The Terri Schiavo case was a huge start of the “Right to Die” movement, the underlying cause of Schiavo’s collapse was never given a diagnosis. Consequentialist moral theories focus on how much good can result from an action. Non Consequentialist moral theories or Deontological theories, consider not the consequences of an action but whether they fulfill a duty. Some theories that can be used include utilitarianism, Kant’s ethics and natural law theory. Being aware of the case already, I believe there should be some sort of law that gives doctors to comply with the wishes of the patient if they are in a lot of distress.
The goal of this paper is to demonstrate that Philippa Foot’s objection, raised to her own argument against utilitarianism, is correct. Her initial thesis is that benevolence, while the foundation of utilitarianism, is an internal end of morality, rather than the ultimate end of morality. The possible objection to this that there must be some overarching reason behind morality, which must imply a form of consequentialism. The response she offers is that there should be some other form of morality, which is a weak argument, as it does not provide an alternate conception of morality itself.
Consequentialism is based more around the consequence and final result of the actions. In our text book, Ethical Reasoning, it states that in consequentialism, “consequences count, not motives or intentions” (Pence, 2011). Non-consequentialism is based around the intention of one’s doing, regardless of the consequences. A particular action may be good for a business but not good for society or ones health. An example of this would be pharmaceutical companies raising the cost for medicine, this cause many patients to suffer or not be able to afford the medication they need. When a person is going to make a moral decision based on consequentialism, he or she first look at the good and bad possible consequences of the action, then determine whether the total good consequences outweigh the total bad.
Ethical theories are ways of telling right from wrong and include guidelines of how to live and act in an ethical way. For example when faced with a difficult situation in your life, you can use ethical theories to assist you in making the right decision. One key theory is consequentialism, which says that an individual’s correct moral response is related to the outcome/ consequence of the act and not its intentions/ motives. Early writers on this theory were Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill, a modern writer is Peter Singer. For example Brenda Grey has asked for the asthma specialist to visit her weekly, and to decide if this is necessary the professionals involved have to look at how it would affect her wellbeing. This is done by questioning
A current ethical debate in the world of healthcare is Savior siblings. A savior sibling is a child who is born to be genetically compatible with a sibling that is suffering from a life-threatening disease. The child is born to provide either organ or cell transplant, and/or blood transfusions for the ill sibling. The child is created through in vitro fertilization (IVF), once the embryo goes through preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD), it helps identify genetic defects within the embryos. This arises many ethic concerns for people, like whether or not savior siblings should be allowed, and how far would one go to save the sick child’s life. Each branch of Philosophy has their own view and opinions, that
I think I will divert the train to the right killing one person because one person is less important than five. Sometimes it is important to do what is right than what is morally good to do. The utilitarianism is a moral theory that gives happiness to the number of people in the society and it has been considered greatness, an action is morally appropriate if its outcomes lead to happiness and wrong if it results in sadness. I will begin by describing what Mill might do in the Trolley situation. Next, I will contrast what Kant might do in this situation and lastly, I will be also going to give my opinion on this Trolley situation.
It is a part of normative ethical theories and it means that the consequence of ones behavior is an ultimate mean for anyone to judge the rightness or wrongness of that behavior. So, from the perspective of a consequentialist an ethically right act is the one that will inherit good outcome or consequence. It usually explains the saying “the end justifies the means” which means that in order to achieve a goal, take any route which leads to achieving it.
runaway trolley and the only way to save five people on the tracks is to sacrifice
Bernard Williams’ essay, A Critique of Utilitarianism, launches a rather scathing criticism of J. J. C. Smart’s, An Outline of a System of Utilitarian ethics. Even though Williams claims his essay is not a direct response to Smart’s paper, the manner in which he constantly refers to Smart’s work indicates that Smart’s version of Utilitarianism, referred to as act-Utilitarianism, is the main focus of Williams’ critique.
I, along with a majority of people would agree, without hesitation, that in this case it is okay to pull the lever and take one life instead of five, some would even say that we should pull the lever, implying that we are morally obligated to do so. Justification for this decision is as follows: “When you have the means to save life, it’s better to save more”, which is a common consequentialist reasoning in this situation. I believe that given the chance to do so, we are morally obligated to save as much life as possible, after all, isn’t all life sacred?
The City of Cypress, California Department of Planning and Community Development (DPCD) is led by Commissioner Johnnie Walker. As commissioner of DPCD, Mr. Walker provides leadership and policy direction for the Offices of Planning, Buildings, and Housing. He is also the overseer of all eminent domain cases within the city however he has never dealt with such a case until now. On one particular early Monday morning Commissioner Walker walked into his office to find a very interesting eminent domain case waiting on his desk. On his desk he found two very compelling arguments about the potential development of a church on private property. In the documents, Commissioner Walker read that Pastor Bayless Conely of the Cottonwood Christian Center
In today’s world, many people tend to have a set of ethical principles which is one of the guidelines for them to follow on. The question is how he or she defines ethics? To answer, Ethics is best defined as knowing what is right or wrong in the action based on the moral principles. Moreover, it is also known as the branch of knowledge that deals with ethical issues. In relation, there are some ethical theories which deal with the ethical issues. The consequentialist theorist can be taken as an example. Consequentialist theories are a theory in which it is based on the consequences of an action. Based on the movie assignment, The Island, there are some major views that the consequentialist theories have on the movie. One of the major
Explain how the movie deals with consequentialism and non-consequentialism, particularly in the role the “Pre-Cogs” play in the movie and the idea behind Pre-Crime.
Child labor is work that children should not be doing, work that may harm their health and keeps them without education. While working children have no time for attending schools and get education that is the most important thing for their future life and success. But not all work done by children should be accepted as child labor. In other words, if a work doesn’t harm child’s health or personal development (educational issues), it is generally accepted as something positive and useful. Such activities develop children’s skills, provide experience and formulate them to be part of society. The term “Child Labor” is when children do work that damages their health or hamper mental or physical
Suppose a conductor is driving his train and the breaks are defect. The rails lead directly into a cluster of five people who would all die if the train will go this direction. However, the conductor can change onto another track where only one person is standing hence only one person would die. How should the conductor react (Hare, 1964)? Is it possible to condense the problem to a rather simple maximization problem in example that the action is taken, which would kill the least people? Utilitarianisms would answer the question in the affirmative and change the track so only one person has to suffer. However, we have to question if the Utilitarianism is applicable to such ethical questions (Smart & Williams, 1973). This essay will outline several strength and weaknesses of the Utilitarianism devised by Jeremy Bentham. Firstly, the Utilitarianism will be outlined, secondly some strength and weaknesses are explained by employing examples, and thirdly several solution approaches for dilemmas Bentham’s Utilitarianism is facing will be sketched.