INDIAN INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY PALAKKAD

PROFESSIONAL ETHICS

NOTES

What is Philosophy:

Quite literally, the term “philosophy”, means, “love of wisdom.” In a broad sense philosophy is
an activity people undertake when they seek to understand fundamental truths about themselves,
the world in which they live and their relationships to the world and to each other. As an
academic discipline philosophy is much the same. Those who study philosophy are perpetually
engaged in asking, answering, and arguing for their answers to life’s most basic questions.1

Etymology:

from the Greek – Philosophia: Philo = love or loving and Sophia = Wisdom. Hence Philosophy
means “love of wisdom”

Definitions of philosophy: According to Oxford Advanced Learner’s dictionary 7th Ed:

1. The study of the nature and the meaning of the universe and of human life.

2. A set of beliefs or an attitude to life that guides somebody’s behavior.

ETHICS

Suppose that all your life you have been trying to be a good person, doing your duty as you see it
and seeking to do what is for the good of your fellowmen. Suppose also, that many of your
fellowmen dislike you and what you are doing, and even regard you as a danger to society,
although they cannot really show this to be true. Suppose further, that you are indicted, tried, and
condemned to death by a jury of your peers, all in a manner which you correctly consider to be
quite unjust. Suppose, finally, that while you are in prison awaiting execution, your friends
arrange an opportunity for you to escape and to go into exile with your family. They argue that
they can afford the necessary bribes and will not endangered by your escaping; that if you escape
you will enjoy a longer life; that your wife and children will be better off; that your friends will

                                                            
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still be able to see you; and that people generally will think that you should escape. Should you
take the opportunity?

What is Ethics?

Origin:

From the Greek adjective ‘ethica’, which again comes from the noun ethos which means
customs, usages or habits. Ethics is also called moral philosophy. The word ‘moral’ is derived
from the Latin ‘mores’ which also means customs or habits.

The field of ethics, or morality studies the proper standards and principles of human conduct. It
considers various answers to the question “How should I live”?

Consider these questions…

Do I often pick up quarrels? How can I talk to my mother so that she will listen? How can I help
this company keep employee loyalty after all the layoffs? How, basically, should I lead my life?
What is the most important thing for me to consider when I make decisions? The focus here is on
the details of our lives or on the broad task of how people ought to behave. Ethics usually means
determining what it is most important for us to do. Specifying the conduct most befitting us as
humans.

How do Ethics differ from other courses?

Most subjects study in a systematic way laying down rules and regulations and following those
rules. But philosophy (applied philosophy or applied ethics) does not have such strong rules to be
followed, it is an open enquiry into anything from a critical and reflective perspective. Ethics
studies the distinction between right and wrong, good and evil, proper and improper conduct –
but other subjects are not. Other courses are a source of information, while ethics is a source of
formation. In ethics courses, unlike other classes, students are not simply told the score. Instead
they are asked to scrutinize competing answers to questions and the arguments advanced to
support them.

Ethics like other branches of philosophy, considered to have no orthodoxy that can simply be
assumed. No view can be accepted on faith from one generation to the next. Ethical
considerations form an integral part of human existence and are constantly disputed. Human
beings argue about ethics partly because it is so central to our lives. Ethical issues arise whenever
we consider how people behave and what guides their conduct. The study of ethics is concerned
with what is good and evil, or right and wrong, for human beings generally, by virtue of their
humanity. Most importantly, Ethics deals with the powers we have to make choices.

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 ‘Free will’
Free will is the ability to choose between different possible courses of action without any
compulsion. It also means that having control over one’s actions. Control here means our
freedom to do otherwise or the power we have for self-determination. For moral responsibility
the power for self-determination is a necessary ingredient. One who is not free cannot be held
responsible for an action. Questions about rightness and wrongness, good and evil, virtue and
vice, blame and praise, reward and punishment are all meaningful only if we are free. The most
important aspect of free will is that only a free agent can be assigned with a moral responsibility.
A person deserves praise of blame only if her actions are up to her. It also entails that an action is
up to an agent only if she had the freedom to do otherwise. This also would lead to the question
that; Are you responsible for a wrong action if you were not free?
Free will is closely linked to the concepts of moral responsibility like praise, guilt, sin, and other
judgments which apply only to actions that are freely chosen. Traditionally, only actions that are
freely willed are seen as deserving credit or blame. To be completely free, or to do something of
your own free will, it is essential that you could have acted otherwise. If you cannot avoid acting
in a particular way, then your action is not free. While it is generally understood that human
beings have the ability to think and act freely as rational and moral agents, the common causal
laws by which all human activities and responses are governed are incontestable. It is this
conflict that provides the real problem of how we are free.

It is hard to refute determinism in a world where almost all scientific disciplines depend on
physical cause and effect. While causal determinism argues against Free Will Philosophers have
long claimed that we have introspective evidence of freedom in our experience of action (of
consciously attended or deliberated action). Again our ability for rationality can help us know
about free will, we can infer or know freewill from our own moral responsibility.

DIVISION OF ETHICS

Today Ethical theories are divided into three subject areas:

1) Meta-ethics, 2) Normative Ethics, and 3) Applied Ethics.

1) Meta-ethics 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? Meta-ethical answers to these questions focus on the issues of universal truths, the
will of God, the role of reason in ethical judgments, etc.

2) 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.

3) Applied Ethics involves examining specific controversial issues, such as abortion, infanticide,
animal rights, environmental concerns, homosexuality, capital punishment, nuclear war etc.

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 CHALLENGES TO ETHICS

ETHICAL SUBJECTIVISM:

It means that no one can say what is right and wrong except the person or people involved. To
put it another way, ethical subjectivists hold that whether some act is good or bad is a matter of
how it appears to the individual who is doing the evaluating. If the individual regards it as the
right course, then so it is; if he or she does not, then it is not. All depends on the person
concerned.

Some would argue that something is right if someone believes it to be right. One argument for
ethical subjectivism is that nothing can be invoked to demonstrate that something is right or
wrong. People are unique. They are all creative, free agents and share nothing in common aside
from the fact that they are all free to do as they will. There is no human nature from which to
glean principles to help us make our choices.

Even our understanding of the world may be entirely unique and not shared with others. We
must acknowledge this fact. There is no right and wrong; there are only the choices that we
make. Indeed, human life is the complex and confusing affair that it obviously is because life
shapes us into the selves that we all are. To pretend that some standards can be identified to
guide us in our conduct is self-delusion and invites us to kid ourselves instead of accepting the
reality that we are free and on our own. (This attitude is very close to the existentialist view of
the human situation.)

Another subjectivist viewpoint asserts that we are not free at all. We cannot make choices, right
or wrong, about our actions. We are guided by our innate constitution (instincts) or by our
environment (sensory or social stimuli) to do as we will. Our likes and dislikes come about
arbitrarily, without our having a hand in their development or assessment. We are like the rest of
the animal kingdom (except with respect to our greater biological complexities), and we move
about in our world in accordance with the laws of physics, chemistry, biology, psychology,
sociology, economics, and politics. These laws govern our behavior. They are not easy to
identify, true, and it remains for science to determine exactly what does play a decisive role in
human affairs. But there is no reason to think that we differ from molecules, stones, planets,
plants, zebras, and the rest of nature, all of which conform to a predetermined, preexisting order
of things. In short, we are complex machines developed through evolution by the forces of
nature. Considerations of right and wrong are mere prescientific confusion.

Objections:
Ethical subjectivism poses two challenges to ethics. First, in most of its renditions human nature
is a myth – each person must create his or her own nature. Second, it does not permit us to
identify a standard of moral conduct.

In objection to the subjectivists we could go on to claim that the theory in fact proposes a
standard of right and wrong, however much this is denied. Because we human beings are self-

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moved, free, and undetermined, it is our task to carry out the activities we can freely engage in,
to be creative as only human beings can be. To be individuals true to the requirements of our
human nature is to be creative, ever-growing, ever-developing, never-stagnant beings coping
with our own circumstances. Whatever our freedom consists in, whatever it is that we are
ultimately free to do, is just what we ought to do and do well.

ETHICAL NIHILISM

The term “nihilism” originated in the Latin word nihil, meaning “nothing.” Most nihilists are
actually fervent opponents of their culture’s dominant values, although more broadly speaking,
nihilism advocates opposition to all moral and political values. The nihilist rejects the very idea
that moral (and political) values should be instrumental in human life.

Moral principles are devices of exploitation. Nihilists see moral values as means by which the
productive, imaginative, genuinely powerful elements of humanity are subordinated to its baser
members. Consciously or unconsciously, moralists, according to the nihilist, seek to sabotage the
very best in human beings. By intimidation, threat of punishment, doctrines of divine retribution
(for example, the idea of hell and damnation in an afterlife), and the like, moralists impose upon
people practices, systems, and institutions that destroy the life-sustaining features of the human
race.

Friedrich Nietzsche (19th century French Philosopher and a Nihilist) rejected Christianity’s
conceptions about morality (such as doctrines about the supreme virtue of humility, self
sacrifice, and charity). He himself predicted that the twentieth century would see a return to
nihilism.

The nihilist’s position, in general, reflects total dismay and disgust with the so-called morally
good human life. As a result the nihilist sometimes rejects and opposes all actual and possible
moral positions. But as with Nietzsche, the nihilist often responds with a sharp attack on
prevailing ideals and values only to cry out for new ones. Beyond the occasional call for new
values, nihilists in general do not believe that values can be demonstrated objectively. Therefore
the new values must in some sense be relative to the character of the willing individuals who
select them.

Criticism

Nihilism is more often a desperate (though brilliant, powerful, and even dazzlingly beautiful)
form of protest than a precise argument in support of some philosophical viewpoint.

First, in a basic sense values are just what the nihilists are asking for. By opposing values, they
proclaim some of their own. The strict nihilist tells us to abandon our concern with values and
moral truth. However petty the procedure may appear to him, we must determine whether the
call itself is warranted. Is it true that we ought to abandon a concern with values? Is this
universally true? Will the quality of life be improved if we do so? The nihilist is apparently
obliged to answer yes to all these questions. But the nihilist who does so is not being candid with

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us. Nihilists do not tell us to discard all values. Instead they advise us that certain moral positions
are in fact wrong and destructive.

Nietzsche too criticized from a moral point of view; he too argued for what should be done rather
than for what was being done. He foresaw a future time, furthermore, when proper values would
be generated, after the improper ones had wrought their destruction.

Notions of morality in a culture may become distorted by news media or by the pronouncements
of politicians, religious leaders, or parents. Nevertheless, morality may also manifest itself
properly.

TYPES OF MORAL THEORIES

Deontological and Utilitarian Moral Theories

Deontological Moral Theory:

The word deontology derives from the Greek words for duty (deon) and science, or study
(logos). In contemporary moral philosophy, deontology is one of those kinds of normative
theories regarding which choices are morally required, forbidden, or permitted. In other words,
deontology falls within the domain of moral theories that guide and assess our choices of what
we ought to do (deontic theories), in contrast to virtue theories which fundamentally assess what
kind of person we should be. A deontological moral theory focuses on the intention (purity of
intention) that underlies an action. In everyday ethical talk, for example, we often hear the
expression “It is the thought that counts.” If someone does something that is highly valued but
the person has ulterior motives (for example, he or she wants power or praise or favors granted in
return), then the act itself is deemed morally insignificant.

Immanuel Kant advanced this point. By his account a moral act must aim for nothing
beyond its realization as a moral act. The moral goodness of a deed derives from its being
intended by the agent to be nothing except a morally good deed. A person may act in accordance
with ethics or morality, but if she does it for pleasure or hopes to go to heaven or to win public
approval as a result, no moral praise will be forthcoming even though the act accords with
morality. An agent exhibits moral goodness only when he has the purest intention to be morally
good.

Kant on Ethics and Duty (Kant’s Moral Philosophy)

Immanuel Kant (1724–1804) is known for his famous ethical treatise viz. Foundations of the
Metaphysics of Morals (1785). Kant set out to restore reason to what he regarded as its rightful
place in our moral life. Specifically, he attempted to show that there are some things that we

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ought to do and others that we ought not to do merely by virtue of being rational. Moral
obligation thus has nothing to do with consequences, in Kant’s view, but arises solely from a
moral law that is binding on all rational beings. Although Kant’s own expression of his theory is
difficult to understand, the main thrust can be formulated in two intuitive principles:
universalizability and respect for persons.

According to Kant there is nothing absolutely good except a good will. A will is good when it is
determined by respect for the moral law, or the consciousness of duty. An act that is done from
inclination is not moral. Moreover, the rightness or wrongness of an action does not depend on
its effects or consequences; it is immaterial whether happiness or perfection results, so long as
the motive of the agent is good.

According to Kant moral law is a Categorical Imperative (an unconditional command).

Categorical imperative does not say do this if you would be happy or successful or perfect, but it
says: Do it because it is your duty to do it (duty for duty’s sake).

Kant gives three Maxims which will guide an individual’s behavior.

MAXIM 1: Always act in such a way that you will the maxim or determining principle of your
action to become a universal law.

MAXIM 2: Act in such a way that you treat humanity, whether in your own person or in the
person of any other, never merely as a means to an end, but always at the same time as an end.

MAXIM 3: Therefore, every rational being must so act as if he were through his maxim always
a legislating member in the universal kingdom of ends

The Categorical Imperative is a universal and necessary law, a priori, and it is inherent in reason
itself. It is present in the commonest man; though he may not be clearly conscious of it, it
governs his moral judgments, it is his standard of right and wrong. The rational will, therefore,
imposes upon itself universal laws, laws that hold for all and are acceptable to all. If everybody
obeyed the law of reason then a society of rational beings would result as a kingdom of ends, a
society organized by rational purposes.

A categorical imperative, in other words, implicitly commands a perfect society. Therefore every
rational being ought to act as if he were by his maxims of universal principles, a legislating
member of a universal kingdom of ends. She is both sovereign and a subject: she lays down the
law and acknowledges the law.

To conclude:

In Kant’s view, what is distinctive about human beings, which makes them different from
“things” or inanimate objects, is the possession of reason, and by reason Kant means the ability
to posit ends and to act purposefully to achieve them. In acting to achieve ends, human beings

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also have free will that enables them to create rules to govern their own conduct. This idea of
acting on self-devised rules is conveyed by the term autonomy , which is derived from two
Greek words meaning “self ” and “law.” To be autonomous is quite literally to be a lawgiver to
oneself, or self-governing. A rational being, therefore, is a being who is autonomous. To respect
other people, then, is to respect their capacity for acting freely, that is, their autonomy.

Kant’s ethical theory thus yields at least two important results: the principles of universalizability
and respect for persons, which are important elements of ethical reasoning

UTILITARIANISM

Utilitarianism is a theory of ethics based on a principle formulated in Jeremy Bentham’s book

Principles of Morals and Legislation (1789). He argues: by the principle of utility is meant that
principle which approves or disapproves of every action whatsoever, according to the tendency
which it appears to have to augment or diminish the happiness of the party whose interest is in
question…. Thus actions are to be judged only by the contribution they make to increasing
human happiness or decreasing human misery. The moral validity of a law or rule, or the value
of an institution depends on the same considerations. If the tendency of an action is to increase
the happiness of the community is greater than any tendency to diminish it, then it is comfortable
to the principle of utility. A pertinent consideration is its contribution to happiness.

According to Utilitarianism the morally right action is the action that produces the most good.
The Classical Utilitarian, Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill, identified the good with
pleasure. They also held that we ought to maximize the good, that is, bring about ‘the greatest
amount of happiness for the greatest number’.

John Stuart Mill (1803-73)

John Stuart Mill is the most famous utilitarian philosopher. In his book Utilitarianism he
develops and refines the cruder version of the theory which bad been put forward by his mentor
Jeremy Bentham. Mill’s Greatest Happiness Principle, for example, is simply ‘actions are right

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in proportion as they tend to promote happiness, wrong as they tend to produce the reverse of
happiness’. Both Bentham and Mill were hedonists (pleasure seekers) in the sense that their
approach to ethics was founded upon the pursuit of pleasure (not, however, merely the pursuit of
individual’s own pleasure, but rather the pursuit of the greatest overall pleasure). Actions for
both philosophers were to be judged according to their probable consequences, not according to
any religious code or set of binding principles.

The phrase ‘the greatest happiness of the greatest number’ is sometimes used to describe the
utilitarian approach to ethics, but this can be misleading. What both Bentham and Mill were
interested in was achieving the greatest aggregate happiness (that is, the largest total sum of
happiness) irrespective of how that happiness was distributed. It would be consistent with this
approach to think that it would be better to make a few people extremely happy than to make a
much larger number slightly happier provided that the sum of happiness in the first case was
larger than the sum in the second.

Mill’s utilitarianism differs from Bentham’s in that he gives a more sophisticated account of
happiness. For Mill, there are qualitatively different sorts of pleasure: higher and lower
pleasures. Higher pleasures are to be preferred to lower ones. Bentham, in contrast, treats all
pleasures equally.

Mill on higher and lower pleasures

One common criticism of simple versions of utilitarianism, such as Bentham’s, is that they
reduce the finesses of human life to a stark calculation of animal-like pleasures, with no concern
for how these pleasures are produced. Utilitarianism of this kind was ridiculed as a doctrine only
worthy of swine.

Mill meets such criticisms with his distinction between higher and lower pleasures. As he puts it,
it is better to be a dissatisfied human being than a satisfied pig; and better to be a dissatisfied
Socrates than a satisfied fool. Human beings are capable of intellectual pleasures as well as the
brute physical ones; pigs cannot have intellectual pleasures. Mill argues that the intellectual

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pleasures, those he calls higher pleasures, are intrinsically more valuable than the physical lower
ones. His argument in support of this is that those who have felt both kinds of pleasure will
certainly prefer the intellectual kind.

Conclusion

Since the early 20th Century utilitarianism has undergone a variety of refinements. After the
middle of the 20th Century it has become more common to identify as a ‘Consequentialist’ since
very few philosophers agree entirely with the view proposed by the Classical Utilitarians,
particularly with respect to the hedonistic value theory. But the influence of the Classical
Utilitarians has been profound — not only within moral philosophy, but within political
philosophy and social policy. The question Bentham asked, “What use is it?,” is a cornerstone of
policy formation. It is a completely secular, forward-looking question. The articulation and
systematic development of this approach to policy formation is owed to the Classical Utilitarians.

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Acknowledgements:
1.Peter Singer, A Companion to Ethics, Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, 1993
2.A Companion to Applied Ethics, Edited by R. G. Frey, and Christopher Heath Wellman,
Blackwell Publishing. 2003.
3.Tibor R. Machan, A Primer on Ethics. 1997.
4. John R. Boatright, Ethics and the Conduct of Business (Seventh Edition), Pearson Education
limited, 2014.

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