Note | A Definition of Ethics

What is Ethics

Ethics is a branch of philosophy. It is a principle, a norm or a theory of behaviour, value, and judgement about good or bad, are invented, made up or reformed by philosophical reflexions. To say quite simply, ethics is a form of knowledge treats human good and bad, or a principle of moral, but it’s not exact.

The founder of Stoicism, Zeno of Citium first divide philosophy into three parts of principle: physics, logic and ethics. Aristotle really invented ethics as a separated study which inspired by ethical thought of Socrates and Plato. Originally, Aristotle’s ethics treats all of humane matters such as living human itself, law and system of society. While Aristotle’s physics treats natural matters are not affected by human. Once ethics was total human study, but the time go on ethics was separated by many fields of humanities and social studies. Now a day, ethics exclusively covers moral, morality, matters about them and action by them.

Difference to Moral

Also, moral or morality is a manner or a way of behaviour and judgement of a man live in the world. But ethics and moral are formed by different roots. Moral is a type of norm and value set naturally inherits past and tradition, or typically from a religion. Also, moral is a judgement by intuition to judge good or bad, a natural and spontaneous thinking about behaviour, what we should do and how to act.

The word, ethics is used for exclusively for the field, the norm and the rule of behaviour are built, invent and formed by the method of general collective reflection. Face with a new situation or problem, it’s necessary to allow or forbid these acts, decide them good or bad in each of cases, persons and situations. Ethics is the rule is elaborated and shaped by accounts and realities of multiple points of view, and find a consensus or an accept among each individuals.

Significance of Ethics

Moral can’t deal with contemporary problems such as biotechnology, doping, environmental destruction, globalization, multiculturalism, information technology and AI. These problem must be considered by various view points, various facts, up-to-date knowledge and various principles of general ethics. And, by the ethical consideration, new principles of applied ethics (such as bioethics) in each fields should be formed. On ethics we reflect on to justify rules, to found choices of action, and point of beginning of our commitments. So ethics is a solution to new problems or peculiar situations.

Today is the age of globalization, so we need a universal mutual understanding beyond divides of countries, regions, religions, races, classes, traditions and common knowledge. Moral is formed by tradition, common knowledge and spontaneousness. So it is different in countries, religions and social positions. Moral might occur conflicts and problems. But ethics is formed by common sense and philosophical reflection, always begin from nothing, and present a mechanism of relations to others. Ethics is a key to live better together in the age of globalization.

Conclusion

  1. Ethics is a principle treats behaviour, value, and judgement about good or bad, are invented, made up or reformed by philosophical reflexions and common sense.
  2. Ethics is the rule is elaborated and shaped by accounts and realities of multiple points of view, and find a consensus or an accept among each individuals.
  3. Moral is a type of norm and value set naturally inherits past and tradition.
  4. Significance of ethics is which give us a solution to new problems or peculiar situations, a key to mutual understanding in the age of globalization.

References

Christopher Panza & Adam Potthast, Ethics for Dummies (Wiley Publishing, 2010)

Roger-Pol Droit, L’éthique expliquée à tout le monde (Éditions du Seuil, 2009)

Yoshiaki Utsunomiya, Introduction to Ethics (Chikuma Books, 2019)

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Note | A Definition of Philosophy

What is Philosophy ?

The origin of the word philosophy is “philosophia” of Greek, love or collection of wisdom or knowledge. The definitions of philosophy by André Comte-Sponville is “a (discursif, reasonable and conceptional) theoretical practice”. And the definition of philosopher by Roger-Pol Droit is a specialist of ideas (or concepts) and a friend of knowledge-wisdom.

Philosophy is a way of thinking by concepts and principles for a fundamental comprehensive account of the world. Subjects of the account are (what are) being, human, self, others, life, knowledge, perception, time, virtue, happiness, reality, society, world, universe, to live good and so on.

Philosophy forms or let you have a view to the world and the life. Because it is a fundamental account of the world. So philosophy become a criterion of how to think and how to live good.

Philosophy is a “language game” aims for the universality and mutual general understanding. Philosophy itself and its principles is not absolute and true. Philosophy can be remade to be better one.

Different to Religion

Religion is also a comprehensive account of the world. But religion teaches believers the origin of world, the meaning of life and moral by a story. And a most important thing of religion is believers believe a story of a prophet or a founder, and believe there’s a truth in its story. Religion gives us truth, and salvation, peace mind and the meaning of life by truth, so it’s an indispensable thing for human.

Religion pursuits a truth, but philosophy pursuits a universality. And essences, methods or worths of philosophy and religion are not same. They are in different aspects or spheres. So they are comparative each other. And we can hold both philosophy and religion.

Philosophy is a Process

Philosophy always begin from nothing, root or ignorance, on the other hand it should follow philosophical tradition, problems and themes. New philosophies have appeared as a critical following or a critical turn. Almost philosophers refine their philosophy for their entire career by their own further researches, and arguments and criticisms by others. Philosophy isn’t a truth or a fact. It’s a changeable principle is refined and replaced by better one(s). Because aim of philosophy is to grasp a universality and mutual understanding. So philosophy is an endless process of thinking.

And the history of philosophy is a succession of conflicts between monism and dualism or pluralism, absolutism and relativism, realism and idealism, subjectivism and objectivism, rationalism and anti-philosophy.

Different to Science

Once, Philosophy includes today’s natural science, engineering and social science. The past philosophy is a total science to know principle of the nature and the world. Modern philosophy and modern science are divided, and the feature of modern science is pursuit physical and material facts unlimitedly. Science grasps and describes facts as they are.

But science doesn’t give us principal value of the life. Different to science, philosophy inquires “why and how the facts exit”. Philosophy treats value and meaning of facts include scientific facts. A role and a significance of philosophy is principal value and ethical judgement by thinking about facts. Science can’t reply to questions like “How it should be ?” and “How I live ?”.

On the other hand, the progress of science influences our view to the world and philosophy. Also philosophy of science inquires into the basis and the meaning of science.

Conclusion

  1. Philosophy is a way of thinking by concepts and principles for a fundamental comprehensive account of the world.
  2. Its principle always begin from nothing or ignorance. Philosopher must think by himself, but his thinking should be in the philosophical tradition, themes or problems.
  3. Philosophy is not absolute and true, is a variable process of thinking. Its aim is a universality and mutual understanding of the world.
  4. Philosophy tells how to think and how to live good. So philosophy is a criteria of our thinking, act and life, and give us a key to a the meaning and value of our life.

But philosophy has no fixed definition. Continue to think about what is philosophy or definition of philosophy is also an important element of philosophy.

And some thinkers or philosophers (such as Pyrrho, Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, Deleuze and Derrida) said like “there’s no universal view to the world”, “The philosophical tradition is a fiction.” and “There isn’t a good life and the meaning of life of the world”. These skepticism, pessimism and unti-philosophy are also a philosophy as well.

References

André Comte-Sponville, La philosophie (Presses Universitaires de France, 2012)

Roger-Pol Droit, La philosophie expliquée à ma fille (Édition du Seuil, 2004)

Seiji Takeda, What is Philosophy: To Know Yourself and Society (Iwanami Books, 2002)

Seiji Takeda, A Super Introduction to Philosophy from Age 14 (Chikuma Books, 2009)

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Translation |”On Happiness” from “Notes on Life” by Kiyoshi Miki

Nowadays, people might hardly think about happiness. If you open a book of ethics recently published on our country, then you find easily a book doesn’t treat problems about happiness at all. I don’t know that I can believe such a book is a book of ethics, and I can accept which author is a scholar of ethics. A undoubtedly certain thing is happiness is a key and unavoidable problem of ethics in the all past eras. The Greek classical ethics would be so, also the Stoic rigorousness told the frugality for happiness, then on Christianity, especially St. Augustine and Pascal, their theory of religion and ethics set about a profound fact which human require happiness endlessly. Without thinking about happiness is a characteristics of human today. Today’s confusion of ethics is argued variously, and the fact that theory of happiness disappeared on books of ethics is a representative thing. Till a new theory of happiness will be set upped, confusion of ethics wouldn’t be saved.

You may think, thinking about happiness already must be a… probably a biggest omen of unhappiness. And you may say a man is happy doesn’t think about happiness, as a man has a healthy stomach doesn’t feel a presence of stomach. However, today’s people don’t think about happiness since they are happy ? If anything our era is miserable and which make people lose a motivation to think about happiness. Is the present-day society filled with unhappiness as people feel talking about happiness is an immoral thing ? But a man don’t know what is happiness can know what is unhappiness ? People today must pursue happiness by the instinct. Moreover, they are troubled with their excess of self-consciousness. And the self-conscious men very seldom think about happiness. It’s a characteristic of mental situation today, and it forms a characteristic of unhappiness of people today.


To think about duty by conscience and demand for happiness are opposed is a modern rigourism. In spite of this, I think… today’s conscience is the demand for happiness. The society, the classes, the mankind and so on, there’s nothing as conscientious as demand for happiness in the case of humane demand for happiness is denied by the name of totality. As far as it connects the demand for happiness, ethical concepts used continually today like society, classes mankind and so on may not posses anything ethical means. Or, as the problems of ethics divided them of happiness, all of arbitrary things could be treated as the concepts of ethics. The demand for happiness should be restored as today’s consciousness. The problem of a man is a humanist or not depends on this point mostly.

As the problem of happiness was killed much more on the the problem of ethics, ethical jargons were formed. For instance, be ethical and be subjective are treat as the same is right. But, today, be subjective also became an ethical jargon by being abstract from the demand for happiness. As well theory of motive is going to be vanished on the contemporary ethics, and by the spread of the word “subjective”, ethics resulted in objective on the contrary. Demand for happiness is motive of all acts, were the common staring point of ethics once. The contemporary philosophy learned expel such a thinking as the mentalism, on the other hand chaos of spirits of today’s people people began simultaneously. This chaos are formed when people can’t understand their own motive of action is the demand for happiness or not. Then, at the same time, the reality of mind became doubtful, and various idealisms about humane interpretations raised. The reality of mind is certified only in the case of an order is in the mind. Demand for happiness is the base of the order, and the reality of mind is given by a fact of the demand for happiness. Ethics denying the theory of happiness is apparently logical, but in the fact it should be a Nihilism.


Psychology of the past was a critical study of mind. The aim is a criticism to mind same mean as the criticism of literary critic. The aim of psychology was evaluate and keep good order in various activities and aspects of humane mind. Philosophers are same as literary men in this aim. When a crisis of such a psychology of which criticize value was destroyed by the psychology based on the natural scientific method arised, in the opposite direction the human science occurred. So that, nowadays, the human science also deviate from the original motive and give up the inherent role as a criticism to human mind, and various arbitrary studies are called as the human science. The artistic things on Philosophy has been lost, and leave the profession of critic for human science to literary writers and authors. There’s today’s abstraction of philosophy, one doesn’t own psychology generally. Unforgettable thing at the moment is a particular thing of the contemporary philosophy is relate to the vanish of theory of happiness.


It’s wrong to think about happiness is a mere sensual thing. Or rather, the history of thought indicates subjectivism connect with the ethical theory of happiness. The problem of happiness is the mainstay of subjectivism.


Happiness is not contrary to virtue, or rather happiness is the virtue itself. Sure, it’s right to think about happiness of others. But, can we make a good act beyond your own happiness, for a person you love.


From ordinary trivial things to acts fo self-sacrifice, in various matters, happiness is a power. The fact that virtue is a power indicates the most apparent of happiness.


Goethes’ maxim, Personality is the greatest happiness of earthly men, is nothing like a perfect definition of happiness. To be happy is the same as to be a personality.

The question such as “Is happiness in physical pleasure or in mental pleasure, in action or being ?” pulls us into confusion. To such a question, we should say either is right. Because, personality is both a physical thing and a mental thing, both an action and a being. And, this notion means personality is a formative thing.


The thing today people don’t think about happiness, is suitable for the era of divided personalities as a modern characteristic. And, on the contrary, this fact proves the thesis that happiness is a personality in the scale of world history.


Happiness is a personality. Like a man takes off a coat, a man can easily throw away another happiness anytime is a greatest happy man. But he won’t throw away the true happiness and can’t throw away it. His happiness is one in himself the same as his life. He struggle with any difficulties together with this happiness. A man struggles with happiness as a weapon is happy even if he is defeated.


Good humour, politeness, kindness, tolerance and so on, happiness alway appears in surface. A merely internal happiness is not a true happiness like a poet does’t recite is not a true poet. Happiness is an expressive thing. A thing spontaneously appears outside and make other people happy like a bird sings is the true happiness.

Details of the Book

Notes on Life
Kiyoshi Miki
Iwanami Library, Tokyo, Japon, September 1978
176 pages, JPY 464
ISBN 978-4101019017

Notes on Life
Kiyoshi Miki
Kadokawa-Sophia, Tokyo, Japon, 25 February 2017
304 pages, JPY 648
ISBN 978-4044002824
Contenu

  • Notes on Life
  • Untold Philosophie
  • For My Children
  • Commentary by Ichiro Kishimi

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