THE PHILOSOPHY OF LANGUAGE:

THE ETHICS OF SCIENCE

Kamelia Sari (2120722003)

Kiki Hardiansah (2120722012)
Lailatul Rahmi (2120722007)

INTRODUCTION

Philosophy is a science that deals with human life every day. Humans philosophize to
fulfill their curiosity about something driven by their doubts, admiration, and limitations in
understanding something. It relates to the benefits of philosophy, as one of the sciences used to
identify human needs for their interest in something, and it will be helpful for their lives. In this
case, humans use their intellect and knowledge to think and explore something. The use of
science cannot be separated from how the public is ethical in using that knowledge. Good ethics
means having good attitudes and morals as well. Ethics and science are related things that must
be owned by every person who philosophizes. Apart from all, ethics and science cannot be
separated and must remain parallel.

Science is a tool for humans, which was created to improve the welfare of humankind.
Science can create a better atmosphere, and thus through science, humans can more easily
achieve the goal of improving welfare. Although science does not always prosper humans in its
development, there is also a lot of science that causes suffering for humans.

Philosophy has the concept of good and bad thinkers known as ethics, the rules for
distinguishing good and bad. A science and ethics are a source of knowledge expected to
minimize and stop deviant behavior among the community. For this reason, we need the role of
science as a source of morality in developing human welfare and benefit.

Scientific knowledge is the knowledge that has article characteristics, rational, logical
objective, and open. This is a must for a scientist to do so. But it is also a fundamental problem
faced by scientists after he built a strong sturdy building. The problem is the usability of sciences
for human life. It cannot be denied that science has brought people a huge change. The science
that is solid, strong, and fundamental can save humans or vice versa in which humans also can
save science by developing it. These are their responsibilities as scientists. The development of
science as science axiology embodiment requires proper ethical vision to be applied. People who
understand science will be able to do anything they want, yet the consideration is not merely on
what can be done by humans, that is more important in this context is the need for ethical
consideration of what to do with the purpose of human kindness.

Ethics is a branch of philosophy that talks about human behavior, which emphasizes good
and bad things. In other words, ethics is a science that discusses good deeds and bad deeds of
human minds. In ethics, the value of goodness from human behavior becomes the center of the
problem, namely behavior that is full of responsibility for oneself, society, nature, and for as the
creator.

Humans in living their lives will face a lot of choices. If the choices are arranged as two
things that are contradicted, then one’s life will feel tough. Therefore, the choice should be made
as an alternative accompanied by various reflections, so that someone can make the right
decision. This is a form of philosophical action. Philosophy does not provide instructions for
achieving a higher standard of living or provide new techniques in making atomic bombs indeed,
but philosophy leads to understanding, and understanding leads to more appropriate actions. In
understanding everything, there must be scientific ethics that teaches the right methods or ways
of thinking to find relation facts about the nature of things in life.
 DISCUSSION

To distinguish the right or wrong thing in science, we need the existence of ethics. Ethics
is derived from the Greek word, which is an ethos that means character. It is an arrangement of
moral responsibilities that determine what is good and wrong in actions and decisions. It deals
with the concept of individual or group as a tool to evaluate the things that have been done. In
ethics, the excellent value of human behavior becomes the central problem by having full
responsibility, whether it is for yourself, society, nature as well as to God as the Creator
(Suhartono, 2005). Ethics in science has a huge role since it guides the scientists to decide
whether something is appropriate.
The book History of Western philosophy written by Delfgaauw (1992:34) states that
ethics is an art to achieve well. Goodness is the goal to be completed by every object, which is
pursued by action. Ethics also function as human guidance in carrying out social control. Ethics
is the application of values about good or bad that function as norms or rules of behavior to other
people.
The term of scientific ethics introduces us to the nature, process of formation, and
institutions that produce environmental science that is conducive to the development of science,
as well as morals in developing and utilizing that knowledge. In discussing science, it means
discussing people or institutions of particular disciplines. In general, these institutions can be in
the form of research institutions, universities, etc. As a science, scientific ethics is normative
ethics that formulate ethical principles that can be justified rationally and can be applied in
science. In the field of ethics, the responsibility of a scientist is no longer to provide information
but only to give examples of what he finds. He must be objective, frankly, acceptable, criticize
and suggest acceptance from others, and be firm on his stance which he considers proper and has
the bravery to admit his mistakes. However, the existence of science urges humans to always
make it interesting.

In the field of ethics, the responsibility of a scientist is no longer to provide information

but only to give examples of what he finds. He must be objective, frankly, acceptable, criticize
and suggest acceptance from others, and be firm on his stance which he considers proper and has
the bravery to admit his mistakes.
 In principle, the definition of ethics can be divided into three kinds, namely as follows:

a. Ethics as a science. Which is a collection of virtues, about the judgment of one's

actions.

b. Ethics in the sense of action, namely the act of virtue. Ethics in this case is seen as a
normative and evaluative science that only gives good or bad values to human
behavior.

c. Ethics as philosophy, which studies views, issues with moral issues.

There is no single absolute understanding of ethics. It is because ethics always develop

along with socio-cultural and political developments. From some of the opinions above, ethics is
one of the sciences that studies and becomes a human's guideline to determine the good and bad
of human behavior.
As one of the sciences investigating human behavior, ethics in science has two
approaches (Barber, Stainton; 2010). They are metaethics and prescriptive. Further explanations
about these two types are revealed below.
1. Metaethics
Metaethics is often sometimes called descriptive. A descriptive approach entails the
objective and nonjudgmental description of language use as much as feasible (Barber, Stainton;
2010). It studies an individual's morality, a particular culture, and sub-culture. What drives pro-
social conduct, how individuals argue about ethics, what people think to be most important, and
how societies manage behavior are all topics covered in descriptive ethics, such as by punishing
people for doing specific actions (Gray, 2014). Thus, instead of giving any judgment, descriptive
exposes the behavior. Descriptive ethics seeks to comprehend the nature and dynamics of ethical
principles and the process through which humans develop moral faiths.
2. Prescriptive
Ethics is only conceivable because people consider specific behavior to be desirable and
others to be undesirable. However, it appears that there may be a science of physics or that things
were never classed in this way. Thus, it is pretty reasonable that ethics and other sciences that
include value should be referred to as prescriptive (Sabine, 1912). The other name of prescriptive
ethics is normative ethics. Normative ethics is the most critical part of ethics and in different
fields, where the discussions of morality are the main topic. In this field, the scientists do not
only observe what is descriptive ethics, but they intervene themselves to give the value of
people's behavior. It can be said that this ethics aims to formulate the principles of ethics that can
be accounted for rationally and be used practically.
Prescriptive aims to establish norms or rules that govern what is right and wrong or
pleasant and unpleasant behavior. In English grammar, most early English grammars were
prescriptive and provided a range of prescriptive principles, most of them very obvious to native
languages (Barber, Stainton; 2010). For instance, do not start a sentence by using and do not end
a sentence by using prepositions. These examples are widespread, and those who speak English
have known such rules.
To make it easier to distinguish between these two kinds of ethics, another example is
drawn. For instance, a police officer who has to stand guard in a mall kills a man. The man is a
terrorist who wants to blow up the crowded mall. If it is based on metaethics, the act of the
police killing the terrorist is morally wrong. It happens since, according to metaethics, none
deserves to be eradicated, no matter who they are. However, if it depends on prescriptive, the act
of a police officer is the right thing to do in such a situation. If the police officer does not kill the
terrorist, the terrorist might kill many people in the mall. Thus, the police officer is doing right in
killing the terrorist.
In other books, there is another type called applied ethics. It is an action of normative
theories to specific issues, such as justice, abortion, death penalty, and animal rights. It concerns
how ethics is applied properly based on the theory on certain issues. It shows the attempt to
apply the theories of normative. However, this paper is based on Barber’s and Stainton’s that
categorizes the applied ethics into normative since it is still based on normative theories.
The ethics in science is normative ethics or prescriptive that deals with the principles of
ethics that can be trusted rationally and can be explained in science (Alfan, 2013). The aims are
to apply the moral principles that are decent and to avoid unacceptable behaviors. According to
Resnik, there are three main principles in the ethics of science (Rensik, 1998). These three
principles have all significant implications for the objectivity of inquiry. The principles of ethics
in science are explained below.
A. Moral
 In studying ethics, a person's good and bad behavior will be a problem that refers to
moral rules. Ethics is often referred to as moral philosophy. In Greek, moral comes from mores,
which means custom, habit, way of life, and behavior. The moral is something that becomes the
standard of human behavior related to the principle of right or wrong of human behavior. The
word moral is identical to a human action based on the notion of good or bad. Discuss moral
means discussing a person's personality.

According to M. Adib (2010: 207), morals contain four meanings, including:

a. Good-bad, right-wrong, correct-incorrect in human activities

b. The right action, fair, and reasonable

c. The capacity to be directed to the awareness of right and wrong, and the certainty to
direct others based on the rules of behavior that are judged to be right and wrong

d. A person's attitude with other people

Humans are intelligent creatures; all their actions and words will be accounted for. As
humans, we must be ethical and moral. It is the actions of value that make human life
meaningful. Human life is not just a species, but how he can be responsible for himself, his
family, society, and humanity in general. This responsibility puts demands on humans regarding
human activities in all fields.

According to the KBBI, there are two views on the notion of morals. First, the teaching
about good and bad is received from actions, attitudes, obligations, and others by humans.
Second, the mental condition that keeps people brave, passionate, disciplined, and so on stems
from the content of the heart of the state of feeling as expressed in actions (KBBI, 2005: 6-7).

Thus, morality means the standard of teaching about the good and bad of human actions
or behavior. In this case, ethics and morals have the same meaning, but there is a slight
difference in their application. The moral is used for the assessed activity, while ethics is used to
examine the existing value system. Also, ethics has a concept of judging whether the actions
taken by humans are good or bad and right or wrong. In this case, ethics provides a standard for
humans in socializing with their environment. In other words, ethics is a benchmark for humans
in behavior.

B. Norm

According to the KBBI (2005: 787), norms mean the rules or provisions used to bind
groups of citizens in society as a form of guidance, order, and control of appropriate and
acceptable behavior. Norms are the rules that grow and live in society as a binding element and
control of humans in community life. By that, norms are used as benchmarks to judge or
compare something. For example, people must obey the applicable rules.

Ethics, morals, and norms are interrelated because they try to direct humans to have a
good mindset, attitude, and behavior in social life. By understanding and practicing it in life, it
will produce a lot of benefits for life, such as we can uphold and respect human values, become
more tolerant, ethical/polite, and fair in attitude and action, become more able to appreciate the
abilities and work of others, be more responsible for the field of science that he has, and also it
can improve professionalism.

C. Standards of Ethical Conduct in Science

The scientific attitude possessed by scientists is a form of understanding of science.

Therefore, a scientist must have a mindset that reflects himself as a scientist. Based on the KBBI
(2005:425), a scientist must have a scientific attitude because it is following his understanding
that a scientist is a person who is an expert or has a lot of science knowledge. Scientists can be
said to be people who are involved in the field of science.

The scientific attitude is to have and understand ethics, morals, norms, and decency. Other
standards of ethical conduct in science are:

a. Honesty

According to Ustar (2011:13-15), honesty is comportment based on attempts to always

trust people, both to themselves and to others, in words, actions, and works. Honesty is a moral
character with positive and precious qualities, such as integrity, patience, and honesty, while not
lying, cheating, or stealing. In the ethics of science, it is expected that scientists can differentiate
between dishonor in collecting and recording data (Resnik, 1998). In this principle, a scientist is
strictly prohibited from falsifying, fabricating, even misinterpreting data or research. In this case,
the scientists must be objective and impartial to anyone. In a specific sense, they must adhere to
the principle of honesty in all aspects of the research process.

b. Carefulness, Diligence

A scientist must be accessible in determining the topic of his research, free in conducting
experiments. This freedom will later be able to measure the quality of his abilities. In the works,
scientists must be meticulous about their work. They must minimize the errors that will occur as
much as possible, whether they are experimental, methodological, or systematic errors, even
human errors that may come from themselves or others. When a scientist works, he focuses on
the process of his scientific work and the goal for his research to be successful. Scientists must
understand what they are doing; therefore, they must make a precise estimate of the remaining
errors that might even occur. With these principles, scientists will be able to present their
research results correctly and following data. On the other hand, their carelessness in their work
will have fatal consequences, such as deception of research results and themselves. For a
scientist, his scientific activities with scientific truth are critical.

c. Openness, Fairness

When science is so rigidly tied to values, science must be open to its context. To be a
scientist is not merely focusing on the work. Yet, they also need to keep positive attitudes.
Scientists cannot be selfish in doing their work. They must show an open attitude by having a
willingness to accept critics and suggestions from others. In addition, scientists must be open in
conveying research results. They may not manipulate the data since it will lead them to make
untrustable works. Moreover, it can help them to identify the strengths and weaknesses of the
research results.

d. Respect, Credit, Efficiency

Scientists must respect the rights of other scientists. Moreover, they also have to respect
the object of their research, the environment, and resources without discrimination and causing
condescension. The research results must be accountable. Objective values are always the
primary goal, and he does not want to be tied to subjective values. Subjective values such as
values in society, religious values, traditional values, and so on.

On the other hand, the research team's safety and the environment are also part of a
scientist's responsibility. To produce the best data or research, scientists should have attitudes.
Scientists who have a perspective following the standard can be said to be ethical scientists and
responsible in their research. Moreover, as an observer of a result, it is not wrong to appreciate
scientists for the research they have completed, whether it is in the form of credit scores or
awards. They can and get an appreciation as a form of constant appreciation for those who do
well. This appreciation is given to those who deserve it because their research has benefited the
community and the environment. Therefore, this appreciation is needed to make them keep up
the excellent work.

e. Education

Scientists should share what they have got with others. Therefore, other people will
understand and implement the knowledge as well. For instance, there is a learner who wants to
conduct research. Scientists have to guide the learner to make proper research and ensure he does
the right steps. However, if there is someone who is a non-science student, the scientist could
explain to him to build the public’s view of science. Moreover, scientists are expected to let the
media know about their work, so then the media can recognize their works and take them as
lessons. Yet, it is a need to prevent unformed judgments or misunderstandings from being
released.

For a scientist, by studying scientific ethics, it is hoped that he can apply moral
principles, namely sound principles, and avoid bad things in his scientific behavior so that he can
be responsible for his scientific behavior.
 CONCLUSION

Ethics is essential in human life because the good and bad of humans can be seen from
ethics or action. Many philosophers have defined and formulated ethics as a moral attitude or
behavior to determine a choice. But in essence, ethics is a way of critical human thinking to
analyze and examine everything in life to produce something rational and valuable for many
people.
The development of science following the embodiment of scientific axiology requires
that humans apply the right ethical vision to do whatever they want. Still, the consideration is not
only on what humans can do. More important in this context is the need for an ethical review of
what to do.
In principle, the definition of ethics can be divided into three kinds, namely as follows:
a. Ethics as a science is a collection of virtues about the judgment of one’s action
b. Ethics in the sense of action, namely the act of virtue. In this case, ethics is a normative
and evaluative science that only gives good and bad values to human behavior.
c. Ethics as philosophy, Which studies views, issues with moral issues.
Ethics in science has two approaches: metaethics is sometimes called the descriptive
approach, which entails the objective and nonjudgmental description of language use as feasible,
and prescriptive, where ethics is only conceivable because people consider specific behavior
desirable and others to be undesirable. As an object of ethics, assessing an action is related to the
concepts possessed by individuals and society, where ethics provides judgments, boundaries, and
directions that govern humans in other social groups. In the evaluation process, ethics provides
an approach so that science helps offer advice or guidance and goals.
There are three principles of ethics in science we have to know, they are moral, norm,
and standards of scientific ethics. Ethical conduct in science has several standards as a form of
understanding of science: honesty, carefulness and diligence, openness and fairness, respect,
credit, and efficiency, and education.
By studying scientific ethics, we hope that scientists can apply moral principles and avoid
bad things in their scientific behavior to be responsible for their scientific behavior. Thus, the
role of ethics in science can continue to influence all scientists who will conduct future research.
 REFERENCES

Agustinus W. Dewantara (2017). Filsafat Moral Pergumulan Etis Keseharian Hidup Manusia.
Yogyakarta: Kanisius, p. 7-8.
Alfan, Muhammad. (2013). Pengantar Filsafat Nilai. Bandung: Pustaka Setia.
Barber, Alex., Stainton, Robert J. (2010). Concise Encyclopedia of Philosophy of Language and
Linguistics. United Kingdom: British Library.
Blocker, H. Gene. (1999). World Philosophy: An East-West Comparative Introduction to Philosophy.
Baskerville: Pub-Set. Inc. P. 159-167.
Delfgaan, Bernard. (1992). Sejarah Ringkas Filsafat Barat. Yogyakarta: PT Tiara Wacana Yogya:
Yogyakarta.
Gray, JW. (2014). Ethical Realism. Advance retrieved from
https://ethicalrealism.wordpress.com/2014/05/05/normative-descriptive-ethics/
Gisler, Galen. (2007). Ethics in Science Basic Principle. University of Oslo: Physics of Geological
Processes. Retrieved from https://www.uio.no/studier/emner/matnat/fys/nedlagte-emner/FYS-
GEO4100/h07/undervisningsmateriale/Ethics%20in%20Science.pdf
Resnik, David B. (1998). The Ethics of Science: An Introduction. London & New York: Humanities,
Social Science & STEM Books.
Sabine, George H. (1912). Descriptive and Normative Sentence. Stanford: Duke University Press.
Retrieved from https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/2177252.pdf
Suaedi. (2016). Pengantar Filsafat Ilmu. Bogor: IPB Press Printing.
Suhartono, Suparlan. (2005). Dasar-Dasar Filsafat. Jogjakarta: Perpustakaan Universitas
Muhammadiyah Makassar. Retrieved from https://library.unismuh.ac.id/opac/detail-opac?
id=7113
Susanto, A. (2011). Filsafat Ilmu Suatu Kajian Dalam Dimensi Ontologis, Epistimologis, dan
Aksiologis. Jakarta: Bumi Aksara.
Sya’roni. Mokh. (2014). Etika Keilmuan: Sebuah Kajian Filsafat Ilmu. Published in January-June
2014. Vol. 25 No. 1