An Introduction to Philosophy for Ethics Bowl Participants
By Gina Lebkuecher, Cameron Bassiri, Ellen Feder and Andrea Tschemplik*
American University
December 2015
*
The preparation of this introduction was inspired by Matthew Deaton’s Ethics in a Nutshell. The authors are
grateful to Jin Y. Park for her assistance, especially with respect to the inclusion of Confucian ethics.
Table of Contents
Chapter 1: What is philosophy?
Chapter 2: What is ethics?
Chapter 3: Introduction to Ethical Theories
Virtue Ethics
Confucianism
Kantian Deontology
Social Contract Theory
Consequentialism
Care Ethics
Other Ethical Systems
Combining Ethical Theories
Chapter 4: Examples from Previous Ethics Bowls
Vaccination Programs as a Cover for Spying
China’s One Child Policy
Chapter 5: Tips for Presenting Your Point Effectively and Conclusion
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Chapter 1 – What is Philosophy?
Wonder is the experience of a philosopher, and philosophy begins in wonder.
Socrates, from Plato’s Theaetetus
Many people think of philosophy as a dry, complicated, and ancient subject. However,
philosophy’s most literal meaning is the love of wisdom – from the Greek philo, love, and sophia,
wisdom. It seeks to understand not only the world around us but ourselves. To say philosophy “begins in
wonder” simply means that it is driven by that part of ourselves that is always questioning, that part that
craves answers to the deepest mysteries in our lives. Though not everyone chooses to study philosophy
academically, we are each philosophers in our own way – for example, when we try to make a logical or
ethical decision, or choose the best course of action. Thus, whether we are aware of it or not,
philosophy plays an important role in our daily lives.
To understand philosophy, it is important to know a bit about its history. Just as the meaning of
the word philosophy can be traced back to ancient Greece, so can some of Western philosophy’s most
foundational thinkers. In ancient Greece, philosophy wasn’t the exclusive pursuit of intellectuals or
academics. Rather, it was a part of everyday life – whether that meant examining one’s way of living,
participating in politics, or developing new systems of thought to understand the world around us.
Socrates, who lived in ancient Greece during the fifth century BCE, famously said, “The
unexamined life is not worth living.” For him, philosophy was important in order to answer questions
about the best way to live, what we should value, how we should act, and what is good. Socrates was
regarded as a “gadfly” in his hometown of Athens, as he often annoyed people with his questions.
However, he embraced that mantle. He was willing to talk with anyone about the pursuit of the best
possible life, whether aristocrat or slave. His famous “Socratic Method” encouraged everyone he
interacted with to challenge their assumptions and always be critical of the status quo. His probing,
questioning approach to philosophy is highly regarded and followed to this day.
In Athenian political life, philosophy was also used by citizens participating in democratic debate
in the polis, or city-state. Athenians used philosophy to promote policy, make laws, and decide whether
to go to war – all by presenting their views before other citizens for a vote. Many of the debate and
rhetoric strategies developed by these philosophers are still used today, and are presented in Chapter 5.
Philosophers also provided the justification for different types of government; Plato, for instance, valued
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democracy not as the best type of government but as the one that would cause the least damage if the
system became corrupt.
Aristotle, Plato’s student, systematized logic, which allows us to break arguments down into
basic statements and reject those based on fallacious reasoning. For example, while it may seem logical
to say something like “This animal is black. This animal is a cat. Therefore, cats are black,” we know
that’s not always true. Some cats are not black. Formal logic allows us to examine statements like these
and find exactly where the reasoning went wrong. Learning logic can be very interesting and helps make
one a much more effective speaker. We’ll touch on some basic logic in Chapter 5. Aristotle also laid the
groundwork for much of modern science, which he called “natural philosophy;” he wrote on physics,
biology, and other natural sciences.
Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle are seen by many as the founders of Western philosophy, and
their ideas still influence many modern philosophers. Some of our most widely-held—and widely
contested!—beliefs today come from these thinkers. For example, Plato was an early exponent of the
idea that the soul is immortal, and that it exists as something separate from the body. He also
introduced what today is called Platonism, the idea that the material world – the world we experience in
our daily lives – doesn’t truly exist or is not the “real” world.
However, these three thinkers didn’t come up with their philosophies in isolation. They were
influenced by philosophers before them, like Pythagoras, Heraclitus, Zeno of Elea, Democritus, and so on.
These thinkers were in turn influenced by philosophers from other parts of the world, especially the
Ancient Near East, which we today call the Middle East, and northern Africa. Pythagoras was educated
in Egypt under Egyptian priests, especially the archprophet Soches. Many other influential pre-Socratic
philosophers, like Thales, Anaximander, and Anaximenes, were born and educated in present-day
Turkey and heavily influenced by Egyptian philosophy. Thus, philosophy has always been a collaboration,
in which philosophers build on and improve upon the ideas of those who came before them. Besides,
though Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle can be seen as the founders of Western philosophy, Western
philosophy is by no means the foundation of philosophy in general.
Chinese philosophy, specifically Confucianism, is responsible for the idea of meritocracy. This
idea began by valuing people based on their education and the cultivation of virtue, and was later
developed into a system by which people took tests to earn positions of power in the government based
on hard work and their mastery of classical texts, rather than being promoted through a hereditary
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system. Chinese philosophy is also responsible, especially through Daoist philosophy, for the idea of
complementary opposites, that is, the world is made up of complementary forces like the sun and moon,
light and dark, male and female.
Islamic philosophy, from Africa and the Middle East, expanded on philosophical ideas
introduced in Egypt and ancient Greece and led to the reintroduction of philosophy in Europe hundreds
of years later, sparking the Enlightenment. Avicenna, a Persian philosopher, developed the first
ontological argument – a proof of the existence of God – and used thought experiments to demonstrate
that humans are self-aware. Indian philosophy, Japanese philosophy, Jewish philosophy, and Indigenous
American philosophical traditions have also been very influential throughout history.
Unfortunately, until recently Western philosophy has been seen by many as the most serious
and important philosophical tradition. This is a result of ignorance of, and discrimination against, nonEuropean philosophers and their ideas. Women have also been discriminated against throughout history,
which is why there are relatively few influential women philosophers before the nineteenth century.
Luckily, today there is increasing recognition that philosophy is practiced by people all over the world,
regardless of race, gender, or religion. This has allowed new and diverse viewpoints to gain prominence
in contemporary philosophy, reinvigorating the field. Latin American philosophy, philosophy of race,
feminist philosophy, Asian philosophy, African philosophy, and others have become very influential in
recent years. Philosophy is always changing as new ideas and questions arise. It’s a discipline that
evolves with the cultural and social tide, that seeks to criticize and examine ideas that many accept as
necessary truths, and encourages us to always question ourselves and the world around us. Thus, as
more viewpoints contribute to the field of philosophy, we become better able to challenge accepted
views and to come up with new and interesting ways of looking at problems.
By looking at the history of philosophy we can see that it’s not perfect. Like all fields of study, it
has evolved over time and contains many conflicting ideas. However, philosophy is unique in that it is
always striving to answer new questions, and provide new answers even to questions we all take for
granted. Philosophy gives us the tools to contemplate our lives, our world, and the nature of existence,
but at the same time it encourages us not to settle on an answer and stick with it. It involves constant
self-criticism and self-reflection, as well as collaboration with other philosophers to find philosophical
systems that make sense. Philosophy may be one of the oldest fields of study, but that doesn’t mean it’s
stuck in the past. Philosophy teaches us that we should always keep questioning, and keep wondering.
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Chapter 2 – What is Ethics?
Man is man because he is free to operate within the framework of his destiny. He is free
to deliberate, to make decisions, and to choose between alternatives. He is distinguished
from animals by his freedom to do evil or to do good and to walk the high road
of beauty or tread the low road of ugly degeneracy.
Martin Luther King, Jr., from The Measures of Man
If philosophy asks “What is life?” ethics is the part of philosophy that asks, “What is good?” or
“What is right?” Most of us have our own ideas about good and bad, right and wrong; ethics helps us
examine these ideas and look at their underlying values. Not only can ethics help us think about what
we should do or how we should act in certain situations, it also helps us answer broader questions.
What is valuable? How does one live a good life? Is there such a thing as “evil”? These big questions may
seem outside the scope of ethics, but they all fall back on the question of the good. Ethicists have very
different ideas about what the good is: some say happiness is the greatest good, some say virtue, some
say pleasure, some say everyone decides for herself. Many religions define the good in relation to a god
or gods. Some people think what is good is the same as what is legal. Some believe that it’s possible to
have certainty (to be sure) about right and wrong in ways we can generalize as “rules;” others believe
the details of each complicated situation require close consideration.
In every decision you make, your own idea of ethics is playing a role. The purpose of studying
ethics isn’t to tell each of us what to do; rather, it’s to help us think more carefully about the reasons we
consider something right or wrong. When you’re looking at an ethical system or approach for the first
time, it makes sense to start “backwards”: first, consider what you think you should do in a particular
situation, then consider why. Usually, an ethical theory or system supports what you originally thought,
as long as you think seriously about the reasons you thought that. If you can’t explain why you think
something is right or wrong, you should reconsider whether or not you have a good reason to believe
the way you do. A good ethical conclusion should be supportable. For example, if you think “Littering is
wrong,” you can come up with a lot of good reasons to defend that idea: it’s not behavior consistent
with what you think a good person would do; if everyone did it the world would become unlivable; it
might harm animals who eat your trash or ruin the view for other people; we have a responsibility to
care for the Earth and preserve it for future generations. As we will see in the next chapter, each of
these justifications fits with a major ethical theory.
On the other hand, let’s say you think “Canned pineapple is disgusting.” When someone pressed
you to explain why you thought that, you would have difficulty coming up with a logical, justifiable
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reason, right? “It doesn’t taste good” or “I don’t like it” isn’t a reason other people would accept; just
because you don’t like it doesn’t mean other people shouldn’t like it, either.
This highlights an important part of ethics: for something to be considered an ethical judgment,
it must have an idea about what should or shouldn’t be done. In other words, ethics make what
philosophers call “normative” judgments: they prescribe something to do. Of course, this is different
from saying something like, “it should rain this week.” You don’t use ethics to talk about what you want
to happen or what will probably happen. You use ethics to talk about what should or ought to happen
because it’s the right thing to do. So, since it makes sense to say “We shouldn’t litter” but not as much
sense to say “We shouldn’t eat canned pineapple,” only the first one is an ethical judgment, the other
an opinion — however sound (or flawed) it may seem to you, given your own views about the appeal of
canned pineapple.
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Chapter 3 – Introduction to Ethical Theories
In this chapter we’ll look at six major types of ethics: virtue ethics, Confucianism, Kantian
deontology, social contract theory, consequentialism, and care ethics. Each of these ethical systems was
developed at different times by very different people in different parts of the world. Each has strengths
and weaknesses, particularly with respect to different sorts of ethical situations. Ethics is about more
than just learning ethical systems and how to apply them. Rather, you should think critically about each
system and come up with your own ideas about which system is best in which situations.
Virtue Ethics
The Good of man is the active exercise of his soul's faculties in conformity with excellence
or virtue, or if there be several human excellences or virtues, in conformity with the best
and most perfect among them.
Aristotle, from Nicomachean Ethics
Virtue ethics was developed in ancient Greece, with its most famous proponents being Socrates,
Plato, and Aristotle. Its basic tenet is that, to live a moral life, one should cultivate virtue in oneself by
recognizing one’s intrinsic virtues and vices, then working to improve oneself over time. For Aristotle,
regarded by many as the developer of virtue ethics, cultivating virtue is important because virtue is seen
as something that comes about when someone or something fulfills its function well. He believed that
humans are rational animals – our primary difference from other animals is our ability to reason. If the
function of a knife is to cut, then the virtue or excellence of a knife is to cut well. So, as human beings
who are capable of reason, our virtue is to choose well.
Virtue ethics is very different from most contemporary ethical theories, since it is concerned
primarily with one’s personality or character rather than the way one relates to others or the effects of
one’s actions. Good actions are those that help improve one’s own character. Of course, to have a good
character, you must treat others well; but the reason being kind to others is important is because of the
way it affects your own development and character rather than because of the result of your actions or
the worth of the action in itself. Good character is developed, according to Aristotle, by the habitual
practice of good actions. One must actively strive to maintain habituation of virtue.
So, when considering what to do, instead of asking “What would be the best action to take?”
one should ask “What would a virtuous person do?” You may notice that this has little practical
difference – a good person would, presumably, take good actions. However, the focus on one’s own
virtue means that in order to judge whether something is ethical we consider the motivations of the
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person doing the act, rather than the act itself or its consequences. Thus, traits like honesty or kindness
are regarded as part of one’s character, above and beyond the way that person is likely to act. An honest
person is more than just someone who is usually honest – she has cultivated the virtue of being honest,
and all her actions are consistent with that part of her character.
Just as good actions are seen as arising out of good character, bad actions, for the virtue ethicist,
are a result of bad character. Thus, bad actions are more than just the sum of their results, reasons or
intentions. Virtue ethicists believe that good actions and qualities lie in the middle or mean, of opposite
vices. For example, gluttony and complete denial of the pleasures of food are both “extremes”; the
mean between them would be the habit of enjoying food but not eating too much or placing too much
value on it. As this example shows, good habits result in a life of temperance and balance. Virtuous
character is maintained by holding ourselves constantly ready to display our virtue through action, in a
state of equilibrium in which we can carefully consider the way each action will display or affect our
character.
Over time, by choosing virtuous actions, which are the mean between two extremes of excess
and deficiency, we develop the habit of virtue. This leads to what the Greeks called eudaimonia.
Eudaimonia, which is often translated as happiness, is better described as the kind of “flourishing” that
comes from living a healthy and virtuous life, and from having developed a good character through
virtuous choices. Because cultivating our virtue is our way of fulfilling our function as humans, living
virtuously is living in the best way we can and leads to flourishing.
For the ancient Greeks, eudaimonia would not be possible without sufficient material support
(like enough food, for example, or a stable family life which was for them crucial for thinking about the
development of virtue). Thinking about the necessary “conditions” for virtuous action is not emphasized
in some ethical thinking influenced by later thinkers, but it has played a very important role in thinking
about global human rights.
Confucianism
When you meet someone better than yourself, turn your thoughts to becoming his equal.
When you meet someone not as good as you are, look within and examine your own self.
Confucius, from The Analects
Virtue ethics and Confucianism developed in very different parts of the world, and at different
times, but they share a philosophy that focuses on the character, or virtue, of a person as a guideline for
ethical behavior, rather than examining individual acts or their consequences. While virtue ethics
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emphasizes the cultivation of virtue in order to achieve personal eudaimonia, Confucianism emphasizes
character-building as a way of serving the community.
Confucianism was developed in ancient China, and is still very important today, especially in
many Asian countries. It is named after its founder, Confucius, who lived around 500 BCE. Similar to
virtue ethics, Confucianism focuses on each person’s character rather than her actions alone. Also like
virtue ethics, followers of Confucianism believe that virtuous qualities are located as the mean between
extremes. However, while virtue ethics focuses on the individual as the source of virtue, Confucianism
promotes different virtues for different people, places a strong emphasis on one’s duty to her family and
society, and regards relationships as important not just for self-cultivation but for contributing to overall
harmony.
Another major difference between Confucianism and virtue ethics is the reason cultivating one’s
virtue is emphasized. As discussed earlier in this chapter, virtue was important for the ancient Greeks
because it led to the development of eudaimonia through fulfilling our proper function as reasoning
beings. Like Socrates, Confucius emphasized constant self-betterment. However, rather than cultivating
one’s virtue merely for the sake of improving oneself, being virtuous is seen as necessary for the good of
the community of a whole. For Confucius, the individual is always seen as part of the whole, so
improving oneself necessarily improves others and the community. In his Analects, he states that
“Developing oneself, one develops others. Maintaining oneself, one maintains others.” Thus, cultivating
virtue is important not only for oneself.
Because Chinese ethics is collectivistic – relational, valuing others’ needs above one’s own –
rather than individualistic, the importance of virtue for role ethics lies in how it can be used to serve the
community. While virtue ethicists like Aristotle also regarded each person as part of a larger community,
the cultivation of virtue was seen as a personal goal that only secondarily benefits others. Confucianism,
on the other hand, teaches that the needs of the whole should always come above one’s own, so
cultivating virtue is done primarily for the benefit of others.
While Confucianism seems to focus on a person’s responsibility according to her family role, it
also encourages a careful consideration of one’s duties in other roles. Each role a person inhabits – as
sibling, child, teacher, spouse, citizen, friend, and so on – comes with its own set of duties and virtuous
qualities. Confucianism emphasizes the importance of harmony and collective peace over that of
individual freedom, and favors a strictly ordered hierarchal web of relationships in which each member
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has a determined place. However, because Confucianism sees the development of personal virtue as
beneficial for the whole, its emphasis on certain roles doesn’t mean that those roles are more important
or should be practiced at the expense of others. Rather, fulfilling ones duties as a family member, for
instance, also serves the community outside of the family.
How would virtue ethics and Confucianism be applied to solve a modern ethical problem? Let’s
look at an example. Let’s say you borrow a book from the library. You like it a lot, so you decide to keep
it. How do we determine whether such an action is ethical? First, ask yourself: is this something an
ethical person would do? Then, think about whether the action would contribute to your cultivation of
virtue and development of good habits. It would seem that this action would not lead to the
development of good habits, so virtue ethicists would consider it unethical. Besides, stealing is not a
moderate action. Confucianism would further have you consider the way this action fits within your
particular social roles. Does it fit your duties as a student, for example? Probably not. Besides, it would
have you consider the way cultivating virtue in yourself would affect those around you.
Kantian Deontology
I ought never to act except in such a way that I could also will that my maxim should
become a universal law.
Immanuel Kant, from Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals
Deontology is the name for ethical systems that examine the rightness of individual acts, rather
than the virtue of people or the outcomes those acts might have. It comes from the combination of the
Greek word deontos, meaning duty or obligation, and logos, meaning logic or reason. Proponents of
deontology believe that ethical systems can be logically deduced, and that one logical system can
explain what action to take in any scenario. In these systems, morality is based on one’s duty to oneself
and others. There are many different deontological systems, but in this section we’ll focus on the most
well-known one, Kantian deontology. You’ll notice that, like all deontological systems, it starts with a
few premises about human nature and attempts to base an overarching system of morality on these
premises.
Immanuel Kant’s, deontological system was developed in the late eighteenth century. As we see
in the quote above, Kant says that, in order to know whether an action is good or not, we should test it
by seeing if its maxim, or the principle behind that action, is universalizable. In other words, we should
think about what it would be like if our action were universal – if everyone else took that action, too. It
may look like the Golden Rule – “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you” – except that
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this one is “Only do things everyone else could do, too.” So, the basic premise on which Kant’s
philosophy is based is that, in order for an action to be ethical, the principle behind it must be
universalizable.
A common example used to demonstrate universalizability is lying. Is it ever ethical to lie? To
decide this, we have to determine whether or not lying is universalizable – that is, if it can logically be
applied by everyone in all situations. Obviously, it would cause a lot of problems if we lied all the time,
because no one would ever believe what we said. But for Kant the important thing is not the
consequences, but the logical impossibility of universalizing the telling of a falsehood: If everyone lied,
there could be no “truth” and thus lying would be impossible. Of course, this has important
consequences: There would be no possibilities for contracts, promises, or trusting relationships of any
kind, but the important “test” that Kant devises is to ask whether it is possible to universalize a moral
violation, and he says that the answer is no. Lying is clearly not universalizable – and according to Kant,
that means it’s unethical.
Because Kant’s test of universalizability depends on whether a maxim is universalizable, this
principle or intention behind an action is seen as more ethically important than the consequences of the
action. He asks us to consider why we’re acting, and then think about whether or not that intention can
be universalizable – thus ruling out any actions that are purely self-serving. Another tenet of his
philosophy, which can serve as another way of thinking about universalizability, is that we must always
regard other people as ends rather than merely means. In other words, we must see others are valuable
in themselves, not just as valuable because of what they can do for us.
Looking back at our example of lying, we could apply this principle to see that lying is unethical
because it treats others as a mere means – it uses them to get something we want, without considering
their feelings or needs. It is true that we do (and indeed must) treat people as “means”--whether to
pleasure (as friends may be), to life (as parents certainly serve, especially in infancy), or to your growth
and education (as your teachers surely are). But for Kant there is a world of difference between treating
people as a means, and treating people as a “mere” means, that is, treating people as objects. Rational
beings, Kant say, are not objects, but are “ends-in-themselves,” and treating rational beings as mere
means is a violation of human dignity. It might be good to remember this when interacting with servers
in a restaurant, your school’s janitors, or cashiers at your local store. Do you follow the Kantian principle
of treating them as ends in themselves, or do you regard them as mere means?
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Social Contract Theory
The actions of men are the best interpreters of their thoughts.
John Locke, from An Essay Concerning Human Understanding
Like Kantian deontology, social contract theory is concerned with the ethical principle of the
action, not of the consequences of the action. It also tries to logically determine an ethical system based
on a premise. In this system, however, the question to ask in order to determine whether or not an
action is ethical is not whether it is universalizable, but whether it is just. This philosophy was an
important influence on many modern constitutions, including that of the United States. Some important
early proponents are John Locke and Thomas Hobbes, who lived in the seventeenth century, and JeanJacques Rousseau, who lived in the eighteenth. This work was revived in the twentieth century most
famously by John Rawls.
There is some debate whether social contract theory is a kind of deontology, and in fact is
regarded differently by different social contract theorists. Early social contract theorists, like Locke and
Hobbes, didn’t develop it into an ethical system at all, but later thinkers like Rousseau and Rawls
developed into an ethical system that is at least very similar to deontology.
To test whether something is ethical according to social contract theory, you should ask whether
it is something a rational person would agree to if everyone were equal and didn’t know what position
she would have in society. If you could imagine being stripped of identities like your race, gender,
nationality, religion, and so on, what rules would you want? The idea is that everyone would agree on
the fairest rules just in case, since they wouldn’t know what position they would be in once the rules
were enacted. For social contract theorists, we should try to take actions that serve this idea of justice.
Society is seen as a collection of individuals who have entered into a contractual relationship, in which
they promise to promote justice for the good of everyone.
Often, when determining whether an action is just, social contract theory relies on ideas of
individual rights. For example, one might decide that stealing is wrong because everyone should have
the right to own her own property. Social contract theory is also applied to talk about the
responsibilities governments have to their citizens and vice-versa. This theory assumes that the purpose
of government is to ensure justice and protect people’s rights. Government is the result of a contract
people form with each other to make sure everyone is treated as equally and fairly as possible. As such,
the government should only exist as long as it protects the interests and rights of the governed.
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All deontological ethics rely on systems that work in any situation and for any person. While this
can make them easier to apply, it also means that they may be less practical in complicated, everyday
life situations. Whether we regard social contract theory as deontological or not, it is similar to Kantian
deontology in that both provide ethical systems that are based on idealized, universal maxims that
represent the most rational way to behave. As a result, both Kantian deontology and social contract
theory are well-suited only for situations when careful, objective thought is the best way to analyze the
problem. In many cases, however, there are more variables than these systems can account for easily.
Let’s look again at our example of borrowing a book from the library and deciding to keep it. Is
that an ethical act? According to Kant’s deontology, it is unethical because it’s not universalizable. In
general terms, this action is theft, and universalizing theft would make the concept of ownership invalid.
But more specifically, universalizing the taking of library books would undermine the institution of a
“lending library”: there would be no such thing, and it would not be possible to borrow (or steal) books
from it. It’s not possible to universalize stealing a library book. The only way to justify such an act is to
make an exception of yourself. By discounting the maxim of universalizablity, you’re not doing your duty.
What about social contract theory? In this case, the action is unethical because by taking the
book you violate the contractual obligation you have toward the other people in your society (you all
use the same library). Taking what you want at the expense of others is unjust. A more complicated
example, however, like taking a book you need to solve a particular emergency, or from a particular
library, or that you plan to replace after a particular amount of time, is what ethicists call a “moral
dilemma,” where your duty pulls you in two different directions. Deontology does not provide a lot of
guidance in this situation, but it does help to identify the existence of a duty—or conflicting duties.
Consequentialism
We are responsible not only for what we do but also for what we could have prevented.
Peter Singer, from Writings on an Ethical Life
Consequentialism is a system of ethics that determines whether or not something is ethical by
looking at the consequences of actions. Before we take an action, consequentialists ask us to think
about the consequences that action will have for ourselves, other people, and the world around us.
While deontology says that an action can be either right or wrong, consequentialism says that
something that seems like a bad thing to do can be good if it produces good results. Similarly, something
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that seems like an ethical action might not be right if it will lead to bad consequences. Basically,
consequentialism is the system that gives us the phrase “The ends justify the means.”
One popular branch of consequentialism, and the main one we’ll discuss in this work, is
utilitarianism – so-called because it regards as ethical any act that maximizes utility, which most
utilitarians define as well-being or happiness. Utilitarianism was first developed in the late eighteenth
century by Jeremy Bentham and popularized by his friend James Mill, though it was later developed
more by James Mill’s son, John Stuart Mill. Peter Singer, a modern day utilitarian, has also updated the
system to fit current problems. He has been known for applying utilitarianism to complicated problems
like animal rights and world poverty, and for developing a more nuanced utilitarian system than the
ones proposed in the eighteenth century.
One of Peter Singer’s thought experiments can provide a starting point for thinking about the
implications of utilitarian ethics, or consequentialism in general. Say you’ve just bought a new, $40 pair
of shoes. You’re walking down the road in your new shoes when you see a child drowning in a lake.
There’s no one else around, and you can see that if you don’t wade into the lake to save her, the child
will die. Most people would agree that the ethical choice in this situation would be to save the child,
even though it would mean ruining your shoes and wasting your $40. Singer then points out that, for a
donation of $40, you could save multiple children from malaria or other diseases affecting impoverished
nations. Is the ethical imperative to save children far away with a donation of $40 as strong as the
imperative to save a child right in front of you for the same price? A utilitarian would say yes.
As this example shows, consequentialism isn’t concerned with details like the immediacy of the
problem, the emotions it invokes, or the intentions of the actor. Only the consequences of the action
matter. This can be hard to grasp because most people make ethical choices based at least in part on gut
feelings or emotional reactions. These things aren’t important to the consequentialist. Like deontology,
consequentialism attempts to provide a system of ethics based on logic and universal principles.
However, unlike deontology, it must take into account small details of a problem in order to estimate
how it affects the happiness not just of those directly involved but of those individuals’ community, and
then of the world as a whole in order to determine what action would be ethical. Only by determining
the overall increase or decrease in utility caused by an action can we determine its ethical worth.
Looking at our example from earlier, what would a consequentialist say about taking and
keeping a book from a library? To determine whether or not it’s ethical, she would need to estimate the
15
consequences of the action. If she’s a utilitarian, she would need to weigh the potential happiness she
would gain by keeping the book versus the happiness other library patrons would lose by not having
access to the book. Of course, the library staff would probably also be unhappy to discover the book was
stolen. The local government may even be affected, if they find out there has been an increase in crime.
All these factors seem to indicate that stealing the book would be unethical, since it would lead
to small decreases in happiness for many different people, all for a moderate increase in happiness for
one person. A utilitarian like John Stuart Mill might also see the larger problems in terms of the
weakening of social institutions that would resonate with a deontological criticism, though his focus
would be on the consequences of the action. From this example we can see that consequentialism may
provide tools to examine moral actions that may be easy to grasp compared to deontology. However, in
a situation in which there are many people involved or the consequences of an action are difficult to
predict, consequentialism may be too complicated to be of much use.
Care Ethics
What we do depends not upon rules, or at least not wholly on rules – not upon a prior
determination of what is fair or equitable – but upon a constellation of conditions that is
viewed through both the eyes of the one-caring and the eyes of the cared-for.
Nel Noddings, Caring, a Feminine Approach to Ethics & Moral Education
Care ethics values the relationships people have with each other and the responsibility we have
toward others. Unlike virtue ethics, Confucianism, Kantian deontology, social contract theory, or
consequentialist ethics, care ethics doesn’t base its ethical system on what the most logical choice
would be in order to be a certain kind of person, follow a certain system, or bring about a certain result.
Rather, it focuses on how our choices are affected by the way we relate to others in terms of power and
responsibility. It also criticizes other ethical systems’ attempts to rationalize ethics into a universal
system. Care ethics, rather than relying on logic as the basis for ethics, focuses on our emotions and
human experiences.
Care ethics was developed more recently than the other systems of ethics we’ve explored. It
arose mainly as a critique of deontology, which considers each person as a rational, autonomous actor
who makes ethical decisions for herself alone. Care ethics began with the work of a social psychologist,
Carol Gilligan, who saw the need to think about “moral development” in a way that could recognize that
most women seemed to engage in and think about moral decision-making in a way that was different
from most men. Following Gilligan, care ethicists like Nel Noddings argue that people face pressure to
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consider how their decisions will affect those around them, and face constraints on their actions in
certain situations. Because of this, we can’t separate our actions from our humanity. We must always
think about our relationships, our own needs as people in the world, our culture and experiences, and
other factors that ground us in the real world.
Ethical systems like Kantian deontology and utilitarianism, care ethicists argue, try to distance
themselves from the world to create a system that works in all situations. However, this is impractical
since humans can’t divorce themselves from their emotions, relationships, and experiences. For
example, Kantian ethics would say that you should never commit an act that isn’t universalizable, like
stealing. Utilitarianism would say that you should never take an action that would benefit one person at
the expense of total universal happiness. But who could think about these considerations if you had to
steal from others to feed your child? Care ethics attempts to take these practical concerns into account
to create a system that is more human and applicable than earlier, more abstract systems.
Ethical systems typically try to remove the ethical actor from her situation and context to find a
rational system of action. However, care ethicists have argued that this approach fails to consider how
contextual factors like race, gender, culture, language, religion, sexual orientation, income, and others
affect the way we think and may cause different people to think about their decisions in different ways.
As a result, the rational, detached subject in these ethical systems – which were developed largely by
educated white men – is really a reflection of the values and rationality of this group. By acknowledging
the way our existence in the world influences our thinking and ethics, care ethics attempts to create a
more inclusive and realistic approach.
Care ethics places moral value on details that are often overlooked by other systems. For
example, deontology and consequentialism would both have you treat your child, boss, best friend or
sister in the same way you would treat a stranger. According to care ethics, that is not only impractical
but unethical. It lends weight to the relationships we have, saying that our obligations to our loved ones
are greater than those we have to strangers. Furthermore, it tells us to consider who will be most
affected by our choices. It recognizes that we can’t make choices without affecting others.
In order to use care ethics, we must first try to recognize the way our own background affects
our ethics, so we can empathize with other actors instead of presenting our ideas as the only rational
way to approach the problem. Then, we should try to determine the details and context in which the
action is to take place. What are the norms, motivations, or other factors influencing the way the
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problem is being presented? Finally, we must think about the people our actions affect and our
relationships to them. Who is most vulnerable to the results of my action? To whom do I have the most
responsibility? Is stealing a book from the library ethical? For care ethics, it depends on the context.
Other Ethical Systems
While virtue ethics, Confucianism, Kantian deontology, social contract theory, consequentialism,
and care ethics are some of the most commonly used ethical systems today, they are not the only
ethical systems that exist.
One less common, but still practiced, ethical theory is Pragmatism. Pragmatists, like John Dewey,
believe that ethics will develop over time much as science has. Pragmatism is unique in that it doesn’t
provide its own system of ethics, but encourages us to accept other ethical theories with a grain of salt,
and always experiment with ways to improve or replace them. In other words, it challenges us never to
accept ethical theories or prescriptions as objective truth. Instead, we should see them as a model that
works for now but which will need to be updated as our understanding and knowledge expand. To
follow a pragmatist ethics, you must accept that every system you try is imperfect, and constantly work
to improve your approach not only to ethics but to truth.
Religions also often have their own ethical systems, with encouraged and forbidden actions,
justifications based on religious texts or the words of religious figures, and promoted virtues and
lifestyles. Many people choose to live their lives by these systems. However, these religious systems
often resemble some of the other ethical systems we’ve discussed – many religions promote some
variation of “the Golden Rule,” for instance, which tells us to “do unto others as you would have them
do unto you.” This can be justified using any of the major systems we’ve discussed. During an Ethics
Bowl – or any ethical discussion – it’s probably best to focus on the underlying justification of ethical
positions even if they come from a particular religious system, since appeals to a certain book or
religious figure may not have weight with people who believe differently. Similarly, one should never
argue that something is ethical merely because it is legal or customary.
Combining Ethical Theories
While the ethical systems we’ve discussed so far may seem very different, they all have the
same goal: to help us decide what is right to do. Because we all have our own ideas about which things
are right or good, it’s important to remember that an ethical system is useful only insofar as it helps us
make sense of our own ethical intuitions. As such, ethical systems like these should serve as tools to
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help you reason for yourself – not as instructions that tell you what to do. With this in mind, you should
never be afraid to combine different ethical systems in a way that makes sense to you or that supports
what you intuitively feel is right.
That being said, ethical theories cannot be used to justify any position – they’re not magical
“Get Out of Jail Free” cards that legitimize illogical or poorly-supported views. In general, if you feel that
something is right, you shouldn’t adopt an ethical theory that tells you it’s wrong. However, this is only
true if you already have good reasons to support your ethical choice. An ethical system is only as good as
the point it supports. Thus, these systems cannot easily be used to support actions that most people
agree are unethical – like murder or discrimination. For that reason, it’s important to think carefully and
critically about any ethical views you hold. Remember, philosophy is about challenging your own
assumptions and the status quo, so you should always make sure your view is logical, rather than just
popular or easy, before you assume it. If you find your own views don’t stand up under scrutiny from
these ethical systems, that may be a good reason to reconsider them.
These theories are not exclusive choices; you can pick and choose aspects of different ethical
systems that seem to fit the situation at hand. In the next section, we’ll show that different ethical
systems make more sense for different problems, and that sometimes the best approach is to combine
elements of several systems. Rather than leading us to different conclusions, the strength of these
ethical theories is that they help us think rationally about the reasons we feel a certain conclusion is
right – they highlight different considerations and frameworks that can be used to explain whether
something is ethical or not, and why.
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Chapter 4 – Examples from Previous Ethics Bowls
Did the team’s presentation clearly identify and thoroughly discuss the central moral
dimensions of the case? Did the team’s presentation indicate both awareness and
thoughtful consideration of different viewpoints, including especially those that would
loom large in the reasoning of individuals who disagree with the team’s position?
NHSEB Judge’s Score Sheet
Each of the ethical philosophies that have been discussed have merits, and when deciding which
one (or ones) to use it is often helpful to consider examples of ethical problems, and apply each
philosophy to the problem. We can then adopt whichever ethical philosophy seems to make the most
sense, or combine elements of different philosophies to create a cohesive argument. Here it is
important to draw on your own experience and intuition, to find an ethical system or systems that
seems to solve the problem in the most logical way. During the Ethics Bowl, it’s important to consider
every angle of the case – every detail that is relevant to the problem, as well as any counterarguments
that may challenge your position. To practice this, let’s look at how each of the ethical systems
introduced in this book would deal with different problems.
Example 1
Here’s a case from the 2015 Ethics bowl:
At the 41st World Health Assembly in 1988, a goal was set for the worldwide eradication
of polio by the year 2000. The Global Polio Eradication Initiative was undertaken by the
World Health Organization (WHO), US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC),
and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF). Today, however, polio is still active in
Afghanistan, Nigeria, and Pakistan. In Pakistan, there are 198 known cases of polio.
Polio vaccination programs have a long history of controversy among Muslims in
Pakistan. Rumors that vaccinations are a Western plot to sterilize women and that some
vaccines contains the AIDS virus have gained traction in recent years. Some Muslims
believe that according to Islamic Law vaccines are unclean. WHO and UNICEF have
partnered with Islamic scholars and clerics to issue fatwas (legal opinions in Islamic faith)
stating vaccinations are safe to help eradicate polio and other diseases.
Recently, public health officials from Tulane University, Harvard, John Hopkins, and
other universities uncovered proof that the recent increase in polio is connected to a
secret spy operation. That is, a polio vaccination program was used by the CIA to help
gain information on the whereabouts of Osama bin Laden in Pakistan. In January 2013, a
total of thirteen Schools of Public Health wrote to President Obama urging him to stop
the use of vaccine programs as cover for spying operations. The universities argued that
the practice needed to be stopped to protect humanitarian volunteers and gain back the
trust of the Pakistani people, many of whom are vulnerable to polio.
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In May 2014, Lisa O. Monaco, assistant to the President for Homeland Security and
Counterterrorism, responded to the thirteen Universities by stating the CIA will now,
“...make no operational use of vaccination programs, which include vaccination workers.”
Since the inauguration of the vaccination-spying program in Pakistan, more than sixty
polio workers, humanitarian volunteers, and security personnel have been killed.
Pakistani villagers have chased off humanitarian workers in fear of CIA spying. WHO has
stated that polio has re-emerged as a public health emergency in Pakistan.
After reading the problem, you may have already come up with some ideas about whether or not the
U.S. government’s actions were ethical. You might draw on your own experience, or what you’ve
learned about the ethical systems we’ve discussed. Often, elements of a few different ethical
philosophies can also be combined to give a more inclusive solution. We’ll go through each of the ethical
systems one by one then look at a combined approach.
Virtue ethics regard an act as ethical if it is something a virtuous person would do. So, what
would a virtue ethicist say about this example? The CIA may have misled the Pakistani people for a good
reason, but virtue ethics doesn’t see the outcome of an action as a good justification for doing it. Rather,
we should ask, “Would a virtuous person have done what the CIA did?” Certainly most people would
agree that lying is not a virtue, so virtue ethics would condemn the CIA’s actions. It also seems to be an
extreme measure, so it probably doesn’t fit within the ancient Greek idea of virtue as a mean.
Confucianism would also ask us to examine what role the government is expected to play, and
the duties that that role entails. Since learning from one’s relationships with others is important in
Confucianism, does the government have a duty to be a good role model? Remember that in Confucian
ethics, cultivation of virtue in oneself is important for the development of everyone. Did the
government’s actions help to cultivate virtue? How would the government’s virtue (or lack of virtue)
affect others? Also, did the government’s action contribute to overall harmony, or not?
Kantian deontology, which examines the action itself and the maxim, or intentions, behind it, is
a bit more complicated. Using Kant’s maxim of universalizability, we can ask, “Is what the CIA did
universalizable?” First, the CIA lied to the population. Using Kantian ethics, we know that lying is not
universalizable. Second, the CIA clearly used the Pakistani people as a mere means to get to Osama Bin
Laden, something else that is unacceptable in Kant’s ethical system. Kant says people must always be
regarded as ends-in-themselves and not as “mere” means. Thus, Kant’s deontology also regards the
government’s actions as unethical.
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Social contract theory would ask “Were the people’s rights being infringed upon?” Since social
contract theory sees government as something that exists to protect people’s liberties, it regards
governmental action as ethical only insofar as it doesn’t violate the people’s rights or personal liberties.
So, did the government violate the Pakistani people’s rights with this spying program? Since social
contract theory emphasizes the fact that people give up certain liberties in exchange for the order
government provides, one could argue that the order brought about by the neutralization of a terrorist
element outweighs the temporary breach of liberties caused by lying. However, social contract theory
can only be applied to those who consent to be governed, and since the U.S. government arguably
didn’t have the Pakistani people’s permission to govern them, you could also say that the U.S.
government had no right to make that decision for them. Ultimately, the decision about whether the
action was ethical or not according to social contract theory boils down to whether the U.S. government
held a legitimate, consensual rule over the Pakistani people – a judgment you must make yourself.
Consequentialist ethics would take a very different stance on this issue. Utilitarianism, which
considers actions that maximize happiness to be good, would require us to weigh the decrease in
happiness brought about by the spying with the increase in happiness brought about by the successful
assassination of Osama Bin Laden. The spying led to a decrease in happiness from 1) people being hurt
when they found out they were being lied to, 2) humanitarian workers being killed because they were
suspected of spying, and 3) unknown numbers of children becoming sick or dying because they didn’t
receive the polio vaccine, as well as other, smaller decreases in happiness such as that of Bin Laden’s
followers. On the other hand, it led to an increase of happiness by 1) making many people feel safer
because a dangerous terrorist was killed and 2) potentially preventing the deaths of an unknown
number of people in terrorist attacks. Of course, there are also a number of other, smaller increases or
decreases to happiness we may not have considered. Decide for yourself whether the U.S. government’s
actions led to the greatest overall happiness.
Care ethics would require us to look at the relationships of power and responsibility the U.S.
government has with the humanitarian workers and the Pakistani people, as well as the relationships
the people have to each other. First, it’s obvious that the government has a responsibility to the workers
it sends to vaccinate the Pakistani people. While those workers are responsible for their own decisions
to go there, the U.S. government’s position of power over those workers, as well as the workers’ own
privileged position over those to whom they provided medical attention, probably made them feel
obligated to participate in the program. Care ethics would also note that, by misleading humanitarian
22
workers about the purpose of the vaccination program, the U.S. government neglected its responsibility
to them as their protector abroad. The government’s relationship to the Pakistani people is also
important. By lying to the people, it damages that relationship and makes them less likely to value and
trust that relationship in the future. Finally, using the vaccination program as a pretense for spying
undervalues the relationships the humanitarian workers may have formed with their Pakistani patients
and neighbors, forcing the divide of nationality to come between their personal connections.
Care ethics, by emphasizing the dependence people have on one another, also says that we
should be careful to consider how our actions will affect those who are most vulnerable to them. In
other words, it is ethical to place the consideration of people who depend on us higher than the
consideration of strangers. So, by forcing the humanitarian workers to harm those who depended on
them – people in need of the polio vaccine – in favor of benefiting people with whom they don’t have a
relationship – those who may have been saved from a potential terrorist attack – the U.S. government
promoted the kind of moral indifference that care ethics seeks to avoid. So, it would seem that care
ethics would judge the U.S. government’s action as unethical.
Combining Systems
Another way to look at this problem is to combine elements of each of these ethical systems –
for example, you may think that to decide whether something is ethical we must consider the person
committing the action, the motivations behind the action, and its consequences, rather than just looking
at each of those aspects separately. In this particular case, maybe virtue ethics is helpful – it seems
logical to expect one’s government to express the virtues its citizens value. From deontological ethics, it
seems that Kant’s system doesn’t add much. The government probably regarded its actions here as a
“last resort” or necessary evil, so appealing to maxims about universality doesn’t seem particularly
helpful. Social contract theory seems pretty relevant since it has a lot to say about governments’
relations to their people, but as we saw above it doesn’t lead to a very strong conclusion.
Consequentialism is also hard to apply to this situation, since we can’t easily predict how overall
happiness or good was affected by the governments’ actions. Lastly, care ethics is useful for examining
the way the individuals’ relationships and situation contribute to the ethics of their actions, so it seems
to be valuable here.
If you believe that the government’s actions were ethical, a combined approach using social
contract theory and consequentialism might provide a foundation. For example, you could argue that
23
the Pakistani people agreed to the U.S. government’s protection by allowing them into their country,
and that the government’s actions, though dishonest, served that goal. Furthermore, by taking down a
terrorist threat, the government protected not only the Pakistanis but people all over the world from
the danger of terrorist attacks. The lives of countless people are more important than the betrayed trust
of a few.
If you take the government’s actions to be unethical, virtue ethics, Confucianism, deontology,
and care ethics may support your view. Was the government’s action something that would positively
contribute to their character? No, because they were relying on the potential outcome of the action, not
the worth of the action in itself or the qualities it represented, to justify it. As the leaders of a country
they have a special duty to show the virtues they want their citizens to emulate. Beside, while their
action may have been logical in that it led to an outcome that saved lives, it privileged the potential lives
of strangers over those of U.S. humanitarian workers and the Pakistani people they promised to serve.
As these examples show, different systems can be taken apart, combined, and applied in a
multitude of ways to support different arguments. In this example, it may be difficult to decide whether
the government’s actions were ethical or not. As a result, a convincing argument could be made for
either side. However, ethics is often more nuanced than simply right or wrong, and it certainly can’t be
used to support any point of view. When formulating your ethical opinion, you should first trust your
instinctual response, and then examine it critically. While it’s often a good idea to go with your “gut
feeling,” it’s also possible to have a first impression that later turns out to be wrong.
As we’ll discuss in Chapter 5, a good way to avoid forming unchallenged, possibly incorrect
ethical views is to be self-critical, and listen to criticisms from others. You must choose a position that is
logical and defendable – if you’re unable to effectively explain and justify your position, it probably isn’t
ethically sound. On the other hand, just because you can defend or justify your position doesn’t mean
it’s an ethical one. Always try to consider the viewpoints of each of the ethical systems we’ve discussed,
and take pains to consider how people with different perspectives might approach the problem. Seek
out others who disagree with your point of view and really listen to what they have to say.
Example 2
Let’s look at another example, this time a case from the 2014 Ethics Bowl:
Recently, Zhang Yimou, a Chinese film director and organizer of the 2008 Summer
Olympics, was accused of violating China’s One-Child Policy, allegedly fathering seven
24
children with four different mothers. The One-Child Policy – enacted in 1979 to address
China’s social, economic, and environmental problems due to overpopulation – limits a
couple to having only one child because there is not enough space, natural resources,
and jobs to accommodate the booming population.
However, some consequences of enforcing this law include forced abortions, female
infanticide, higher female suicide rates, and a gender imbalance ratio of 118 boys for
every 100 girls. Journalist Ma Jian describes the policy as reducing “…women to
numbers, objects, [and] a means of production; it has denied them control of their
bodies and the basic human right to determine freely and responsibly the number and
spacing of their children.” Furthermore, some feel that the policy is unfair because the
rich can afford to pay the fine for violating the policy.
In contrast, the United States does not have such a policy, and its citizens enjoy the
liberty of having as many children as they like. Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar have
nineteen children; the family stars in the TLC’s reality TV show 19 Kids and Counting.
With income from real estate investments and their TV show, and by living frugally, the
Duggar family is able to support themselves without government assistance. Nadya
Suleman, the famous “octomom,” used reproductive technologies to have octuplets and
six older children, totaling fourteen children. Suleman is currently under investigation
for welfare fraud. Orlando Shaw has twenty-two children with fourteen different
mothers, and has been sued for child support.
How do you think virtue ethics, Confucianism, Kantian deontological ethics, social contract theory,
consequential ethics, and care ethics would respond to this problem?
You should start with your own, first-look conclusion about whether or not the one-child policy
is ethical. Then, try to reason through why you feel that way. Is your ethical approach based on one of
the systems we’ve discussed, or a combination? Is your conclusion logical and easy to explain? Try to
think about how each system could be applied to help you reach your conclusion. Which systems, or
elements of systems, seem to be the most useful? Write down the important points they bring up. Then
you may try to learn more about the history and arguments that gave rise to the policy, to see if learning
more helps you support or adjust those views.
Next, try using each of the systems to reach the opposite conclusion. This is useful not only to
test whether or not your initial response was the best one, but also to help you anticipate counterpoints
against your argument so you can better prepare to defend your position. If you find a lot of holes in
your original conclusion, don’t be afraid to choose a new one or modify it. For this example, let’s say you
decide, based on more information and a reconsideration of your views, that the one child policy is
ethical. What would each system add?
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Virtue ethics would have you think about whether a virtuous person would enforce the one
child policy, and if the actions taken to do this would help one become a better, more virtuous person.
To do that, you’d have to consider which particular virtues would be supported or opposed by the policy
and what actions you’d have to take to support it. Don’t forget to think about whether those actions
would represent extremes or means.
Confucianism would have you consider how enforcing the policy would be in line with what’s
expected of you, and how you would be serving others. How would your role as a citizen, a family
member, or a student be affected, and what are the duties each role would have in this situation?
Furthermore, how would this policy affect your personal cultivation of virtue, which would in turn affect
your relationships and the harmony of your society? Does this policy promote harmony, or not? Does it
serve the collective needs of the people?
Kantian deontology would have you consider the universalizability and rationality of the policy.
Is it feasible to have the same policy applied to everyone, and all the time? Why or why not? What
problems would that cause? Don’t forget to think about the maxims that underlie the policy.
Furthermore, does this possibility treat people as ends, or merely means?
Social contract theory would have you try to consider whether or not the policy is just for most
people, disregarding whether it would benefit someone in your particular position or with your
background. Furthermore, it would have you ask what obligations the government has to its people and
vice-versa, and whether or not this policy fulfills those obligations. It would also ask us to think about
the tense relationship between individual freedom and contractual responsibility to those in our
community – is the “octomom” violating social contract, for instance?
Consequentialism, of course, would be mostly concerned with the consequences of this policy in
the particular time and place in which it was implemented. Who does the policy affect? Does it increase
or decrease total good? Make sure to consider as many details and possibilities as possible, not just the
obvious or most direct ones. It may help to make lists of good and bad consequences, ranked according
to biggest effect. For examples, for a utilitarian, you might have a large increase in happiness for
increased standard of living in one column, with a large decrease in happiness for children who don’t
have siblings and parents who want multiple kids. Of course, the high rates of female suicide and
infanticide are another important consequence to consider.
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Care ethics privileges the relationships we have with other people and the feelings we have
toward them. So, it may lead us to ask questions about how this policy affects relationships between
family members, the government and its citizens, or those between law-abiding citizens and wealthy
people like Zhang Yimou who shirk the rule. It would also have us take into account who is most affected
by the policy. Who is most vulnerable? Why? Furthermore, under what context is the policy
implemented? Is it applied evenly? How are individual lives really affected?
After figuring out how each system tackles this problem (and how they can be used to support
or condemn it), you should combine the strongest points from each to form a detailed, nuanced position
on the issue. Practice explaining your positon and addressing criticisms, and don’t forget to reason
through why someone might support a different view. Congratulations! You’re ready to present your
point in a logical and convincing way.
Conclusion
Try to use what you’ve learned from these examples to practice applying each of the ethical
systems we’ve discussed. Think of other ethical problems you’ve faced, or examples you’ve heard about
in the media or from history. By reasoning through a wide variety of problems with each of the systems,
you’ll shortly get to know each system’s strengths and weaknesses, and why certain systems may be
better suited to thinking about some sorts of ethical problems rather than others. That way, when
you’re faced with a new ethical problem you can quickly spot which systems are best suited to tackle it.
Remember that even if a problem seems particularly suited to a particular ethical system, you
can still gain insight by thinking about it from other perspectives. You may find elements from other
systems you can incorporate into your analysis, and looking it from the different points of view of other
systems may help bring to light flaws or shortcomings in the system you favor. Besides, in the real world
problems are rarely easily solved by relying on only one ethical system, so incorporating strengths from
different systems is usually a good idea.
Virtue ethics, Confucianism, Kantian deontology, social contract theory, consequentialism, and
care ethics all offer unique ways of thinking about ethics. While many of these systems attempt to
provide a complete framework for ethical decision-making, you shouldn’t rely on one exclusively. Ethics
is about more than just following the rules of a certain system; it’s about thinking logically, critically, and
empathetically. These systems should be used to challenge or support your own intuitions about ethics
by introducing some of the many different viewpoints we can use to approach ethical problems. They
27
should be regarded as tools in a toolbox to help you reach a conclusion, rather than paths from which
you can only choose one.
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Chapter 5 – Tips for Presenting Your Point Effectively and Conclusion
In ethics bowl, teams are not required to pick opposing sides, nor is the goal to ‘win’ the
argument by belittling the other team or its position. Ethics Bowl is, at heart, a
collaborative discussion during which the first team presents its analysis of a question
about the ethical dilemma at the core of the case being discussed, offering support for
its position but also considering the validity of other positions.
NHSEB 2015-16 NATIONAL HIGH SCHOOL ETHICS BOWL RULES, PROCEDURES,
and GUIDELINES
Now that we’ve looked at some major ethical systems and practiced applying them to different
ethical problems, we should turn to learning how to justify our ethical positions. Much of this is up to
you alone. A large part of becoming an effective thinker relies on practice and introspection. However,
there are some strategies you can use and questions you can ask yourself to help hone your skills.
Say you’re presented with an ethical problem, like deciding whether to allow a friend to copy a
worksheet, or whether knowingly exposing someone to HIV should be illegal (both examples from
previous ethics bowls). How can you decide which ethical system is best suited to tackle the question, or
whether to choose elements from multiple systems? Besides, how will you know how each ethical
system would respond to the question, and how do you anticipate potential criticisms or counterpoints?
One strategy is to first write down any questions you can think of when you think about the problem.
Then, once you’ve written down all the questions that come to mind, you can think about the questions
each ethical system would bring up, or how they would answer the questions you’ve raised. If you’re not
sure, discuss the problem with your classmates, coach, or anyone else who will listen.
If you find you don’t fully understand one of the ethical systems, or you aren’t sure how it would
respond to a particular question, you can talk to your teammates, coach, or assistant coach. You can
also try boiling down the question into simpler component parts. For example, let’s say you’re
wondering whether it’s ethical to steal medicine for a dying family member. Some component parts of
this question are: Is stealing ever ethical? Should ethical systems be universal, or is it okay to change
them in certain situations? Do you have more ethical responsibility to someone who’s related to you
compared to a stranger? Does the right to live overrule the right to property? and so on. Once you’ve
broken a complicated ethical question down, it’s often easier to answer the component questions
separately and then think about how they relate to each other.
Unlike debate, the Ethics Bowl asks you to choose your own position and support it because you
believe it. Because of this, the first step of presenting your point well is developing it thoughtfully. Ethics
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is a complicated field because there’s sometimes no obvious right answer – different people can have
different intuitions about whether something is right or wrong. However, that doesn’t mean ethics
accepts different views as equally right as long as they’re sincerely held. Ethical views must be logical
and able to withstand scrutiny – if you’re unwilling to listen to criticism or think critically about the basis
for your ethical ideas, you will have trouble justifying your beliefs, and there’s a chance they’re not
ethically sound. Similarly, you shouldn’t take an ethical position merely because someone you like or
trust has that position, or because a certain set of rules tells you it’s the right one.
If someone challenges your point, you should focus on improving or amending it, rather than
attacking your critic. Criticism is an important part of philosophy – it helps theories grow and change. As
such, preparing to present your point effectively means you must also practice self-criticism, which
includes recognizing that your view may be poorly supported, or even wrong. When faced with ethical
dilemmas, problems that do not have an obviously ethical answer, areas of uncertainty will surely be
present. Even if a choice must be made, and one believes that it is the “right” or “good” choice, there
may still be aspects of the decision that are not “right” or “good.”
Let’s look at one of the Ethics Bowl questions we introduced on the last page as an example.
Should knowingly exposing someone to HIV be illegal? If you believe it should be illegal, you could make
a number of ethical arguments: the consequences of exposing someone to HIV could be life-threatening,
misleading your partner is disrespectful and undermines your relationship, s/he could spread it to others
unknowingly, and so on. However, if it were made illegal there would be bad aspects to the choice as
well: it could increase fear and misinformation about HIV positive people, it may lead to discrimination
against them, it invades people’s privacy, and so on. In genuine ethical dilemmas like the ones you’ll be
presented with in the Ethics Bowl, it’s important to think critically about the good and bad aspects of the
ethical view you choose to support.
When you’ve decided on an ethical response to a problem, one that you strongly feel is the right
one to support, try to change your thinking and consider what others might say if they disagree with you.
Remember, the ethics bowl is different from debate: the goal is not to win the argument at any cost, but
rather to present a logical approach in a persuasive way. Consider: are there any holes in your logic, or
examples of situations in which your ethical system doesn’t seem to make sense? If so, think of ways
you can change your system. If you discover that you can’t find a way out of a certain flaw, don’t be
afraid to abandon your ethical system and choose another one. Different ethical systems, or
combinations of different systems, may be better suited to supporting your opinion. If you still can’t find
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a good way to defend your point using different systems, reconsider whether or not your initial
response was correct. It could be possible that, after thinking more carefully about the problem, your
view about what the ethical choice is might change. Although philosophy often requires thinking about
things in a counter-intuitive way, you should never choose to defend an ethical conclusion that doesn’t
seem practical or logical. An ethical system is only as good as the point that it supports.
Okay, so you’ve chosen an ethical response to a problem, and you’re prepared to address any
criticisms you can think of. How do you convince someone your point of view is correct? In order to do
that, you must practice logic. As we briefly discussed in the first chapter, logic is what allows us to break
statements into their most basic parts and examine whether or not they consist of reasonable premises
and conclusions. Logic is only one way of presenting an argument, one of three approaches to
argumentative writing first presented by Aristotle: ethos (credibility), pathos (emotion), and logos (logic).
In order to present a philosophical argument well, you will need to combine all three approaches. Logos
is the form of the argument itself, while ethos refers to the character of the speaker and pathos to the
feelings the argument evokes. Thus logos, logic, should serve as a base of your presentation; the others
should be used only for support.
Ethos, the appeal to credibility, is something you often see in advertisements. It’s the strategy of
getting you to agree by emphasizing the expertise of the one arguing. For example, you might see a TV
commercial that says “Try this new medicine. Trust me, I’m a doctor.” The problem with this approach is
that smart people can sometimes believe stupid things, and vice versa. I’m sure you can think of a friend,
family member, or teacher you respect who is wrong on at least one subject. If you accept something as
true just because of the person who said it, you might fail to look at the underlying assumptions or
argument. The opposite of this appeal to credibility is the fallacy of an “ad hominem” attack: trying to
undermine a point by attacking the person who said it. Both the appeal to credibility and “ad hominem”
attacks encourage us to focus on the proponent of an argument rather than the argument itself.
However, since it is difficult for us to accept arguments from people we don’t trust or respect, credibility
is still an important part of being persuasive.
The next of Aristotle’s approaches, pathos, is also called emotional appeal. That’s when you try
to get someone to agree with you by making them feel strong emotions about something. There are as
many types of emotional appeals as there are emotions: appeals to self-esteem, pity, fear, gratitude,
happiness, loyalty, and so on. For example: “Smart people choose our brand” or “If you don’t give to our
charity, children like Susie here will be cold and hungry”. Like the appeal to credibility, emotional appeal
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is common in advertisements because it works. In fact, there’s nothing wrong with using a little bit of
ethos or pathos to argue in an engaging way. However, students of philosophy will quickly recognize
these as tactics that can be used as attempts to disguise your argument or bolster a weak point. For that
reason it’s always best to rely on logos, logic, to form the basis of your ethical positions.
A logical argument is one that starts from true premises and leads to clear, supported
conclusions. In order to produce a logical argument, you must start from something uncontestable or
widely regarded as true, then build your point from there. There are two major types of logical
arguments: deductive and inductive. Deductive arguments start from a premise and end with a
conclusion that must be true. For example: “All bachelors are unmarried men. John is a bachelor.
Therefore, John is an unmarried man.” Because it’s impossible for a bachelor to be something other
than an unmarried man – it’s the definition of bachelor – it must be true that someone who is a
bachelor is an unmarried man. Inductive arguments lead to a conclusion that’s probably true. For
example: “All biological life we know of has needed water to exist. Therefore, life probably depends on
water to exist.” Because it’s possible that life exists without water, we can’t know for sure if our
conclusion is true. However, it’s probably true given the information we have.
When presenting your point in the Ethics Bowl, you will probably rely on both types of reasoning.
When speaking persuasively, it’s often hard to distinguish between different types of logic. However, by
keeping these distinctions in mind, you can try to identify which points you need to provide the most
support for. Points that are supported by deductive logic are often somewhat self-evident, so you simply
need to make sure you state them clearly. For inductive logic, on the other hand, you should be sure to
provide a lot of evidence since some people may not agree with your conclusion.
Using logic to present your point will only get you part way, however. It’s important to base your
presentation on logic so that it can stand up to scrutiny. Then, you can sprinkle credibility and emotional
appeals on top in order to make it more convincing. Ethos and pathos are often more persuasive than
logic alone. Just be sure not to overuse them! Your argument should stand on its own merits. Here’s an
example of an ethical argument using ethos, pathos, and logos to present a combination of points from
different ethical systems:
Allowing a friend to cheat on a test is wrong, because it’s unfair and cannot be
universalized. If everyone cheated, the test would be useless. Besides, it encourages
your friend to take advantage of your hard work. Do you want to be a doormat? Risking
your academic future for a friend changes the dynamics of your relationship, maybe
permanently. Allowing a friend to cheat not only undermines your own effort, it also
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damages your character. Once you’ve cheated once, who’s to say you won’t get into the
habit? As Sophocles said, ‘I would prefer to fail with honor than win by cheating.’ If she’s
really your friend, she won’t ask you to do something you know is wrong.
Can you spot the different approaches used in this example? It uses deontology, pathos, care
ethics, virtue ethics, and ethos in that order.
Once you’ve practiced recognizing and using all the ethical systems we studied here, as
well as arguing them using the tools we discussed in this chapter, you should try to apply them
in the most original way you can. Make up your own style of speaking. Use idioms and vivid
language, or lots of quotes from people you admire. Use long, thoughtful sentences, or short,
emotionally-charged ones. Whatever way you choose, practice it on anyone who will listen. Try
to practice at least a few times in a stressful or public environment so you feel less nervous the
day of the Bowl. Regardless of how you do in the competition, you’ll be proud of what you’ve
learned and how much your reasoning and presenting skills have improved.
We hope this introduction has helped you feel more prepared for the Ethics Bowl, as
well as given you an appreciation for philosophy and ethics. By participating in the Ethics Bowl,
you will gain skills that will be useful for the rest of your life. You’ll learn how to identify the
important points of an ethical problem and determine the best approach to it. You’ll also be
able to explain your reasoning to others, defend your point against counterarguments, and
present your case in a persuasive and comprehensive way. Good luck!
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