Foundations for the "greater good": moral philosophy

Morality: principles concerning the distinction between right and wrong or good and bad behaviour.

It forms the very core of who we are as human beings; dictating how we interact with each other and our environment, and yet it evades all five senses, so how are we supposed to understand it? Moral philosophy first sparked my interest three years ago when it popped up as a brief introduction to one of my media subjects. I'd been 24 years on this planet before I'd received any formal education on theories of ethics and morality, quite an oversight, I remember thinking at the time. I had imagined that something which was so essential to my humanity would have been broached a little earlier. I did of course receive plenty of informal training, "don't drown your sister in the bath", "don't put the cat in the letterbox", "don't take somebody elses food without asking"; these things were BAD. All those little hints did help to point me in the right direction but like so many other things we are taught when we're young it was "1+1=2, because it just did". As far as morals went there was never any real framework for examination or exploration, I was simply expected to be GOOD and had to guess the rest. 

As per the always evasive nature of philosophy, moral philosophy offers no concrete answers for what is right and what is wrong nor how we negotiate this daily see-saw but it does provide some concepts which have helped me to wrap my head around this intangible force within. There are three main theoretical areas within the field: metaethics, normative ethics and applied ethics. Metaethics is the most abstract, examining the meaning and origin of morality, eg. do morals exist independently of us or are they human conventions? And what psychological factors motivate us to act morally? Normative ethics examine how we regulate these moral conventions, for example the consequentialist theories break it down into three categories:

1. Egoism: an action is morally right if the consequences of that action are more favourable than unfavourable to the person performing the action.

2. Altruism: an action is morally right if the consequences of that action are more favourable than unfavourable to everyone except the person performing the action.

3. Utilitarianism: an action is morally right if the consequences of that action are more favourable than unfavourable to everyone.

Finally there are applied ethics which focus specifically on analysing various moral issues (eg. welfare, animal rights), employing various normative theories to determine right from wrong. It’s a lot to take in and this is only the tip of the iceberg but I think this is really interesting stuff. I'd love to go into more detail but everything you need you can find at the Internet Encylopedia of Philosophy (Ethics). 

Good and bad, wrong and right, they can make the world go round or stop completely. I want to understand why I act the way I do in different moral situations and even more than that I want to understand why other people act the way they do when faced with right and wrong. I believe change begins with understanding and this forms the basis of my journey, to understand as much as I can so that I can go into the world and do well, but more importantly I can go into the world and do "good".

Rachel