Moral theory

Moral theory, like much of philosophy, is a competition of ideas pursued to their logical ends. The way to make a name in philosophy is to concoct a plausible theory and pursue its logical consequences wherever they lead. It is much rarer to see philosophers integrate disparate theories into a consistent whole. 

To summarize, there are three basic reasons why exploitation cannot be a fundamental notion in moral theory. They are all related to the fact that... 

The third meaning, the one we are concerned with in this chapter, is professional ethics. Professional ethics is the special rules of conduct adhered to by those engaged in pursuits ordinarily called professions, such as law, medicine, engineering, and science. Professional ethics is specific. Legal ethics applies only to lawyers (and no one else) scientific ethics applies only to scientists. Professional ethics governs the interactions among professionals and between professionals and society. In many cases, it requires a higher standard of conduct than is expected of ordinary people, but it must be consistent with ordinary morality and with appropriate moral theories. 

One of the most prestigious contributors to the literature of medical philosophy is K. M. Fulford, a professor at Oxford University. His book, titled Moral Theory and Medical Practice, has little to do with moral theory and even less with medical practice. Acknowledging that his aim is to give different meanings to the terms disease and illness, Fulford maintains that mental illnesses are the same kinds of diseases as bodily illnesses and defends traditional psychiatric principles and practices. He proposes the following definition of disease First, the idea that illness is a value term will be adopted as an assumption next, a hypothesis about disease will be derived from this assumption. Neither the pathologist in the laboratory, nor the clinician at the bedside, nor the suffering patient views disease as a hypothesis derivedfrom an assumption. The utility of Fulford s interpretation clearly lies elsewhere. 

K. W. M. Fulford, Moral Theory and Medical Practice, p. 28, emphasis added. 

Lyotard, 1. (1993). The postmodern explained. Minneapolis/London University of Minnesota Press Macbeath, 1., Galton, M., Steward, S., Macbeath, A., Page, C. (2006). The costs of inclusion. Report prepared for the National Union of Teachers. Retrieved September 24, 2006, from http //www.teachers.org.uk/resources/pdf/CostsofInclusion.pdf MacIntyre, A. (1984). After virtue A study in moral theory. Notre Dame University of Notre Dame MacIntyre, A. (1999). Dependent rational animals Why human beings need the virtues. Chicago Open Court Press... 

W.D. Ross was a Provost of Oriel College, Oxford, Honorary Fellow of Merton College and a Fellow of the British Academy during the early 20th century. His greatest contribution was found in his criticisms of consequentialist moral theories. 

Ethics is the study of right and wrong in relation to human actions. It includes metaethics, that is, study of the general principles from which ethical systems can be built moral theory, that is, the ethical systems themselves, consisting of the criteria and procedures that can be applied to decide whether individual actions are right or wrong and practical ethics or applied ethics, that is, the application of ethical systems to the analysis of particular situations, including such specialized areas as business ethics and medical ethics. 

One difficulty that arises with rule-based systems is conflict between different rales. It is easy to imagine examples in which the requirement to act in the public interest is in conflict with the duty of fidelity towards an employer or client. Moral theory offers a way of handling this, through the doctrine of double effect. According to this doctrine, the foreseeable effects of an action can be divided into those that are intended and those that are merely foreseen but not intended, ft is, in certain circumstances, permissible to carry out an action whose intended effects are good even if some of the consequences that are foreseen as possible but that are not intended are bad. Obviously the good effects of the intended consequences of the action must, in some sense, outweigh the possible bad effects that are foreseen. 

Multinational States and Moral Theories of International Legal Doctrine... 

Allen Buchanan argues persuasively for the need for a moral theory of international law in Justice, Legitimacy, and Self-Determination Moral Foundations for International Law (Oxford Oxford University Press, 2004). Michael Walzer engages in a deeply moral discussion of conventions of war in Just and Unjust Wars A Moral Argument with Historical Illustrations, 3rd ed. (New York Basic, 2000). For a good discussion of the need for normative theorizing, see Allen Buchanan and David Golove, Philosopy of International Law, in The Oxford Handbook of Jurisprudence and Philosophy of Law, ed. J. Coleman and S. Shapiro (Oxford Oxford University Press, 2003), pp. 868-934. 

On the Commonwealth was the first, and perhaps the only, serious attempt by a Roman to analyze the structure and values of republican government and imperial rule. In adapting Platonic and Aristotelian theories based on the small, self-contained, and relatively homogeneous society of the polis to the conditions of the Roman imperium, Cicero made use of Stoic ideas of the cosmopoUs and of natural law to develop a complex and ambitious argument, linking the traditional values and institutions of republican Rome on the one hand to Aristotelian ideas of civic virtue and on the other to the order of the universe itself. Stoic moral theory made it possible for Cicero to construct an image of society... 

Tronto acknowledges paternalism as problematic (p. 145), but does not seem to offer any solutions or practical work-arounds. However, she does point out that at least through care ethics one can recognize and identify such issues and this is surely preferable to sole reliance on a moral theory that can not. 

ICE in 1828) as the art of directing the great sources of power in Nature for the use and convenience of man implicitly associates engineering with the moral theory of David Hume, for whom use and convenience are basic moral categories of human benefit (Mitcham and Munoz 2010). 

Other deontological approaches include duty theory popularized by David Ross and rights theory (concerned with rights that all people have, and which the rest of us must respect). Ross s duty theory defines duties of beneficence, nonmalfeasance. Justice, self-improvement, reparation, gratitude, and promise keeping. He calls these prima facie duties. This approach was developed as an alternative to utilitarianism because of perceived failures of utilitarianism as a satisfactory moral theory. 

---