In the mouths of politicians and pundits, the phrase "moral and ethical" is a pleonasm—and a sloppy one. Such folk—if asked whether they use both words in the same phrase because they recognise a difference in meaning and wish to denote either the union or the intersection of those meanings—might be hard pressed to explain the difference. Most people, indeed, will almost certainly think the words are synonyms, even if they know that they are, respectively, of Latin and Greek derivation (unlikely in these unclassical days).
And yet there are, arguably, several significant differences between the terms "ethics" and "morals" (or "morality"), and between the adjectives formed from them. Depending on context, "ethics" is either the organised philosophical study of the concepts and principles involved in systems of morality, or it is the set of principles, attitudes, aims and standards adopted by individuals or organisations by which they live and act.
In the first sense, "ethics" is a second-order enquiry into the first-order principles and practices constituting a normative moral outlook ("normative" meaning "guiding" or "prescribing"). In the second sense, "ethics" is itself normative, but it is much broader in scope than "morality," because it concerns practices and aims which are not distinctively moral. For example, a corporate ethics might include prudential guidance about good practice in customer relations and product quality. Such guidance can typically be framed as a hypothetical imperative: "if you wish to maximise profits, ensure that…"
Morality, by contrast, is categorical as opposed to hypothetical; it is about intrinsic questions of right and wrong, the good and the bad, obligation and duty, consequences and intentions, as these apply in our conduct and relationships, where the right and the good are under consideration in themselves and not merely as instrumental to some non-moral goal such as profit, corporate image or the like.
But ethics includes morality; it is broader in scope than morals, but morals is an integral part of it. Ethics is about ethos, about what sort of person one is, or what sort of organisation one belongs to. Morals is about right or good action and intention. Obviously, the latter flows from, or partly determines, or both, the former, and is inseparable from it.
This illustrates the difference precisely: considered as a matter of what sort of person one is, and what sort of life one leads, it is an ethical but not a moral matter what colour you paint your front door. If the colour really upsets the neighbours, however, it is a moral matter.
Politicians and pundits, accordingly, need only ever say "ethical," unless they particularly and more restrictively mean "moral."
Sent in by Rob Wheeler, Faversham. Send your philosophical queries and dilemmas to AC Grayling at
question@prospect-magazine.co.uk
