'Everyday Ethics'

Morality Requires Regular Reflection on the Day-to-Day Decisions That Confront Us. As philosopher Mike Martin notes, the moral aspects of day-to-day living are "more direct, persistent, and urgent" than the global moral issues — immigration, capital punishment, welfare reform — we might be at ease discussing over the dinner table.

How We Treat One Another

How many times have we asked ourselves: Is that the way I should treat someone else? Is that the way someone else should treat me? Because we have the ability to be critical of our interpersonal behavior and our contact with animals in the physical world, we have the ability to develop codes and norms to guide that behavior. Those moral norms and codes, plus a set of virtuous character traits, are what we mean when we talk about ethics.

Ethics poses questions about how we ought to act in relationships and how we should live with one another. Ethics asks us to consider whether our actions are right or wrong. It also asks us how those character traits that help humans flourish (such as integrity, honesty, faithfulness, and compassion) play out in everyday living. [Read on]