The history of ethics practically began with the appearance of the first humans, when they understood the difference between right and wrong, as well as between right and wrong. It was then that they began to look for ways to justify and determine their actions. However, it was not until Ancient Greece that philosophers began to deliberate on ethics.
After considering that their gods were not good ethical references, authors such as Plato and Aristotle left their thoughts on this subject in their works. The thinkers belonging to currents such as Stoicism or Epicureanism did the same. In the Middle Ages, unlike in Greece, ethics was completely linked to religion.
For this reason, the most important philosophers who wrote about it were related to Catholicism. This changed in the Modern Age, especially with the one considered to be the father of modern ethics: Kant. Currently, scholars have established that ethics is divided between normative and moral theory.
The first studies the problem of good and evil and establishes the moral code that must prevail. The second, for its part, explores the essence of morality, its origin and its development. Antecedents of ethics Although it is very likely that the first human beings already raised ethical questions, this as a philosophical matter did not appear until much later.
In general, ethics is defined as a branch of philosophy that studies human behavior from the point of view of right and wrong, good and bad, happiness and duty. In addition, it is in charge of looking for the value systems that support these concepts. At the dawn of human history, early humans searched for what was right and what was wrong.
Likewise, they established a series of values and norms that had to be obeyed. Otherwise, they were punished. In Ancient Egypt, for example, these moral norms were collected in papyri, as in the case of The Book of the Dead.
Also in Mesopotamia these moral codes of conduct were established. This can be seen in the Code of Hammurabi, which apart from reflecting the laws of the time, established the rights and obligations of society and doctors. Origins According to many experts, ethics appeared at a time when society was slave-owning.
This appearance was related to the changes caused by the transition from primitive society to classical civilization. At such times, morality began to be emphasized . In some of Homer's poems and in other Greek works it can be seen how the development of ethical thought occurred at the same time as the elaboration of abstract moral norms.
An important aspect was the nature of the Greek gods. These, immortals, had a violent and unscrupulous behavior, so they were not suitable references to be imitated. Philosophers like Socrates, although they respected religious ceremonies, preferred to ignore their mythology when talking about ethics.
Ancient Age It was the ancient Greeks who began to study ethics as a branch of philosophy. The word itself originated in that civilization. Thus, the original meaning of the term ethos was a common room or dwelling.
Later, the term expanded its meaning and came to designate the habit, the character, the way of thinking or the temperament. Plato Plato treated ethics from various points of view and contexts. In Gorgias, for example, the author sought to overcome the law of the strongest and hedonism, while in Phaedo, he shows the importance of what is after death to know how to behave in life.
On the other hand, in La República, he dealt with individual ethics, understood as justice within the soul, like public ethics. In this last aspect, Plato elaborated a complex theory of the State, which he later completed in The Politician and The Laws. Aristotle Aristotle devoted an entire work to the study of this matter.
The Nicomachean Ethics, the name of the treatise, was based on the premise that every individual seeks happiness, which is called eudemonic ethics. The Greek philosopher affirmed that all natural beings tend to fulfill their own functions and try to fully realize their potentialities. For Aristotle, the good, which he identified with the perfection of being, consists in fulfilling those own functions, everything that only he can do.
Human beings are no strangers to this dynamic, although there is a question as to how their own function. Aristotle reflected in his work some of the opinions of his contemporaries on the subject and concluded that, in most cases, they agreed that it was about being able to carry out the higher activity (contemplation) with sufficient goods and health. To the above I had to add that it was also necessary to have a sufficient number of friends.
The author also affirmed that only those freely chosen actions could be moral, while the obligatory ones were neither moral nor immoral. Epicureans and Stoics Other philosophical currents of Ancient Greece, such as the Stoics and the Epicureans, also developed their own theories on ethics. In the case of these two schools, their visions were totally opposed: the Stoics based it on a moderate and virtuous life, while the Epicureans affirmed that pleasure should be sought.
Middle Ages The Middle Ages, despite its fame as a dark age, was a period of considerable philosophical activity. Scholasticism Medieval philosophy was developed with a very technical theoretical vocabulary, mainly because the dominant philosophical tradition, scholasticism, was quite complicated and only suitable for the very learned. In general, the thinkers of the time united the Christian religious doctrine with some elements of the classical philosophers, such as the fact that the ultimate goal of human actions was to obtain the good in order to be happy.
In the religious aspect, medieval ethics provided the rules that include the ten commandments. Thus, the ultimate goal of human behavior is charity, which can only be achieved if one lives from the Gospel. This allows the human being to access the vision of God after death, the only moment in which the supreme good and maximum fulfillment is achieved.
Saint Thomas Aquinas and Saint Augustine of Hippo Among the most important medieval authors Saint Augustine of Hippo and Saint Thomas Aquinas stood out. The latter dedicated the second part of Summa Theologica to ethics, recovering part of Aristotelian thought. As noted, medieval philosophers developed their ethical theories from Christian moral doctrine.
Thomas Aquinas did it on the basis of Aristotle, with the difference that happiness, the highest good, was equated with God. This grants the eternal law and establishes what is true morality. That natural law established by God includes, according to the author, some moral principles that are found in the human being as natural inclinations.
The first of these principles would be that "good is to be done and evil avoided. " Modern Age Already in modern times, the philosophers who dealt with morality tried to recover part of the theories from the classical world, although the influence of medieval scholasticism remained. Descartes included some elements on ethics in his Discourse on Method, while Spinoza, from rationalism, made a much more complete proposal.
David Hume, for his part, focused his work on understanding human behavior from the point of view of empiricism. Immanuel Kant The author who represented the fundamental change that gave rise to modern ethics was Immanuel Kant. This was contrary to ethics if it was not based on the moral imperative itself.
According to the philosopher, if morality is oriented towards the search for happiness, it is impossible for it to generate any universal norm. For Kant and the idealist philosophers, the principle of utility is not the only criterion for correct actions. Marxist ethics As early as the 19th century, Karl Marx associated morality with social class.
For this author, morality fulfilled a social function, since each class has different moral beliefs. These class differences caused that morality should have as its objective the achievement of an egalitarian and just society, in which the conditions that kept men exploited and humiliated were eliminated. 20th century Throughout the 20th century, there were many authors and philosophical currents that dealt with ethics.
The vitalists and existentialists developed a sense of responsibility and choice, while Max Scheler, for his part, developed a phenomenology of values. Precisely the importance reached by the current that values options as the main value led some authors, such as Alain Badiou, to affirm that the issue of ethics in that century had become "a true nihilism". In recent times, an in-depth analysis of the foundations and origins of ethics has been developed.
Among the main contributions are research on the role of emotions in the creation of ethical thinking.
