Glossary

Act-utilitarianism	A form of utilitarianism (subscribed to by Bentham) in which the rightness of an act is determined by its effect on the general happiness.



Aesara of Lucania	A Pythagorean philosopher from southern Italy who held that by introspecting about the nature and structure of the human soul we can identify a standard of personal and public morality.



Aristotle	An ethical naturalist who held that moral judgments are judgments of fact about the natural world. He said that happiness is our highest good.



Categorical imperative	Immanuel Kant's formulation of a moral law that holds unconditionally, that is, categorically; in its most common formulation, states that you are to act in such a way that you could desire the principle on which you act to be a universal law.



Consequentialism	Ethical theories that evaluate actions by their consequences.



Contractarian theory	The political theory according to which a legitimate states exists only by virtue of an agreement or "contract" among the subjects of the state.



Contractualism	Ethical theories according to which right and wrong are established by a societal agreement or social contract.



Cultural relativism	The theory that what is right (and wrong) is what your culture believes is right (and wrong).



Cynicism	A school of philosophy founded around the fifth century B.C., probably by Antisthenes or Diogenes; the Cynics sought to lead lives of total simplicity and naturalness by rejecting all comforts and conveniences of society.



Cyrenaicism	The philosophy of Aristippus and others who lived in Cyrene about Plato's time; it emphasized seeking a life of as many intense pleasures as possible.



David Hume	Held that moral principles are neither divine edicts nor discoverable by reason and that value judgments are based on emotion. He said that the act that pleases our moral sensibilities is one that reflects the agent's benevolent character.



Deontological ethics	Ethical theories according to which what I ought to do is whatever it is my moral duty to do.



Descriptive egoism	The doctrine that maintains that in conscious action a person always seeks self-interest above all else.



Descriptive relativism	The doctrine that the moral standards people subscribe to differ from culture to culture and from society to society.



Diogenes	The most famous Cynic, who taught by shocking example that the wise person reduces all wants and avoids all comforts.



Divine-command ethics	Ethical theory according to which what is morally right and good is determined by divine command.



Divine law	In the philosophy of Thomas Aquinas, God's gift to humankind, apprehended through revelation, that directs us to our supernatural goal, eternal happiness.



Egoism	The doctrine that in conscious action one seeks (or ought to seek) self-interest above all else.



Egoistic ethical hedonism	The theory that one ought to seek one's own pleasure above all else.



Epictetus	A leading Stoic, held that one's highest objective is to find a serene or untroubled life through acceptance of the rational natural order of things.



Epicureanism	The philosophy of followers of Epicurus, who believed that personal pleasure is the highest good but advocated renouncing momentary pleasures in favor of more lasting ones.



Epicurus	An Ethical egoist, held that one's highest objective is to lead the pleasant life through moderate living.



Ethical hedonism	The doctrine that you ought to seek pleasure over all else.



Ethical naturalism	The belief that moral value judgments are really judgments of fact about the natural world.



Ethical relativism	The theory that there are no absolute and universally valid moral standards and values and that therefore the moral standards and values that apply to you are merely those that are accepted by your society.



Ethical skepticism	The doctrine that moral knowledge is not possible.



Ethics	The branch of philosophy that considers the nature, criteria, sources, logic, and validity of moral value judgments.



Form	In Plato's philosophy, that which is denoted by a general word (such as "good") that applies to more than a single thing.



Friedrich Nietzsche	Distinguished between slave morality (the morality of the masses) and master morality (the morality of the nobleman). The former represents the denial of life; the latter represents the will-to-power.



Hedonism	The pursuit of pleasure.



Heloise	A medieval French philosopher who held that the morality or immorality of an action is determined by the intention with which it is done.



Hypothetical imperative	An imperative that states what you ought to do if a certain end is desired.



Immanuel Kant	Held that the supreme prescription of morality is to act always in such a way that you could rationally will the principle on which you act to be a universal law. He believed that what you should do you should do not because it promotes some end but simply because it is right.



Individual relativism	The theory that what is right (and wrong) is what you believe is right (and wrong).



Instrumental end	Something that is desirable as a means to an end, but is not desirable for its own sake.



Intrinsic end	Something that is desirable for its own sake and not merely as a means to an end.



Jeremy Bentham	A utilitarian, held that the rightness of an action is identical with the pleasure it produces as its consequence and said that pleasure can be evaluated quantitatively.



John Stuart Mill	A utilitarian, held that the rightness of an action is identical with the happiness that it produces as its consequence and said that pleasure - a part of happiness - must be measured in terms of quality as well as quantity.



Moral imperative	Distinguished by Kant from a hypothetical imperative, which holds conditionally (e.g., "If you desire health, then eat well!"), a moral imperative holds unconditionally (e.g., "Do your duty!").



Moral judgment	A value judgment about what is morally right or wrong, good or bad, proper or improper.



Natural law	In the Stoic philosophy, a principle of rationality that infuses the universe, to which human behavior ought to conform. In Thomas Aquinas's philosophy, God's eternal law as it applies to humans on earth and dictates the fundamental principles of morality.



Objective reality	The reality possessed by anything whose existence or characteristics do not depend on our consciousness of them.



Paradox of hedonism	Henry Sidgwick's term for the fact that the desire for pleasure, if it is too strong, defeats its own aim.



Peter Abelard	Set forth one of medieval philosophy's most careful analyses of the morality of intent.



Plato	Also sought the essences of moral virtues, identifying these with the unchanging Forms, the highest of which he held to be the Form of the Good, the ultimate source of all value and reality.



Prescriptive egoism	The doctrine that in all conscious action you ought to seek your self-interest above all else.



Psychological hedonism	The theory that pleasure is the object of a person's desire.



Rule-utilitarianism	A form of utilitarianism (subscribed to by John Stuart Mill) in which the rightness of an act is determined by the impact on the general happiness of the rule or principle the action exemplifies.



Skeptic	One who questions or suspends judgment on the possibility of knowledge.



skepticism (lowercase "s")	The doctrine that true knowledge is uncertain or impossible.



Socrates	Sought to discover the essences of moral virtues and championed the use of reason in moral deliberation.



Sophists	Ancient Greek rhetoricians who taught debating skills for a fee.



Sophists	Professional teachers of fifth-century B.C. Greece whose attack on traditional moral values marks the beginnings of ethical philosophy.



St. Augustine	Used Platonic concepts to solve "the problem of evil," held moral evil to be misdirected love, and identified God as the supreme moral authority and source of all goodness.



St. Hildegard of Bingen	A medieval German mystic philosopher who held that the moral powers of the soul come from its three faculties understanding, insight, and execution.



St. Thomas Aquinas	Reconciled Aristotelian ethical naturalism with Christianity.



Stoicism (capital "s")	The ethical philosophy of the ancient Greek Stoics, who emphasized the serene or untroubled life as the highest good and thought it best reached through acceptance of the natural order of things.



Subjectivism	In ethics, the doctrine that what is right is determined by what people believe is right; elsewhere, the theory that limits knowledge to conscious states.



Thomas Hobbes	Held that "good" and "evil" denote what a person desires or hates; he maintained that our natural end is preservation of self.



Universalistic ethical hedonism	The doctrine that one ought to seek, over everything else, the greatest pleasure for the greatest number of people.



Utilitarianism	The doctrine that the rightness of an action is identical with the happiness it produces as its consequence.



Value judgment	A proposition that explicitly or implicitly assigns a value to something.



Virtue ethics	Ethical theories according to which what I ought to do is what the virtuous person would do; for virtue ethics, the primary question is, What kind of person ought I to be?



Zeno	The founder of Stoicism.

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