Understanding Ethics: Foundations, Dilemmas, and Origins
Understanding Ethics
What is Ethics?
Etymologically, the word “ethics” has roots in two Greek words:
- Ethos, meaning custom, habit, or use.
- Another word meaning dwelling or usual place of residence, but also character, way of being, feeling, and thinking.
Its meaning is equivalent to “moral” (as often done). In a narrower sense, we understand the ethical way of being human, of living in the world, to be at the core of our existence. In this manner, we differ from all other beings in the world in at least three ways:
- We realize who we are and what we do.
- We do it because we want to (or not).
- Our decisions and actions are making us better or worse people.
Ethics is both a theoretical and practical knowledge. It seeks to explain and justify what we do, looking for whether our actions respond to any foundation. That is, if we can explain the reason for our actions and if they help us to be human or to behave, on the contrary, vegetating in life or being a beast.
In short, ethics is about knowing who we are to behave as such.
What is Ethical-Civic?
To reflect on who we are, we discover that we are social beings by nature. That is, we need wilderness groups, certain institutions, and certain people to be able to survive and eventually develop our personal skills. The answer lies in this society where we can become part of a group.
Therefore, the ethical-political is that part of ethical reflection and justification of our actions, which relates to our behavior in a social community or a state.
A citizen is one who lives in a city or a state (social institutions) as subjects of rights and exercises them, involved in their government.
Moral Dilemmas
Moral dilemmas are cases in which there are two equally good alternatives, but you have to decide and commit.
The Issue of the Foundation
Is it Necessary to Explain the Meaning of What We Do?
People, as intelligent and free beings, do not do things just following our instincts, as do other living things (plants and animals). We act always for “something.”
That “something” is the motor of our actions, which gives them meaning. It is tied to our values, those things that we consider unassailable. Otherwise, our life would be “a nonsense tale told by an idiot.”
Can This Foundation Be Established?
Some believe it is impossible to base what we do and make universal moral (ethical) judgments on what should be done, because everyone does what he can, or what he wants. Each has its own criteria, interests, motivations, and they can all be legitimate. It all depends… This is known as moral relativism or even nihilism (when all values are dissolved).
But then… Why do you claim to stand a note you unfair? Because there is something in us that is revealed to what is wrong and bow to something we understand as good, valuable, enjoyable, useful, necessary….
How is it Done?
In history, there have been many proposals. Most of them agree in asserting that the clues to find the trace of this foundation are the nature or mode of being human and our rational capacity.
Origin of Ethics
Ethics arose where those criteria were sought and rationale. It was in Athens, Greece (V century BC).
First, the so-called sophists maintained that there was no objective basis for establishing what is better and therefore no law or rule may be universal, falling into relativism and even nihilism.
But on the other hand, the philosopher Socrates and his disciples maintained that not all rules can be relative, because then everything would have no real value. If everything goes, then nothing really matters.