Philosophical Ethics and Business

Abhishu Rimal
 Three Major Ethical Theories
• Consequentalist: Egoism and Utilitarianism
• Non consequentalist: Deontology
• Virtue Ethics
Utilitarianism: Making Decisions based
in Ethical Consequences
• Also known as the “greatest happiness principle”
: An action is right if it produces the greatest
amount of happiness or more good for the
greatest number of people.
• Happiness is intended pleasure and absence of
pain
Good Consequences = Good Actions
• It’s a hedonistic moral theory i.e. good
consequence = pleasure to greatest number of
people.
 Critical Incident: Martha and George
• Martha, as a home-service medical care volunteer,
has cared for George through the final weeks of his
fatal illness.
• Just before he died, George told Martha where a
large sum of money he had accumulated was stored.
• He asked her to see that the money was given to the
Society for Protection against Alien Control of the
Earth (SPACE).
• Since George's illness did not affect his mental
capacity, she agreed.
 Continue…
• But now that he has died, she is considering using
the money to support the activities of the local
Hunger Task Force (HTF), an organization that
provides donated food to those who need it.
• George has no surviving friends or relatives, and no
one else knows about the money. He left no written
will.

WHAT SHOULD MARTHA DO?

How to Apply Utilitarian Approach
• Look at all the actors involved and analyze their
potential utility in terms of the pleasure and pain
involved in different courses of action
• We could set up a simple balance sheet.
• Add up ‘pleasure’ and ‘pain’ for action 1, and the
result will be the utility of this action.
• After having done the same for action 2, 3, and so
on, the moral decision is relatively easy to
identify:
– the greatest utility of the respective actions is the morally right
one.
 Applying Utilitarian Analysis
• It seems that the options Martha faces are
these:
– Keep the promise
– Give the money to the Hunger Task Force
 Continue… Considering Consequences
for Each Option

Keep the promise Give the money to HTF

Stakeholders Pleasure Pain Pleasure Pain

Martha Dissatisfaction Satisfaction

George
Loss of
SPACE Gets huge donation money (OC)
Loss of money
HTF (OC) Gets huge donation
 Core Problems with Utilitarianism
• Subjectivity
– Assessing such consequences as pleasure or pain
might depend heavily on the subjective
perspective of the person who carries out the
analysis.
• Problems of quantification
– Quite difficult to assign costs and benefits to
every situation.
• Distribution of utility
– By assessing the greatest good for the greatest
number, the interests of minorities are overlooked
 Does Consequence matter?
• Imagine two people out together drinking at a
bar late one night, and each of them decides to
drive home very drunk.
• They drive in different directions through the
middle of nowhere. One of them encounters no
one on the road, and so gets home without
incident regardless of totally reckless driving.
• The other drunk is not so lucky and encounters
someone walking at night, and kills the
pedestrian with the car.
Who is the better drunker?
DEONTOLOGY comes into picture
 Deontology: An Ethics of Duties
• Ethical theories that consist of abstract,
unchangeable obligations, defined by a set of
rationally deduced a priori moral rules, which should
be applied to all relevant ethical problems.
• An action is right if it is in accordance with a moral
rule or principles regardless of outcome
• Deontological theories hold that some acts are
always wrong, even if the act leads to an admirable
outcome
• Deontological approach is represented by the
perspective of Kant’s categorical moral imperative
 Kant’s Categorical Moral Imperative
• What does it mean for one's duty to be determined
by the categorical imperative?
• What is an imperative? An imperative is a
command. So, "Pay your taxes!" is an imperative
• There are mainly two imperatives: hypothetical and
categorical
 Hypothetical and Categorical
Imperatives
• Hypothetical Imperatives: These imperatives
command conditionally on your having a relevant
desire. E.g. “If you want to go to medical school,
study biology in college.” If you don’t want to go to
medical school, this command doesn’t apply to you.
• Categorical Imperatives: These command
unconditionally. E.g. “Don’t cheat on your
taxes.” Even if you want to cheat and doing so would
serve your interests, you may not cheat
Categorical Imperative: Who is a good
person??
• Kant argues that a person is good or bad depending
on the motivation of their actions and not on the
goodness of the consequences of those actions.
• By "motivation" it means what caused one to do the
action (i.e., one’s reason for doing it).
• Two tests: universality and humanity can be
conducted as a way for evaluating motivation
 Motivation of Action: Lottery Winner
• Imagine that a lottery winner gives his won amount
to a charity and he intends to save hundreds of
starving children in a remote village.
• The food arrives in the village but a group of rebels
finds out that they have food, and they come to steal
the food and end up killing all the children in the
village and the adults too.
 Lottery Winner…cont’
• The intended consequence of feeding starving
children was good, but the actual consequences
were bad.

• Kant is claiming that regardless of intended or actual

consequences, moral worth is properly assessed by
looking at the motivation of the action. Thus the
person is a good person.
 Two formulations of the Categorical
Imperative
• For Kant there was only one categorical imperative
in the moral realm, which he formulated in two
ways: universality test and humanity test.
1. Act on only those principles that s/he would feel all
right for everyone to act that way. (Universality test
or Universalism)
2. Always treat humanity, never simply as a means.
(Humanity test)
 Universality and Humanity Test:
Lottery Winner
• Universality test: Is it ok if everyone give their
lottery amount to charity?
• Humanity test: Is lottery winner using human
as a means?

ETHICAL BEHAVIOR
 Universality test and Humanity Test:
Martha and George
• Universality test: Is it ok to LIE by everyone to
anyone who is on death bed?
• Humanity test: Did Martha used any human as
a means?

UNETHICAL
Virtue Ethics: An Ethics of Integrity and
Character
• Aristotle describes a virtue as a “mean” or
“intermediate” between two extremes: one of excess
and one of deficiency
• Virtues are not everyday habits; they are character
traits, in the sense that they are central to
someone’s personality and what they are like as a
person
 Virtue Ethics…continue
• An action is right if it is what a VIRTUOUS
AGENT would do in the circumstances
• A different explanation of why an action is
right or wrong given might be given by a
virtue ethicist
– E.g. a lie is wrong not because of its consequences
and not because it violates rules but because it is
not what a virtuous and honest person would do
 Continue…
• Focus is on what sort of people we should strive to
be, not what things should we do on individual
occasion
• Ethics is a practical knowledge and practical
knowledge only comes with practice: doing it
yourself. (E.g., knowing how to ride a bike.)
• One should act virtuously as through practice s/he
becomes virtuous
 Continue…V-Rules
• The v-rules are the guidelines set by virtue and
vice terms that can act as general prescriptions
for right action.
• For instance,
– The virtue of charity carries the prescription to help
others.
– The virtue of honesty prescribes that I should tell the
truth.
– Courage advises that I face fear without running away.
• Each term provides action guidance for dealing
with particular moral situations.
 Continue…Problem with Virtue Ethics
• Virtue rules (V-rules) might conflict with each other
and ranking might not be possible>> (Whether to be
charitable or honest??)
• If everyone can apply the v-rules, the primacy of the
virtuous agent is lessened
• V-rules are not specific enough. The v-rules can only
be useful if compared to deontological rules. For
instance, the v-rule 'be honest' is very vague
 What will you do?
• While heading to a friend's college graduation ceremony
you stop to help a person in trouble, even though it
results in you breaking a promise to your friend who was
expecting you to be at that ceremony.
• The virtue of charity requires that you help the stranger
in need, but at the same time the virtue of honesty
requires that you keep your promise to your friend.
• In either case, the agent acts wrongly. Either the stranger
in need will not be helped, or your friend will be hurt
emotionally by you breaking your promise.
• This particular situation is resolvable though, depending
on the circumstances involved.
 What will you do? Con’t
• There is a big difference between helping a stranger
in need that was in a car wreck and needs medical
care, or a stranger in need that has a flat tire
• In the first case, the moral requirement of charity
overrides honesty.
• In the second case though, keeping your promise to
your friend might be the better decision or resources
without care or restraint.
 A Decision Making Model for Business
Ethics
• Determine the facts
• Identify the ethical issues involved
• Identify stakeholders
• Consider the available alternatives
• Compare and weigh the alternatives
• Make a decision
• Monitor and Learn
 Critical Incident: Trolley Problem
• There is a runaway trolley
barreling down the railway
tracks. Ahead, on the tracks,
there are five people tied up
and unable to move. The
trolley is headed straight for
them. You are standing some
distance off in the train yard,
next to a lever. If you pull this
lever, the trolley will switch to
a different set of tracks.
However, you notice that
there is one person on the
side track.
 Critical Incident…cont’
• You have two (and only two) options:
– Do nothing, in which case the trolley will kill the
five people on the main track.
– Pull the lever, diverting the trolley onto the side
track where it will kill one person.

Which is more ethical option??

 Think Yourself…What should be
Done??
• An ethical dilemma for parents is whether to
monitor their teens’ social media activities.
• Teens spend a large part of their day online
engaging in behaviors that have implications
for their health and well-being.
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