A few days ago some friends of mine asked me to explain how to derive ethics. One of them had some disagreements with what I was saying, and after a while I figured out that the primary reason for his problems was that he did not have the same definition of ethics that I did. He was referring to group ethics, specifically the ethics of law and society. I, on the other hand, was arguing my point from the perspective of personal ethics, which govern what choices a specific person makes based upon their own personal goals and values. I did not, unfortunately, have a chance to fully explain the difference to him, so I shall explain it here. Firstly, personal ethics, as I just mentioned, are what guides each person and their individual actions. A good set of personal ethics can and should be used to make every decision in your life. This type of ethics, also, is subjective. You, under most circumstances, are the person best equipped to determine what the objective of your ethics should be. Due to its importance at all times and for every person, personal ethics is a very high tier of philosophy. Generally it is thought of as the third level of philosophy, after metaphysics and epistemology. It is also the last level before philosophy branches off and begins to narrow its focus. Group ethics is a fourth tier area of philosophy. It discusses how humans should interact, both ideally, and in terms of how to set up society to account for those who donโt act ideally. Politics makes up a significant portion of group ethics. Group ethics are objective, as they are based off of the nature of man, not personal preference (also note, I use man to mean humanity. I do this often). The fact that group ethics is objective, but personal ethics is subjective, occasionally causes contradictions between them. I shall give an example to explain how this works, and what should be done. There is a society, relatively similar to our own. It has government and laws, and most people follow those laws. There is a man in that society, and he wants a painting. The problem is, this painting is unique, and the owner is unwilling to sell it. Stealing the painting is against the law, and the man knows this. So, he must make a decision. Does he value the painting more, or does the possibility that he might get caught outweigh the benefit of having the painting? He must also take into account that stealing the painting will encourage more theft, for any action taken makes it more acceptable to society to take again, and he must decide if he values the happiness of any of the other people who would be hurt by his stealing the painting. For this man, this is a matter of personal ethics. He must examine the situation, and make a decision based upon his own values. This is not the case for the society as a whole, though. For the society as a whole, it should not allow him to take the painting. If the painting were stolen it would, firstly, reduce the amount of value in society. When a transaction is held, both parties generally benefit. This means each is better off after than before, and because this occurs on both sides, it means that value has been created. If a transaction is not able to occur, though, it means that one side would lose more than it would gain. This means that if such a transaction were forced, value would be lost. So, firstly, theft leaves society poorer. Second, it would mean that the government is not doing a sufficient job of protecting the property of its members. This encourages those members to leave, which, over time, will eventually destroy the society. Third, it would encourage more theft, which would merely further exacerbate the other problems. These conflicts are inconvenient, but resolving them is the area of politics, and a subject that I shall go over in greater detail later. Group ethics, and particularly its derivative areas of philosophy, tend to be extremely complex. I hope that I have explained these two subjects sufficiently, but please, feel free to ask if you have any questions or comments.
