“Good engineering, good business, and good ethics work together in the long run.

• It concerns conduct: right and wrong, good and bad, the rules that ought to be followed
• It is associated with consequences to ourselves, others, and the environment
• The “right” or “good” is linked to value judgements generally thought to promote fairness, health, and safety while minimizing injustice

• Utilitarianism - the view that we ought to produce the most good for the most people, giving equal consideration to everyone affected
– Rule-Utilitarianism is applying those rules that if generally adopted would produce the most good for the most people
– Act-Utilitarianism is applying rules in order to produce the most good for the most people involved in the particular situation (rules become at most rules of thumb)

• Deeply satisfying pleasures mixed with some inevitable pains & a pattern of activities and relationships that one can affirm as valuable overall (Mill)
• Things that satisfy rational desires, e.g., love and creativity. Rational desires are those we would approve of if we scrutinized our desires in light of all relevant information about the world and our own psychology (Brandt)

• Rights Ethics - the view that human rights - not good consequences - are fundamental.
– Acts of respect for human rights are obligatory, regardless of whether they always maximize good
– Truthfulness important in terms of its contribution to liberty, especially within relationships based on trust
– Complex in that there are many types of rights that may conflict and must be balanced

• Liberty Rights (Locke) - places duties on other people not to interfere with one’s life.
– To be a person entails having human rights to life, liberty, and the property generated by one’s labor
– property thought of as whatever we gain by “mixing our labor” with things
– Views reflected by today’s Libertarians

• Liberty & Welfare Rights (Melden) - having moral rights presupposes the capacity to show concern for others and to be accountable within a moral community
– extent of rights determined in terms of interrelationships among persons
– recognizes right to community benefits for living minimally decent human life

• Duty Ethics - the focus on duties which correspondence to and sustain fundamental rights
• List of duties based on respect for persons and belief in human capacity for moral autonomy
• For example, if you have a right not to be deceived, then I have a duty not to deceive you. To deceive you is to undermine your ability to carry out your plans based on available truths and within relationships based on trust

• Kant
– Be truthful
– Be fair
– Make reparation for harm done
– Show gratitude for kindness extended
– Seek to improve one’s own character and talents
• Gert
– Don’t
• cause pain
• disable
• deprive of freedom
• deprive of pleasure
• deceive
• cheat
– Do
• keep your promises
• obey the law
• do your duty

• Are duties universally applicable and exceptionless? Is duty absolute?
• What about when duties conflict with each other, e.g., “do not deceive” versus “protect innocent life”
• Prima facie duties
- those that have justified exceptions or limits

• Morality - “good” is linked to value judgements
• Ethical Theories - attempt to provide perspective on moral responsibilities
– Utilitarianism
• Rule-Utilitarianism
• Act-Utilitarianism
– Rights Ethics
– Duty Ethics

• Is it applicable and coherent?
• Is it consistent?
• Is it based on valid information?
• Is it sufficiently comprehensive to provide guidance?
• Is it compatible with our moral convictions?

A Theory of Justice (John Rawls)
(1) Each person is entitled to the most extensive amount of political liberty compatible with an equal amount for others
(2) Differences in social power and economic benefits are justified only when they are likely to benefit everyone, including members of the most disadvantaged groups

• Primary focus on the kinds of persons we should aspire to be
• Virtues are
– desirable way of relating to others (individuals or groups)
– desirable habits or tendencies of motive, attitudes, and emotion as well as conduct
• Vices are
– undesirable habits and tendencies
• By extension, virtues and vices apply to organizations

• Defined the moral virtues as tendencies, acquired through habit formation, to reach a proper balance between extremes in conduct, emotion, desire, and attitude (balance between excess and deficiency)
• Example: Truthfulness is the mean between revealing all information in violation of tact and confidentiality (excess) and being secretive or lacking in candor (deficiency) in dealing with truth

• Politics without principle
• Wealth without work
• Commerce without morality
• Pleasure without conscience
• Education without character
• Science without humanity
• Worship without personal sacrifice

• Internal goods define what the practices are all about ( external goods are money and prestige)
• virtues defined by reference to its internal good
– professional responsibility
• Self-direction virtues
– understanding, cognition (as grounded in moral concern)
– commitment and putting understanding into action (courage, self-discipline, honesty)
• Public-spirited virtues
• Team-work virtues
• Proficiency virtues

• A theory about morality that emphasizes the limitations of abstract rules (“anti-theory”)
• Not to be confused with crass expediency
• Good consequences emphasized, but so too are rights, duties and virtues within a given context
• Flexibility emphasized
• Like act-utilitarianism, there is danger of paying insufficient attention moral principles through immersion in specific contexts.

• Customs or ethical relativism is view that values are reducible to conventions, customs, or laws
– would we accept bribes, cruelty, and intolerance?
• Religion and divine command ethics
– who are those among us who know precisely what
God’s commands are or are not on each issue?
• Self-interest and ethical egoism is view that the sole duty of each individual is to maximize his or her own good
– is everything act reducible to personal gain, alone?

• Craft Motives
– attraction to challenging work
– wanting to create objects and systems
• Moral Motives
– contributing to the well-being of other human beings
• Compensation and Self-Interest
– money, power, and recognition motivate and guide human conduct
– reasonable regard for one’s self-interest can be a moral virtue (prudence) as long as it does not crowd out other virtues