Moral Obligation by Bentham - Essay Example

Moral Obligation by Bentham Introduction Moral obligation can be viewed in the light of those facts that help us distinguish between good and bad or right and wrong. Now what are those facts that justify rights and wrongs? “Those facts prove the existence of ethics by giving ultimate justification of moral standards”. (Moore, “Moral and Political Philosophy”, p. 251) Some philosophers hold the opinion that moral obligation refers to the laws that cannot be advised. Bentham gives the justification of good and bad as ‘pleasure’ and ‘pain’. He related ‘pleasure’ with goodness and ‘pain’ with badness. According to Bentham, “Nature has placed mankind under the governance of two sovereign masters, pain and pleasure. It is for them alone to point out what we ought to do, as well as determine what we shall do.” (Moore, “Moral and Political Philosophy”, p. 282). How a person perceives such obligations to be accepted or rejected, depends upon the conditions it describes make it fair to adopt the stance or not. Moral obligations can be referred to those errands, which one considers to be an essential instance of personality to be adopted. It depends upon as to what extent one feels him socially responsible to be answerable to those instances. These instances show the extent of how much a person is humanistic in behaviour and shows that the conditions of rational power satisfy this constraint: that it is fair to hold people morally responsible if they possess the rational power to grasp and apply moral reasons, and to control their behavior by the light of those reasons. As far as my opinion is concerned I believe every individual in this society has a right to live and let live and not only live but live happily and contentedly which can only possible if one is aware as how to justify morality whatever be the circumstances, this morality teaches us as to how to least expect from the society and giving the society the best we possess in moral notions. When it comes to ‘expectations’, episodes of guilt, resentment, and indignation are the outcomes of our justifications. Once this interpretation of the reactive emotions is in place, we can draw on it to account for the stance of holding people morally responsible. That stance is characterized by the responses of blame and moral sanction; to understand the stance, we therefore need an interpretation of blame and morals. We should consider those facts that we believe society expects from us, rather than what we expect from society. Only in this case we would be able to fulfil our moral obligation towards society, our country and above all, ourselves. Euthanasia – Is it immoral to allow Euthanasia to a patient? “Euthanasia is the deliberate production of the death of a human being on the grounds that in his situation it is considered that it is better that he should be dead than that he should continue to live”. (Wilkinson, 1990, p. 10) Many thinkers and philosophers believe that Euthanasia is immoral. According to Rachels, “thinkers oppose killing patients in any circumstances whatever. However, they think it is all right, in some special circumstances, to allow patients to die by withholding treatment”. If we view ‘Euthanasia’ in the light of philosophical rationalizations, we would come to know what Epicurus has tried to explain, “death is nothing to us. For all good and evil consists in sensation, but death is deprivation of sensation. And therefore a right understanding that death is nothing to us makes the mortality of life enjoyable, not because it adds to it an infinite span of time, but because it takes away the craving for immortality”. (Moore, “Moral and Political Philosophy”, p. 291) As said by Epictetus, “Some things are under our control, while others are not under our control”. (Moore, “Moral and Political Philosophy”, p. 293) He justified his statement by giving the examples of human sentiments and emotions, like conception and desire are something that can be controlled by us, while poverty, strength and cure from a disease are those factors that are not under our control. Here lies the situation where humans tend to be weak, because as long as the things are under our control, we are contented, but when things or situations get beyond our control we experience misfortune and start losing hope. The same is the case with Euthanasia. When the patient lose hope, he starts believing things to be out of his control, and ultimately he leads to a situation where he feels that nothing is under his control. That is the place where he prefers death because psychologically he has lost everything, and in order to console him ‘death’ is the only option that remains under his control. So, he is likely to die. Keeping in view the conditions of ‘Euthanasia patient’ the legality of euthanasia has been legal in most of the countries like UK and Holland since the 1960s. Thus, if patients wish to end their lives prematurely by declining life-sustaining treatment, the law will respect their decision to do so. In my opinion Euthanasia should not be legalized under any circumstances because a patient should be aware of the value of life, he should be positive to experience what comes his way, now it is the responsibility of the doctor to make him realize that he should confront to life’s challenges as we all are unaware of what it holds for each of us every single minute. According to Hegel, “humans are in continuous life and death fights with each other. Each person wants to override, negate, and destroy all others. If you do not enter into this fight, then you are not truly a human being”. (Moore, “Political Philosophy”, p. 335) Is it a violation of your moral conviction to kill a person while you are rendering military services for your Country? Military organizations are the best examples of obvious objections to all instances as majority despite acquiring the responsibility of serving and protecting their nation, often found to kill individuals in various wars for their country. According to Milgram, “It will be recalled, showed that entirely normal, decent members of a civilized society would act in entirely indecent uncivilized ways under certain conditions”. Specifically, the participants in his research were willing to continue administering extremely painful and apparently life-endangering electric shocks to an unwilling victim for just as long as someone in authority demanded this of them”. (Gewirtz & Kurtines, 1991, p. 87) Today’s philosopher Michael Walzer holds the opinion “Though states are founded for the sake of life and liberty, they cannot be challenged in the name of life and liberty by any other states.” (Moore, “Recent Moral and Political Philosophy”, p. 374) From this statement it is clear that when a war is going on, to what extent the lives of innocent are at sake. No doubt it is very difficult to analyze the situations in which a war is fought with morality or immorality, however “One important ethical issue pertains to the justness of war: When is a war just, and when is a war fought justly? The classical theory of the justness of a war comes from Augustine and, especially, Aquinas. Augustine said that just wars are those that avenge injuries: a state should be punished if it fails to right a wrong done by its citizens. Aquinas held that there are three conditions for a just war: (1) The ruler leading the war must have the authority to do so, (2) a just cause is required, and (3) right intention is required: those making the war must intend to achieve good and avoid evil. (Moore, “Recent Moral and Political Philosophy”, p. 374) The modern age has appeared to be deeply problematic to some critical theorists: Moral and social/political development, on the one hand, economic/technological development on the other hand neither match each other nor does one support the other. They may even contradict each other. “With the establishment of the death-camps in Germany, Central, and Eastern Europe during the 1940’s it became apparent that technological development and bureaucratic/political competency for example could be used for the most horrible ends and in fact become an instrument of plans for the most regressive forms of social organization in history where killing an individual does not matter to anyone”. (Gewirtz & Kurtines, 1991, p. 87) Who dares to think of violation of moral conviction in such circumstances where society is viewed as a death camp? In my opinion killing an individual whether intentionally or unintentionally refers to the violation of moral conviction, because among several wars, rare are those which are fought keeping behind the real morals towards nation. No doubt if the services are rendered for the country, in case of war or any other condition, killing an innocent is a violation of the moral conviction for which one must be accountable for. Is divorcing your spouse an immoral act? This issue has got many perspectives, many visions. When seen in the light of religion, every religion hates ‘divorce’. Psychologically it leaves its impacts in a negative manner, it always creates problems for children, as the little ones are the sufferers. When it comes to such sensitive issues it entirely depends upon the circumstances as to what extent they influence one’s life in a positive or negative manner. As far as the opinion ‘moral’ or ‘immoral’ is concerned, I believe in a neutral way divorce is a curse. Now there is a need to analyze as to what are the circumstances due to which one feels no option left other than to ‘divorce’ his partner? Most philosophers consider ‘ego’ to be the main bone of contention in ‘divorce’. According to Aristippus, “our lives should always be dedicated to the acquisition of as many pleasures, preferably as intense as possible, as we can possibly obtain. Even when intense pleasures lead to subsequent pain, they should still be sought, he said, for a life without pleasure or pain would be unredeemingly boring”. Ancient Greek philosopher Aesara analysed the then men’s thinking regarding moral philosophy according to which there exists two different philosophies: one inside the home and the other outside. But she refrained this belief. (Moore, “Moral and Political Philosophy”, p. 261) According to an ancient Greek Polis, “Human beings cultivate virtues these virtues alone they cultivate. They do this with hardness, indeed they want hardness; ever aristocratic morality is intolerant in the education of youth, in their arrangements for women, in their marriage customs, in the relations of old and young, in their penal laws (which take into account deviants only) they consider intolerance itself a virtue, calling it ‘justice’.” (Moore, “Moral and Political Philosophy”, p. 302) Moral standards are not deemed to be absolute, but relative, and express the social approval of values which emerge from human relations and experiences under given conditions; they are not therefore final and immutable, representing a fixed norm from which deviations may be measured in terms of the degree of deterioration. These values themselves change as conditions change and require re-formation and restatement in the light of new adaptations. If this were not true, these persons insist, it would be difficult to conceive of such a thing as moral progress except as it consists in increasing conformity to existing codes. If, as it is assumed frequently, the increase in divorces connotes a sudden change in human nature which is modifiable ordinarily, if at all, by long-continued processes, then the causes for this change should be investigated. “Investigations may reveal the fact that marriages today are not internally coherent and that with the lessening of many of the former restraints implicit in the patriarchal form of the family and in sacramental marriage, together with the removal of some of the external supports supplied by former social and economic conditions, they are simply falling apart because of this lack of internal moral and spiritual cohesion”. (Lichtenberger, 1931, p. 6) Conclusion The disagreement between supporters and critics of abortion, euthanasia, suicide or divorce is not that one side regards the conduct in question as morally good, while the other thinks of it as morally bad. The dispute is whether moral judgments are normally appropriate or not. Defenders of these practices want to exempt them from moral judgment altogether or regard them as only incidentally subject to reasonable moral concern. Suicide or euthanasia, for instance, is said to be morally wrong because the deliberate killing of a human being is wrong. On the other hand it is gradually weakening the society as the patients are learning to lose hope. Society is getting weaker; indeed it is the society who is suffering. Opposed to this is the claim that moral considerations apply only if the victim is someone else; how people dispose of their lives is, in normal circumstances, entirely up to them. Our confusion is less concerned about whether we should praise or blame, but more concerned whether praise or blame are moral or immoral response. And the source of this confusion is that we no longer know what constitutes a moral question, we possess no knowledge of moral or immoral or if we do, we have forgotten our morals in the fast pace. It is true that our morality is being forgotten in some ways; suicide, and divorce, for instance, is beginning to be exempted from moral censure. But in other ways our morality is expanding because animal experimentation, smoking, spreading AIDS, and advertising are becoming moral issues. According to Aesara, “the idea that from the well-ordered soul, the soul characterized by the harmonious functioning and proper proportioning of its elements springs virtue, and the idea that the human soul is the model for society. If you understand the nature of the soul, you understand how society and social justice ought to be”. (Moore, “Moral and Political Philosophy”, p. 261) References Bruder – Moore, 2005. “Philosophy: The Power of Ideas, Sixth Edition”: Moral and Political Philosophy: Part Two, The McGraw-Hill Companies. Bruder – Moore, 2005. “Philosophy: The Power of Ideas, Sixth Edition”: Political Philosophy: The McGraw-Hill Companies. Bruder – Moore, 2005. “Philosophy: The Power of Ideas, Sixth Edition”: Recent Moral and Political Philosophy: The McGraw-Hill Companies. Rachels James in “Euthanasia: The moral issues”, 1989. Prometheus Books.Buffalo: NY. P. 61 John Wilkinson, 1990. “The Ethics of Euthanasia”, 6 J. LAW SOC’Y, SCOTLAND 243, 243 LEXIS, News Library. Non-U.S. File. Gewirtz L. Jacob & Kurtines M. William, 1991. “Handbook of Moral Behavior and Development”. Vol:3: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. Place of Publication: Hillsdale, NJ. Lichtenberger J. P, 1931. “Divorce: A Social Interpretation”: Whittlesey House. Place of Publication: New York. Read More