HKDSE ERS flashcards

32 cards. Read the term and the definition here. The deck at the top of this page is optional.

Consequentialism

An ethical theory holding that the moral rightness of an action depends solely on its outcomes. Utilitarianism, which seeks the greatest happiness for the greatest number, is its best-known form.

Deontological ethics

An approach judging actions by whether they conform to moral duties or rules rather than by their results. Kant's categorical imperative, which requires universalisable maxims and respect for persons, is the classic example.

Virtue ethics

An approach focusing on the character of the agent rather than on acts or rules. Aristotle holds that virtues are stable dispositions lying between extremes, and that right action flows from practical wisdom.

Categorical imperative

Kant's unconditional moral law. Its formula of universal law asks whether a maxim could be consistently willed as universal law; the formula of humanity forbids treating persons merely as means.

Moral agent vs moral patient

A moral agent is a being capable of acting and being held responsible; a moral patient is a being whose interests count and who can be harmed or benefited. Debates about abortion and animals concern patient status.

Is–ought gap

Hume's claim that purely descriptive statements about what is the case cannot logically entail prescriptive statements about what ought to be done. Bridging the gap requires an additional value premise.

Moral relativism

The view that moral judgements are valid only relative to a culture or individual. Descriptive relativism reports disagreement; normative relativism draws the further claim that we ought not to judge other cultures.

Sanctity of life

The belief that human life has intrinsic value and should not be deliberately taken. In religious ethics it grounds strong presumptions against abortion and euthanasia, though exceptions are debated.

Quality of life argument

A position holding that the value of continuing a life depends on its experienced quality, such as suffering, capacity for relationships, and autonomy. It is used to support euthanasia and some abortion cases.

Doctrine of double effect

A principle holding that an act with both good and bad foreseen effects may be permissible if the bad effect is unintended, not a means to the good, and proportionate. It is applied in palliative sedation.

Active vs passive euthanasia

Active euthanasia deliberately causes death, for example by lethal injection. Passive euthanasia withholds or withdraws life-sustaining treatment. Some ethicists argue the distinction is morally significant, others deny it.

Voluntary euthanasia

Euthanasia performed at the competent patient's own informed and repeated request. It is distinguished from non-voluntary cases, where the patient cannot consent, and involuntary cases, which proceed against the patient's wishes.

Anthropocentrism

The view that only humans have intrinsic moral standing and nature is valued instrumentally for human benefit. Environmental critics argue it underlies ecological exploitation and should be replaced.

Ecocentrism

An environmental ethic treating ecosystems, species, and biotic communities as the primary units of moral concern. Individual organisms matter insofar as they contribute to the health of the whole system.

Stewardship

A religious environmental position holding that humans are entrusted by God to care for creation. It rejects both exploitation of nature and the claim that nature has value wholly apart from its relation to humanity.

Stakeholder theory

The view that a firm owes consideration to all parties affected by its operations, including employees, customers, suppliers, and communities, not only shareholders. It contrasts with shareholder primacy.

Whistle-blowing

Disclosing wrongdoing inside or outside an organisation. Ethicists often treat it as a duty when serious harm is imminent, internal channels have failed, and the disclosure is proportionate.

Jus ad bellum

The conditions for justly going to war: just cause, legitimate authority, right intention, last resort, reasonable prospect of success, and proportionality of the overall resort to force.

Jus in bello

The rules governing conduct within war: non-combatant immunity, proportionality of force used, and discrimination between legitimate military targets and civilian persons and objects.

Just-war theory

A tradition holding that war can sometimes be morally justified under strict conditions. It is distinguished from pacifism, which rejects all war, and from realism, which denies moral constraints on war.

Negative vs positive rights

Negative rights require others to refrain from interference, such as freedom of speech. Positive rights entitle holders to provision, such as education or healthcare, and require resources from others.

Social cohesion function

Durkheim's account of religion as reinforcing shared beliefs, rituals, and collective identity, thereby integrating society. Critics note it explains unity but understates religion's role in conflict and change.

Prophetic role of religion

The function of religion in criticising injustice and the abuse of power, appealing to transcendent standards over existing social arrangements. It contrasts with religion's integrative, legitimating role.

Conflict thesis

The claim that science and religion are inherently incompatible. Historians and philosophers often treat this as oversimplified, since the relationship varies from conflict through independence to integration.

Methodological naturalism

The working rule that scientific explanations appeal only to natural causes. It is a method, not a metaphysical claim, and so does not by itself entail that God does not exist.

Analogical predication

Thomas Aquinas's account of religious language: terms applied to God are neither univocal nor purely equivocal but analogous, related to creaturely perfections without capturing God fully.

Falsification challenge

Flew's objection that religious claims are unfalsifiable, since no conceivable evidence would count against them, and so they fail to assert anything factual. Responses appeal to eschatological verification.

Logical problem of evil

The claim that the existence of an omnipotent, omnibenevolent God is logically incompatible with the existence of evil. The free-will defence is a standard response to this version.

Soul-making theodicy

John Hick's response to evil: a world with challenge and suffering is necessary for the development of moral and spiritual virtues, so God permits evil to enable genuine growth.

Numinous experience

Rudolf Otto's category of religious experience characterised by the mysterium tremendum et fascinans - a sense of awe, dread, and attraction before a wholly other sacred reality.

Principle of credulity

Swinburne's principle that it is reasonable to believe an experience is veridical unless there is positive evidence against it. It is used to defend religious experience as evidence.

Euthyphro dilemma

Plato's question: is an action good because God commands it, or does God command it because it is good? The first horn threatens arbitrariness, the second limits divine sovereignty.