Hello friends, join me in this week's philosophy writing challenge if you're up for it! Guidelines for this challenge are simple:
Answer the actual question asked and try to stay on topic. Try.
Tell us what you think and, most importantly, why -- opinions are great, but it's the reasons for your belief that interest us!
You can take as long as you'd like to research your answer, but don't spend more than 30 minutes to write your response. [1] Here is a 30 minute timer you can use.
Add the tag #philosophychallenge to your entry or comment a link to your response below.
Have fun with your answer!
Here is this week's question (5/3 - 5/10):
Are your morals and ethics circumstantial or static? For example, if you believe it’s wrong to kill another person, is it always wrong or are there exceptions? Is it unethical to kill a mass murderer? What other moral beliefs do you hold and what are some exceptions that would cause you to put those morals aside? (source)
My take on this question: Think of one of your core ethical beliefs, something that you strongly believe about how we should all behave. Is this always the case, or are there edge cases or circumstances under which you'd be willing to eschew your otherwise strongly held conviction?
Another version: Imagine that there is one thing that you would make an absolute ethical law and we humans would be programed to obey it. What rule would you invoke for everyone to follow? Now imagine a wayward person who is forced to break the rule - under what circumstances might breaking your rule be acceptable?
References and quotes are encouraged! ↩
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STOPIf there was one ethical rule that I could mandate for all it would be not talking behind someone else's back. In other words, if you have someone to say about someone it should be to them. This is seems like a perfectly good ethical rule to follow until you think through its consequences....
I was actually in a work environment - it was a bit of an experiment - where "triangulation" (speaking of others who are not present) was disallowed. I thought this was a fabulous rule until I realized that I needed to speak to others about certain situations in order to validate my experience, to talk through it in order to understand it.
I now understand that this is sometimes what people are doing when they speak 'behind the backs' of others, and that it is not necessarily malicious even if it can have negative consequences. Being able to check in with others about our experiences is especially necessary for the under-represented or disenfranchised because their experiences and realities are so often denied, obfuscated, or disparaged.
What this taught me is that ultimately there can be no absolute ethical laws - this is just one example to illustrate the belief. We have to use our human judgement and empathy to determine how to act in any given situation. It is up to us to decide how to act and any rules can only serve as general guidelines from which we may begin our deliberations.
I try not to speak of others behind their backs, and I certainly try not to do so in a malicious way, but I also know that sometimes I will need to do this, and sometimes I will need to allow others to do this, as a normal part of the processing that we need to do with each other.
So I guess that I don't believe there can be any static laws where it comes to humans.