Cultural relativism and consequentialism in Italian tardiness

Over break I was having a conversation with Nancy, a violinist in the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, as well as a friend of my family. She has a house in my hometown in Italy, Spoleto, where my family and her met a couple of years ago. Nancy and her husband Terry have fallen in love with the diverse architecture of the town, presenting styles that vary from Ancient Roman times to our days. They have also fallen in love with the Italian way of life, characterized by a relaxed pace, shopping for food at local markets and stores, a pervasion in art in everyday life, and, of course, good wine. There are certain aspects about the Italian way of life, however, that she finds are frustrating. The main one is the inevitable tendency of Italians in being late.

She told me about an episode in which Terry and she were involved. They hopped on a public bus to go from the train station to their house. The bus driver had to wait one minute in order for the bus to run exactly on schedule, but a tourist couple approached the bus driver asking him where to buy tickets. The bus driver pointed at the newspaper kiosk where they could buy them, not mentioning the fact that he would have left the following minute. But, in fact, the bus driver wanted to do the couple a favor and decided that waiting for them would have been the right thing to do, the nice thing to do. As a result, the bus left five minutes late. Just a few stops later, one of the main bus stops of the town, there were six people waiting for the bus.

This is just a simple example of a common tendency in Italian culture, where being 20 minutes late for an appointment is perfectly acceptable, where classes at universities have developed the concept of the “academic 15 minutes” (i.e. a class scheduled at 9am is expected to start at 9.15am), where the average delay of trains is 7 minutes (this statistic also takes into account trains that are on time). There is actually an unofficial website that, by entering the number of the train, it will tell you its current, average, and expected delay.

I found this story interesting because it brings forward two ethical issues that we have discussed in class this semester: cultural relativism and consequentialism. The first one is concerned because I can tell you that, as a person that grew up in Italy, being late is not perceived as being late; it is perceived as a normal feature of everyday life. If my friends and I want to go out for a drink on a Friday night and wish to meet at 10.30pm, we will schedule to meet at 10pm. Being raised in a bicultural family (my mother is American), I sometimes point out to my friends how this doesn’t make any sense and, although they kind of acknowledge it, they don’t perceive as a big deal at all and continue to follow this model. Cultural relativism is involved in this issue because the conception of punctuality is perceived differently throughout different cultures.

The issue of consequentialism concerns the bus driver’s choice of waiting for the tourist couple to the detriment of the six people waiting at the next bus stop (and of all the people at the next bus stops). The bus driver thought that he did a good deed by accommodating the needs of the tourist couple, but he neglected the needs of all the people, perhaps dozens of people, that suffered from the bus delay (maybe one of these people was a train driver who consequently made the train depart late). Consequentialism looks for the best outcome for the greatest number of people. Therefore, a consequentialist bus driver would have ignored the needs of the tourist couple to favor the needs of dozens of people. 

Moral Obligation to be Green

A friend of mine recently wrote a blog post addressing the recent energy wars between major living units on campus called "Do You Have a Moral Responsibility to Go Green." During Energy Wars major living units compete to reduce the amount of electricity they use in three weeks and the housing unit that reduces the most energy wins bragging rights and a money prize they can use to contribute to a "greener campus." This resulted in some competitors reducing much of their energy use and become educated and aware of the effects of electricity use around the world. The winner is praised and the campus as a whole receives reputation on being a Green campus. However, after the competition is over most people return back to their usual habits of leaving the lights on and leaving outlets plugged. The problem with this is that we all live on this earth, and we all have ecological effect on the earth. Still, there seems as though there was no actual moral obligation or responsibility to self regulate energy use at all aside from winning the competition.

Although the result was that many people learned more about being aware of their effects on our world, looking at this from a praising aspect, was their anything that deserved moral praise? Some may argue that it is a moral obligation to be sustainable because everyone has to live on earth. Being sustainable and conscious would be the equivalent to cleaning your own room. I think people are well aware of their moral obligation to be sustainable, but they choose to not participate because they learn that the problem is too great for them to have any contributing factors in turning the situation around.

According to David Norton, those who simply participated has only barely completed the bare minimum of their moral duty. Although the participates have learned a lot from the publicity during the three weeks of Energy Wars, they do not deserve significant praise for their actions. The participates simply did something they understood to be correct but is not morally challenging in any way. Norton would ask more from the participants and argue that it is a moral obligation to continue to stay green and that they are not worthy of praise. Saying that the participates deserve some sort of moral praise would a minimalist thought therefore Norton would most likely expect more from them.
So, should we praise those who participated in energy wars?



Norton, David L. "Moral Minimalism and the Development of Moral Character." Midwest Studies in Philosophy 13.1 (1988): 180-95.

Witwer, Noelle. "Do You Have a Moral Responsibility to “Go Green”?" The Prindle Post. The Prindle Institute, 6 Mar. 2015. Web. 18 Mar. 2015. <http://www.prindlepost.org/2015/03/moral-responsibility-go-green/>.

Consequentialism in Gun Control

In class last week we discussed how Shafer-Landau describes consequentialism as choosing the most optimific act.  An optimific act is a scenario where you have weighed the pros and cons for either choice you make and picking the one with the best overall outcomes.  Following a consequentialist mindset means the optimific act is obligatory in happening regardless of how the outcome will affect your own individual life.  This notion of sacrificing your own self interest for the benefit of the aggregate tends to be the deal breaker for many philosophers, myself included.  While I absolutely value happiness outside of my own and want others to attain success and achieve their goals, at the end of the day all individuals are intrinsically motivated through their own subjective biased and that is something I find to be hard to practically overcome.

The Gap Between Good Will and Volunteer Work

Volunteers traditionally project the image of dedication, commitment, and morality. Volunteers feel as though they are performing a good deed, further, an act of good will. Kant would disagree. Kant classifies a good will as something not considered or contemplated, but as a duty both known and expected. Good will is done without analysis of outcome or weighing of possible consequences. These good wills are limitless in their intrinsic value and are established by maxims which can be universalized. Volunteer work seemingly aligns with all of these motivations based on its basic concept. However, volunteering has been socially warped into an act of self-gratification and self-benefit.

Is a Woman's Plea of Clemency an Exception to Kantian Ethics?

Immanuel Kant once wrote in his philosophical writing, Metaphysical Elements of Justice "If, however, he has committed a murder, he must die. In this case there is no substitute that will satisfy the requirements of legal justice. There is no sameness of kind between death and remaining alive even under the most miserable conditions, and consequently there is also no equality between the crime and the retribution unless the criminal is judicially condemned and put to death." Would Immanuel Kant apply this logic to the case of Kelly Gissendaner?

Shortcomings of Lex Talionis

German philosopher, Immanuel Kant, is arguably one of the most important and most widely read philosophers of morality.  However, this popularity and merit does not come without challenges in his arguments.  Two central ideas in Kant's moral philosophy are the Principle of Humanity and Lex Talionis, the theory used when prescribing justice. The principle of humanity, in short, claims it is morally obligatory to treat others never as merely an object, but rather always with respect for humanity, or anything capable of autonomy and reason.  Kant argues that humanity is infinitely valuable.  Lex talionis, on the other hand, is the law of retaliation.  Broadly, it "tells us to treat criminals as they have treated their victims" (Shafer-Landau 182). In other words, it is the eye-for-an-eye principle.  In this post, I will argue that Kant's principle of humanity and lex talionis are contradictory of each other's core principles.

Kant's Good Will

What if I were to tell you that happiness had no value? What if I were to tell you that happiness was only achieved as a result of wrongdoing? Kant states that happiness is merely one of numerous values that can be abused and misused. As a result, happiness is not consistent and therefore it is not always valuable. However, there is a value believed to be absolute and consistent. According to Kant this is the good will.

As defined by Kant, the good will “is the ability to reliably know what your duty is, and [the] steady commitment to doing [one's] duty for its own sake” (Shafer 178). In other words, the good will is doing what we know is right and expected of us without any sort of hesitation or question, regardless of the possible outcomes. The objective of the good will is not the outcome, it is the will and the intention under which the action is performed—this is what makes the action praiseworthy and moral. The intention in turn affects the moral worth of the action, this is what influences the overall praise that the action will receive. For example, a man volunteering in order to fulfill service hour requirements and for the praise is less praiseworthy and viewed as has having slightly less moral worth than the individual that volunteers in order to create more good and for the overall health and well being of the community. But, if the good will is our duty where is it that we draw the line in regards to acting on our duties that possibly infringe on the rights of others? Where does the respect and the dignity that Kant speaks of come into effect?

In the case of the “Cassandra C,” as she appears in legal documentations, the 17 year old who was mandated to undergo chemotherapy against her desires can be seen as an example of what Kant's considered the idea of the good will. Receiving statistics from her medical providers Cassandra and her mother opted to refuse chemotherapy and go about their lives. They continually missed appointments that put the terminally ill teenager at risk. In relation to the good will, the hospital was doing what they believe to be their duty and they were acting upon it. As a result, the Connecticut Department of Children and Families became involved in what appeared to be a case of medical neglect. With good will and good intentions the department was simply trying to protect Cassandra and take care of immediate and desperate medical needs.

However, Cassandra did not wish to continue to receive treatment and she preferred to discontinue it and go about her time, conscious of the consequences. Under good will where is it that we see its boundaries? Although it was in the department and the hospital's moral duty to care for the patient and see that she receive the necessary treatment in order to heal and recover, it was not what the patient deemed necessary and it was not what she wanted. Do these “wants” outweigh the necessities and the possibility of improving health? When is it acceptable to forfeit your rights in the practice of the good will in order to please and satisfy the patient and their desires? Does allowing a patient to suffer not violate the Hippocratic oath? The same general idea applies to the concept of physician assisted suicide, although the concept of such medical practices does in fact lie on a very slippery slope, when does the good will that is expected by us exceed the desires and the legal rights of the patient? When is it right to intervene, and when is it not?

Cassandra was forced to continue to receive chemotherapy despite legal attempts to halt treatment.

Is it moral to utilize the good will to do a duty that would generally be optimific if it no longer respects the human and their intrinsic dignity and rights?

Shafer-Landau, Russ.The Fundamentals of Ethics. 2nd ed. New York: Oxford UP, 2010. Print.

"Connecticut Teen in Remission as Forced Chemo Nears End - CNN.com." CNN. Cable News Network, n.d. Web. 11 Mar. 2015.

Johnson, Robert. "Kant's Moral Philosophy." Stanford University. Stanford University, 23 Feb. 2004. Web. 10 Mar. 2015.

WWUD? New Delhi Brutal Gang Rapist Testimony

Warning: This blog post post contain information about a highly brutal sexual assault case. Please read with caution. 

Utilitarianism and Capital Punishment

Utilitarianism and Capital Punishment

            While reading Shafer-Landau the sentence that stood out to me most was “Utilitarian’s reject any absolute ban on killing innocents (or torturing them, or stealing from them, etc.)” (148).   This goes as far to say as innocent rather than criminals, and at first I was puzzled to why utilitarianism would be OK with killing someone that isn't doing any harm in the eyes of the judicial system.  But the more I thought about it I remembered it doesn't matter whether the law allows or disallows the act if the act would provide more happiness to people it is considered OK.  Brain storming of cases that would fall under this category, of killing, torturing, or stealing from an “innocent” person, adultery and stealing from the rich and dispersing his wealth among the less fortunate.  There are so many different calculations one would have to do to prove that his or her actions were justified that it is hard to take yourself out of the act and be impartial.  Yet, you have to be impartial in order to be looking at the situation from the utilitarianism perspective.  In this case I came the conclusion that it is impossible to do the calculations while being impartial, therefore look at the situation in all aspects in the utilitarian’s view.  But this caused me to wonder what utilitarian’s view on capital punishment is.

            I initially thought that they would support it because it would give closure to some families and that it would rid the world of a vicious criminal, but I was wrong.  According to Antonio Cassese utilitarianism view that it is justified because “capital punishment deters criminals from murder.  Furthermore, killing murderers prevents recidivism” if released from prison they might kill again.” (Cassese).  Also that by using capital punishment we don’t expend as much money on murders by imprisoning them the rest of their lives.  These two arguments are both justified in my eyes, especially the second one.  He goes on to say that there is a utilitarianism argument against capital punishment too that states it is an irreversible act, and what if he or she is latter proven guilty?  One would have been killed for no reason, and he can’t be given his life back like he would have been if he or she would have been imprisoned. 

            Having these two views that both use utilitarianism views interest’s me because it should simply come down to a simple addition of the positives and negatives, and we still get two outcomes?  I thought that utilitarianism all agreed because math has no positives and negatives, but it truly comes down to one’s own moral views and values.  Tying it back into that idea that it is impossible to approach a situation impartially, which disproves, in my opinion, that utilitarianism can either support or not support capital punishment.

Works Cited

"Beyond the Death Penalty Debate." Beyond the Death Penalty Debate. Web. 06 Mar. 2015. <http://www.policyinnovations.org/ideas/commentary/data/death_penalty>.

Shafer-Landau, Russ. The Fundamentals of Ethics. New York: Oxford UP, 2010. Print.