MAJOR ETHICAL PHILOSOPHIES OF VARIOUS CLASSICAL PHILOSOPHERS

By YLA YEPES
  • 469 BCE

    SOCRATES

    SOCRATES
    “He who is not contented with what he has, would not be contented with what he would like to have” According to Socrates, “No one commits an evil act knowingly and doing wrong arises out of ignorance”. A person will commit only moral evil if he lacks moral knowledge. Sometimes, a person may have knowledge but he deliberately commits an evil act to satisfy his hidden motive.
  • 428 BCE

    PLATO

    PLATO
    “Good actions give strength to ourselves and inspire good actions in others”
    Plato held that moral values are objective in the sense that they exist in a spirit-like realm beyond subjective human conventions. Plato’s main concern is to challenge the views most people have about goodness, for it is here that they go disastrously in trying to live happy lives.
  • 384 BCE

    ARISTOTLE

    ARISTOTLE
    “At his best, man is the noblest of all animals separated from law and justice he is the worst” Aristotle’s ethics is concerned with action. People should strive to have a good character/moral. Aristotle stated that virtues are good habits that we accumulate that govern our feelings and thoughts. Aristotle’s “The Golden Mean Principle” states that to be happy, live a life of moderation. In everything we do, we must avoid extremes.

  • MORAL POSITIVISM

    MORAL POSITIVISM
    Moral positivism is the belief that there is no necessary link between law and moral standards. According to Hobbes, moral positivism constituted a profound split with common law study. Positivism originated as an explanation of the source of law's authority within broader concepts of social order.

  • UTILITARIANISM

    UTILITARIANISM
    Utilitarianism is a tradition in normative ethics that may be traced back to the late 18th and early 19th century English philosophers and economists Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill. According to utilitarianism, an action is good if it promotes happiness or pleasure, and it is bad if it causes misery or suffering. It's a subset of consequentialism, which holds that actions (or categories of actions) should be judged according to their outcomes.