Chapter 1 Homework Capital Punishment Wrong Helping The Poor Good

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CHAPTER 1

The Nature of Morality

Learning Objectives

After completing this chapter students should be able to:

Define the nature and sources of ethical and moral standards.

Distinguish between moral and non-moral questions.

Examine our business environment and debate the extent to which business ethics differs from

Glossary

1. argument: Perhaps the most important element of moral reasoning, which is a group of

statements. One or more of these statements are premises and one of them is a conclusion. The

premises are reasons to believe the conclusion.

2. argument form: The form of reasoning an argument uses. The same form of reasoning can

underlie different arguments and statements. The argument “All men are mortal, Socrates is a

man, therefore Socrates is mortal” uses the argument form “All A are B, C is a B, therefore C is

an A.” Argument forms can be valid or invalid.

Chapter Summary Points

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1. Morality deals with individual character and the moral rules that are meant to govern and limit

our conduct. It investigates questions of right and wrong, duty and obligation, and moral

responsibility. ‘Ethics’ can be used as a synonym for ‘morality’ but it can also refer to ‘moral

philosophy.‘ Philosophy is a quest for knowledge through reason. Moral philosophy can help us

attain improved moral opinions by learning how to apply logic and good reasoning to morality.

We can do this (in part) by considering multiple perspectives, arguing, and theorizing.

2. Business ethics is a form of moral philosophy that helps us determine what’s morally right or

wrong in a business (or organizational) context.

3. Moral standards concern behavior that has serious consequences for human well–being, and they

take priority over other standards, including self-interest. Their soundness depends on the

adequacy of the reasons that support or justify them.

4. Morality must be distinguished from etiquette (rules for well–mannered behavior), from law

(statutes, regulations, common law, and constitutional law), and from professional codes of ethics

(the special rules governing the members of a profession).

5. Morality is not necessarily based on religion. Although we draw our moral beliefs from many

sources, for philosophers the issue is whether those beliefs can be justified.

6. Ethical relativism is the theory that right and wrong are determined by what one’s society says is

right and wrong. There are many problems with this theory. Also dubious is the theory that

business has its own morality, divorced from ordinary ideas of right and wrong.

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Teaching Suggestions

1. Ethics – This is the first exposure that many students will have had to ethics. Therefore, at the

beginning of the course, it may be useful to distinguish three areas of ethics: descriptive ethics, normative

ethics, and metaethics.

Descriptive ethics is simply the description of the ethical beliefs of a certain group of people. It is a matter

of sociology or anthropology, not philosophy. By contrast, normative ethics attempts to answer

substantive questions of right and wrong. For example, determining whether insider trading really is

morally permissible or impermissible—not simply whether a particular group of people thinks it is

permissible or impermissible—is an issue of normative ethics.

a. Capital punishment is wrong.

b. Helping the poor is good.

c. It is wrong to harm other people.

d. Child abuse is wrong.

There are two things you can point out here. First, all of these moral claims seem to use language that

functions informatively and not just emotively. That is, they state that something is or is not the case. This

is important because if the language is not functioning informatively, then there cannot be arguments

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2. Argumentation –This is the first exposure that many students will have had to philosophy. This is one

reason why the discussion of logic and argumentation is important. It should be emphasized that this is a

philosophy class and we should do our best to justify our arguments using valid arguments. Shaw and

Barry do not discuss what argument form is, but understanding logical validity requires us to have at least

An example of an argument is the following:

1. Hurting people just to benefit yourself is wrong.

2. If hurting people just to benefit yourself is wrong, then it’s wrong to kill people just to take their

money for yourself.

3. Therefore, it’s wrong to kill people just to take their money for yourself.

This argument can be stripped of its content to reveal the following argument form:

1. A.

2. If A, then B.

3. Therefore, B.

Other arguments can use this argument form. For example:

1. Charity is always wrong.

2. If charity is always wrong, then giving money to the poor is wrong.

3. Therefore, giving money to the poor is wrong.

Counterexamples should use the same argument form as an argument, but the premises should be true and

the conclusion should be false. This proves that the argument form can have true premises and a false

conclusion at the same time, and that is sufficient proof to show that an argument is invalid. An example

of an invalid argument is the following:

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It should be made clear that valid arguments are not necessarily good arguments, but good arguments

should be valid. If an argument isn’t valid, then it‘s unreliable. Even if the premises are true, the

conclusion could be false anyway.

When having a class debate or analyzing arguments in class, it’s a good idea to make sure that the

arguments are valid. Students often have unstated assumptions they think are “too obvious to mention”

and arguments can be valid once these assumptions are found. For example, a student might argue that

Questions for Discussion

Introduction

How far must manufacturers go to ensure product safety? Must they reveal everything about a product,

including any possible defects or shortcomings? At what point does acceptable exaggeration become lying

about a product or a service? When does aggressive marketing become consumer manipulation? Is

advertising useful and important or deceptive, misleading, and socially detrimental? When are prices

unfair or exploitative?

Are corporations obliged to help combat social problems? What are the environmental responsibilities of

business, and is it living up to them? Are pollution permits a good idea? Is factory farming morally

justifiable?

Business and Organizational Ethics

Would it be right for a store manager to break a promise to a customer and sell some hard-to–find

merchandise to someone else, whose need for it is greater?

What, if anything, should a moral employee do when his or her superiors refuse to look into apparent

wrong–doing in a branch office?

If you innocently came across secret information about a competitor, would it be permissible for you to

use it for your own advantage?

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