AS Ethics Half Term Challenge 20 Memorable facts

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  • Kant introduced a new approach to Ethical Decision-making – he argued that every human being has a sense of moral obligation, experienced as a belief that there is something that we ought to do.
    • 20 facts to learn.
      • Kant wrote: Two things fill the mind with ever new and increasing admiration and awe the oftener and more steadily we reflect on them: the starry heavens above me and the moral law within me.
        • A Priori Synthetic means that a statement is knowable before sense experience, but requires sense experience for verification.
          • A Kingdom of Means, “Act as if you were through your maxim a law-making member of a kingdom of ends”
          • Ross called these exceptions prima facie duties (first sight duties). These duties are conditional and can be outweighed by a more compelling duty.
        • A Categorical Imperative is a command without conditions
        • Universal Law is “Act only according to that maxim (principle or rule) by which you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law” 
          • The Benevolent lie is based on the claim that sometimes lying is the right thing to do, such as not telling a murderer where his intended victim is hiding
        • The three postulates of practical reason are, Eternal life, freedom and Existence of God.
        • Ross Listed Seven Prima Facie duties:             Fidelity or promise keeping                Reparation for harm done                     Gratitude                  Justice            Beneficence                    Self – improvement               Non-maleficence
      • A priori means knowledge that comes before sense experience.
    • Synthetic means knowledge that requires external verification, and may be true of false
      • Immanuel Kant claimed that telling the truth was always a moral duty
      • The Summum Bonum or greatest good is a state where happiness and virtue are united   but for Kant it is the virtuous person who has a ‘good will’ which is vital for morality; 
    • A Hypothetical Imperative tells us to act in a certain way because it will tend to produce a certain result. The need for the action in conditional on our wanting the proposed result
      • Kant believed that after death, in the next world, there is no conflict between ‘duty’ and ‘happiness’, as ‘duty’ is part of the natural harmony or purposes created by God.
    • Kant only recognised the good will – therefore good is wound up in the action and its motive, and not in its consequence
      • The problems with Kant’s theory led W.D. Ross to make certain changes. He argued that certain exceptions should be allowed to Kant’s Duties
    • Humans as Ends Not Means, “Act that you treat humanity, both in your own person and in the person of every other human being, never merely as a means, but always at the same time as an end.”
      • One objection to the benevolent lie is that consequences are unpredictable and the good you hope to achieve by lying may go badly wrong

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