Reflection About My Ethical Principles

Reflection about my ethical principles

There are four areas contained in the ethical theories framework, and each of them has their own principles and ideas. My position stands for the Teleological ethics because I identify myself with the idea of judging acts by its consequences instead of by the means. I’m not saying that the end justifies the means, but I think that when it comes to make a decision you have to analyze the effects that this decision can have over yourself and the rest of the people. I also like the utilitarian theory that says that as long as it makes you happy that is the correct moral decision to take. As explained in the book happiness is different from simple pleasure. Pleasure is a satisfaction you can get in certain moment, but that in long term has no beneficial effect over you or the people that surrounds you. As Jeremy Bentham said in 1994, “the greatest happiness of the greatest number is the foundation of morals and legislation.

When prioritizing my ethical principles I chose the golden rule as the most important, this is because I believe the correct way of acting is not doing to others what we don’t want them to do to us. In this case I understand the golden rule from the perspective of the consequences, I mean if I know that my decision will have a negative impact over some, so I’m not supposed to do it that way. My second choice was the utilitarian ethic which pursues the greatest good for the greatest number. Being selfish, from my point of view, doesn’t lead anywhere. And my third choice was the intuition ethic, do what your gut feeling tells you to do. This following also a bit the utilitarian ethic, I mean, I have to follow my instinct to know the probable consequences of my acts over the rest of the people.

My decision not to use virtue ethics is because of the argument that most of those virtues named by Aristotle