Posted: May 2nd, 2015

Ethical Relativism and Virtue Ethics

Ethical relativism

Ethical relativism is a theory that states that moral judgments that include judgement of the right or wrong action are relative instead of being absolute. There are two types of ethical relativism namely cultural relativism and subjective ethical relativism, also known as subjectivism. This theory holds that moral judgement is are relative to a culture, society or a group of people. Determination of whether a given action is right or wrong depends on the belief of the culture or society. Moreover, there lack a universal means for moral judgement of the right or wrong action (Reference, 292). What a society hold as the right action remains right however wrong it may appear from other society. Actions that are considered to be right are those that conform to the society values while actions considered to be wrong are those that violate society values. According to cultural relativism, moralities are equal, majority rules and morality of other society should not be criticized. Morality presents doubts of what is right or wrong. Cultural relativism and ethical relativism does not agree on the standards of morality that should be authoritative. In a society, the things that are seen as right acts as the standard of morality. They form the basis for what is ethical or unethical in the society. According to ethical relativism, moral principle is fixed at individual or society level. However, they are be based on ignorance, brainwashing, prejudice and superficial thinking yet taken to be the morally right action. Therefore, a society may view something as the right action but people from other culture may view it as morally wrong. Ethical relativism based the right and the wrong action on the value and the culture of a given society. Therefore, virtues vary across and within society and are based on values and culture of a given group of people.

Measurement of moral progress requires standards. In ethics, moral rule act as the standard and this rule is given by the society (Reference, 297). However, some rules in the society do not support moral progress and some moral codes in the society are morally equivalent. Ethical relativism is a means of challenging the idea held by some people that morality is objective. However, it faces a problem because it assumes that social codes and moral view are equivalent. An act is proven to be right just because the society accept it but not because it is right. It commit on personal or society view of morality event without paying attention on the basis on which the belief is formed. Some of the society or individual view of morality is based on vices such as prejudice. As a result, the action chosen to be right or wrong does not hold the idea of virtue ethics. It limits the progression of morality because some of the action that is taken to be right violates people’s right and does not support some virtues (Reference, 298).

Relativism brings contradiction in explaining why moral judgement is good. Moral judgment varies from one society to the other and approaches used to define morality depend on the society. Therefore, moral judgement are said to be true relative to the agreement of a given society. According to the ethics relativism, society agreement acts as the standard or reference for moral claims. Conflict in the ethical code brings contradiction in the moral advice ant it occurs when agreement differs across different groups in the society (Reference, 301) .

In relativism, moral laws are created either by the society or individuals. In order to overcome conflict and contradiction presented by relativism, those making moral laws should avoid logical errors and have sound knowledge of all the relevant information. To achieve moral progress, the view of individual and the society should reflect those of the observer that is ideal (Reference, 303).

Virtue Ethics

People are either virtuous or vicious. Virtues are character that identifies and individual as morally right while vices define a person as morally wrong. The idea of virtual was begun in 18^th century by Aristotle, an ancient Greek, Kant and Bentham. Virtual ethics starts with a virtuous person who acts as a reference of the right action. It acts as the standard of the right action and it is the act of morally right. Virtue ethics does not follow established of rules and regulation to define what is morally right. Instead, it considers an action as the right action because it is the one that could be followed by a moral exemplar. Apart from providing a single standard, virtue ethics also provide a set of moral ethics that are more specific. Moral rules guide people in acting accordingly such as acting honestly, loyally, justly, courageously and avoid vices such as infidelity, gluttony, prejudice, rudeness and cruelty (Reference, 255).

Moral duty varies considerably from one situation to the other. It is not easy to determine the action that a virtuous person should have in order to be used as an example or a standard of the morally acceptable behavior (Shafer-Landau, 622). Virtue ethicists have conducted research on this and they have not yet established a single formula for determining how people should act. This shows how morality is a complex concept to define. Due to lack of methods and rule, morality uses general principles. Ethics is a complex area that requires sound judgement and maturity of emotions. Morality should not be based on the opinion or personal feelings but on true standards (Reference, 259).

Virtue ethics require moral understanding which involves knowing moral facts and practical wisdom. Acquisition of moral wisdom requires experience, training and refection. Emotions play an integral part in helping people to determine the morally right action. It acts as a guide of the action that is right in a given situation. However, emotion must be trained in order to gain maximum benefits out of its alert. The second important role that emotion plays in moral understanding is to help people to understand and differentiate right and wrong. The inner part of an individual help people to know whether something is right or not. For example when doing something wrong, there is that feeling of anxiety while doing the right thing is accompanied by a good feeling. Moreover, the feeling experienced by a person can show whether the action of another person is right or wrong. Lastly, emotion is very critical in virtue ethics because it motivates people to act in the right way. A morally right person has the ability to choose what is right through reinforcement of brain (Reference, 261).

Acquisition of virtue is not inborn and it is an ongoing process that requires training, experience and practice. It is affected by the surrounding environment and people. When a person is exposed to a healthy environment and moral people, it is easier to gain virtues than people surrounded by immoral environment. Individual have no choice of whether to be virtuous or not because this is dictated by the way a child is brought up. People who grow in a corrupt society lack an opportunity to develop virtues at their tender age. However, they still have a chance the most essential element of moral training occurs at youth stage. Therefore, children should be given moral education to help them develop virtues which in turn help them acquire moral wisdom.

Virtues do not only require good habits but also require distinctive set of thoughts, perception and motives. People who have virtues differ significantly from those who hold vices. They are caring and mindful about the well-being of others unlike people without virtues. They are also very concerned about the situation other people are in and are ready to offer assistance. Therefore, virtuous individuals are defined not only by their deeds or habits but also by their inner part. They view and feel things that they encounter from a different perspective as compared to vicious people. To become a virtuous person calls for integration of emotion and understanding. When a person understand what is right they feel motivated to do it without reluctance (Shafer-Landau, 622).

Virtue is associated with good life to enjoy a good life a person should exercise a worthy pursuit and a worthy choice. A virtuous person has ability to understand the right action and feels motivated to do it no matter the surrounding pressure. Definitely, such as person will experience a good life characterized by happiness and ability to flourish. However, virtue is not a guarantee for a good life. It is only essential but not sufficient to acquire a good life because other factors play a part such as misfortune which are inevitable play a part in determining whether life will be good or not. People have different definition of how good life should be. As result, virtue is mistaken when a person with wealth, power and fame are said to have good life. However, these factors do not make life good because they act as means of acquiring   important values hence lack worth of their own. A good life should differentiate people from other living things by showing their uniqueness. Although virtue does not guarantee a good life, it is important because it determines the well-being of human being (Reference, 262).

Virtue ethics cannot be used entirely to account for morality due to its vulnerability to tragic dilemma. When faced with a dilemma, a virtuous person is presented with two bad choices but it a must to choose one. Choosing either of them is morally wrong. Virtuous people are faced with the issue of moral conflicts which make it very difficult to know the right thing to do due to two conflicting rules. In such cases, deciding the right thing to do depend on experience and sound judgement. Virtue ethics is very demanding because it requires a person to act in a way a virtuous person will act while at the same position. Mostly, virtuous people have denied themselves to an extent of causing harm to themselves at the expense of others. Therefore, to have virtue may be very difficult to achieve (Shafer-Landau, 622).

It is not easy to determine who a moral exemplar should be because different people endorse different people as the role models. Appropriate role model depends on individual and the culture and this is referred to as relativism. Therefore, moral standards differ across people and culture. Virtue ethics present conflicts and contradiction because different people an act differently in the same situation. Moreover, choosing the right role model requires a person to be wise and because moral education is an ongoing process people never acquire the require knowledge to make appropriate choices (Reference, 278).

People can determine the nature of a virtue by identifying their duty first. Virtue is what drives people to perform their duty as expected. Although in virtual ethics people are supposed to act the way a virtuous person will act, they do not choose to do the right thing because that what the virtuous person will do but because it is the right thing to do (Reference, 287)