Major Ethical Theories: From Aristotle to Habermas
Aristotle’s Ethics
According to Aristotle, humans are composed of body and soul. The soul is divided into three parts: the vegetative, the animal, and the rational.
Most human beings must be content with operating their vegetative-animal soul, whose aim is to achieve virtue ethics through action and the achievement of habits. These habits of action must be correct and always aim for the average. This means that one must never fall into a vice, either by default or by excess.
Cynic Ethics
For Socrates and Diogenes, man was good by nature. Therefore, man should live according to his nature, that is, he should be free in action and speech. Fundamentally, they valued education and personal effort as a way to achieve self-sufficiency (the ability to fend for oneself) and philanthropy. They despised social conventions. Everything could be subjected to criticism.
Ethics of the Stoics
The cosmos is rationally ordered, so that everything that exists in nature is already determined. The wise man must adapt to the facts without rebelling against them, but trying to adapt. Happiness lies in achieving inner peace, accepting destiny, and trying to control the forces of passion, which lead to unrest, that is, evil.
Ethics of the Epicureans
Epicurus of Samos believed it is wise to calculate which pleasure is more intense and lasting, and which has less painful consequences. He also considered that there are four causes of distress and pain:
- The fear of the gods, but men should not fear them because they do not intervene in the lives of men.
- The fear of pain, but it is either mild or it is short.
- Fear of failure to others, but a man must be autonomous and should not be influenced by the opinions of others.
- The fear of death, but there is no reason to fear it, because, as long as you are, death is not, and when death is, you are not.
Utilitarianism
Utilitarianism believes that men derive pleasure through sympathy, which leads us to extend to others our desire for happiness.
The moral goal is to achieve the greatest happiness, pleasure, or utility for the greatest number of people. There are two forms of utilitarianism: act and rule.
Act Utilitarianism
Act utilitarianism believes that pleasure can be measured. At any given moment, you can tell the amount of pleasure that exists in a community. Only you can judge the morality of our actions by the consequences. It is judged that we must act first, and then, by seeing the consequences, we will know if they are right or wrong.
Rule Utilitarianism
Rule utilitarianism considers that pleasures differ not only in quantity but also in quality; there are higher and lower pleasures. It is people who decide which are which. Mill thought that, to see if an action is good or bad, we should, before acting:
- Compare it with other laws that we consider correct.
- If we still cannot decide, it would be convenient to call experts so that they can foresee the consequences.
- If they judge that the consequences would be good for the majority, then we must act.
- Once we have acted and have verified that the results were good, then we generate a rule that will help us in other experiences.
Kant’s Ethics
- There are two types of reason:
Theoretical reason and practical reason.
Theoretical reason is needed to achieve happiness. It generates hypothetical imperatives or advice that tell man what to do, what means should be employed to achieve happiness. Here we consider only special interests.
Practical reason is necessary for human beings to be good, that is, to have a good will. It generates moral laws that have in mind universal interests.
- Practical reason and the categorical imperative:
In the physical order, it sets the natural laws governing bodies in the universe and the physical part of being human. In the ethical order, it sets a practical law, the categorical imperative, which tells the spiritual man how to behave to behave like a person of good will.
- Autonomy and dignity
We are conditioned to do what is good for everyone. And if we are autonomous beings, we will become priceless; no one may buy or want to sell us. We value all, we deserve dignity, and we must treat everyone as such.
- Postulates:
If we do this, we are virtuous, but according to Kant, we are not likely to get happiness.
Kant believes that there should be, after death, an area through which man can continue to fight for his happiness. Therefore, he postulates the existence of an immortal soul that can reach it.
He also postulates the existence of an Almighty Being, God, that guarantees the unity of virtue and happiness in the soul.
Habermas’ Ethics
- From monologue to dialogue:
Kant was criticized because his moral rationality is monological. But real rationality has to be dialogic (it has to do with more than one person).
- Discourse and its rules:
It should be guided by two principles: that of universalization (a norm is valid when those affected freely accept the consequences and side effects that will follow in general compliance) and the ethics of discourse (apply the rules accepted by all concerned as participants in a dialogue).
- Its foundation is not strategy but communication:
This is to enable all dialogue with the aim of achieving a communicative agreement.
Covenants are used in instrumental rationality because we intend to achieve our ends without taking into account the means. In agreements, we use practical or moral rationality because we want to achieve our goals, taking into account the interests of all.