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Situation Ethics - Coggle Diagram
Situation Ethics
6 propositions
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2) love is the only norm
love replaces law: love employs law when it seems worthwhile, otherwise love can break any/all Commandments. 'drop the legalistst's love of law, and accept only the law of love' - Fletcher
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4) love is not liking, it is not sentimental. Love is CONATIVE (willed)
we don't need to like everyone (that would be cheap hypocrisy). Virtues like kindness, generosity, patience, concern, righteous indignation (listed by St Paul) are all conative
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STRENGTHS
1) basing a Chrstian ethical approach on principle of agape seems right, since principle itself is grounded in life of Jesus. Jesus acted situationally, not legalistically, so Christians should follow Jesus' example. Love is motivational
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3) situation ethics promotes individual autonomy- people are empowered to make their own decisions in the situations that they encounter. Religious legalism can often do the opposite. situationists do not discard moral rules, since they can accept that rules are formed from the entire experience of the human race, although laws which do not fit a situation should be ignored in that situation
4) whereas legalism can struggle to accomodate new technologies, SE adapts readily to developments in medical science+to developments in understanding human sexuality, flexible. Legalistic ethics tend to ban technologies because they contradict pre-scientific beliefs about the nature of the body
5) SE focuses on helping people, whereas legalistic ethics often amounts to worship of laws that have no real moral force
6) SE promotes social justice, forces people to analyse situations in terms of the desired end. motivates people to change things for the better and to get rid of discrimination
WEAKNESSES
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2) SE sidelines 2,000 years of Christian tradition and authority. Great risk of descending into moral chaos. William Barclay argued, religious law is the distillation of experience that has been found to be beneficial, so to discard moral rules is to discard this experience. "not all men are angels"
3) there may be no consensus on what the most loving action may be in a specific situation, which would make the decision arbitrary
4) with Fletcher's case studies, it is commonly objected that they reflect extreme situations rather than 'real life'
5) SE puts lots of emphasis on motivation and appears to argue that doing something with the sincere motive of love justifies what you do, but that is a doubtful assumption to make
6) obsessive love is not agape love, but parents might think that it is. A valid ethical theory needs to be consistent, coherent, rational, objective, otherwise it can't stand the test of time.
4 presuppositions
pragmatism: morality is about facts and actions, do what maximises love in the situation
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positivism: we should love one another because love is from God. Ethical norms are not rational: they are held as an act of judgement and of faith. FAITH COMES FIRST
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Conscience is a verb, not a noun. Fletcher disagrees with 4 theories of it
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2) it is guidance by the Holy Spirit, or by an angel or some other entity
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DIVINE COMMAND THEORY: Protestants believe morality consists in following God's absolute commands, as laid down in Scripture