Let's start our discussion of ethics by simply calling it moral philosophy; that branch of philosophy that deals with the concept of right and wrong in human behavior. All human behavior has three aspects: object of action, which refers to how one defines what he or she is doing; end of action, which refers to the actor's intention, or why he or she is doing something; and circumstance of the action, which refers to who is doing it, to whom, how, when, where, how often, and so on. The rule for ethics with regard to the following is that an action must be good in all three elements for it to be ethical. If one is evil, the entire action is evil. If the object is indifferent, the other elements must be good. Now that we've examined conduct and the ethical rule, let's consider voluntariness.
More specifically, a human act or conduct is one that is physical or mental, consciously and deliberately willed. A voluntary act in other words proceeds from the will, with knowledge of the end to which the action leads. In view of the foregoing, it is force (directed against the will) and invincible ignorance that prevent a behavior from being properly called a voluntary act, or conduct. The development of conduct takes place in five steps: antecedent emotion, constitutive judgment, desire, deliberation, and consent or choice. Antecedent emotions are bodily reactions accompanied by insight into a situation. Antecedent emotions lead to constitutive judgments, which further lead to desire, and then to deliberation over whether or not to act in a certain way, and then consent.
Determinism is any theory of human conduct which holds that there is no such thing as free choice. It holds rather that any "choice" we ever make is already settled prior to our very act of choosing, by factors external to our will. Conversely, the concept of free will places the responsibility for human action squarely in our lap. Free will is the ability to do or not to do, to choose this or that on one's own will and intellectual freedom. Voluntariness is key to responsibility. But there are modifiers to responsibility, and they are: vincible ignorance, strong emotion, intellectual fear, force, and habit. Habits may be deliberately acquired, voluntarily performed, and regularly practiced.
A moral good is whatever is perfective of the human person as a person, whereas a moral evil is whatever diminishes the human person as a person. This must not be confused with convention. Society's acceptance of something as right or wrong is no guarantee of its actual rightness or wrongness. Philosophical ethics guides our human actions, perfects us as persons and protects those around us, furnishing the world with good people. Ethics leads to equity, which in a sense is superior to common law. Furthermore, the relationship between ethics and morality is that ethics helps us to behave in a moral way. To this end, it is necessary to have some global uniformity in ethics so that all peoples can easily navigate different moral cultures internationally, thus speedily increasing interconnectivity.
With regard to direct and indirect voluntary acts, a direct consequence of an act is its foreseen and intended effect. An indirect consequence on the other hand is an act's foreseen but unintended effect. In other words, of a certain voluntary act, there are two effects, one effect which is both foreseen and intended, and another effect that is foreseen but not intended. Principles guiding morality in double effects are as follows: the act must be good in itself or at least indifferent. It may not be evil. The evil effect cannot cause the good one. The evil effect must be permitted only, and not intended. There must be a proportionately grave reason for permitting the evil effect. In other words, if the good effect can be achieved in another way without the evil effect, that way should be adopted.
We can assume some responsibility for others' acts by giving or being an occasion of evil. An occasion of evil is any word or deed tending to lead, entice, or allure another person into wrongdoing. Giving an occasion of evil directly is foreseen and intended, buttressing our desire to use the act for our own evil intent. Giving an occasion of evil indirectly on the other hand is foreseen but not intended; in other words, we do not intend another to do evil, but only foresee it a consequence of something else we do. Being an occasion of evil in any case is "taken only," when someone with peculiar subjective dispositions is led to evil by another person's innocent words or deeds. Cooperating in evil is the act of one person joining one or more others in causing evil. Formal cooperation is a direct evil act, with evil intent, and occurs when someone actively and knowingly helps another to commit evil. Material cooperation on the other hand is an ordinarily good act that aids another's evil act without evil intent. Material cooperation occurs when one does not approve of another's wrongdoing, but helps the other to perform an evil act by an action of one's own that is not evil. In this latter situation, estimation of extent of cooperation proceeds by the following considerations: the amount of evil such cooperation helps others to do; the amount of evil that will happen if the individual refuses to cooperate; the closeness of the individual's cooperative act to the evil: proximate or remote.
Truth is simply defined as what-is. In the quest for truth, or simply epistemology, necessary distinctions need to be made between objectivity and subjectivity; reality, and the knowledge of reality; objective truth, and the subjective knowledge of truth. Conscience is founded in truth. It is any power to decide the morality of one's actions before, during and after the action has taken place, according to a set of moral standards and values. Judgment of conscience is the application of conscience to actual issues. Conscience is formed by habit of natural law, also known as synderesis; it is also formed by deductive reasoning, or by developing the intellectual powers to do so. The rules of thumb with regard to conscience are: always act with a certain conscience, by being certain of what one is about to do (this is where knowledge is key); never act with a doubtful conscience, without first solving the doubt.
One must solve conscientious doubt by research. This where ethics works hand in hand with epistemology, and both help each other. In any case, the end of ethics is good actions. The bible in this regard enjoins us to act justly, love tenderly and walk humbly with God (Micah 6:8). As ethical persons, we are supposed to do good always and be virtuous in our ethical pursuit. With certainty of conscience and the intellectual freedom it brings, we are to position our wills and let the knowledge we have inform them to move us to act in moral ways. Good deeds, like we have said, perfect us as persons, and make us draw nearer to the creator, and good deeds are their own reward because of this, as we have said in an earlier post. All in all therefore we must embrace ethical conduct for its ontological merit, and for our own good.
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