Question

Choose 5 questions to write about out of the following. No less than a one-page response.

1. Your mother is ill with diabetes, and you can’t afford her medicine. In the pharmacy one day, you notice the previous customer forgot that same prescription on the counter when she left. Why might the premise that the ends justify the means lead you to steal the pills?
2. Why might the premise that the means justify the ends lead you to return the pills?
3. Bernie Madoff was a very good—though obviously not a perfect—fraudster. He got away with a lot for a long time. How could the duty to develop one’s own abilities be mustered to support his decision to become a criminal?
4. In the Madoff case, what duties could be mustered to refute the conclusion that he did the right thing by engaging in fraud?
5. Madoff gave up most of his money and possessions and went to jail for his crimes. Is there anything else he should have done to satisfy the ethical duty of reparation?
6. Imagine Madoff lied to attain his clients’ money as he did, but instead of living the high life, he donated everything to charity. For Kant, does this remove the ethical stain from his name? Why not?
7. Think back to your first job, whatever it was. Did you feel like you were used by the organization, or did you feel like they were doing you a favor, giving you the job? How does the experience relate to the imperative to treat others as an end and not a means?
8. How does the right to pursue happiness license Lepp’s Medicinal Gardens?
9. What is a libertarian argument against imprisoning Lepp?
10. One justification Lepp cited for his farm was the health benefits marijuana could provide. Assuming Lepp was right about those benefits, how could they be combined with rights-based ethics to justify his activities?
11. How could the rights to freedom and the pursuit of happiness be set against Lepp’s business?
12. What are positive rights and how could they be mustered against Lepp’s farm?
13. If someone drives away from Lepp’s farm high as a kite and soon after drives off the road and into a tree, does Lepp bear any ethical responsibility for this within a rights ethics?

6 months ago

Answer