Preliminaries

 The thing with ethics is that there cannot be a divorce of what you know with what you do in
real-life. The study of ethics is important because we want you to become good persons.
 The measure of ethical excellence is not in the amount of information acquired and retained
about topics learned in the course, but in the living out of the demands of what you have
learned.
 Hence, the test of ethical excellence is outside of the classroom, in how you are as a person.
 At minimum, what a course in ethics does is to provide you with a vocabulary to articulate
the reason for your moral decisions.

Essence of Law

 Reasonable – not arbitrary

Varieties of Law and the Natural Law Theory

 God’s plan for every creature has the character of law. God has created these creatures and
he intends that they return to him. A condition for the return is that they must be good.
 How to be good?
 God has created creatures preloaded with tools that enable them to know what is good.
 God has instituted a proper measure governing the acts of beings thus allowing them to
attain the ends intended for them. It is to live according to one’s nature/inclinations/goods.
 Measure of goodness: performing one’s function well thereby allowing for the attainment
of happiness. E.g., a healthy plant, or a tree that grows to its fullness is a good plant/tree,
and it is not difficult for us to imagine that it is happy. Or, a fruit bearing tree that bears
fruit according to the season is a good fruit bearing tree, or an animal free to exercise its
peculiarity as an animal is a good and happy animal. Human beings, in his excellent
exercise of reason, is a good and happy human being.
 The overall plan of God that directs each being toward its proper end can be called the
eternal law. This is God’s will for every creation, how each participant in it is intended to
return to him.
 We cannot cognize the fullness of this will; we only have intimations, i.e., through our
reason we discern how God intends other creatures to operate, what their inclinations are.
 There is a non-conscious participation of irrational creatures; there is an instinctual following
of their nature.
 Human beings, on the other hand, participate in the eternal law differently. We participate
more fully and perfectly in the law given the capacity for reason.
 We are endowed with the peculiarity of reason that enables us to discern right from wrong,
good from evil, and we have the freedom to choose which action to perform thus directing
ourselves appropriately.
 Using our reason we are able to discern our inclinations, the goods God has intended for us,
desire for the things that are designed to be the best for us.
 The participation of the eternal law in the rational creature is called the natural law.

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  Natural law is the participation of the eternal law in the rational creature whereby this
creature uses his reason to discern the inclinations or goods God has intended or designed
to be the best for him.
 “Natural” thus in the context of natural law is not arbitrary, i.e., what is acceptable to me is
natural, or the opposite unnatural. Natural is not within the context of distinctions such as:
o Normal vs abnormal
o Acceptable vs unacceptable
o Normative vs what deviates from the norm
o Like vs dislike
o Attractive (appetitive) vs aversive (Ew! E.g., homosexuality)
o Instinctive vs learned
o Analogue vs absence of analogue
 “Natural” is what is consistent with our inclinations intended by God for us.
 Laws legislated by man and promulgated by him consistent with natural law are referred to
as human laws, i.e., prohibition against murder.
 Unlike the natural laws which is obtained by means of our natural principles, i.e., reason,
there are precepts or instructions that come from the divine revelation, and these are
referred to as divine laws.
 Recall the structure of the Summa Theologiae:

God

| ^
| |Jesus

v |

Man

 God created man for happiness, but happiness attained by his natural lights, i.e., reason, is
only secondary. This is happiness attained by living according to his natural inclinations. But,
it is also possible for man not to be happy even if he does the right thing. So, how does he
attain happiness? It is through his union with God. The happiness that surpasses human
nature, a supernatural happiness that can be obtained through the power of God alone,
salvific ways/ graces of God through Jesus Christ. Our end is the blessed return to God
through Jesus Christ, living according to how he wants us to live, i.e., through his divine
laws, i.e., God’s instructions.
 But one need not rely on the divine law in order to be moral. Of interest then about this
natural law theory of Aquinas is that while it is clearly rooted in a Christian vision, it grounds
a sense of morality not on that faith but on human nature; a nature discerned through the
use of one’s reason…a peculiarity possessed in common with the rest of humanity, believers
and non-believers alike. Anyone, coming from any religious tradition, just by looking at the
nature that he shares with her fellow human beings, would be able to determine what is
ethical.

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Seven inclinations

Common with the other animals

 Life/Self-Preservation
 Reproduction/Propagation of the Species
 Educate one’s offspring/Care for the young

Peculiar to us

 Seek God
 Live in society
 Avoid offense
 Shun ignorance

The Principle of Double Effect and Proportionate Reason

 In acting according to our inclinations, it is possible for another inclination or the same to be
violated. An act which violates an inclination is considered evil.
 The principle of double effect spells out the conditions under which an indirectly willed evil
effect is not imputed or attributed to the agent and therefore can be permitted.
 Conditions
 The act may not be evil in itself, e.g., direct abortion, direct suicide, adultery, denial
of faith, blasphemy, and a few others.
 There is no question of double effect when there is the intent to kill; the act
must be good, i.e., I am saving a life.
 The evil and the good effect must be at least equally directly proceed from the act;
or else the immediate effect must be good. It may never be evil.
 The good effect must not come as an afterthought, deliberating on doing
the action regardless of the evil it brings about is because of the good that is
immediately derived from it
 The intention of the agent must be good; i.e., the agent may not will the evil effect.
 A proportionately grave reason must be had in order to justify the admission of the
indirect, evil effect. Four conditions:
 A value at least equal to that sacrificed is at stake
 No less harmful way of protecting the value here and now is at disposal
 The means used to achieve the value will not ultimately undermine it.
 Case analysis: War on drugs
 The principle of proportionality or proportionate reason: The reason for the
admission of the evil effect must be all the greater,
 The greater the indirectly willed evil is. A graver reason is required
to run with one’s car into a man than to run into a cow;
 The more surely the evil will come about. The greater the possibility
that an operation will not be successful but lead to death or to
mental derangement, the extreme the illness must be.
 The more proximately the action leads to evil. A graver reason is
required to assist during an illicit operation (e.g., abortion) than to
prepare the operating theatre before the operation. (In these
instances we are at the same time dealing with the cooperation in
the wrong deeds of others.)

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  The greater the obligation to prevent the evil. A superior (bishop,
religious superior) has a greater obligation to correct faults of his
subjects than an ordinary fellow citizen.

 Why is it that under the indicated conditions, evil effects can be admitted?
o If not life would be unbearable
o Much good could not be done because of possible evil side-effects of an action
o If indirectly willed evil effects were never to be admitted, many ventures could not
be allowed, in spite of the good effects which they could produce and which by far
prevail.
o It would be unreasonable to subscribe to a moral tenet of such an extreme nature

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