Ethics class 3
20-8-2022
Determinants of ethics
• Ethics is a standard to measure goodness and badness of human actions, so
determinants of human actions are also determinants of ethics.
• In law and ethics actions are classi ed in to two categories: 1. Human actions
(actus humanus) 2. Acts of human (actus hominis).
• Those actions which are deliberately and consciously performed by humans
through their intellect and will are known as human actions. In contrast to this
‘Acts of Man’ are instinctive in nature i.e. they are driven by an impulse or
habit.
• Acts of human have three distinctive characteristics 1. Knowledge 2.
Voluntariness [Link]
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Human action
• Knowledge- You should be aware of what you are doing
• Voluntariness- The action should ow from your will
• Freedom- The action must be freely performed
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• Ethics can only judge human actions not acts of human.
• Determinants of human actions are:
• The Object of the action
• The Circumstances in which the action was performed
• The end of the action
• The object of an action:
• The object of the human action is the very thing being done (What is being
done?). The object of an action answers the question “What”.....i.e. what did
he do? Object is the prime element of moral evaluation. From the viewpoint of
object an act can be classi ed as good, bad or indi erent.
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Principles apply to the object of an action
• An action whose object is bad will remain bad and nothing can improve it.
E.g.
• An action, whose object is good, may become bad because of
circumstances or purpose. E.g.
• An action that is indi erent (neither good nor bad) may become good or bad
due to circumstances or purpose. E.g.
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Circumstance of an action
• The circumstances are the situation or condition in which the action is
performed. (i.e. when and where the action is performed). The circumstances
of an action answer the question of space and time.
• Circumstances can be aggravating, extenuating or specifying.
• Circumstances are aggravating when they increase the goodness or
badness of an action. E.g.
• Circumstances are extenuating when they decrease the goodness or
badness of an action. E.g.
• Circumstances are specifying when they make an indi erent act become
good or bad. E.g.
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The ends of human action
• The end is the purpose a person has in mind while doing the act. The
following principles apply to the end of every action.
• An action that is indi erent because of its object may become good or bad
due to its purpose or intention. E.g. :
• An action which is good because of its object may become better, less good
or even bad because of the purpose. E.g. :
• An action that is bad because of its object may become worse or less bad
due to its purpose but a bad action is never good irrespective of purpose.
E.g:
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Determinants of ethics are:
• Determinants of human actions
• Socio- cultural determinants : 1. Social norms [Link] norms 3. Religious
practices 4. Political ideologies 5. Economic structure 6. Constitutional values
7. Law
• Human conscious and intuition.
• Intuition is the ability to understand something instinctively, without the need
of conscious reasoning. E.g.
• Conscience is a person’s inner sense of right or wrong. It is often called as
inner voice of reason.
CONSEQUENCES OF ETHICS IN HUMAN ACTIONS
• Consequence of ethics mean the outcome of human actions which are
guided by ethical thinking. This mean consequences also determine how
good or bad an act is.
• If the doer know ahead (even if vaguely) what the consequences of a
particular choice or action will be, he/she is presumed to have willed the
e ect. E.g.
• If the doer know ahead (even if vaguely) what the consequences of a
particular choice or action will be, he/she is presumed to have willed the
e ect. E.g.
• If one, remains silent or chooses not to act, when he/she should have acted.
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DIMENSIONS OF ETHICS
• Ethics is usually divided into three distinct subject areas:
• meta ethics
• normative ethics
• applied ethics