Doctrine #46: Morals vs. Ethics

Here is the link to the Introduction for this Series.


DOCTRINE #46: MORALS vs. ETHICS
Morals are a set of Principles and Laws that result in Profitability in the Long Term regardless of culture. Ethics are a set of Principles and Laws that are accepted as correct by a specific culture at a specific time in history.


Doctrine #47

Table of Contents


BACKGROUND
During April and May, I am posting sixty Doctrines. These sixty Doctrines ought to be used as a diagnostic tool: you ought to begin with Doctrine #1 and see how far you get before you disagree.

If you believe the Doctrine that is presented above, then continue to the next Doctrine.

If you don't believe the Doctrine that is presented above, look at some of the corresponding Scriptures through links to Jonathan's blog and/or look at the philosophical explanation through the links to posts on this blog.

If you still don't believe the Doctrine in question, take some time to state your will what your doctrine is for this topic. Identify the Scripture to support it...and then continue to the next Doctrine.


SCRIPTURAL LINK
Jonathan's Blog


PHILOSOPHICAL LINKS
We covered the difference between Morals and Ethics in the post titled, "Confess and Repent".

Here is the excerpt:

"Ethics is man’s other way the deal with guilt. It is different from an apology in two ways. First, its focus is not on the individual, but on society. Secondly, it doesn’t even acknowledge the guilt. It tries to completely avoid this need to remove guilt. Society simply declares the immoral action that caused guilt to be allowable. In order to look at ethics, let’s first define morals.

Morals are a set of principles that result in profitable actions in the Big Picture and Long Term. They are actions that create something of Long Term value regardless of the location or the era. Specifically, they are actions that would be profitable regardless of when a person lived or under what culture (where) they lived.

For example, we can all agree that individuals should not abuse each other physically for their own personal benefit. This is pretty much true for every culture that has ever existed.

Ethics are a set of principles that result in actions that are accepted as correct by a specific society for a specific location and time in history. Even though the actions result in one person losing profitability through coercion, the society agrees there is no need for justice to equal out this specific case.

Ethics is man’s way of removing guilt for not being moral. Basically, groups of people agree it is okay not to be moral as long as we act according to an accepted, special code of conduct. The best example of this is business. People who aren’t moral in their business dealings rationalize the guilt by saying they are following “business ethics”. However, the guilt still remains."