FREEDOM IN

THE CONTEXT
OF MORALITY
FREEDOM IN THE CONTEXT OF MORALITY

I. Morality and Freedom

II.Value Experience and Morality
III. Approaches to Moral Reasoning
IV. Common Mistakes in Moral Reasoning
ETHICS
Is a branch of philosophy that deals with the systematic questioning and critical
examination of the underlying principles of morality.
 Ethics comes from the root word ethos which refers to the character of a
culture.
 The subject matter being studied in ethics is morality.
 Ethics has been associated with two general approaches Normative and meta-
ethics.
MORALITY
 Morality comes from the root word mores which means, customs including
customary behavior of a particular group of people
 This constitutes the core of attitudes and beliefs of a particular group of people.
 Morality can be a body of standards or principles derived from a code of
conduct from a particular philosophy, religion or culture, or it can derive from a
standard that a person believes should be universal. Morality may also be
specifically synonymous with "goodness" or "rightness."
THE CONCEPT OF MORALITY
NORMATIVE ETHICS – is meant to give an answer to the
question
META-ETHICS – tries to go beyond the concepts and
parameters set by normative ethics by trying to question the
basis of the assumptions proposed in a framework of norms
and standards by normative ethics.
THE ROLE OF SOCIETY AND THE INDIVIDUAL
IN THE EMERGENCE OF MORES
THE ROLE OF SOCIETY AND THE INDIVIDUAL
IN THE EMERGENCE OF MORES
According to the American sociologist and a well-known anthropologist William
Graham Sumner, who coined the term, folkways are social conventions that are
not considered to be of moral significance by members of the group (e.g.,
customary behaviour for use of the telephone).
There would always be the best known practices that one has to follow. This
notion of “right” and “true”, according to Sumner, is known as folkways.
In order to preserve society together with its accepted norms and practices, the
individual has to defend and maintain of what is right.
THE ROLE OF SOCIETY AND THE INDIVIDUAL
IN THE EMERGENCE OF MORES
From these folkways, now becoming the basis of the mores, the individual,
whether consciously or unconsciously, develops habits to preserve the notion of
what is right. The usual ways are therefore, defended and upheld. Thus, in our
society, there is a tendency to defend the practices that we have been used to.
While the individuals develop these habits, society or the group, on the other
hand, develops the social rules and sanctions, which may be implicit or explicit,
in order to preserve these practices and to control the behavior of the individual
and to maintain order in society.
THE ROLE OF SOCIETY AND THE INDIVIDUAL
IN THE EMERGENCE OF MORES
Thus, in this society, customs emerge out of these repeated practices, while from
the individual emerges habits.
Therefore, the mores are the compelling reasons to do what ought to be done,
because they are the right things to do. The changes in the mores of a particular
society do not happen in an instant, but they happen unconsciously over time.
THE ROLE OF SOCIETY AND THE INDIVIDUAL
IN THE EMERGENCE OF MORES

TWO IMPORTANT FACTORS IN THE

EMERGENCE OF MORALITY
1. Point of view of society
2. Point of view of the individual
QUESTION

What is freedom and how is

it being exercised in the
realm of morals?
THE REALM OF FREEDOM
the power or right to act, speak, or think as one wants without hindrance or restraint.
 When we are exercising freedom in making choices, we are taking control and
assuming full responsibility for the choices that we are making.
 There is one more important caveat: you are free but this freedom is not absolute.
 The mores are there to serve as a form of social control to limit, govern, or regulate
your behavior in order to uphold and maintain order in your society.
 Freedom of the human person from the moral sense of the word assumes that one is a
free moral agent.
THE REALM OF FREEDOM
THE REALM OF FREEDOM

There are two necessary conditions for morality

to occur
1. Freedom
2. Obligation
VALUE EXPERIENCE AND MORALITY

 Only humans are moral

 Value Experience
 Values and Moral Values
 Moral Judgments and Moral Decisions
 Intellectual Choice and Practical Choice
ONLY HUMANS ARE MORAL

Deliberation is an act pertaining to human alone.

This act requires reflection and an exercise of
one’s capacity to the fullest without sacrificing
his ability to emphasize with other human
beings.
VALUE EXPERIENCE

This valuation process happens when we make

choices and indicate our preferences, for example,
when we like or dislike, approve or disapprove, favor
or disfavor. Values are the result of this process of
value experience where you are setting which are
priorities that you have chosen to pursue.
VALUES AND MORAL VALUES

According to Mothershead, “All values are

priorities with respect to some aspect of human
experience.” She also argues that a value can
become a moral value if they become unlimited
priorities in their scope of relevance in our life.
MORAL JUDGMENTS AND MORAL DECISIONS
According to Mothershead, “Making moral judgements is budgeting actions.”
Furthermore, for him, “A moral decision is the most important class of moral
judgment,” because it “has reference to the judger’s own future action. “Thus, this
happens when one is exercising his full capacity a free moral agent.
Furthermore, Mothershead claims that “not all moral judgments are decisions,
thus, many of our moral judgment have reference to other people or groups of
people.” Many of these moral judgments do not involve our own moral decisions.
ANALYSIS OF MORAL REASONING
Moral reasoning is a process of examining moral arguments. An argument is
defined as the search for a statement or a set of statements that can be made to
yield a new statement which is its conclusion. The result of the process of
reasoning or inference is an argument.
Moral reasoning is also known as evaluative reasoning since one is trying to
evaluate the soundness of the argument from the moral point of view.
DEONTOLOGICAL ETHICS
Is an ethics based on duty. It came from the Greek word dein, meaning duty.
Deontological ethics recognizes that there are moral principles that we follow
which we consider as universally correct and should be applicable to all of
humanity..
This fundamental moral principle is known as the categorical imperative or the
law of morality. This is something that we are unconditionally obliged to do,
without regard to the consequences.
DEONTOLOGICAL ETHICS
According to Kant, as human beings, we perceive the world
as phenomena. This phenomena is our reality, the knowledge
of reality that our mind is capable of interpreting and
understanding.
The mind is, thus, endowed with two faculties
1. Faculty of pure reason (a priori – prior to experience)
2. Faculty of pure intuition (a posteriori –from experience)
TELEOGICAL ETHICS
Teleology came from the root word telos, meaning end, goal, or purpose. Thus, a
telcologist believes that the end, goal, purpose of an action must be based on its
consequences. The most common though extreme form of consequentialism is the
use of the dictum, “the end justifies the means.”
The most popular form of teleological reasoning is based on utilitarian ethics.
Utilitarianism is construed as the maximization of pleasure and the avoidance of
pain in order to promote happiness. Happiness becomes the summum boum or the
ultimate goal for utilitarian morality.
NATURE OF VIRTUE ETHICS
Virtue ethics has diverged from the above distinction. Instead of looking at the
nature of the action, it focuses on the character of a good person.
Virtue ethics realizes that there is diversity in ethics and morals. It recognizes that
there are something lacking in both normative approaches, which fail to consider
that an analysis of ethics and morals could not be completely covered by only
appealing either to consequences of the act or an appeal to a universal principle or
a code of some form.
THREE KINDS OF VIRTUE ETHICS
1. EUDAEMONIST – from the tradition of Plato and Aristotle, where one
achievement of virtues like justice, wisdom, courage, temperance are
construed as excellence
2. AGENT- BASED – where you look for moral examplars of a good person and
emulate them as role models virtues
3. ETHICS OF CARE – where caring or nurturing as a virtue is being
emphasized
COMMON MISTAKES IN MORAL REASONING
1. The failure to recognize the vagueness of moral concepts
2. The failure to recognize the value-laden nature of many concepts which appear value-free
3. The uncritical use of emotive terms
4. Hasty generalizations
5. Faulty causal reasoning
6. Rationalization
7. The dismissal of a moral position on the basis of their origin