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ETHICS THEME 2
PART A - Coggle Diagram
ETHICS THEME 2
PART A
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Secondary Precepts
Humans are then to use their reason to establish rules that will fulfil the requirements of the primary precepts. These rules are known as secondary precepts.
Examples:
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- secondary precepts may not hold in certain circumstances so it is accepted that there may be situations where in order to follow a primary precept, you have to break a secondary precept
Advantages
To Natural Law
- There is a fair set of rules for everyone
- However, it is not just a large number of rules dictating what we should do
- All the things that are good for us are celebrated, rather than focusing on negative things
- Humans are at the centre of this ethical approach, not rules
- It allows us to use our reason and so feel in control of the secondary precepts
- It allows people to establish common rules in order to structure communities
Key words
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Apparent good = something that appears good when really it isn't, taking us further away from what god intended for humans
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Disadvantages
To Natural Law
- In modern forms Natural Law does not allow for negotiation because the Church has made the secondary precepts into absolute rules.
- It is based on very complicated notions and doesn’t ask everyday questions such as 'should hospitals get more money than schools'?
- It could be argued that we have gained our natural instincts through evolution, not through God and so we do not need a God-based theory
- We can observe differences between cultures, which rejects the notion of a single natural purpose for all humans
- Natural Law could even be seen as a relativist theory - because the secondary precepts might change as we use our reason differently, perhaps because of the different circumstances we find ourselves in.
Key aspects
to Natural Law
- Reason is used in order to establish how we should live our lives. We use our reason to fulfil the requirements of the primary precepts and therefore to achieve our aim of doing good and avoiding evil.
- At times humans use their reason incorrectly because they are following apparent goods rather than real goods. An example of an apparent good is taking drugs - it seems like we are doing a good thing but in reality we are not!
- Aquinas also noted that God knows the secrets of our hearts and so our actions must be interior rather than exterior - the motive behind an action counts. For example we should help an elderly person cross the road because it is the correct thing to do not because we want to impress a boy/girl who's watching nearby
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- the universe has a natural order that works to achieve an end or purpose (telos)
- humans are apart of the natural world and so have a purpose. they have an innate sense to follow a natural moral law that leads them to fulfil their purpose= reaching fellowship with God
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- Aristotle who believed the purpose of life is eudomania which is achieved through cultivating virtues. he suggests humans know what 'good' is through reason, and if we all use our reason well, we would have a happy society