Chapter 1 Ethics

Professional Ethics and
Moral Thoughts
Dr. Md. Tarek Hossain

Director, Research & Training Center
Ethics Meaning
Derived from the Greek word “ethos”, which
means “way of living”, ethics is a branch of
philosophy that is concerned with human conduct,
more specifically the behavior of individuals in
society.
To put it in simple terms,
Ethics = Morals + Reasoning.
Ethics: Branch of philosophy that seeks to determine the
correct application of moral notions such as good and
bad and right and wrong or a theory of the application
or nature of such notions.
What is the definition of ethics?
Ethics examines the rational justification
for our moral judgments; it studies what is
morally right or wrong, just or unjust.
What is the need and importance for ethics at
workplace?
Workplace ethics is important as it enables
management to treat all employees as equal and
think from their perspective as well.
 Satisfying Basic Human Needs

 Creating Credibility
 Uniting People and Leadership
 Improving Decision Making
 Long Term Gains
 Securing the Society
What are the 4 ethical dilemmas? Answer: See Example
What are some of the reasons why people act
unethically?
Individual Factors: Unethical choices are more likely from
people with specific personal characteristics specific views
and values. Overwhelmingly, these employees are driven by
self-interest.
Issue-Specific Factors: An employee might make an
unethical choice in one situation, but not in others. Some
issues are more likely to lead to unethical choices. Employees
are more likely to act unethically when they don’t see their
action clearly causing harm.
Environmental Factors: Unethical choices are more likely
when the organization encourages individualistic behavior
rather than doing what is best for other employees,
customers, and the community.
Ethics is mainly divided into
four main branches. They are
as follows:
Meta Ethics
Prescriptive Ethics
Descriptive Ethics
Applied Ethics
Meta ethics is defined as the study of the origin and
meaning of ethical concepts, the term "meta" means after
or beyond, and, consequently, the notion of Meta ethics
involves a removed, or bird's eye view of the entire
project of ethics.
 It is a branch of ethics that seeks to understand the

nature of ethical properties statements attitudes and
judgments.
 It is a branch of analytic philosophy that explores the
status, foundations, and scope of moral values,
properties, and words. Whereas the fields of applied
ethics and normative theory focus on what is moral,
meta-ethics focuses on what morality itself is.
PRESCRIPTIVE ETHICS / NORMATIVE ETHICS:
•Normative ethics is also called as prescriptive ethics. It is
the study of ethical theories that prescribe how people ought
to act. It examines standards for the rightness and wrongness
of actions. Normative ethics suggests punishment when a
person deviates from the path of ideals.
•Aristotle's virtue ethics, Immanuel Kant’s deontological
ethics, J S Mill's Consequentialism {Utilitarianism) and the
Bhagwat Gita's Nishkam Karma yoga are some of the
theories in Normative Ethics.
•The Golden Rule is a classic example of a normative
principle: "We should do to others what we would want
others to do to us".
•Normative ethics can be of following types
1.Deontological Ethics 2.Teleological Ethics 3. Virtue ethics
DESCRIPTIVE ETHICS:
Descriptive ethics deals with what people actually believe
(or made to believe) to be right or wrong, and accordingly
holds up the human actions acceptable or not acceptable or
punishable under a custom or law.
*However, customs and laws keep changing from time to
time and from society to society. The societies have
structured their moral principles as per changing time and
have expected people to behave accordingly. Due to this,
descriptive ethics is also called comparative ethics because
it compares the ethics or past and present; ethics of one
society and other.
*It also takes inputs from other disciplines such as
anthropology, psychology, sociology and history to explain
the moral right or wrong.
APPLIED ETHICS:
Applied ethics is the branch of ethics which consists of
the analysis of specific, controversial moral issues such
as abortion, animal rights, or euthanasia. It helps to use
knowledge of moral principles to present dilemmas.
*It is the philosophical examination from a moral
standpoint, of particular issues in private and public life
that are matters of moral judgment. It attempts to use
philosophical methods to identify the morally correct
course of action in various fields of human life.
*Examples: Ethics associated with some moral issues
like euthanasia, surrogacy, medical termination of
pregnancy (abortions), Bio Ethics, Environmental
ethics, Media ethics etc. will be a part of applied ethics.
What is general ethics and special ethics?
Ethics has two parts: general ethics and special ethics.
General ethics develops general principles concerning
the morality of human actions. Special ethics applies the
general principles developed in general ethics to people's
conduct toward themselves, other human beings, society
and the state.
Why is general ethics important?
Ethics is what guides us to tell the truth, keep our
promises, or help someone in need. There is a
framework of ethics underlying our lives on a
daily basis, helping us make decisions that create
positive impacts and steering us away from
unjust outcomes.
What are the 5 steps to an ethical
framework?
A Framework for Ethical Decision Making
 Identify the Ethical Issues.
 Get the Facts.
 Evaluate Alternative Actions.
 Choose an Option for Action and
Test It.
 Implement Your Decision and
Reflect on the Outcome.

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Professional Ethics and

Dr. Md. Tarek Hossain

 Satisfying Basic Human Needs

 It is a branch of ethics that seeks to understand the

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