In Max's latest novel, Company (http://www.maxbarry.com/company/), one of the characters expounds upon the idea that people's ethics are guided by their actions, not the other way around - that they only use them to justify what they have done. What do you think? Taking crime, commerce, religion, politics, and just day-to-day life into account, would you say that ethics guide actions or are guided by them?
AB Again
18-05-2006, 19:06
Option 4. (seriously - none of your options covers how I see the relationship between actions and ethics.)
For ethics to be ethics, I think ethics have to guide actions. Actions guiding ethics precludes them from being ethics.
Which leaves open the possibility that there's no such thing as ethics.
AB Again
18-05-2006, 19:16
Ethics do have to be practical, in the sense that they have to affect our actions in some way. This does not mean though, that they can not themselves be influenced and constructed on the basis of our actions