MATSEC SEC Ethics cheat sheet

Normative ethics asks what makes actions right; meta-ethics asks what moral language and moral facts mean; applied ethics applies theory to concrete cases such as medicine, business and environment.

Consequentialism judges acts solely by outcomes; utilitarianism is the consequentialist form requiring the greatest total welfare (Bentham's hedonic calculus; Mill's qualitative pleasures and harm principle).

Deontology judges acts by duty and intention, not results: Kant's categorical imperative has a formula of universal law (act only on maxims you could will as universal law) and a formula of humanity (never treat persons merely as means).

Virtue ethics locates morality in character: Aristotle's eudaimonia is flourishing achieved through habituated virtues lying on a mean between vices of excess and deficiency (courage between recklessness and cowardice).

The naturalistic fallacy (Moore) is inferring 'ought' from 'is'; Hume's is-ought gap states descriptive premises alone cannot logically entail a moral conclusion.

Cultural relativism holds moral truth is relative to a culture; it faces the objection that it forbids cross-cultural criticism and cannot explain moral reform within a culture.

Ethical egoism claims each agent ought to pursue self-interest; psychological egoism is the descriptive claim that people always in fact act self-interestedly - the two are logically independent.

A sound moral argument needs true premises plus valid inference; thought experiments (trolley problem, experience machine) test intuitions but intuitions can conflict, so they are evidence rather than proof.

Use the four-step structure for applied questions: state the moral issue, present two opposing positions with their supporting theory, evaluate each with a counter-argument, then reach a justified conclusion.

Universalisation test (Kant): ask whether the maxim of the act could consistently be willed as a universal law; if it destroys the practice it depends on, the act is impermissible.

Harm principle (Mill): interference with liberty is justified only to prevent harm to others, not for the agent's own good; offence and self-regarding acts do not normally qualify.

Act vs rule utilitarianism: act-utilitarianism evaluates each act's consequences; rule-utilitarianism asks which general rule, if generally followed, maximises welfare - rule versions resist counterexamples better.

Doctrine of double effect: an act with a good intended effect and a foreseen bad side-effect may be permissible if the act itself is good or neutral, the bad effect is not the means, and proportionality holds.

Distinguish descriptive claims (what is the case) from prescriptive claims (what ought to be done); a common exam error is answering an 'ought' question with only factual description.

Evaluate a theory by testing it against a hard case (e.g. a lying promise to save a life); a theory that cannot accommodate a strongly held intuition is weakened but not automatically refuted.

Moral luck (Williams, Nagel): outcomes partly beyond the agent's control affect blame, challenging the view that moral worth depends only on intention.

When a question asks 'to what extent', quantify the judgement: 'largely', 'partly' or 'only in limited cases', and justify the degree with the strongest opposing argument.