Coda

2021 ◽  
pp. 199-202
Author(s):  
Jay L. Garfield
Keyword(s):  
Ethical Theory ◽  
Ethical Perception ◽  
Buddhist Ethics ◽  
Ethical Thought ◽  
Moral Cultivation ◽  
Ethical Debate

This brief concluding chapter argues that Buddhist ethics constitutes a distinctive voice in ethical theory. While Buddhist ethical thought is distinct in both form and content from any of the major Western metaethical systems, it is supplementary to, rather than inconsistent with them. Buddhist ethics encourages us to look at the subjective, phenomenological side of ethics, and to foreground ethical perception and experience in our account of moral cultivation, as opposed to actions, rules, and consequences. By examining Buddhist ethical theory in conjunction with Western ethical theory, we can discover new questions that make our ethical debate richer than before.

The Nature of a Buddhist Path

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bronwyn Finnigan
Keyword(s):  
Virtue Ethics ◽  
Ethical Theory ◽  
Normative Theory ◽  
Common Element ◽  
Buddhist Ethics ◽  
Ethical Theories ◽  
Ethical Thought ◽  
Constitutive Analysis ◽  
Normative Ethical Theory

Is there a “common element” in Buddhist ethical thought from which one might rationally reconstruct a Buddhist normative ethical theory? Many construe this as the question Which contemporary normative theory does Buddhist ethics best approximate: consequentialism or virtue ethics? This essay argues that two distinct evaluative relations underlie these positions: an instrumental and a constitutive analysis. This chapter raises some difficulties for linking these distinct analyses to particular normative ethical theories but gives reasons to think that both may be justified as meta-ethical grounds for rationally reconstructing Buddhist thought as an ethical theory. It closes with some reflections on the complexity involved in trying to establish a single and homogeneous position on the nature of Buddhist ethics.

Virtues and Capabilities

2018 ◽  
pp. 586-599
Author(s):  
Steven Torrente ◽  
Harry D. Gould
Keyword(s):  
Political Theory ◽  
Virtue Ethics ◽  
Ethical Theory ◽  
Capabilities Approach ◽  
Way Of Life ◽  
Ethical Thought ◽  
Moral Concepts ◽  
International Political Theory ◽  
Modern Era ◽  
Ethical Systems

After a long dormancy in the modern era, virtue-based ethical thought has once again become a subject of serious consideration and debate in the field of philosophy. The normative orientation of most International Political Theory, however, still comes primarily from principles-based (deontological) or outcome-based (consequentialist) ethical systems. Virtue ethics differs from focus deontological and consequentialist ethics by emphasizing character, context, and way of life, rather than rule-governed action. This chapter reviews the emergence of contemporary virtue ethics as a challenge to overly abstract, language-based analysis of moral concepts, and its development into a broad and nuanced ethical theory. It then connects virtue ethics to the capabilities approach to human development, which is similarly focused.

Naturalism

2021 ◽  
pp. 169-179
Author(s):  
Jay L. Garfield
Keyword(s):  
Human Nature ◽  
Ethical Theory ◽  
Natural World ◽  
Human Experience ◽  
Ethical Orientation ◽  
Buddhist Ethics

This chapter argues that naturalism is a virtue in an account of human experience, and thus desideratum in any ethical theory, and that Buddhist ethics is indeed naturalistic. In particular, its ethical orientation relies on no transcendent or transcendental concerns; its theory of the good is rooted in an account of human nature and the nature of the natural world, and its account of agency and responsibility is thoroughly causal. The chapter also discusses some of the aspects and implications of karma, including karmic fruition, the ways that our future lives are conditioned by our present ones, and the idea of collective karma.

A Mirror Is for Reflection

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Owen Flanagan
Keyword(s):  
Early Career ◽  
New Work ◽  
Buddhist Ethics ◽  
Ethical Thought ◽  
Ethical Imperative ◽  
Cultural Perspectives ◽  
Philosophical Dialogue ◽  
The Past ◽  
New Directions ◽  
Contemporary Work

This volume offers a snapshot of the present state of academic investigation into the nature of Buddhist ethics. Over the past decade many scholars have come to think that the project of fitting Buddhist ethical thought into Western philosophical categories may be of limited utility, and the focus of investigation has shifted in a number of new directions. Contributions to these recent investigation from many of the leading figures in the academic study of Buddhist philosophy are collected here alongside exciting new work from a number of early-career scholars. Topics include the nature of Buddhist ethics as a whole as well as the role in Buddhist ethics of karma and rebirth, mindfulness, narrative, intention, personhood, agency, free will, politics, anger, and equanimity, among other areas. The volume offers a rich and accessible introduction to contemporary work on Buddhist thought for students and scholars new to this area of philosophy, as well as chapters taking up more technical philosophical and textual topics. The contributors aim to engage Buddhist traditions in a rigorous, critical, and respectful philosophical dialogue, rather than to document these traditions as historical curiosities. The chapters of this volume stand as contributions to the emerging field of cosmopolitan philosophy, demonstrating by example why considering ethical questions such as how we ought to live, act, and train our minds from a plurality of cultural perspectives is itself an ethical imperative today.

Breaking Good

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christian Coseru
Keyword(s):  
Psychological Factors ◽  
Moral Agency ◽  
Self Awareness ◽  
Buddhist Ethics ◽  
Moral Cultivation ◽  
Concern For Others ◽  
Ethical Norms ◽  
Iconic Representations ◽  
Sentient Beings ◽  
Conceptual Resources

Proponents of Buddhist neuroethics argue for the need to make different aspects of moral cultivation receptive to the findings and conceptual resources of neuroscience. Given its centrality to the path, compassion holds the key to understanding how moral agency can have such profoundly transformative effects despite being conditioned by various biological, social, and psychological factors. If bodhisattvas, the iconic representations of compassionate undertaking, act compassionately because of their training and cultivation, they can benefit sentient beings habitually or spontaneously. However, how such spontaneity can guarantee that violations of conventional ethical norms (which the agent-neutral framework of Buddhist ethics allows) do not translate into detrimental outcomes is deeply mysterious. On the proposal put forward here, agency presupposes some degree of self-awareness and of concern for others, both of which, it is argued, resist its explanation in terms of impersonal causal series.

Methodological Introduction

2021 ◽  
pp. 3-17
Author(s):  
Jay L. Garfield
Keyword(s):  
Ethical Theory ◽  
Buddhist Ethics ◽  
Methodological Issues ◽  
Dependent Origination ◽  
Four Noble Truths

This chapter explores some of the methodological issues that arise from studying Buddhist ethics. It gives an overview of the four noble truths, and it argues that Buddhist ethical theory is grounded in the Buddhist metaphysical outlook captured by dependent origination, selflessness, and impermanence. It further argues that Buddhist ethics is an attempt to solve the ubiquity of suffering that is grounded in these three characteristics of reality, and that this solution is reflected in the eightfold path. Also addressed are the six realms of transmigration on the Buddhist Wheel of Life, and their applications to the forms of suffering.

Conclusion

2019 ◽  
pp. 211-214
Author(s):  
Sandra Shapshay
Keyword(s):  
Animal Rights ◽  
Moral Realism ◽  
Ethical Theory ◽  
Ethical Thought ◽  
Moral Realist ◽  
The Real ◽  
Inherent Value ◽  
Value Ontology ◽  
Static Body

The reconstruction of Schopenhauer’s ethical thought on offer in this book is novel in three main ways. First, it views Schopenhauer as a more faithful Kantian than most commentators have been apt to recognize. Second, it sees Schopenhauer’s philosophy as an evolving rather than static body of thought. Third, it claims that there are really two Schopenhauers—The Knight of Despair and the Knight with Hope—and this distinction helps to capture the real incompatibilities between the resignationist and the compassionate moral realist sides of Schopenhauer’s ethical thought. This reconstructed version of Schopenhauer’s ethical theory—compassionate moral realism—provides an interesting option for the contemporary ethical-theoretical landscape. A Schopenhauerian value ontology of degrees of inherent value puts this theory into the animal rights camp, but in a more moderate way—closer to Mary Anne Warren’s “weak animal rights” position, rather than Tom Regan’s strong theory of animal rights.

scholarly journals Power, Scepticism and Ethical Theory

2015 ◽  
Vol 76 ◽  
pp. 225-251
Author(s):  
Thomas Pink
Keyword(s):  
Ethical Theory ◽  
Self Determination ◽  
Ethical Thought ◽  
The Real ◽  
Precise Nature ◽  
Natural Conception ◽  
Moral Blame

AbstractIt is often thought that as human agents we have a power to determine our actions for ourselves. And a natural conception of this power is as freedom – a power over alternatives so that we can determine for ourselves which of a variety of possible actions we perform. But what is the real content of this conception of freedom, and need self-determination take this particular form? I examine the possible forms self-determination might take, and the various ways freedom as a power over alternatives might be constituted. I argue that though ordinary ethical thought, and especially moral blame, may be committed to our possession of some capacity for self-determination, the precise nature of this power is probably ethically underdetermined – though conceptions of the nature of the power that come from outside ethics may then have important implications for ethics.

scholarly journals Autonomy, Progress and Virtue: Why Kant has Nothing to Fear from the Overdemandingness Objection

2018 ◽  
Vol 23 (3) ◽  
pp. 379-397 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jens Timmermann
Keyword(s):  
Ethical Theory ◽  
Kantian Ethics ◽  
Ethical Thought ◽  
Right Action ◽  
Kant's Ethics

AbstractIs Kant’s ethical theory too demanding? Do its commands ask too much of us, either by calling for self-sacrifice on particular occasions, or by pervading our lives to the extent that there is no room for permissible action? In this article, I argue that Kant’s ethics is very demanding, but not excessively so. The notion of ‘latitude’ (the idea that wide duty admits of ‘exceptions’) does not help. But we need to bear in mind (i) that moral laws are self-imposed and cannot be externally enforced; (ii) that ‘right action’ is not a category of Kantian ethics – there is a more and a less, and lack of perfection does not entail vice; and (iii) that only practice makes perfect, i.e. how much virtue can realistically be expected can vary from agent to agent. The principle that ‘ought’ is limited by ‘can’ is firmly entrenched in Kant’s ethical thought.

scholarly journals Konsep Etika Epikuros dan Problem Media Sosial

2020 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 1-22
Author(s):  
Bahrul Afif
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Ethical Theory ◽  
Human Life ◽  
Public Attention ◽  
Ethical Thought ◽  
Ethical Problems ◽  
Library Research ◽  
Ethical Concept ◽  
False News ◽  
Descriptive Method

In the last few decades, one of the ethical problems that has taken a lot of public attention is the hoax problem on social media. Social media, which was originally created as a medium to facilitate the delivery of messages and information, is actually being misused to spread false news which eventually breeds hatred and animosity. One philosopher who is famous for his thoughts on ethical concepts, namely Epicurean. This article will discuss how the Epikuros ethical concept and its relevance to social media problems. This paper is classified in library research and uses the hermeneutical descriptive method. The typology of Epicurean thought belongs to the ethical theory of hedonism, Epicurean in its ethical thought establishes pleasure or pleasure (hedone) as the highest ideal in human life. The intended enjoyment is not only from the material aspect, but the most important thing is the enjoyment of the soul which is referred to as ataraxia. To achieve ataraxia that is by trying to avoid suffering and anxiety. According to Epicureans, in order to avoid suffering and anxiety, humans must have the attitude of phronesis or prudence, which is interpreted as an attitude of vigilance. When connected with social media problems, this attitude of vigilance is very relevant and important to be owned by every individual as a user of social media, so as not to become part of the chain of hoax distribution.

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