Thought for the Evening: Rough-and-Ready Ethical Tests for Practical Decision-making
In much of what we do, we use various tests and diagnostics and rules of thumb to give us first approximations for practical purposes. We certainly do this in ethics, but there is remarkably little discussion of these; discussions tend to be about underlying systems and not about useful first-approximation rules in decisions. If we are faced with a given scenario or situation, what are some rules that people use to get a first assessment of what choices are right and wrong, good and bad?
(1) Reciprocity: A very popular one is to use a crude form of reciprocity, either positive (you should do to others as you would generally like them to do to you) or negative (you should not do to others as you would generally not like them to do to you). There are sophisticated forms of reciprocity, but in practice the first-approximation rule is fairly simple and based on appearances.
(2) Generalizability of Principle: One common practical test is to consider whether the action is a candidate for being principled. (This is weaker than determining whether it is actually principled.) Is the principle of the choice or action something that could be generally used (even if some exceptions or qualifications are allowed)?
(3) Traditional Acceptability: Another common one is to consider what has long been considered acceptable by a diverse and widespread population of people.
(4) Beneficialness of Precedent: People often assess possible actions on whether the action would be beneficial or detrimental if taken as a precedent.
(5) Consistency with Paragons or Exemplars: There are also persons of exceptional reputation in moral matters, and people will regularly assess whether a given action is something that such persons would do, or at least whether they would approve or disapprove of it.
It's not difficult to find people using any and all of these. None of them are intended, of course, to be rigorously exact or always right; the whole point is just that we sometimes need a first assessment for practical purposes, something fairly easy that usually gets us in the right neighborhood. And in fact, you can easily build accounts in utilitarianism, Kantianism, or Aristotelianism, to name just three, that would explain why some of these rules would, across a large number of domains, give us something approximately right. For instance, if you accept the Kantian idea that maxims should be universalized, it's easy to show that our impression of how generalizable a principle is would often be a good first step to assessing whether the maxim can be universalized. It in effect gets us partially to where a Kantian wants us to be. Beneficialness of precedent can likewise easily be shown to be something that you will often have to consider in applying the greatest happiness principle. You can often build such justifications for most of the rules, although of course, which general approach to ethics you choose will change how directly a rule can be justified, as well as its relative importance compared to the other rules. In some cases, there is an inconsistency -- e.g., Kantianism strictly speaking rejects consistency with paragons as a way of assessing right and wrong -- but even then it may be that the particular approach implies that it has another use -- e.g., Kant holds that, once we've determined right and wrong, consistency with paragons like Jesus can be an assurance of sorts that doing what is right is possible.
Whenever we are faced with an ethicist (or, as often seems the case, bioethicist) making an apparently controversial or provocative claim, we should apply the rough-and-ready tests. They won't establish whether the ethicist is right or wrong, but they will give us the lay of the land, and lead us to raise the right questions about what they are claiming.
Various Links of Interest
* Mark Balaguer, Platonism in Metaphysics, at the SEP
* Michael Vazquez, Kant's Rejection of Stoic Eudaimonism (PDF)
* David Mikics, Christmas, the Greatest Jewish American Holiday, at "Tablet", discusses how much Christmas music is due to Jewish American composers.
* Michael B. Willenborg, The Persons of the Trinity are Themselves Triune: A Reply to Mooney (PDF)
* Abigail Tulenko, Folklore is philosophy, at "Aeon"
* Tuomas E. Tahko, Laws of Metaphysics for Essentialists (PDF)
* Luke Coppen, The book of before and after, interviews Fr. Andrew Younan on Chaldean Catholicism, at "The Pillar"
* Ignacio Silva, Thomas Aquinas and Some Neo-Thomists on the Possibility of Miracles and the Laws of Nature (PDF)
Currently Reading
Donald A. Norman, The Design of Everyday Things
Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics
Heinrich von dem Turlin, The Crown
in Audiobook
Isaac Asimov, Foundation and Empire
C. S. Lewis, The Chronicles of Narnia
Eve Titus, The Great Mouse Detective
