The question of how we determine what is right and what is wrong has been one that has plagued humankind for centuries. Although many have tried to answer this question there is still no definite answer. Adam Smith believes morals are grounded in sympathy and experience. Immanuel Kant however, is certain that morals should not be derived from experience but from pure reason. I for one believe that neither of these men are entirely correct. Both of their theories on morality are flawed in that one does not account for the human experience and the other takes the human experience too much into account. With this being said the only logical thing to believe is that morals should be derived from both reason and sympathy.
To begin with Kant’s theory
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Many believe to be human means to make mistakes and to learn from those mistakes. Based on Kant 's theory, in an ideal world no one would make moral mistakes because everything would be based on reason. This would result in a robotic like creature to take the place of what we would normally call a human. Humans would no longer be influenced by emotions nor by experience but would simply respond in a systematic way to any moral problems they encounter which could lead to undesirable results. These results can be seen if we apply Kant 's theory to Anton Chekhov’s story A Misfortune. The main character, Sofya Petrovna, faces a moral dilemma in that she is a married woman who is being approached by another man. Sofya appears to decline this mans advances but later finds herself wanting to run away with him. Kant would say that the moral …show more content…
Smith states that everyone has the urge to sympathize with others and that this ability to use sympathize is what we should base our morals on. Although this may sound ideal in that we should show everyone sympathy there is also the matter of over sympathizing. Think of a situation in which someone is being lied to. You could sympathize with the liar and not tell the person who is being lied to because you remember how it felt like to be found out when telling a lie. Or you could sympathize with the person being lied to and tell them they are being lied to because you know how it felt to be lied to.Because sympathy is cultivated by past human experiences there are a lot of different ways in which morals may be formed and what people consider to be moral.This could lead to a constant back and forth in trying to figure out who we should sympathize with. In Chekhov 's story for insatnce, Sofya’s husband shows indifference when she tells him that another man is pursuing her romantically. Using Smith’s idea on morality many may approach this problem different ways since we all have varying past experiences. Do we sympathize with Sofya and her decision or completely ignore how she feels and focus on how her husband and daughter feel. This could cause us to over sympathize instead of actually reaching a conclusion in what the moral thing to do
In the essay titled “Foundations of the Metaphysics of Morals” published in the Morality and Moral Controversies course textbook, Immanuel Kant argues that the view of the world and its laws is structured by human concepts and categories, and the rationale of it is the source of morality which depends upon belief in the existence of God. In Kant’s work, categorical imperative was established in order to have a standard rationale from where all moral requirements derive. Therefore, categorical imperative is an obligation to act morally, out of duty and good will alone. In Immanuel Kant’s writing human reason and or rational are innate morals which are responsible for helping human. Needless to say, this also allows people to be able to distinct right from wrong. For the aforementioned reasons, there is no doubt that any action has to be executed solely out of a duty alone and it should not focus on the consequence but on the motive and intent of the action. Kant supports his argument by dividing the essay into three sections. In the first section he calls attention to common sense mor...
Ethics are the principles that shape individual lives in modern society. It is a subjective idea that seems to have a standard in society. Ethics and morals are the major factors that guide individuals to make right and wrong choices. Something that is morally right to one person might be the very opposite of what another person would view as right. There are many factors that can trigger a change in an individual’s view of morality.
Morals are developed from the moment we are born to the moment we die, and are cultivated by what we see, hear, and do within our lives, but more importantly by the people we meet. In the world there are all manner of things for us to bear witness to, whether it be the beauty of birth or the gritty horror that is war, in either case men and women are shaped and changed by these events whether it be good or bad. The greek philosopher Aristotle is quoted as saying, “And to say what makes good morals vs what are bad ones is completely based on self, for no two people have the same upbringing, class, or position in life, for how is a slave who has known nothing but the brutality of his/her master to understand under what morals, owned by their
Webster's English Dictionary defines "morality" as: the conformity to ideals of right human conduct. With this in mind, I wonder who determines right human conduct? Religion aside, there is no literary context that strictly states the rights and wrongs of human behavior. So who decides? Who determines what we ought morally to do and what we are obligated to do as a society? An Australian philosopher, Peter Singer attempts to draw the line between obligation and charity with the moral incentives to providing food for the starved in East Bengal. Although he presents many sound arguments, the reality of his utopian world is that it cannot exist. In the following expository, I will justify my reasoning behind this fact.
Who decides what is ethical and what is moral? There are no standards of conduct that everyone in the world agrees upon. There are different religions, cultures and ethnicities in this world and because of that; there will most likely never be a day where everyone finds everything that someone else does to be ethical or moral. Since there can never be a universal standard for morality and ethical behavior for people everywhere, we must stop judging people by looking through the lenses of our culture or society . We must judge someone and his actions by the standards of his culture or society. An action one person considers being justifiable behavior may not be the same case for someone else. When cultures and religions cross paths that do
One of the most persistently asked and perpetually unanswered questions in psychology is the question of morality. What is it, how does it develop, and where does it come from? A basic definition of morality is “beliefs about what is right behavior and what is wrong behavior” (Merriam-Webster). Based on the definition, the question then becomes even more complicated; How do people decide what is right and what is wrong? Research has examined this from many different angles, and two distinct schools of thought have emerged. One centers on the Lockian idea of children as blank slates who must be taught the difference between right and wrong and what it means to be moral, while the other espouses a more Chomskian perspective of a preset system of basic rules and guidelines that needs only to be activated. So what does this mean for humans and humanity? Are we born tabula rasa or are we born with an innate sense of good and evil? For those researching this topic, the question then becomes how to most effectively theorize, experiment and interpret human morality.
Kant’s moral philosophy is built around the formal principles of ethics rather than substantive human goods. He begins by outlining the principles of reasoning that can be equally expected of all rational persons regardless of their individual desires or partial interests. It creates an ideal universal community of rational individuals who can collectively agree on the moral principles for guiding equality and autonomy. This is what forms the basis for contemporary human rig...
Through his discussion of morals in the Grounding for the Metaphysics of Morals, Immanuel Kant explores the question of whether a human being is capable of acting solely out of pure duty and if our actions hold true moral value. In passage 407, page 19, Kant proposes that if one were to look at past experiences, one cannot be certain that his or her rationalization for performing an action that conforms with duty could rest solely on moral grounds. In order to fully explain the core principle of moral theory, Kant distinguishes between key notions such as a priori and a posteriori, and hypothetical imperative vs. categorical imperative, in order to argue whether the actions of rational beings are actually moral or if they are only moral because of one’s hidden inclinations.
...elop morals as a result of practical material situations and experience as described in The Grapes of Wrath and confirmed by the ideas of Plato. We humans evolved from creatures of pure instinct into something that craved a sense of order; the concept of morality is likely a byproduct of this. Ultimately it is more likely that we born morally neutral as opposed to good or evil. We were born creatures of instinct, but we have the capacity to distinguish right and wrong. This is entirely due to cultural upbringing as well as experience and practical material situations.
Kant argued that morals were based only on reason and once we fully understood this, we could find universal morals (Lacewing). Perhaps this could be an eventual end as we continue to progress as societies and individuals. Although personal emotions, such as happiness, will influence our choices, it can’t be the basis of morality as what makes individuals happy is not a universal. If we based morals only on what made each of us personally happy, what is morally right would change from situation to situation and from individual to individual (Lacewing). There must be something besides happiness that can help us understand moral values. Reason is this other factor. Reason is a universal that can influence our moral values. Emotions certainly play a role in our decision making, but many people will go against their personal happiness to make a positive moral decision. We have free will and the ability to go against what would make us happy to make a morally right choice. It seems as though moral values should be independent of, or at least not only based, what we want and individual happiness, or we fall down the path of might makes right. Over time when an idea is followed to its logical end, it should end up at the same place, but between cultures and individuals there are still drastic differences in moral values.
While Kant’s theory may seem “overly optimistic” (Johnson, 2008) now, it was ruled as acceptable and rational behavior then. Kant believed that any moral or ethical decision could be achieved with consistent behavior. While judgment was based on reason, morals were based on rational choices made by human beings (Freeman, 2000). A human’s brain is the most advanced in the animal kingdom. Not only do human beings work on instinct, but they have the ability to sort out situations in order to make a decision. This includes weighing the pros and cons of decisions that could be made and how they affect others either positively or negatively. This is called rational thought. Kant believed that any human being able to rationalize a decision before it was made had the ability to be a morally just person (Freeman, 2000). There were certain things that made the decision moral, and he called it the “Categorical Imperative” (Johnson, 2008). If someone was immoral they violated this CI and were considered irrational. The CI is said to be an automatic response which was part of Kant’s argument that all people were deserving of respect. This automatic response to rational thinking is where he is considered, now, to be “overly optimistic” (Johnson, 2008).
Our brain controls our body, because of our brains, we are able to tell qualitative differences between colours, tastes of food, our fears, and what brings us happiness(citation). In addition, the concept of what is right and what is wrong is controlled by our brains, which means that it’s truly an illusion that differs from person to person. The same concept can be applied to acts like sexual assault and murder. What makes something like these terrible acts wrong for the majority of the population and not just a distasteful act. To explain further, what a person considers distasteful versus what a person thinks is right or wrong is just a personal illusion that you personally apply to other’s. This makes me question where our moral judgements originate from, or could they just be figments of our imagination? The reason for this is simple, moral judgements are not physical objects and they do not have a mass. The only explanation that I think is reasonable comes from Steven Pinker’s “The Moral Instinct”. The explanation is that “Perhaps we are born with a rudimentary moral sense, and as soon as we build on it with moral reasoning, the nature of moral reality forces us to some conclusions but not others”(Pinker,
I strongly believe that some acts are morally right and others morally wrong. Though in society today I find many different people with many different opinions on this some issues. The way someone was raised or the experiences they have faced could be what has molded these beliefs. The differences between right and wrong are not always the same in each person's head and this is where we face controversy. Morals differ from person to person resulting in confrontations dealing with morality issues. Such as euthanasia, human beings should not have to suffer, just as we do not allow animals to suffer. I believe Pro-Choice is morally right. Woman should be given the choice of whether or not she can terminate her pregnancy. On the flip side, I feel cheating is morally wrong, and puts people at an unfair advantage.
In the article “What makes us moral” by Jeffrey Kluger, he describes how morality is defined and how the people follow rules. Kluger discusses about scientific research that has been done to point out the important reasons of morality. Kluger explains that a person’s decision to do something good or bad is based on empathy, that humans tend not to do bad to those they sympathize with. Kluger also compares humans with animals and thinks that morality is the only thing that separates us from animals. I do agree with Kluger that people are born with a sense of right and wrong, but we should be taught how to use it. We learned to be nicer to those around us because we already know the type of person they are, and the morality we learned as children
The concept of morality differs for every individual. Morality is one 's concept of right and wrong as defined by the individual 's society, family, religion, ethnicity and even gender. It is also subject to the individual 's interpretation and experience. This lends credence to the idea that no one 's morality is exactly the same. The next logical question to answer would be how does one develop their morality? Developmental behaviorist such as Piaget and Kohlberg developed theories for this moral development and how it progresses from childhood into adulthood (Barsky, 2010). Kohlberg 's theory centers around three levels of growth: preconventional reasoning, conventional reasoning, and postconventional reasoning. The levels progress from