Talk:Ethics/Archive 2

This is an archive of past discussions about Ethics. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

Let us not pretend that just because two books have the same word somewhere in the title that they must be about the same subject! That certainly is not so. RK

Of course not. But that is not the case here. Some of this literature is about ethics, some not. Crick's political virtues do not claim they are a work of ethics, but clearly they are. One has to know the actual material. Likewise Michel Foucault did sociology but much of his work was on ethics, utimately. Notably the morality of excluding the body from the discourse, etc.

This article should certainly not discuss these topics in any detail; rather, it should have links to articles on these often unrelated topics. RK

They're not "unrelated", and giving them two lines each is simply fair. If one isn't fair in the ethics article, one isn't going to be seen as fair in any other article.

I agree. Listing specific examples of applied ethics, and summarizing them in one or two lines, is fair in this top-level article. I never had a problem with that. Rather, I had a problem with the longer discourses that were becoming very off-topic. RK

Where do you draw the line? Why not shove in Business ethics and bioethics as well? because these are separate topics. RK 04:34, 29 Aug 2003 (UTC)

No, business ethics and bioethics belong with about two lines each, because they are important to the survey and resolve practical questions - indeed global questions these days. Although, they got left out probably because they are about decisions only a few people seem to make - like other professional decisions - whereas, *everyone* makes spiritual decisions, and almost everyone makes purchasing and lifestyle decisions that affect the whole planet. And, since we give science special status around here, the social science views like psychology and other descriptive ethics based work also needs full status.

I draw the line on things that are only about ethics in clearly public situations where violence can be invoked (that's politics), and systems to manage that (civics), and in the other direction, don't want to step on the philosopher's turf of epistemology, ontology, metaphysics and such questions as truth. But I also draw the line at things that attempt to put ethics in a box that only Judeo-Christian-tradition-with-mathematics-and-science-from-the-19th-century-POV are permitted to interpret, as the earlier articles here did. That was clearly wrong, and very biased, for instance, a very minor movement in ethics, the Mussar Movement, and one ethicist, Henry Hazlitt, were the only ones mentioned on this page. The present article is fair to both, and doesn't challenge any of the categories from analytic philosophy, but, it doesn't grant that group of POV specialists any special status either.

And, if Queers and Marxists and Feminists and Greens and Buddhists and Taoists start to seriously challenge what is called "epistemology", as lately the Greens and Buddhists have started to do, that will be mentioned there. If the cognitive scientists crack open ontology (there is much work on cognitive ontology for instance, go Google that), likewise, they will get space there. Just because one philosophy teacher who wrote an early article here didn't know about this stuff or "get" it, isn't a "precedent" you can quote to keep the article stuck in a narrow POV later. If we are pushing to 1.0 around here, the really serious deficiencies in the philosophy sections here have to be fixed, and brought past say 1950.

I draw the line on things that are only about ethics in clearly public situations where violence can be invoked (that's politics), and systems to manage that (civics), and in the other direction, don't want to step on the philosopher's turf of epistemology, ontology, metaphysics and such questions as truth. But I also draw the line at things that attempt to put ethics in a box that only Judeo-Christian-tradition-with-mathematics-and-science-from-the-19th-century-POV are permitted to interpret, as the earlier articles here did. That was clearly wrong, and very biased, for instance, a very minor movement in ethics, the Mussar Movement, and one ethicist, Henry Hazlitt, were the only ones mentioned on this page. The present article is fair to both, and doesn't challenge any of the categories from analytic philosophy, but, it doesn't grant that group of POV specialists any special status either.

And, if Queers and Marxists and Feminists and Greens and Buddhists and Taoists start to seriously challenge what is called "epistemology", as lately the Greens and Buddhists have started to do, that will be mentioned there. If the cognitive scientists crack open ontology (there is much work on cognitive ontology for instance, go Google that), likewise, they will get space there. Just because one philosophy teacher who wrote an early article here didn't know about this stuff or "get" it, isn't a "precedent" you can quote to keep the article stuck in a narrow POV later. If we are pushing to 1.0 around here, the really serious deficiencies in the philosophy sections here have to be fixed, and brought past say 1950.

Your transparent attempt to censor this article by first defining it as a concern only of Western academic philosophers, then coming back for the rest, is noted, and repelled. The four major and one minor view of ethics reflected in this article are now noted explicitly up front as a dispute of definition. If this proves to be too long, as one article, the answer is to move the "ethics in religion" section to a new article (better titled) Ethical traditions. This could complement one on Ethical relationships, taking a more modern and social science focus, and Global ethics, about the constraint-oriented postmodern views.

This would at least segment the concerns. EofT

But by no means does this mean reducing ethics itself to the Western analytic view, unless you are willing to shove that into ethics (philosophy) and make simple view of ethics and morals the main article.

This is a bald-faced lie. I never made this definition; rather, that is what this article has always been about, and I certainly didn't create this article. It seems this anonymous person is just ranting. So sad. RK

You have added section titles like "Ethic in THE religion", shown willingness to add whole chunks from an utterly POV source like "The Jewish Encyclopedia", and made comments like "sets of truths that need to be described and applied, and (in theory) should equally be true for all humans.... is a very different subject from what one finds in books and articles on "Global Ethics", "Feminist ethics", "Marxist ethics" and "Queer ethics"". I think this admits a POV bias.

Uh, this simply never happened. It looks to me like I made a tiny typo, (adding the word "the')...and from this you have created a screed against me based on your imagination alone. BTW, you also lied about what I wrote. If people take the time to look at the article, they will see that I did no such thing; rather, I said that I only began the article with a few exceprts from that public domain encyclopedia, I myself stated that it was out of date, and I asked for others to help contribute and bring it up to date, and include Christian views. And I also asked others to incorporate points of views from other religions. So let us be clear - Entmoots of Trolls and I do not have a mere difference of opinion; he is writing bald-faced lies about my contributions, and screaming about things I never did. RK 17:38, 29 Aug 2003 (UTC)

It may be that you just don't care what other people deeply believe, nor believe that what they have based their life on is in any way worthy of respect. I think there are lots of people like you in the world, but, I don't think they should be editing the ethics article. Take that as you will, my friend.

Folks, we now know that this anonymous troll is "EntmootsOfTrolls", who has been following me from article to article, harassing me, and telling Jombo Wales to go fuck himself when he was asked to stop the harassment. As such, I don't feel the need to take these pseudo-anonymous statements seriously any longer. I will simply revert his changes. RK 17:43, 29 Aug 2003 (UTC)

A review of the Page history will show who is following who. I believe you have asked Mr. Wales to make a choice, to wit, to ban me and leave you alone, or, to simply let you leave as you claim you will do if I don't go. If you care to withdraw that request, we may get much done. Anyone who wishes to read my rsponse to Wales can go to User_talk:EntmootsOfTrolls. I deny that any of what I say is harassment by any sane definition. That's all I have to say.EofT

For those interested in what this article always has been about, it is about ethics as understood and written about by philosophers.

The field of ethics, also called moral philosophy, involves systematizing, defending, and recommending concepts of right and wrong behavior. Philosophers today usually divide ethical theories into three general subject areas: metaethics, normative ethics, and applied ethics. Metaethics investigates where our ethical principles come from, and what they mean. Are they merely social inventions? Do they involve more than expressions of our individual emotions? Metaethical answers to these questions focus on the issues of universal truths, the will of God, the role of reason in ethical judgments, and the meaning of ethical terms themselves. Normative ethics takes on a more practical task, which is to arrive at moral standards that regulate right and wrong conduct. This may involve articulating the good habits that we should acquire, the duties that we should follow, or the consequences of our behavior on others. Finally, applied ethics involves examining specific controversial issues, such as abortion, infanticide, animal rights, environmental concerns, homosexuality, capital punishment, or nuclear war. By using the conceptual tools of metaethics and normative ethics, discussions in applied ethics try to resolve these controversial issues. The lines of distinction between metaethics, normative ethics, and applied ethics are often blurry. For example, the issue of abortion is an applied ethical topic since it involves a specific type of controversial behavior. But it also depends on more general normative principles, such as the right of self-rule and the right to life, which are litmus tests for determining the morality of that procedure. The issue also rests on metaethical issues such as, "where do rights come from?" and "what kind of beings have rights?"

Source - Ethics - The Internet Encyclopedia

Perhaps we need a disambiguation page, like the one we have for Knowledge, who knows? We just need to make sure that this article is kept on track, that's all. RK 17:43, 29 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Disambiguation is one option. But, if we agree that there are some universal constraints (like planetary limits and human nature and gender perspective) that inherently apply to all ethics, then, we might be able to resolve this. EofT

Please note that the Internet Encyclopedia takes a "Multiple Point of View", in which, they present the primary article on a topic from a perspective that is sympathetic and traditional to the language in which it is presented. Then, from there, they have critical articles like "ethics (critique)" that outline all challenges, or even "ethics (critique from feminism)" or "ethics (critique from Marxism)". We don't do that here - Neutral point of view requires us to reconcile in detail, difficult as that is for some topics, and present fairly the multiple perspectives all in one balanced article. This topic may be the most difficult to achieve that on. So what? We still have to try. The early articles in this slot were simply inadequate. We can't settle for those. EofT

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I've protected this at the request of EoT because of edit war over disputed NPOV. Try to sort it out. CGS 18:17, 29 Aug 2003 (UTC).

Thank you. If the solution of putting a wholly-Western-tradition view at moral philosophy (which is an English phrase after all), and leaving the more general treatment at ethics (which is derived from Greek ethos or character and thus has very broad implications), is acceptable, we may no longer have an edit war. If this solution is not acceptable, I await an alternative, possibly including ethical tradition and global ethics as spinoffs. EofT

CGS - could you add a wikipedia:NPOV dispute? I think it ought to be standard practice when a sysop protects a page to help resolve an NPOV issue. Martin

I've added it. Angela

There is no POV dispute. EntmootsOfTrolls is lying to you. Stop helping him damage Wikipedia. As you were already told, you need to speak to Jimbo Wales, creator of Wikipedia, immediately. Right now you are now helping a known vandal damage Wikipedia, and then lock in his rants. Please stop this behaviour. RK 02:18, 30 Aug 2003 (UTC)

RK, the fact that CGS is not involved in this dispute makes him the perfect person to protect the page. Please stop removing sections of the discussion, and try to have the discussion on this page rather than in the edit summaries. Thanks. Angela

Nod. Martin

At the risk of derailing the flame-fest by looking at some of the substantive issues, I see that EofT removed these two paragraphs fro the top of "Ethics in religion":

Western philosophical works on ethics were (and many still are) written in a culture whose literary and religious ideas were based in the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament) and the New Testament chronicling the teachings of Jesus. Along with the imperial tradition, this had a profound and undisputed effect on categories, rules of procedure, and all practices that were defined in Europe and enforced on North America via colonialism.

The article ethics in the Bible is a survey of ethics in the Hebrew Bible and in the New Testament.

I wonder if this text should be re-added, but specifically under "The Judeo-Christian tradition". That might be a more specific, and hence more appropriate, location. Martin 14:29, 30 Aug 2003 (UTC)

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Here is a solution to the current dilemma. Turn this page into a disambiguation page that follows the basic structure found in most modern philosophy textbooks; this allows for a NPOV presentation, yet simultaneously allows for discussion of all topics that writers are interested in.

Ethics (philosophy) - This entry covers two related topics, metaethics and normative ethics.

• Metaethics is this the investigation of where ethical principles come from. It asks: Where do ethical principles come from? What do they mean? How do we know that any exist? Are ethics merely social conventions, or are they universal truths? Metaethics is one of the most imporant fields in philosophy.

• Normative ethics bridges the gap between metaethics and applied ethics. It is the attempt to arrive at practical moral standards that tell us right from wrong, and how to live moral lives.

Applied ethics - This entry covers a wide array of subjects; it is based on the philosophical discipline of normative ethics, and applies these ideas to specific controversial issues. Examples of applied ethics include:

• Abortion, legal and moral issues
• Animal rights
• Bioethics
• Business ethics
• Criminal justice
• Environmental ethics
• Feminism
• Gay rights
• Just war theory
• Medical ethics
• Utilitarian ethics
• Utilitarian Bioethics

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I'm not really sure I want to get involved, but as RK has requested my comment; I think disambiguation seems a plausible option. Perhaps something similar to what has been done at knowledge? ie - Ethics (philosophy) to be a separate page. Angela 22:24, 31 Aug 2003 (UTC)

I don't see why we need ethics (philosophy) - why not leap straight into meta-ethics, normative ethics, and applied ethics? Martin

Ok, I didn't realise those existed. I thought Ethics (philosophy) was going to include both of them, but if they're already separate, they may as well stay that way. Angela

I think we should have Ethics (philosophy) as a introduction into the three listed by Martin. If I (as a computer scientist with no formal philosophy education) wanted some info on the philosophy of ethics, I wouldn't know where to go if there were only the three articles. CGS 01:09, 1 Sep 2003 (UTC).

CGS - what would we have at ethics then? Martin

(incidentally, my computer science degree included a course in ethics! shows what changes...) Martin

I don't think you understand the proposed disambiguation. The Ethics article would include what was written above; I have boldfaced it. This would tell people what the word "ethics" means, and the variosu ways that this word is used. If someone wanted to learn more about how ethics is studied in the field of philosophy, then they cloud click to the Ethics (philosophy) article, which would include both metaethics and normative ethics. Is this clearer? RK

I don't understand why someone would have created an article on metaethics alone. Wikipedia is not a dictionary. Perhaps someone thought that they could write an article about this subject alone? While this in theory is possible, this is not desirable. College philosophy books usually do not write about one subject (metaethics) in a separate chapter from the other (normative ethics). One subject flows into the other. The Ethics (philosophy) page would, of course, have links to more specialized articles, such as: Ethical skepticism, Ethical relativism. Ethical egoism, Utilitarianism, and all the other standard forms of ethical doctrines. RK 13:15, 1 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Metaethics is a huge subject. Many philosophy departments have multiple courses on metaethics alone. Hundreds of books in contemporary moral philosophy are devoted to metaethics. In the 50s and early 60s almost all philosophical writing about ethics in the analytic tradition was focused on metaethics rather than normative ethics. RK seems to be focused on introductory texts for a course in ethics, which usually include both normative ethics and metaethics. User:Lsolum

I agree, meta-ethics is indeed its own subject. Evercat 19:52, 1 Sep 2003 (UTC)

I agree with both of you. Lsolum is using the key word - "introductory". A top-level article on Ethics (like this one!) should not go into hundreds of pages on meta-ethics. Rather, a top-level article should be a general definition of the term, and a summary of different fields within ethics. The way I imagine it, this particular article would describe both metaethics and normative ethics; we could write quite a bit on both. We can certainly have separate articles on metaethics, by itself, and maybe normative ethics by itself. RK 23:00, 1 Sep 2003 (UTC)

My concerns arise because someone was jamming into this article all sorts of details about specific applied ethics arguments, without any sort of structure. They even started making critical attacks on Christianity, which really has no place in a general introduction to Ethics as a philosophical discipline. The article was pushing someone's political and social agenda. I want to avoid all this controversy by introducing some sort of organization. Not my personal form of organization, but simply a standard way of discussing philosophy that we find in many ethics textsbooks: Start off with a general definition, explaining that the word can be used in different ways, and describing metaethics, normative ethics and applied ethics. Have links to as many specific articles within as needed. RK 23:00, 1 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Is that what I said above then? That Ethics (philosophy) is going to include both of them? Angela 17:56, 1 Sep 2003 (UTC)

RK's suggested approach is what you said above. Martin

Martin understands me correctly. of course, as I noted to Lsolum and Evercat, this does not preclude having separate articles on these topics as well. I just want to introduce some clear organization. This Ethics article could be top level page. As I currently imagine things, Ethics (philosophy) could be a detailed introduction to both metaethics and normative ethics. Of course, it could and probably should have links to articles specifically on Metaethics and Normative ethics for even more detailed discussions. Of course, I am flexible; maybe there shouldn't be an Ethics (philosophy) page at all then! Maybe this page should contain a couple of pages introducing all three major categories of philosophy: Metaethics, Normative Ethics, and Applied ethics, and carry links to those three pages on their own, where really detailed discussion could take place. (In fact, it appears as if that was the original intent of this article all along.) RK 23:15, 1 Sep 2003 (UTC)

I just want to point out that a top-level article like Ethics is not the place for detailed examples of applied ethics, like criticisms of Christianity, arguments for gay rights, or tractates on the evils of global warming. That would be POV advocacy. The better way to do this is to have an article on Applied Ethics, which could have links to articles on Animal rights, Bioethics, Environmental ethics, Feminism, Gay rights, etc. Within those articles specific positions could be stated, in an NPOV fashion. RK 23:08, 1 Sep 2003 (UTC)

On a really mundane level, there's a wrong apostrophe ("material limits of Earth, it's carrying capacity in particular") in section 4.4 (Ecology), last paragraph, and I can't fix it as the page is protected. Would someone who can, like to?

While I'm here, I feel the Ethics article needs some serious work. It has lots of NPOV problems and is just plain confusing as is. IMO one of the problems is the enormous number and variety of articles that link here. As is suggested above, one solution is to create some more subpages. This top-level article then should avoid all the many jargons that are used in these linking pages. I'm not sure it matters a lot which of the several schemes suggested for creating and naming these subpages is adopted, or even that any consistency is possible or desirable. Just a thought, and I'm still thinking, and I'm not entirely sure I want to take this one on either...! Andrewa 13:07, 5 Sep 2003 (UTC)

I totally agree with you. On this top-level page, it is inappropriate to go into detail on many specialized sub-topics; those can be discussed on other pages. However, Cgs insists on protecting this page; she seems to think that we are fighting with each other. I don't get it. Many people have comments on this page, and I don't see any flame wars. There seems to be general agreement, and I don't understand why this article is still protected. RK 15:37, 5 Sep 2003 (UTC)

No objection to unprotecting. I just don't think I should do it. Angela 18:41, 5 Sep 2003 (UTC)

unprotected. -- Someone else 18:55, 5 Sep 2003 (UTC)

I don't see what all the fuss is about. Ethics is a philosophical field in which EVERYTHING is merely somebody's opinion. So every POV ought to be welcome here. If there are those who "feel" that ethics is (or should be) about 'getting ones rights' or about 'conflicts' between people, then simply say that School-of-thought X sees ethics as primarily dealing with Y -- what's so hard about that?

What's so hard about that is it presupposes a particular solution to the "is/ought" controversy, which is still a live issue. Believers in naturalistic ethics would say that ethics is knowledge, and belongs in Wikipedia without this qualification. Others would say that ethics is opinion, and that we do need this sort of qualification. To take either viewpoint is POV. I don't see any way out of this, I think we'll need to make an exception to NPOV and say that Wikipedia arbitrarily rejects the naturalistic approach, not as an expression of opinion but just to give some consistency to our articles. This is essentially what you're suggesting, but perhaps without realising the consequences. Andrewa 01:02, 8 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Please don't make me rewrite the article for NPOV. I hate rewriting other people's work. I just like to add little bits and pieces. --Uncle Ed 19:03, 5 Sep 2003 (UTC)

I won't have time right away, but I sure would like to see the "Judeo-Christian" section modified. There is an unfortunate, prejudicial, and ultimately inaccurate equation of "Christian ethics" with Imperial Rome. The business of running an empire is usually called "politics", not "ethics"; and besides, the conflict between the "ethics" of the church and the business of the empire is quite obviously in practically unrelieved tension throughout the Christian era. I think that the section reflects a narrow POV, which puts the applied ethics of large, public (national), practical issues out ahead of all of the central emphases of Christian ethics. The section is not only skewed toward an outsider's perspective, it appears deliberately evasive of ethics as Christians actually consider it. Four hundred years of patristic writings (in the context of Roman Law, but in very obvious conflict with it, in ethical terms), are ignored. Mkmcconn 19:06, 5 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Your suggestion is fine. Since this is a top-level article, that subject should only be briefly summarized here, with a link to a more specific article that deals with that issue, such as Ethics in religion or Ethics in the Bible. Of course, religious viewpoints on ethics could be a part of Metaethics, Normative ethics and Applied ethics. RK 19:10, 5 Sep 2003 (UTC)

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For some reason the whole of the 'Ecology' and 'Ethics without politics' sections were removed by 12.88.85.244. I'm not sure if this was possibly accidental so I did a partial revert and put them back in. Please revert if this was meant to be done. Angela 19:31, 6 Sep 2003 (UTC)

The idea of "ethics without politics" fails the Google test. The sections were mishmashes of subjects, jumping wildly from one topic to another, sometimes with no discussion, and other times with an overly high amount of detail. The relationship of ethics to feminism to toilet training itself was quite disturbing, and I wonder why someone wrote such things. Someone should write a serious paragraph on the relationship of politics to ethics, feminism, and the other subject. But much of what we have here in the article's latter third is a personal discourse that seems POV and jumpy.

Ok. Next time, you might want to say that before deleting it. :) --Angela

Here's another idea which I don't think has been canvassed... maybe the main Ethics page should be a disambiguation page? The introduction to this article says that ethics is a branch of philosophy. But professional ethics for example aren't part of philosophy. I think there are lots of meanings of "ethics" that aren't part of philosophy, and this matches my observation that lots of the discussion on this page is not really philosophy either.

There is a lot of good Ethics (philosophy) in Wikipedia already, but it's taken me a while to find it. So some better linking would pay dividends I think.

The reason I say the diambiguation page belongs here and not in 'Ethics (disambiguation)' or something similar is that I'm not at all sure what we'd then say this page is about! It's a bitza, and needs disentangling. Comments? Andrewa 01:02, 8 Sep 2003 (UTC)

I think your new introduction fixes everything. RK

If it's supporting your efforts I'm pleased, they are great. It's an alternative to simple disambiguation, which didn't get a lot of support. I think from previous comments that this page was originally intended to be just philosophy, but I see no hope of restoring it to that... nor is it appropriate to try IMO. Andrewa 06:18, 10 Sep 2003 (UTC)

IMO, following the new intro I've just added and lots of work by RK, the neutrality warning could now be removed. Other thoughts? Andrewa 15:49, 9 Sep 2003 (EDT)

Sounds fine to me. Do any of our already signed in users, who have been contributing to this discussion, have any thoughts?

RK thinks it would be premature, see the reply to my comments there (bottom of user talk page). Andrewa 21:44, 9 Sep 2003 (EDT)

I think you are confusing RK with 142.177. See the history of RK's talk page. I don't believe RK has commented yet. Angela 22:24, 9 Sep 2003 (EDT)

You are quite correct, thank you...! Apologies to both RK and 142.177, I missed that. Andrewa 06:22, 10 Sep 2003 (UTC)