Ethics is a branch of philosophy that deals with what is considered to be right and wrong.

What is 'ethics' concerned with?

Are you the type of person who usually 'does the right thing'? How do you know what the 'right thing' is?

What do we mean by the term 'ethics'? Before you read on, take a few moments to write down a definition of what you think the term means.

Now watch the video from La Sierra University (LSULife 2007) and compare your answer with the answers given by the students.

The branch of philosophical study that focuses on 'ethics' is concerned with studying and/or building up a coherent set of 'rules' or principles by which people ought to live. The theoretical study of ethics is not normally something that many people would regard as being necessary in order for them to conduct their everyday activities. In place of systematically examined ethical frameworks, most people instead carry around a useful set of day-to-day 'rules of thumb' that influence and govern their behaviour; commonly, these include rules such as 'it is wrong to steal', 'it is right to help people in need', and so on.

But sometimes the vicissitudes and complexities of life mean that these simple rules are sometimes put to the test. Consider the idea that it is wrong to kill. Does this mean that capital punishment is wrong? Is it wrong to kill animals? Is killing in self-defence wrong? Is the termination of pregnancy wrong? Is euthanasia wrong? If we try to apply our everyday notions of right and wrong to these questions, straightforward answers are not always forthcoming. We need to examine these questions in more detail; and we need theoretical frameworks that can help us to analyse complex problems and to find rational, coherent solutions to those problems. Whilst some people attempt to do this work individually, for themselves, philosophers attempt to find general answers that can be used by everyone in society.

Think about a significant decision that you have made that had an effect (either for good or bad) on the lives of other people. This could be a decision about changing a job, moving home, responding to a dilemma, helping somebody who was in difficulty, etc.

How did you arrive at your decision? Was your decision based explicitly on ideas of what was right and wrong? Try to examine and record precisely the justifications for your decision. Can you identify any underlying principles or rules which you used to reach your decision?

Examples of such underlying principles or rules might include:

• 'I should do the best thing for my career in the long run.'
• 'It is OK to tell someone a lie if it prevents someone from being hurt by the truth.'
• 'I should always help someone in difficulty.'

Ethics and morality

The terms 'ethics' and 'morality' are not always used consistently and precisely in everyday contexts, and their ordinary meanings do not always correspond with philosophers' use of the terms. Ethics is often used in connection with the activities of organisations and with professional codes of conduct: for instance, medical and business ethics, which are often formalised in terms of exhaustive sets of rules or guidelines stating how employees are expected to behave in their workplaces (such as in respect of a duty of care or confidentiality that health-care workers owe to their patients; or the medical ethical principles of beneficence, non-maleficence, respect for autonomy, and justice). Morality, on the other hand, is more often used in connection with the ways in which individuals conduct their personal, private lives, often in relation to personal financial probity, lawful conduct and acceptable standards of interpersonal behaviour (including truthfulness, honesty, and sexual propriety).

These 'everyday' uses of the terms 'ethics' and 'morality' are not so much incorrect by philosophical standards, as too limited. The philosopher's interest in the theoretical study of ethics is with the idea of conduct that is right, fair and just, does not cause harm, and that can be applied to a wide variety of cases. For our purposes, each of the terms 'ethics' and 'morality' captures the essence of that idea sufficiently well. In what follows, then, it is not really necessary to over-emphasise the distinction between ethics and morality; here, those terms may be used interchangeably to refer to ideas about how humans ought to act.

Areas of ethical study

There are three broad areas of ethical study:

• Meta-ethics, which focuses on the meaning of ethical terms themselves (for instance, 'what is goodness?'), and on questions of how ethical knowledge is obtained (for instance, 'how can I distinguish what is good from what is bad?'), rather than on the more applied question of 'what should I do in a particular situation?'. Meta-ethics is therefore concerned with the nature of ethical properties, statements, attitudes and judgments. Meta-ethics examines such themes as what moral questions mean, and on what basis people can know what is 'true' or 'false'.
• Normative ethics, in contrast, is the study of ethical acts. It therefore focuses explicitly on questions of 'what is the right thing to do?' in general. Normative ethics is concerned with questions of what people ought to do, and on how people can decide what the 'correct' moral actions to take are.
• Applied ethics, which is concerned with how people can achieve moral outcomes in specific situations. Therefore, it is concerned with the philosophical examination of particular - and often complex - issues that involve moral judgments. Areas such as bioethics, environmental ethics, development ethics and business/corporate ethics may be regarded as areas of applied ethics. (The distinction between normative and applied ethics, however, is becoming increasingly blurred.)

The area of meta-ethics is more of a 'pure', abstract or theoretical, field of study, whereas the areas of normative and applied ethics tend to focus more sharply on how ethical considerations relate to human actions in general (in the case of normative ethics) or in particular situations and contexts (in the case of applied ethics). Given that our interest is principally on the study of ethics in relation to environmental and development issues, it is the latter which will provide the most useful insights. Therefore, our focus will be primarily on questions that fall within the areas of normative and applied ethics.

Is a branch of philosophy that seeks to define what is right and what is wrong on a universal basis?

What does ethics refer to?

What is right and wrong philosophy?

What is ethics and types of ethics?