...QUESTIONS FOR THE ‘ETHICALLY-PROFESSIONAL’ C.P.A.-TO-BE 1. Do YOU care about how your actions as a C.P.A. could benefit or harm other persons / society? (from our discussion of Psychological Egoism) I care about how my actions as a C.P.A could benefit or harm other persons/society. I realize that as a professional working for the public I need to use due care in working as a C.P.A. As a member of the AICPA I’m obligated to follow the Code of Ethics designed for members to follow when working in the profession. It is in my own self-interest to follow the code of ethics, as if I don’t I might have to bear the consequences, for example suspension of my license. As a C.P.A professional it is in my own self-interest to follow the rules and regulations set forth by the Board of Accountancy and other authorities if I want to stay in this profession. 2. Do YOU believe that there are (at least some) objective ethical standards and norms? – Or do you think that ethical standards and norms are subjective, merely a matter of what you subjectively feel is right / wrong? (from our discussion of Ethical Subjectivism) Subjectivism says that the moral values are dependent on a human or divine will, and that they can change from one situation to another. I believe there are some objective ethical standards and norms. Ethical subjectivists might claim that morals are based on culture or religion. However, humans have some moral values that are universal. For example murder,...
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...interpreted by roles of individuals in society; therefore, liberty has different descriptions depending on the society you are considering. Paternalism is the complete opposite of liberty. It is defined as the fatherly way of running a government, where society has no rights or responsibilities given to them. It is a form of policy that practices authoritative and controlling ways within a government. Unfortunately, the use of non-therapeutic drugs, alcohol, guns, prostitution and pornography are very much available in our day and age. Drugs are available amongst children and within middle school. Alcohol and guns are not as accessible to get to because there are laws that make it more difficult for minors to actually get their hands on them. Pornography is becoming less accessible for minors as well throughout the internet. These things are reoccurring every day and hour of the day and making it illegal will not stop it. In fact, illegalizing the availability of these things will increase the crime rate. Minimizing the requirements to use or have access to them would be a more productive solution. For example, under the Constitution of the United States of America, citizens of this country have the right to bear arm, but this does not mean minors should have the opportunity to buy and use a gun. There must be restrictions and supervision to the accessibility of drugs, alcohol, guns etc. The reality of the matter is that individuals will do as they please no matter if these...
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...provided a complete theory of society, all social actions can be understood in terms of how they help society to function effectively or not i.e when a person is sick they are unable to perform their social roles normally. Compared illness to crime, acts as a deviance disturbing the functioning of society, which needs to be controlled and the deviant helped or forced back into their social role once again. Illness is just one of a number of forms of deviance that could be harmful to society. The sick role – argued that the idea of sickness was not a biological concept, instead it was a social one. So when you are ill, you are acting in different, deviant ways compared to the norm. Being sick was one social role, where the deviant acted in a certain way according to the culture of society. In Western societies, this involved four elements: rights x 2, and obligations x 2. Rights of the sick role: 1. the sick person has the right to be exempted from normal social obligations such as employment, and family activities. How much the sick person took on this role depends upon the seriousness of the illness and other people’s acceptance. 2. The sick person has nothing to do with the sick role and therefore cannot be blamed – they must have the right to be ‘looked after’ by others Obligations of the sick role: 1. The sick person must accept that the situation is undesirable and need to recover as soon as possible. 2. Must seek professional help Parsons believes that...
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...Although academic business ethics is relatively recent, its intellectual roots are found in the corporate social responsibility (CSR) and business and society literatures originating in law and in business in the early and middle 20th century (Marcoux). The corporate focus is evident in the titles of early works of academic business ethics that have done much to shape the subsequent discussion in the field. Velasquez’s "International Business, Morality and the Common Good" 1992 paper takes business ethics to be concerned centrally with questions about the corporation's proper role in and relationship to the social order. These questions are said to surround the moral status of the corporation: Is the corporation a moral agent? Do multinational companies have any moral obligations to contribute to the international common good? While dominant management thinking is steered by profit maximization, this paper proposes that sustained organizational growth can best be stimulated by attention to the common good and the capacity of corporate leaders to create commitment to the common good. However, the complex process of re-orientating corporate priorities towards the common good requires alertness and concerted effort if both business and society are to truly benefit. In our contemporary post-modern context, it has become increasingly awkward to talk about a good that is shared by all. This is particularly true in the context of multi-national corporations operating in global markets...
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...physician with a retainer practice limits his or her patient panel size to a manageable number, creating a more satisfying practice style and more time for both practice and other pursuits; these physicians and their patients have a better primary care experience than before. Critics of retainer medicine suggest that such arrangements breach a de facto social contract between physicians and society and will worsen the current imbalance between the number of primary caregivers and the patients who need them. So far, professional organizations have not taken a stance on retainer medicine, although the American College of Physicians has sounded a cautionary note about its ethical status. The authors contend that retainer medicine is an ethical form of practice that will eventually improve the work conditions for primary caregivers and thereby diminish the shortage of PCPs in the United States. Part of the authors’ argument is they do not believe the pursuit of social justice is an integral aspect of physician identity, despite numerous contemporary assertions to that effect. They contend that social justice is a civic virtue that makes its claims upon physicians as citizens and if physicians are obligated to further health care access for every member of society, then they have that obligation as members of society, not as physicians. It is enough that physicians concentrate their moral...
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...debilitating medical condition or disease, and argued my point that addiction should not be considered a disease, but rather a behavioral problem. Assuming the “sick role” offers rights and social exemptions that I do not feel addicts deserve, as well as demanding obligations that addicts are not interested in adhering to. In the following pages, I explain my position that society enables addict by labeling addiction as a disease, thus exempting them from any responsibility for that which they are entirely responsible for.when, on, the economy could collapse An addiction forms into a habit only after the choice has been made to consume a addictive substance in the first place; Addiction is a physical or mental habit; you could have an addiction as simple as biting your nails or as pervasive as smoking methamphetamine. However, while addiction is a very complex and serious problem for many people, others are able to use equal proportions of substances and are unaffected by the grasp of addiction. Although certain people may have more self-control/willpower than others, this does not make them immune to the physical and chemical properties of addiction, they are only more resilient to the inevitable cycle of addiction. Based on the fact that some people are less affected than others, it is my opinion that addiction is not a disease, but an emotional problem stemming from a mental tendency to over-indulge. The term disease is far too respected to describe a condition that can only be acquired...
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...Duties All humans are put on this earth for their own specific purpose. Some people are destined to be an influence and do great things, while others are here solely to be cogs in the clock that keeps the world turning. Regardless on where one stands in relationship to their fellow man, we all have been charged with civic and moral obligations to those in our inner most circles of friends and family, as well as to our employers. After living approximately a quarter of my life, I believe that I have discovered these duties and moral obligations. They can be found in my religion as a Christian as well as in the Boy Scout law. In attempts to find linearity between different ethical view points and my beliefs, Jane English’s theories about families, and Kant’s virtue ethics can be compared to my moral guidelines. Through the years, some friends choose to come and go as they please, where as others will stay by your side no matter what. Your family will stay with you for life; you did not ask for it, and perhaps they did not ask for you. No matter who you have by your side, it is to these people who you should have the most obligations to. To begin, looking to religion under the Ten Commandments, we see the first commandment instructing a moral obligation to our family: “Honor thy mother and thy father.” This first commandment allows for a number of different circumstances where it may be applicable. When referring to mothers and fathers, sometimes the real mother and...
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...ethical theory that an entity, be it an organization or individual, has an obligation to act to benefit society at large. In our daily life, you perform a number of activities. For example, brushing our teeth, showing respect to elders obeying traffic rules on road etc. Now why do we perform all these activities? It is because we live in a family as well as in a society and the members of our family as well as the society want to do all of them. They do several things for us and expect something from us, which you must do. The expectations of the family or society become our obligations, which you need to fulfill. For example, keeping the road clean by not throwing garbage on it, etc. There are also obligations towards our self, which you need to fulfill. For example, taking food timely, going to sleep early at night, etc. that keep you fit and takes care of your health. Now we fulfill all these obligations by performing certain activities which are called our responsibilities. Any responsibility we have, particularly towards members of the society with whom we interact or towards the society in general, are called your social responsibility. * Social Responsibility of Business :- As we know, every business operates within a society. It uses the resources of the society and depends on the society for its functioning. This creates an obligation on the part of business to look after the welfare of society. So all the activities of the business should be such that they...
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...point most people can agree with his arguments unlike others whom may not see his point of view. One of these arguments was lack of food. This was brought up or inspired by the starvation of Bangladesh his main focus was that if one can use one's wealth to reduce suffering for example, by aiding famine-relief efforts without any significant reduction in the well-being of oneself or others, it is immoral not to do so. According to Singer, such inaction is clearly immoral. If a child is drowning in a shallow pond and someone can save it but chooses not to; nor does placing greater geographical distance between the person in need and the potential helper reduce the latter's moral obligations. “It makes no difference whether the person I can help is a neighbor's child ten yards away from me or a Bengali whose name I shall never know, ten thousand miles away. The moral point of view requires us to look beyond the interests of our own society. Previously, this may hardly have been feasible, but it is quite feasible now. From the moral point of view, the prevention of the starvation of millions of people outside our society must be considered at least as pressing as the upholding of property norms within our society.” Singers main issue was can you be helpful without wanting too or can you help someone without wanting but still can help a very good example was the kid in pond, you can be at near inches but not wanting to help the kid is a big difference from wanting to help the same kid...
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...Political Obligation First published Tue Apr 17, 2007; substantive revision Fri Apr 30, 2010 To have a political obligation is to have a moral duty to obey the laws of one's country or state. On that point there is almost complete agreement among political philosophers. But how does one acquire such an obligation, and how many people have really done what is necessary to acquire it? Or is political obligation more a matter of being than of doing — that is, of simply being a member of the country or state in question? To those questions many answers have been given, and none now commands widespread assent. Indeed, a number of contemporary political philosophers deny that a satisfactory theory of political obligation either has been or can be devised. Others, however, continue to believe that there is a solution to what is commonly called “the problem of political obligation,” and they are presently engaged in lively debate not only with the skeptics but also with one another on the question of which theory, if any, provides the solution to the problem. Whether political obligation is the central or fundamental problem of political philosophy, as some have maintained (e.g., McPherson), may well be doubted. There is no doubt, however, that the history of political thought is replete with attempts to provide a satisfactory account of political obligation, from the time of Socrates to the present. These attempts have become increasingly sophisticated in recent years, but they have brought...
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...are signing up for. Anil Netto quoted in the article titled “Health-Asia: Ethics in Outsourcing Drug Trials Questioned,” that by doing these clinical trials in foreign countries, drug companies are “exploiting the healthy who are strapped for cash and the sick who seek cheap or free remedies.” In regards to the utilitarian theory, testing drugs in foreign countries would prove to be unethical. Utilitarianism more specifically act utilitarianism tells us that we should always do an action that generates the greatest happiness for whoever is affected by the act. In act utilitarianism one must consider all consequences of a singular action, and then act if and only if that action maximizes utility for all affected. This type of utilitarianism only has us answer one specific question which is “does this specific action maximize happiness or utility for all parties affected?” Although clinical trials may be useful in finding new drugs and could maximize happiness by doing so. In a way yes, clinical trials could help the medical world and patients, but are the consequences and side effects of these trials worth the risk? In the article stated above, Netto states although clinical trials are supposed to follow specific guidelines, but “these official guidelines are not binding...
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...because his society says so, but also because he is a professor. As an educator, he has a code of ethics which he adheres to. It is very apparent that teachers are not allowed to have any kind of relationship with their students. What he did here is more than disturbing and alarming. He almost forcibly seduced one of his more vulnerable students. Deontological ethics states that we have our duties and obligations to do in the society we are living in. We are “ought” to do certain things; things...
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...Famine, Affluence, and Morality Giving to charity usually is viewed as a generous act, most people who give to charitable causes are held in high regard and thought of as good people, the question peter singer is asking us to consider in the article “Famine, Affluence, and Morality” is where is the moral grey area between charity and obligation when it comes to giving up what we have for others. Who in society decides what is good but not wrong to not do as charity is considered. I can achieve this by looking at Singers arguments, counterarguments and concept of marginal utility while comparing how duty and charity change in the article. The article opens by detailing the famine East Bengal is experiencing in 1971 in details and lists the causes of the Famine, and the number of refugees that amounts to roughly 9 million. Then he lists the affluent nations who are doing basically nothing to help these people, the citizens are not donating or protesting and the governments even if giving to the relief are not doing enough. “Generally speaking, people have not given large sums to relief funds; they have not written to their parliamentary representatives demanding increased government assistance; they have not demonstrated in the streets, held symbolic fasts, or done anything else directed toward providing there refugees with the means to satisfy their essential needs.”(Singer, 1972) From the start his first argument is that of the drowning child, he states that if he sees a...
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...number if you DISAGREE with what is said. Try not to leave any blank. 1. The only motive anyone has in doing anything is to get some-thing for him/herself. Even when you help others, it's only because it makes you feel good. 2. Only if you would agree to allow everyone to do what you are doing is your action morally allowable or right. 3. What makes an action obligatory is that it leads to the great-est good for the greatest number. Motives are irrelevant. 4. The only thing that counts in determining whether someone did the right thing or not is the motive. The results of the action are irrelevant. 5. Since we can always turn out to be wrong about a factual claim (for example, we think there are nine planets in the solar system, but perhaps there are ten), we don't really know anything about such matters. 6. The only thing that is worth pursuing is pleasure. 7. A good will can't be used for any bad end, but everything else can. So a good will is the only thing that is good in itself. 8. No one knows what is right or wrong, or good or bad. 9. Whenever you justify a specific moral judgment, such as "Slav-ery in the United States was wrong," you have to make reference to a general rule or principle, such as "All slavery is wrong." 10. Things of value in our society should be distributed to those who can afford them as a result of their success in competing in our economic system. 11. Moral judgments are an expression of personal taste...
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...Critical Response Essay 1. If Fred were a Utilitarian, what would he do? Utilitarianism is a consequentialist theory where right and wrong depends on the consequences of one’s actions for everyone who might be affected by them. In other words, Utilitarian individuals want a system that will bring good to society than any other system. The philosophy of consequentialism is also based on the belief that the moral and ethical value of one’s action should be judged by the consequence of such action. In the case where Fred has signed a confidentiality agreement with Greyarea Inc. he is unable to leak out any information to the public about his research findings. If he were to tell anyone else that the cigarettes are more harmful, then the consequences of him being sued by the company due to a breach of the contract would be the repercussions. This is not to say that if Fred did give out the information about the truth of their newly developed cigarettes, he would be right or wrong. In the case with his company, he will be considered doing wrong. If Fred were a Utilitarian he would want to bring good to the society as a whole by letting the public know that the cigarettes in production is actually more addictive and has a higher chance of developing cancer in smokers. He would disregard the repercussions that would affect his family and career even when he is financially secure. His moral beliefs would tell him that his actions are for the greater good and so much more important...
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