Ethics

Ethics (from the Ancient Greek ἠθικός ēthikos, the adjective of ἤθος ēthos "custom, habit"), a major branch of philosophy, is the study of values and customs of a person or group. It covers the analysis and employment of concepts such as right and wrong, good and evil, and responsibility. It is divided into three primary areas: meta-ethics (the study of the concept of ethics), normative ethics (the study of how to determine ethical values), and applied ethics (the study of the use of ethical values There are two main strands of thought, "non-realism" and "realism," that attempt to explain what ethical values and claims are actually about.
One strand is commonly termed 'non-realism', because it suggests moral values are creations, dependent on people's feelings and goals regarding themselves and others (emotivism or prescriptivism) or on their belief systems (cultural or individual relativism). Despite the name 'non-realist', such theories may see reality as important in shaping the human choice of ethical values. This could occur indirectly by, for example, the evolutionary or developmental shaping of human psychology, or directly through, for example, people assessing and debating the likely consequences of their actions.
Another group of meta-ethical theories, which is called 'realism', by contrast, holds that moral value is somehow an intrinsic property of the world and that ethical principles are simply discovered or intuited. Under this view, ethical values held by people can at best reflect an independent Truth by which their validity must be judged. These theories may be derived from theology or naturalism.
Although not explicitly reflected in the discussion that follows, any informed ethics discussion will consider the meta-ethical position of the participants in the discussion. The importance of this distinction can be seen clearly when we consider ethics in psychology (below), in which Lawrence Kohlberg's clearly realist theory might be contrasted against Phil Roberts, Jr.'s arguably non-realist theory. Any ethics discussion that does not first consider the non-realist or realist standings of its participants is doomed to frustration.