Frequently Asked Questions
What is ethics?
Ethics is a branch of philosophy in which we study reasons, arguments, justifications and other kinds of support for views and positions about what is right or wrong, good or bad, blameworthy or praiseworthy. To do ethics is to study morality. If someone says "Murder is wrong," ethics provides the process by which we can assess the merit of the underlying arguments. Murder is comparatively easy (and clearly wrong). Balancing economic growth and environmental protection, decisions in end-of-life care or Internet file sharing, for instance, pose greater challenges.
But I heard someone say that we all learn ethics as children, and people do bad things because they were poorly raised. Is this true?
No. Worse, it's a slogan. One is unlikely to learn ethics from parents unless one's parents are philosophers. What we learn - or don't learn - as children are the rules and standards identified as right or wrong by those who teach them. Children of pickpockets will learn how to pick pockets. One also learns generally shared or culturally accepted values. Depending on the culture, these values can be quite sound ethically - or they can be kooky and wrong. Cultures which discriminate against women, for example, will find it difficult or impossible to find ethical support for that practice.
What is character education?
This is the pedagogic movement or effort to ensure that young people acquire certain values. Best undertaken as early as possible, character education fosters acceptance of values such as loyalty, honesty and cooperation. These are generally uncontroversial - but the risk is always that students will be numbed by slogans instead of stimulated by the underlying reasons for accepting the values. The study of those reasons is part of ethics. Despite the easy belief that all people should share the same core values, there is often disagreement. For instance, Miami-Dade County Public Schools identify nine core values; Palm Beach County Schools identify six. But if they are "core values," how can there be a difference? Who is right?
Suppose a student finds a conflict between or among values: "My best friend just cheated on a test. Does the value of honesty require that I turn her in?" What should I say?
This involves a conflict between core values - loyalty and honesty. No amount of virtue or being a good person will resolve this conflict. This is where ethics comes in again. Ethics helps provide and/or assess reasons for a particular course of action. Teaching rules without reasons is pedagogically unsound.
How do I use the Ethics Curriculum Project modules?
Teachers should review the Website and become familiar with its parts. Have a look at the "Ethics 101 Primers," use the "Browse Competencies" function to see what modules address particular pedagogic benchmarks, and look through the modules: Read the introductions and teacher background materials; click on the case studies, assessment resources and so forth. Contact us for guidance about classroom use of the Ethics Curriculum Project resources.
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