What Is Behavioral Ethics?

The essence of ethics is the science of moral issues. It is the systematization and theory of moral ideas. In other words, ethics takes human moral issues as its research object. There are many and complicated problems to be solved in ethics, but there is only one basic problem of ethics, that is, the relationship between morality and interests, that is, the relationship between "righteousness" and "profit". This problem includes two aspects: on the one hand, the relationship between economic interests and morality, that is, who decides who the two are, and whether morality has a negative effect on the economy; on the other hand, the relationship between personal interests and the overall interests of society, namely The question of who belongs to both. Different answers to this basic question determine the principles and norms of various moral systems, as well as the criteria and orientation of various moral activities. ^[1]

[lún l xué]

The science of ethics. Also known as

Greek and Roman ethics

Early stage: Pythagoras-

standard

Value, values, contrast

prior choice

Purpose, behavior, choice, consequences, risks

Precautionary principle

Select, control,

• • Environmental protection

  • Pollution

  • Ethics Development Process

    Marxist ethics is an important part of Marxist theoretical system, and it is formed with the formation of Marxism. In the early 19th century, with the development of the capitalist economy, the economic and political struggles of the proletariat against the bourgeoisie became increasingly acute. The proletariat urgently needs new moral theories in order to clear away the old morals of the exploiting class and various non-proletarian ideas that erode the moral appearance of the working class, and to train a large number of new proletarians. Marx and Engels adapted to this need and set up Marxist ethics from the basic theories of dialectical materialism and historical materialism. (See Marxist ethics)

    Marxist ethics was formed and developed in the criticism of various non-proletarian moral theories. In the mid-nineteenth century, bourgeois thinkers B. Powell, M. Steiner, and others preached many wrong moral views, which had extremely bad effects on the workers' movement. At the same time, opportunists in the workers' movement, such as H. Krigai (1820-1850), E. Durin, and others also desperately advocated the bourgeois theory of human nature, promoted abstract equality, and denied moral class. To this end, Marx and Engels wrote in The Holy Family, German Ideology, The Manuscript of Economics and Philosophy in 1844, Moral Criticism and Critical Morality, the Notice Against Krigai, and Anti-Du. In "Lin Lun" and other works, a series of major issues of Marxist ethical thought are clearly explained. Since then, Marxist ethics has continued to develop with the development of proletarian revolutionary practice and Marxist theory. Lenin, Mao Zedong, and others have further enriched and perfected Marxist ethics theories from different aspects. (See Lenin's ethics, Mao Zedong's ethics)

    Ethical significance

    The emergence of Marxist ethics has produced unprecedented revolutionary changes in the field of ethics. This is mainly reflected in:

    Unlike all old ethics of the past, Marxist ethics is not based on God, rationality, and abstract humanity, but on historical materialism. In his "Outline on Feuerbach", Marx explicitly pointed out that the nature of man is regarded as an abstract human nature, and clearly states: "The nature of man is not an abstraction inherent in a single person. In reality, it is the sum of all social relations. " From the perspective of historical materialism, morality is no longer something that overrides the whole society, but a part of the superstructure and ideology determined by the economic foundation. The development and replacement of various morals in history are ultimately based on changes in the economic foundation. Therefore, morals itself is also a regular social phenomenon. From then on, ethics targeted by morals eventually changed from idealism. Freed from the fetters of the concept of history, it became a real science.

    Marxist ethics overcomes the limitations of all previous ethical thoughts and emphasizes that class has morality in class society. One common characteristic of old ethics is the use of various methods or means to promote the super-class nature and all humanity of morality. Therefore, their moral theories must eventually become untrue theories that are divorced from reality. Marxist ethics emphasizes that any morality is not abstract and trans-epochal, but historical and concrete. All class morals serve certain class interests. In class society, of course, there are certain moral factors common to mankind, such as the general rules of social public life, but in general, it is inevitable that they will be imprinted with class. Only in a communist society, that is, after the total extinction of classes, can the common morality of all mankind be produced.

    Marxist ethics especially emphasizes the significance of the moral practice of human life in ethical theory. Ethical thinkers before Marxism often denied the importance of moral practice, or understood it only as an individual moral activity. They do not understand that all moral theories cannot be suddenly generated from people's minds. It can only be summarized and summarized from people's moral practice activities and from the actual relationship between people. Test and develop with the development of human social practice. Therefore, Marxist ethics emphasizes the important significance of moral principles and normative transformation on human quality, and emphasizes that ethics not only imparts moral knowledge, but also makes people do it physically.

    Relationship between ethics and neighboring disciplines

    Ethics and Philosophy

    Philosophy is the theoretical basis of ethics. Certain world outlooks and historical viewpoints have a direct restraint and guiding role on certain ethical principles and moral doctrines. Different and even opposing world and historical views often lead to different and even opposing ethics. Historically, ethical thoughts often developed simultaneously with philosophical thoughts. Moral cognition is not only restricted by philosophical thoughts, but also often combined with philosophy. In some thinkers, the two are inseparable and integrated. However, as a branch of philosophy, ethics has its relatively independent meaning. Ethics studies a special field of social phenomena, mainly revealing the nature of social moral relations and the regularity of their development. It not only has its own characteristics, but also has the nature and value of being a discipline.

    Ethics and other disciplines

    Ethics and pedagogy, sociology, psychology, aesthetic ethics and pedagogy, sociology, psychology, aesthetics, etc. also have a relationship of mutual influence and penetration. Pedagogy, sociology, psychology, and aesthetics all incorporate morality into their own research scope. Ethics studies all moral phenomena in the history of human society, while pedagogy, sociology, psychology, aesthetics, etc. only study a part of moral phenomena, and they also focus on different angles. Pedagogy is mainly concerned with certain objective laws in the process of moral education and communist moral education; sociology in this regard focuses on the social moral outlook, customs and customs and many moral issues in marriage and family; psychology, especially Social psychology always regards human moral feelings and moral will as important research contents; aesthetics involves human behavior and the sublime of the soul.

    The relationship between ethics and pedagogy is particularly close. Ethics research results on people's behavioral norms and moral concepts, emotions, wills, activities, etc., provide a reliable basis for the theory of moral education in pedagogy. In this sense, it is impossible to make moral education a real science without ethical research. The study of pedagogy on social education and the objective process of education contributes to the study of normative education and ideal education in ethics.

    Both ethics and psychology study people's behavioral motivation, but ethics mainly examines people's psychological phenomena from the moral quality, which is helpful to the research of psychology, especially social psychology; psychology reveals and provides people's behavioral motivation The nature of psychological phenomena such as personality and personality provides necessary conditions for the study of ethics.

    The relationship between ethics and aesthetics and the relationship between goodness and beauty are consistent. Good and beautiful, evil and ugly are often intrinsically and organically linked. In a certain sense, all social phenomena and all human behaviors have both aesthetic and ethical significance.