Ethics vs. Morals

[Marxbear]

As you probably already know, ethics are rules nature has given us (do not kill, do not rape, no direct incest, etc.) and morals are rules man has placed (do not drink, do not smoke, do not gamble, etc.) Do you tend to stick more to ethics, or morals? Why? Any other things worth noting?

 

[Cognisant]

Drinking and smoking are harmful to one's health, whereas murder and rape are quite common in nature, I think you've got it backward.

And that's before I even begin with the moral relativity speech.

 

[Ex-User (5841)]

Who's to say murder, rape, incest etc. are wrong? Even interpretation of "natural laws" is inherently subjective. In fact, Mother Nature is quite the bitch, what with her killing via invenomation & disembowelment and volcanic eruptions and what not. Probably an INFJ ;-P

As for the OP, I stick to whatever my heart desires at that moment in time that is most likely to result in a net gain of pleasure for both myself and others. I believe the term is "Utilitarian Hedonism".

*EDIT* You've been hit by both me and Cog in an ethics/morals thread. Quite a bang-up intro to the forum's contrarian perspectives, if I do say so myself...

 

[Teohrn]

Morals are the principles from which one deems what conduct is good or bad, right or wrong. Ethics is the philosophy of morality. Therefore, your question is not really that good; they are mutually inclusive to great extent.

I would not consider myself much of a moral creature. I deem morals to be necessary of course, but I do not find it to leave many questions, neither do I find it to be relevant to myself as I have basically made up my mind and it is a non-question, so to speak. One personal thought is that morals are relative yet ought not be seen as such. All one needs are some basic principles based on reason that are essential for stable and progressive human societies. The religious stuff should be thrown away. At the same time, in a rather contradictory way, I see morals as a personal matter for myself and those with certain capability, because I trust myself but not the common man to get it right. The philosophy of it (in other words, ethics) and some social aspects of it are interesting to certain extent. All in all, it is not that much of an interesting subject. The most important thing is that they are basic and as objective as possible. It should by all means be morally wrong to rape f.e. However, by the standards of some miserable creatures, eating certain types of food should be morally wrong, being attracted to the same gender should be morally wrong and so on. Basically actions that do not hurt anyone else. That is simply petty, inessential, irrelevant, irrational, etc. Those things are a matter of personal taste and they do not harm anyone.

 

[EyeSeeCold]

The terms seem interchangeable, nowadays at least.


I see communal morality as compliance & protocol for interpersonal cooperation, that can be driven by empathy or practicality. It keeps a community functional, whether it be a country, state, city, workplace, household, or classroom etc. However since there is a tendency of power structures to abuse the idea of communal ethics, I think the rules deserve to be occasionally questioned and updated; there is no need to have certain expectations and limits when the society has changed and progressed, especially if they only benefit leaders of society(e.g. the "War on Drugs").

Then there are principles, reactive feelings, and perspectives which serve a personal sense of right and wrong and everything in between. These are molded from upbringing, personal experiences, and the nature of humanity; they provide personal guidance. As long as personal morality does not infringe on others, it isn't much of a concern to others, but because it deals with something very internal to humanity, philosophical inquiry could be enlightening.



I pay attention to communal morality; unless one lives in the wilderness or something, there are always going to be other people that you have to deal with. I'm not saying I'm for adapting your personality and changing beliefs etc to fit in, that's too extreme and defeats the purpose. I just think it's naive and reckless to not mind others.

I do have a personal sense of morality and I respect others' as long as their own is reasonable. It's not something I define and stick hard to, though, it's more situational and flexible except for some core principles / strong values.

 

[Andronicus]

Morals are the principles from which one deems what conduct is good or bad, right or wrong. Ethics is the philosophy of morality. Therefore, your question is not really that good; they are mutually inclusive to great extent.

I would not consider myself much of a moral creature. I deem morals to be necessary of course, but I do not find it to leave many questions, neither do I find it to be relevant to myself as I have basically made up my mind and it is a non-question, so to speak. One personal thought is that morals are relative yet ought not be seen as such. All one needs are some basic principles based on reason that are essential for stable and progressive human societies. The religious stuff should be thrown away. At the same time, in a rather contradictory way, I see morals as a personal matter for myself and those with certain capability, because I trust myself but not the common man to get it right. The philosophy of it (in other words, ethics) and some social aspects of it are interesting to certain extent. All in all, it is not that much of an interesting subject. The most important thing is that they are basic and as objective as possible. It should by all means be morally wrong to rape f.e. However, by the standards of some miserable creatures, eating certain types of food should be morally wrong, being attracted to the same gender should be morally wrong and so on. Basically actions that do not hurt anyone else. That is simply petty, inessential, irrelevant, irrational, etc. Those things are a matter of personal taste and they do not harm anyone.

Im not a vegeterian. But how can someone, escpecially from western countries. Who do not need any tyoe of meat or fish to survive. justify the suffering of other creatures for your own pleasure?

 

[snafupants]

As you probably already know, ethics are rules nature has given us (do not kill, do not rape, no direct incest, etc.) and morals are rules man has placed (do not drink, do not smoke, do not gamble, etc.) Do you tend to stick more to ethics, or morals? Why? Any other things worth noting?

I conceive of ethics as an abstracted, enlarged and structured version of morality.

To me, individuals have morality. The latin root for morality is loosely transliterated as character. When individual morality is expanded and systematized, it becomes the field of ethics.

I'm not sure about the given/placed dichotomy above. It seems glib and inaccurate.

 

[Da Blob]

Im not a vegeterian. But how can someone, escpecially from western countries. Who do not need any tyoe of meat or fish to survive. justify the suffering of other creatures for your own pleasure?

A butcher who allows animals to suffer is incompetent.

Has one never examined the role of predators in an ecosystem? Predation is most often an act of mercy and humans can be the most merciful of predators if they choose to be so.

As far as the cultural bias, many wealthy Westerners have acquired the taste for animal fat, which poorer cultures can not afford as part of their regular diets.

Interestingly enough, both morals and ethics serve mainly to justify the suffering of other creatures or justify the individual's suffering and sacrifice for the benefit of Others.

 

[Vrecknidj]

The VAST majority of professional ethicists use the terms "ethics" and "morality" interchangeably.

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/morality-definition/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morality#Morality_and_ethics

 

[Teohrn]

Im not a vegeterian. But how can someone, escpecially from western countries. Who do not need any tyoe of meat or fish to survive. justify the suffering of other creatures for your own pleasure?

You are assuming that the animals suffer. In fact, they do not. A lot of measures are taken just so that the animals that are slaughtered do not need to suffer. One example of that is that they use anesthetics on the animals. Death also comes rather quickly. I think you should rather argue that we kill other beings for our self-preservation despite it not being completely necessary for the preservation of our self to do. However, I do not consider the moral aspect of it to be an important issue. The largest problem by far when it comes to meat consumption is that producing it requires a lot of resources. Producing meat is very draining on natural resources and thus ineffective in the long run. (One could argue that animals are fed up to their limits for their pleasure and later on to our own.) That is a real issue. We are thinking in the short term rather than the long term; how is this going to effect the next to come?

If this actually was a moral issue, you would not have differentiated between the West and the rest, as the same rules would have had to apply for both, and it would be more logical to use the more cost efficient way of producing food for the rest who cannot afford meat. You mentioned that you are not a vegetarian yourself; how do you justify it?

Moreover, our consumption of meat and fish (is there an actual difference?) is biological. Humans are omnivores and it is natural for them to eat meat. I just cannot find any reason there needs to be any moral justification. Not only do we get pleasure from it, but meat and fish are also healthy - the former only in certain amounts and depending on which colour of course.

Spoiler

I apologize if I in any way did not respond correctly to your post; inebriation and a busy time-schedule does that.

 

[Andronicus]

"The grading of forms, organic functions, customs and diets showed in an evident way that the normal food of man is vegetable like the anthropoids and apes and that our canine teeth are less developed than theirs and that we are not destined to compete with wild beasts or carnivorous animals." Written by Darwin in The Origin of Species.

Our love for meat has made our teeth too big for our downsized jaws and most of us need dental work. Not even the meat industry has dared to claim that meat-eating is healthy. There is no nutrient in meat that cannot be found in a vegetarian diet. Meat-eating increases cholesterol, and heart attack is the biggest cause of death in America. It also increases the chance for cancer. So it’s defiantly not healthy. Not the amount of which we consume it at least.

The reason I said it’s especially in western countries. Is that the Us don’t need to slaughter around nine billion animals every year. Poorer countries do so for survival. That is survival of the fittest. But that’s not why we eat it. We eat it for taste.

I think only more and more people are going to turn vegetarian/vegan. There is so many downsides to our meat culture. And after time i think it’s going to be frowned upon like smoking. And worse as time goes.

If you’re interested, this documentary shows how slaughtering often takes place in America.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1286537/

 

[SinChroniCity]

You are assuming that the animals suffer. In fact, they do not. A lot of measures are taken just so that the animals that are slaughtered do not need to suffer. One example of that is that they use anesthetics on the animals. Death also comes rather quickly. I think you should rather argue that we kill other beings for our self-preservation despite it not being completely necessary for the preservation of our self to do. However, I do not consider the moral aspect of it to be an important issue.

I'm no tree-humpin' hippy, but to assume that these animals are not suffering, and then to dismiss it as unimportant either way, I think highlights the problem with arguing over ethics in the first place. What's OK for you, might not be OK for me, and vice versa.

Even if the animals suffer very little at the time of slaughter, what about their entire existence leading up to that last moment? Our modern beef and pork production facilities treat these animals not as a living creatures, but as a commodity to be manufactured in the most economical way. It's this view of life in general, and the complacent attitude of our society, that I think, will allow us to take the questionable first steps down a slippery slope of what is deemed 'ethical' in the future.

I'll never be able to know if these animals are in a state of suffering or if they're enjoying themselves, but I can get a feeling of which existence they would prefer. The question of ethics is, 'does it matter'?

 

[Salo425]

I tend to be able to break "moral" rules in the way that you describe them if I think it will put my sense of ethics back in order. But I think you might have the two backwards.

 

[Etheri]

As you probably already know, ethics are rules nature has given us (do not kill, do not rape, no direct incest, etc.) and morals are rules man has placed (do not drink, do not smoke, do not gamble, etc.) Do you tend to stick more to ethics, or morals? Why? Any other things worth noting?

How did nature give us any rules?
I see all rules to be man-made. Since I cannot define good or bad, I consider them to be choices of the individual, rather than absolute truths.

The implications this has onto both meta-ethics and morality are somewhat far fetched, and I'm still confused as to where it brings me in an applicable moral code. It makes meta-ethics confusing and I'm still trying to building a personal system of normative ethics. Obviously, a normative system on which we could base laws would be nearly impossible and no more than an unattainable ideology... Then again, which philosophy isn't?

Just to elaborate, in a way I think that, much like kant, we're all our own moral agents. However, unlike kant, there is no absolute good and no absolute bad, only gray. His categorical imperative, as utopian as it sounds, seems to be an empty set. This means, simply put, that we can only judge ourselves... not others, because we all have a diffrent notion of what is moral, and what is not. Obviously, there is no 'better' or 'worse' choice, the choice is completely arbitrary... and given enough time, won't even matter.

I just implied serial killers aren't bad people, they're just diffrent. I don't think it bothers me, why would I be superior over someone who feels no remorse, after all?

 

[Etheri]

Sorry for the doublepost

I'll never be able to know if these animals are in a state of suffering or if they're enjoying themselves, but I can get a feeling of which existence they would prefer. The question of ethics is, 'does it matter'?

I might be missing the irony in your post, but I'd just like to point a few things out.
I grew up on a dairy farm in Belgium. You're asking which existance they prefer...
The 'happy cow picture' is one taken in the western meat-fabric you're so against. I'm terribly sorry, but did you notice the cattle EAR TAGS? These are regular dairy cows, this picture could very well be taken at my home (obviously, the landscape is less hill-like, but other than that, exactly the same.)

So you're comparing a western meat farm to a western dairy farm. Atleast we already got 'west' out of it. So we're left with meat vs dairy. I cannot continue on the subject, because we simply do not have the farms as shown in the top picture. It happens for pigs here (indoors in huge stables), not for cows. Most meat-cows are specific races, they basically get the same life as dairy cows until they're fat enough to eat. However, they're specifically breed to pack a ton of meat, which doesn't exactly seem the happiest thing either. Then again, I doubt being bred to produce 40 liters of milk a day is that much better. -- Or maybe it is.

Obviously, dairy cows are still eaten (in most cases) after they die... But that's not quite quality meat

Anyways, just wanted to say, both your pictures are the western farming industry at work.
Everything aside, I don't really think any of it matters.