Ethics And Moral Philosophy

Applied Ethics (SERIOUS LANGUAGE/CONTENT)

Applied Ethics                                                                                                                                                          Applied ethics refers to the practical application of moral considerations. It is ethics with respect to real-world actions and their moral considerations in the areas of private and public life, the professions, health, technology, law, and leadership. The most striking development in the study of since the mid-1960s was the growth of interest among philosophers in practical, or applied, ethics—i.e., the application of normative theories to practical problems. This is not, admittedly, a totally new departure. From Plato onward, moral philosophers have concerned themselves with practical questions, including suicide, the exposure of infants, the treatment of women, and the proper behavior of public officials. Christian philosophers, notably Augustine and Aquinas, examined with great care such matters as when a war is just, whether it is ever right to tell a lie, and whether a Christian woman does wrong by committing suicide to save herself from rape. Hobbes had an eminently practical purpose in writing his Leviathan, and Hume wrote about the ethics of suicide. Applied ethics is usually divided into various fields. Business ethics discusses ethical behavior in the corporate world, while professional ethics refers directly to a professional in his field. Biomedical and environmental ethics delve into health, welfare, and the responsibilities we have towards other people and our environment. Organizational ethics defines what a group values in relation to its stated goal. International ethics tries to determine if a nation's primary responsibility is to itself as a sovereign entity or to the world community at large. Sexual ethics speaks to issues such as homosexuality and polygamy, while cyber ethics tries to get a handle on issues in the Information Age.

 The British Utilitarian's where very much concerned with practical problems; indeed, they considered social reform to be the aim of their philosophy. Thus, Bentham wrote on electoral and prison reform and animal rights, and Mill discussed the power of the state to interfere with the liberty of its citizens, the status of women, , and the right of one state to invade another to prevent it from committing atrocities against its own people.