value and Obligation977 Words   |  4 PagesEthical and Philosophical Questions about Value and Obligation I Recall the distinction between metaethics and normative ethics. Normative ethics deals with substantial ethical issues, such as, What is intrinsically good? What are our moral obligations? Metaethics deals with philosophical issues about ethics: What is value or moral obligation? Are there ethical facts? What sort of objectivity is possible in ethics? How can we have ethical knowledge? Recall, also, the fundamentalRead MoreThe Normative Foundations Of Public Service Ethics832 Words   |  4 PagesThe Normative Foundations of Public Service Ethics Introduction Those thought to be ethical or moral are described in terms of their values in regards to honesty, integrity and good character. Our ethical conduct originates from our values which are greatly influenced by our morals; they provide guidance and are our standard for the ways in which we carry out and view right and wrong decisions. For these reasons, personal ethics are said to be our foundation and, as such, often influence how we administerRead MorePerformance Appraisal And Compensation Evaluation1018 Words   |  5 PagesBody At work ethics are a part of almost everything we do, this is especially true of performance evaluations. It is very important to approach performance evaluations in an ethical manner as to avoid letting personal or other irrelevant issues cloud the issues at hand. That being said there is more than one type of ethics that you can apply to performance evaluations. I will provide an overview of the types of ethics I will use and evaluate the ways in which the use of these ethics would be practicalRead MoreNormative ethical subjectivism and the four arguments aganist it with examples1418 Words   |  6 PagesNormative ethical subjectivism is an ethical stance that attempts to specify circumstances under which an action is morally right or wrong using four distinct arguments that try to prove this claim. Normative ethical subjectivism claims that an act is morally right if, and only if, the person judging the action approves of it. Stemming form this view on ethics a normative ethical theory has been made. An ethical theory is a theory of what is right and wrong. This stance on ethics is the opposite

Premier Fitness Ethics Assignment Free Essays

Ethics Assignment Premier Fitness The actions in question regarding Premier Fitness Clubs were proven to be misleading and in violation of the competition act as well as the basic consumerism trend that has aimed to empower consumers and increase their rights. In their quest to meet the firm’s profit oriented objectives, objectives of being economically usefull, and to earn enough profit to survive, Premier Fitness seemingly decided that they could forgo the objective of being socially useful. Misleading/false advertising and marketing was employed that drastically reduced or eliminated social usefulness by underhandedly convincing customers to enter contracts with the fitness club that resulted in materially higher fees, undisclosed costs, and high total net costs than the advertising would lead their customers to believe. We will write a custom essay sample on Premier Fitness Ethics Assignment or any similar topic only for you Order Now Information was not adequately disclosed to portray the true costs associated with gym membership and cancellation of membership was found to be excessively difficult. Premier Fitness also was found to be withdrawing money from cancelled customer accounts which is also unethical behavior on their part. It is ironic that focusing on profit oriented objectives and the resulting unethical activity lead to the payment of a $200,000 fine by Premier Fitness for their unethical actions. Social usefulness was sacrificed by producing misleading advertisements that would lead customers to come to incorrect conclusions regarding total fees. This action violates the competition act and gave Premier Fitness and unethical advantage over their direct competition in the competitive business of fitness establishments. The competition act is structured to limit monopolistic behavior that could be damaging to smaller competitors and protect consumers, and by violating it, Premier Fitness could have negatively affected the competition in an unethical fashion as well as harmed consumers who ended up suffering greater financial losses than they had expected based on the advertising that they would have thought they fully understood. Premier Fitness’ false/misleading advertising and marketing would have left customers to believe that Premier Fitness was giving lower prices than the competition, which was not necessarily the case. Customers would therefore wrongly choose Premier Fitness’ services over those of the competition based on the superior price-point that Superior Fitness was seemingly offering. The result is that Premier Fitness’ acts harmed both the customers themselves as well as the competition that was advertising in a more ethical manor and losing business to Premier because of it. Advertising produced by Premier Fitness was misleading in that it violated many of the ‘do’s and don’ts’ of advertising. For example, using of fine print that was excessively small and possibly not legible. The impression created by the ad was much different than what the fine print conveyed. Also, not all material information was disclosed in all advertising, as some information was strategically left out of some advertisements. Premier’s misleading advertising and fine-print resulted in the charging of higher prices when multiple prices were appearing on their advertised product. With the misleading nature of the advertisements, customers were seemingly charged above the advertised price. The result of legal actions taken against Premier Fitness has undoubtedly affected their reputation considerably. Wide-spread negative publicity toward the company has unquestionably had a negative impact on the company’s operations. Websites designed to promote consumerism are a breeding grounds for the spreading of negative publicity towards unethical business operation. Although Premier continues to operate and has been in business for many years, it is conceivable that their reputation has been tarnished in a way that offsets any financial gains obtained through their unethical actions. Lost business due to poor reputation could easily have negatively impacted their financial objectives far more than gains achieved through misleading and false advertising. In order to fully recover from the negative effects on reputation that this incident has caused, Premier Fitness may benefit from re-aligning its objectives towards more of a customer oriented focus. Its marketing objectives must also be evaluation in order to be in line with such changes in the focus of the company objectives since marketing objectives often go hand-in-hand with company objectives. It is clear by the results observed in this case that Premier Fitness should have paid closer attention to the legal environment. Closer attention would have yielded the knowledge and understanding of the laws that inevitably were broken and could have guided Premier in a more ethical direction that would have bypassed the requirement for legal action and all the following negative publicity and financial ramifications that have haunted Premier Fitness thereafter. How to cite Premier Fitness Ethics Assignment, Essay examples

Machiavelli free essay sample

This paper examines the external influences on Niccolo Machiavellis writings. In four of Machiavelli?s best known works, Discourses on Livy, The Art of War, The History of Florence, and The Prince, we can see a clear influence from such Machiavellian contemporizes as Cesare Borgia, Francesco Vettori, the Medici Family, and general public opinion, which should be a cause for caution in relaying on Machiavelli?s writings as an accurate discussion of history or an ethical discussion of politics. The author discusses how the ideas that Machiavelli placed on paper over five hundred years ago still have meaning in the 21st Century. From the paper: While Machiavelli?s works lack the modern day standards of documentations, he was ahead of his time in historical philosophy and approach. He was the first historian to acknowledge that the need to explain events leading up a specific event to understand why that event occurred and to understand the results of that event. We will write a custom essay sample on Machiavelli or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page As for is external influences, they need to be taken into consideration, so we can accurately understand his writings, the period in which he was writing, and the periods in which he was writing about. He may contradict himself in his political belief, but considering the pressures that he was under he manages to give a pretty good analysis of events and history. Machiavelli?s works has managed to sustain its ideas from the 1500?s to the 21st Century and will continue to be a source of knowledge and debate for centuries to come.