Lesson 4: Human Acts and Law

Topic: Determinants of Human Acts, Types of Ethics, Law and Conscience

Learning Outcomes: At the end of this module, you are expected to:

1. Explain the elements in determining the morality of a human act;

2. Outline the types of ethics; and
3. Define Natural law, Positive law and Conscience.

LEARNING CONTENT

Introduction:

This lesson focuses on the elements in determining the morality of a human act. It enumerates
and explicates the types of ethics, define and discusses natural law, positive law and conscience.

Lesson Proper:

Elements in determining the morality of Human Acts

Elements Description
1. The Object/Act This is the action itself. This answers the question
WHAT. It refers to the Human Act itself. For an act
to be ethically and morally good, the object must be
good in itself, otherwise it is bad. (Living a Christian
Moral Life, 2013).

2. The Circumstance This refers to the persons involved, the time, place
and occasion that surround an object/act. In other
words, it answers the questions: WHO, WHEN, WHERE and
HOW.
This can change or completely alter the moral quality of
a human act.
Circumstance is a condition modifying human actions,
either by increasing or diminishing the moral
responsibility.(Living a Christian Moral Life, 2013).

3. The Intention or End Every human act, no matter how trivial or significant, is
or Purpose done with an intention or purpose – the reason behind
the act. This answers the question WHY. For a human
act to be ethically and morally good, the agent or doer
must have a good intention. Many such activities are
said to be morally indifferent in themselves but when
performed, their moral quality lies in the intention and
circumstance behind this activities. The end or intention
can modify human action in four ways:

a. An indifferent act may become morally good or bad.

b. An objectively good act may become morally bad.
c. An objectively good act can receive added goodness.

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 An objectively bad act can never become good in
spite of the good motive (Living a Christian Moral
Life, 2013).

1. Act /Action – There are actions that we can easily Example:

see if they are good or bad. -Killing is obviously bad
-Helping is generally good

2. Purpose/Intention - There are actions which morality Example:

can only be seen upon examining the purpose of the -Helping someone. Is it good or bad?
doer. -It depends on the purpose of the doer.

3. Circumstance – (who, what, when, where, how or Example:

person/doer, action/thing, time, place, and -Is punching someone bad? What if it’s a baby punch
manner) or just a friendly punch?
-What if you slap someone unintentionally out of panic?
-Bawal bang maghubad? How about in the bathroom?

Other Principles/application of the Act, Purpose and Circumstance criteria:

1. The Act is good if the three (Act, Purpose, and Circumstance) are good.

2. If one of the three (Act, Purpose, and Circumstance) is bad, then the act is bad.

3. An indifferent act may become morally good or bad. (depending on the

intention/purpose of the doer)

4. An objectively good act may become morally bad. (Purpose?)

Example: when a person gives alms to a poor girl with the intention of seducing her.

5. An objectively bad act can never become good in spite of the good motive. Example: to steal money with the
good intention of giving it to charitable institutions or to the poor, as the legendary Robin Hood did. As the
principle says, “The end does not justify the means.”

Types of Ethics

1. Deontology Deontology (or Deontological Ethics) is an approach to Ethics that focuses on

the rightness or wrongness of actions themselves, as opposed to the rightness or
wrongness of the consequences of those actions (Consequentialism) or to
the character and habits of the actor (Virtue Ethics).

Deontology may sometimes be consistent with Moral Absolutism (the belief that some
actions are wrong no matter what consequences follow from them), but not
necessarily.

The deontological class of ethical theories states that people should adhere to
their obligations and duties when engaged in decision making when ethics are in play.

Deontology is ethics of doing and action.

The word deontology derives from the Greek words for duty (deon) and science (or
study) of (logos). In contemporary moral philosophy, deontology is one of those kinds
of normative theories regarding which choices are morally required, forbidden, or

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 permitted. In other words, deontology falls within the domain of moral theories that
guide and assess our choices of what we ought to do (deontic theories), in contrast to
those that guide and assess what kind of person we are and should be (aretaic [virtue]
theories). And within the domain of moral theories that assess our choices,
deontologists—those who subscribe to deontological theories of morality—stand in
opposition to consequentialists (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, 2016)

2. Virtue ethics Character-based ethics

A right act is the action a virtuous person would do in the same circumstances.
Virtue ethics is person rather than action based: it looks at the virtue or moral
character of the person carrying out an action, rather than at ethical duties and rules,
or the consequences of particular actions.

Virtue ethics not only deals with the rightness or wrongness of individual actions, it
provides guidance as to the sort of characteristics and behaviours a good person will
seek to achieve.

In that way, virtue ethics is concerned with the whole of a person's life, rather than
particular episodes or actions.

A good person is someone who lives virtuously - who possesses and lives the
virtues.

It is ethics of being. It asks the questions: “what does it mean to be human?”; “what is
done repetitively?” or “is it part of your character or very being?”

3. Consequentialism It is the class of normative ethical theories holding that the consequences of one's
conduct are the ultimate basis for any judgment about the rightness or wrongness of
that conduct.
-What is the effect of the action? Is the effect good?

Natural Law

Natural Law are the patterns, order, “rules” or “laws” of nature. These are discovered through observation,
experience, common sense, thinking/reasoning or reflecting. Note: we are part of nature since we are living on
earth/nature. We have a body that connects us with mother nature.

So even our bodies have patterns or “rules” that it follows like we need to sleep at least 8 hours a day, we use
our feet to walk and not our hands, we need to eat at least three times a day and the other functions of the body.
So there is order in our body that needs to be followed or maintain or else you will get sick, until you die, etc.
This is the same with our Mother Nature or mother earth. There are patterns or orders in it that we need to
maintain like how many trees can we cut, avoid so much air pollution, not polluting our rivers so much, etc.

Important note: Once we do not follow Natural Law or these orders in mother nature or in our bodies, it will lead
to sickness, natural calamities until eventually to total destruction. Think my dear children that most of the
calamities we are suffering now are the result of not following the Natural Law. People’s abuse to nature will
come back to us in the forms of calamities like sudden erosion, untimely typhoon, flash flood, global warming,
etc. Even the Covid 19 that we are facing now is a result of people trying to manipulate everything. They taught
that they can easily control everything.

So Natural Law asserts that moral standards that govern human behaviors are objectively derived from the
nature of human beings and the nature of the world.
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Natural Law affirms that since humans are by nature rational beings, it is morally appropriate that they should
behave in a way that conforms to their rational nature. In relation to human actions, Natural Law is defined as
the light of human reason so we know what to do and what to avoid.

Natural Law is a natural disposition of the human reason ordaining the person to do good and to avoid evil.
Natural Law could be summed up as the law of human conduct which arises from human nature as ordered to
its ultimate natural end and which is recognized by the natural light of reason.

Characteristics of Natural Law

a. Universal. This law is applicable to all creatures.
b. Recognizable. It can be notice through observations, interactions with others, and through deeper
reflection.
c. Obligatory. Since this is the very law that will lead to our well-being there is no other choice or better
choice than to obey it. Not obeying it would lead to the things that the human person would like to
avoid in life which is destruction and damnation.
d. Immutable. it will never be changed or is not subject to change.

Moreover, the contents of the Natural Law are classified into:

a. fundamental moral principles in their general applications such as “Good is to be done and evil is to
be avoided”, “Never do unto another what you would not want him to do unto you,” “the end does not
justify the means,” etc.;
b. General moral principles which sustain and preserve the basic relations of the human person to God,
to himself/herself, and to neighbors. Examples: “honor your parents;” “preserve your own life;” “do
not murder;” and others;
c. Applications of the general principles of morality to specific situations in life and society which come
in the form of specific laws to govern specific situations and circumstances; and
d. Remote conclusions derived by a process of reasoning which require good education and deeper
reflection. Examples of this content are moral problems such as mercy killing, indissolubility of
marriage, contraceptive practices and others.

So these are the rules, guide, norms in nature that you will discover through common sense, observations
and thinking/reasoning or reflecting. In fact, the Ten Commandments except for Commandment Number 1 and
2 are basically Natural Laws. You do not need to read the Bible before you discover that you need to honor your
parents, not kill, not steal, etc. Sorry if I will say one is too slow to think/learn if he/she does not know these rules
by nature or experience or observation since we are rational by nature.

Positive Law. The word “positive” means being promulgated or “published” or announced. a law enacted should
not take effect unless it is promulgated or announced.

Why is there need for the positive laws when in fact there is already the existence of the Natural Law?
The Natural Law has the tendency to be recognized generally in terms of their aspects, and not all people
easily find the proper application of these laws and their deeper implications in the life of the human person.

The Positive Laws are the specific formulations derived from the Natural Law. These are the specific
application of the Natural Law in different human or societal contexts. So the Natural Law is seen, expressed or
applied through the Positive Law. A positive law which does not respect the Natural Law contributes to the
damage on the development of the human person and of the whole creation. It is territorial or contextual, a law
continues until it is changed by another and it is promulgated by a public authority.

The positive laws are just the laws that people formulate/specify from the Natural Law and they impose it to
community or society since a lot of people violate a lot of aspect of the Natural Law or they just ignore it if they
think it will not affect them personally without considering the effect or the damage that it can do to others. Note
that all our actions will have an effect to others either directly or indirectly or affect us now or later. Example is

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the abuse to Mother Nature; before people just ignored it, and they are only alarmed now that we are suffering
from global warming, and other calamities.

Examples of Positive Laws are: Constitution, Policies, ordinances, rules and regulations, etc.

The Positive Law is an ordinance of reason promulgated for the common good by one in charge of the
community or by a competent authority. Examples of human positive laws are the ordinances of a certain place
or the constitution of a certain country.

1. Ordinance. It is a decree or a command and not a request; it demands obedience. One has to follow it.

2. Reasonable. It means a certain positive law is based on reason and not on mere emotion. It must be useful
or good which means it must attain its goal. A positive law is also reasonable if it has the following characteristics:
just or fair, honest, possibility of fulfillment, relatively permanent, and must be promulgated.

3. Common Good. A law must serve the interest of the majority and not favor only few individuals.

4. Competent Authority. One who enacts or authors

a law could be characterized as someone who is
knowledgeable, just, wise, and respectable.

Conscience

- the inner sense of what is right or wrong in one's

conduct or motives, impelling one toward right action.
- is a personal awareness of right and wrong that you
use to guide your actions to do right.
- conscience is the practical judgment of reason
allowing the person to recognize the moral quality of an
act. (CCC).
- Conscience would tell, one must abhor the evil/bad
and embrace what is good.

The Two General Kinds of Conscience

Antecedent conscience It is a conscience that judges an act before it is done.

A typical example is during a quiz -- when a student has two options whether to
cheat or not to cheat. Before he/she cheats, the person knows and is able to
deliberate whether such action is pleasing to him/her or not.

Consequent conscience It judges an act after it is being done.

Going back to the example above, consequent conscience works after the
cheating has been executed by the student and so he/she starts feeling guilty
about the act that he/she committed.

Conscience is further classified into different forms such as correct conscience and false conscience; scrupulous
conscience and lax conscience; and certain conscience and doubtful conscience. These classifications fall either
under antecedent or consequent conscience depending whether moral assessment happens before or after a
human act is being done.

a. Correct conscience is a conscience that judges a good act as good and a bad act as indeed bad.
b. False conscience - the opposite of correct conscience. One judges a good act as bad and bad act as good.

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 c. Scrupulous conscience - one is always afraid of committing errors; thus not following
rules/laws is tantamount to committing errors.
d. Lax conscience - a person keeps on excusing him/herself from every mistake
committed. It is as if, he/she does not commit any mistake at all.
e. Certain conscience is a firm judgment that one is not in error. It means, it is clear and evident that what a
person does is indeed right.
f. Doubtful conscience - judgment is always suspended because of the uncertainty of the goodness and
badness of a human action. The word ‘doubt’ denotes the idea that one is not sure of what he/she is doing.

General Principle: Always follow your conscience.

*** END of LESSON 4***

REFERENCES

Textbooks
1. Ignacio, Norlito A. (1985). Man and His Actions. Manila: Rex Bookstore.
2. Maniwang, M.N., Parallag, C.R., Washington, S.L. (2013). Living a Christian Moral Life. CICM Publishing
House: CICM Philippines.

Online Reference

1. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (2016). Deontological Ethics. Retrieved on September 4, 2020 from
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/ethics-deontological/

2. Ethics Guide. Virtue Ethics. Retrieved on September 4, 2020 from

http://www.bbc.co.uk/ethics/introduction/virtue.shtml#h1

3. The Basics of philosophy. Deontology. Retrieved on September 4, 2020 from

https://www.philosophybasics.com/branch_deontology.html

4. Wikipedia. The Free Encyclopedia. Consequentialism. Retrieved on September 4, 2020 from

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consequentialism

Picture Reference:

1. Vector, S. Alamy. Good action: girl gives money to a homelessperson. Retrieved on September 5, 2020
from https://www.alamy.com/stock-photo-good-action-girl-gives-money-to-a-homeless-person-135505577.html

2. Voyagerix. Depositphotos. Retrieved on September 5, 2020 from

https://depositphotos.com/82877048/stock-photo-man-holding-axe-giving-gift.html

3. Duns, R. (2019). Why keeping cellphones out of the classroom is a good spiritual practice. Retrieved on
September 5, 2020 from https://www.americamagazine.org/politics-society/2019/01/25/why-keeping-
cellphones-out-classroom-good-spiritual-practice

4. Overmiller, T. (2016). Distracted Worship. Retrieved on September 5, 2020 from

https://shepherdthoughts.com/baptistchurchny/distracted-worship/

5. Neves, P. Good and evil concept. Retrieved on September 5, 2020 from

https://www.123rf.com/profile_petersnow?mediapopup=102331201

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