What is "Ethics", and to which flavour do you adhe

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What exactly is/are "ethics?"

If I accuse you of being "unethical", then what do I mean? Simply that I find you to be behaving in a manner of which I disapprove? Or, that I find you to be behaving in a manner which is inconsistent with some platonic vision of what you ought to be doing?

Do "ethics" vary by person? By society? Or, are "ethics" universally objective?

Brief descriptions of some of the various fields of Normative Ethics are available here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethics

did you know that many of the normative fields of ethics are "retired" from common usage in many of the larger society types in the world?

what we use today in the west(plenty of other places too, it seems only the proportions change) is a mix of certain parts from almost all of the normative fields, sometimes applied in a niche of society and sometimes it spans the whole.

you see plenty of examples of virtue based ethics just as you recognize that a persons enviroment and external factors determine wheter something is ethical or not.

we also see hedonistic areas of society where pleasure is a virtue in and of itself and areas where the end clearly seems to justify the means.

in all of this there is the overarching lesson from postmodernistic ethics that deems it impossible to have universal ethics when it is inherently based upon our perception, which is quite biased even in the best of circumstances.

As a consequentialist (of my own flavour), I think that ethics are objective: the moral value of an action is determined by its consquences. However, said consequences are hard to value correctly.

The science or discipline of right and wrong behavior.

ruveyn

How to determine what is "right" and "wrong" behavior?

Right now I follow mostly Kant's deontology, although I've noticed it doesn't take into account human emotion, which bothers me. I've got lots to read yet on the subject of ethics, in order to finally make my own.

The conscience makes ethics universal, but of course... the conscience easily conforms to societal input, and even if there are good people, good values, and good principles in that society, the conscience can of course still be blunted by being around the opposite. The conscience needs to feel responsibility to something higher then it. It is never enough to simply arrive at the position of something is right and wrong because you feel so, or because logic dictates.

That is the belief of the torah, and it believes that good people can come from everywhere, and that a righteous Pagan is on par with even the most pious Jew. But that is only if that pagan and that jew are both following the ethics of the torah.

I think God should be the basis of ethics, and specifically the Hebrew God as described in the Torah. The genius of the text is that it also acknowledges that God is not limited to Judaism and available to all peoples of all backgrounds, so I also think Buddhism has something to say to humanity, as well as Christianity, Islam, Humanism, etc that could help shape our ethics. But my point is: God first and formost, and the way to understand him is through the 3000 year old jewish text.

meh all it takes to disprove that theory is a single atheist that is good and a single religious man who isnt, of which we have plenty, (both groups that is)

when a piece of fiction from the 80'ies show a far more ethical aproach than something that is 1700 years old and people say is right partly because of that age then i dont really think one has to go further.

but i will, what about other religions, do they hold the same high position as god? oh wait you said they didnt, why?
dont bother it is almost per definition a circular argument, most of what is invoked hold equal or greater truth value in other religions and ingoring that fact is beyond ridicoulous if one wants to be honest about the actual possiblities.

I'm a moral nihilist, but as a matter of personal preference I try (with varying levels of success) to live by a code of rationality and the pursuit of personal happiness.

Situational -- Situational ethics is a teleological, or consequential theory, in that it is concerned with the outcome or consequences of an action; the end. In the case of situational ethics, the ends can justify the means or rules can be used to justify the means if a situation is not intrinsically bad.. A man named Joseph Fletcher explained it better.

You know, the first time they tried this a guy named Joshua had some serious words with the dudes running the show (the Pharisees and Sadducees) about how badly they screwed it up.

The second time, we called it the Dark Ages.

Do you really think Round Three is gonna go better?

I generally follow the idea that

"if I don't like it someone else probably doesn't, if I like it someone else probably does, but there's lots of variation, so at first there's trial and error except on the most basic of things and then I have a framework by which to figure out which areas are most likely to have deviants from the norm and thus make sure to ask/figure out people's specifics in those areas more often ... as long as it's not too much work for myself"


I call it "WAT." but there's no poll result for that one, also known as "what?" and "wut." in regards to the ethics ism's

or "I have no idea lol"

Utilitarian-Consequentialism

I don't say its right because of its age, I am in awe that 3000 year old principles got it right, and not much has between then and maybe 30 years ago. So that is impressive, and one of Man's most revolutionary triumphs was one of it's most earliest achievements.

Explain: " what about other religions, do they hold the same high position as god? oh wait you said they didnt, why?" I don't follow.

And how exactly does the simple existence of one good atheist and one bad religious person invalidate what I wrote above?

Still waiting for an answer, MC.

As with Oodain, please highlight what part of my text you are reacting to Lord Gareth, that would be helpful.