DEFINING ETHICS
Ethics is about evaluating moral values and principles, and is concerned with working out a basis on which to follow these principles. These principles are neither rules nor absolutes; they are rather voluntary guidelines designed to make life easier, more comfortable, and more trouble-free. To comply with the moral principles, is “right.” Not to, is “wrong.”
Compassionate acts, such as are seen when a person gives a helping hand to another individual, something that occurs every day, are evidence of an objective moral order. Allow me to explain: Human beings want to survive. Actually they want more than mere survival. We are pre-wired to seek our personal benefit, of which survival is a minimum necessary requirement.
What does it take to survive? Well, it is a fact of Biology that for a cell in our body to be healthy it helps if the cells surrounding it are healthy. In the same way, if you, or I, or any individual, gets in trouble then we need our neighbors and family to help us out. We need the people around us. Let’s call them “our support group.”
Isn’t it so that each of the people around us has people around them who could serve as their support group? This keeps them strong. If one of the people around us, if anyone our support group has an infectious disease it is going to threaten the health of others in the group and make them less strong. This is just plain common sense!
So, we deduce, since you need the people around you as your suport, you also need the people around them. And where does it stop? It doesn’t. Therefore by logical reasoning we conclude that we need the entire human species as our “support group.”
It would seem that this is a basic fact of empirical ethics: The human race is a support group for each human individual.
We are, in conclusion, interdependent. [Let’s be mindful of this so that we may have awareness.] And thus it is in our personal best interest to cooperate.
Hence, let us seek harmonious cooperation; and we will be “doing the right thing.”
The essence of my theory is that “Ethics” is a perspective …a perspective on a human individual, or group of them. It arises when we view the human being as highly valuable, of indefinitely-high value. Also, the theory indicates that - if we are ethical - we will make things better, morally better. We are to add value if we want to be ethical. Lots of implications may be deduced from that definition (of the concept “Ethics”) and from that basic idea: Make things better!
One of them is: Do no harm! This in turn implies a renunciation of violence, cruelty, ruthless exploitation, greed, self-mutilation, lack of humility, etc.
What do you think with regard to any of these matters? Your comments, questions, and diiscussion are most welcome. Speak up.