PHI 2397 Lecture Notes - Lecture 3: Consequentialism, Moral Agency

• School: University of Ottawa
• Department: Philosophy
• Course: PHI 2397
• Professor: Sardar Hosseini

Document Summary

Three kinds of capacities (potentials: the ability to anticipate the consequences of one"s own actions, the ability to make value judgements, the ability to choose between alternative courses of action. Nevertheless, the capacities or potentials need to be developed or actualized: ethically speaking, most of us are quite undeveloped; we haven"t updates our childhood. This is why being educated about ethics, and in this case ethic of business, becomes pressing. Ethics is the study of right and wrong. Ethics is the branch of philosophy that studies morality (a system of ethical principles and beliefs) and the way in which moral principles are applied to social, professional, and personal life. In short, ethics is defined as the set of moral principles that distinguish what is right form what is wrong. Ethics main objective is to evaluate human practices and actions by calling upon moral standards (rules) It is not always easy to distinguish an ethical question from a non-ethical question.