Situation Ethics

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Situation Ethics
Situation ethics was most famously championed by Joseph Fletcher (1905-1991). He believed that we should follow the rules until we need to break them for reasons of love. It is based on agape love (Christian unconditional love), and says that we shou
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Four Working Principles
When establishing his version of Situation Ethics, Fletcher used four key principles which he aimed to fulfil in writing his theory: 1. Pragmatism (it has to work in daily life - it must be practical) 2. Relativism (there should be no fixed rules) 3.
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Six Fundamental Principles
There are six fundamental things that underlie Fletcher's Situation Ethics: 1. Love is the only absolute (it is intrinsically good) 2. Christian decision making is based on love 3. Justice is love distributed 4. Love wants the good for anyone, whoeve
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Advantages of Situation Ethics
The key advantage is that it uses rules to provide a framework but allows people to break rules to reflect life's complexities.
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Advantages of Situation Ethics
It does not provide a clear definition of what love actually is. Some might say it is too subjective – because decisions have to be made from within the situation. Humans do not have a bird’s eye view on a situation so have difficulty in seeing what
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Other cards in this set

Card 2

Front

When establishing his version of Situation Ethics, Fletcher used four key principles which he aimed to fulfil in writing his theory: 1. Pragmatism (it has to work in daily life - it must be practical) 2. Relativism (there should be no fixed rules) 3.

Back

Four Working Principles

Card 3

Front

There are six fundamental things that underlie Fletcher's Situation Ethics: 1. Love is the only absolute (it is intrinsically good) 2. Christian decision making is based on love 3. Justice is love distributed 4. Love wants the good for anyone, whoeve

Back

Preview of the back of card 3

Card 4

Front

The key advantage is that it uses rules to provide a framework but allows people to break rules to reflect life's complexities.

Back

Preview of the back of card 4

Card 5

Front

It does not provide a clear definition of what love actually is. Some might say it is too subjective – because decisions have to be made from within the situation. Humans do not have a bird’s eye view on a situation so have difficulty in seeing what

Back

Preview of the back of card 5

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