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Ethical Relativism And Egoism Essay

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The two ethical theories that I truly understood and agreed with were Ethical Relativism and Egoism/Egotism. Ethical Relativism refers to cultural differences throughout the world regarding values. For example, in one culture society forces females to be covered from head to toe, while another culture may not have those same expectation from females. The other ethical theory that I understood is the difference between Egoism and Egotism. Egoism is the belief that motivation for people 's actions are carried out in self-interest, while Egotism means excessive conceit or self-absorption and selfishness. Ethical Relativism values, like mentioned earlier, are either an individual or cultural difference. In short, it means that other people and/or cultures should have the same ethical values as you do, or a "master set" of values per se. However, these values are not written in stone, therefore cannot be used in every single instance due to the fluctuation that each and every culture has. Some examples of beliefs that were listed in the textbook are beating of children, using animals for accessories, or helping those that are less fortunate, etc. (Chaffee pg. 435) Someone who believes in Ethical Relativism as …show more content…

Altruism is when one person 's actions risks or cost themselves something to promote someone else 's welfare. In the past, some researchers have conducted experiments with the intention to prove the Altruism theory, and what they found went against what most people believed to be true. These researchers found that most people 's first impulse was to cooperate and help others in need instead of wanting to be competitive. The researchers were even able to come to the conclusion that not only humans were capable of this, but non-human primates were able to display acts that further prove the experimental process in regard to

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According to Ethical Relativism, there are no universal truths, which apply to all human beings at all times, and proposes that moral principles should be viewed as "local, conventional, subjective and self-justified" (Yardley, 2012). While ethical principles should conform to social, cultural norms and moral beliefs and practices are frequently products of cultural upbringing, the basis for Ethical Relativism is fundamentally unsound because it can be used to justify and rationalize practices and behaviors that are inherently immoral, such as racism, discrimination, hate crimes and oppression. Ethical African

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In the discussion of moral objectivism and moral relativism, it is important to understand the difference, and the impact that a moral system has on the criminal justice community. The community exists to enforce the laws. Moral judgments are made with votes, and the decisions on how laws are crafted are made by elected officials. For this reason, it makes sense for the criminal justice community to separate themselves professionally from their own moral views. Moral Relativism is the view of morality, much like beauty, is relative to the person, culture, or organization.

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”(p.19) This shows that in the study of ethics, the study of moral relativism to be more specific, the idea of universal truth does not exist. That is to say what is perceived as “good” or “right” can vary form culture to culture, so there is no way to have one universal truth. Two major examples of cultural differences that are often cited in Support

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In other words, “right” or “wrong” are culture specific, what is considered moral in one society may be considered immoral in another, and, since no universal standard of morality that exist, no one has the right to judge another societies custom (Ess, 2009). Cultural Relativism is closely related to ethical relativism, which views truth as variable and not absolute. What makes up right and wrong is determined solely by individual or the society (Ess, 2009). Since the truth is not object, there can be no standards which applies to all cultures.

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