Jekyll and Hyde

Throughout The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, there are many interesting moral cases presented.  Not only is there the debate on whether certain actions were moral, but also the question of which characters presented certain classic categorical positions on making ethical decisions.

Dr. Jekyll, for example, seems to follow a theory of virtue ethics.  Instead of looking at end-results, or what the law said was right and wrong, he followed his own moral compass.  He saw who he was as a person, and instead of accepting the shortcomings of man, he instead couldn't live with what he believed was a moral duality.  So in order to have a good public reputation, and continue his private downfalls, he created his potion.  For Dr. Jekyll, he saw what good virtues and flaws he had, and came up with a way to live with both.  This was his moral decision through virtue ethics.

I feel that as a reader, I'm supposed to have sympathy for Dr. Jekyll, but it seems he brought his downfall on himself.  He claimed to have "noble" intentions in the beginning, but how noble is it really to continue a lifestyle you believe to be wrong, simply under a personality through which you won't be recognized?  To be fair, the mixture didn't work as he'd intended.  It didn't make one purely good and one purely evil person: it simply created the latter.  A second identity through which he could release his ill desires.  His true self was not magically remedied of the evil he believed to rest within him.

I think part of the reason I am so inclined to have very little pity for Dr. Jekyll is because he was aware of his actions, and allowed himself to justify them.  Even if his drinking of the potion was initially for the good of humanity as well as for the good of himself, he eventually started to lose control of the situation.  Once he began to have less control over Hyde's actions, he should've disposed of the ingredients immediately.  By allowing himself to continue, he saw what he believed was morally right, and then ignored it.  That adds an interesting component to the moral decisions in the novel.

In our group meeting, we discussed how Dr. Jekyll's perceived character changed throughout the novel.  At first, he was morally upright and seen to be an ethically good character.  However, his connection with the mysterious Mr. Hyde, particularly the forged letter, added suspicion to his character.  Finally, when it is revealed that he and Mr. Hyde are one and the same, he is proven to be one of the most morally-flawed characters in the novel.

Mr. Utterson seemed to be a bit more of a consequentialist.  As one of the most morally-consistent people in the story, he acts in accordance with what he believes to be best for his friends.  The author shows his thought process throughout the story, and in making decisions whether or not to visit Dr. Jekyll, or on when to read Mr. Lanyon's letter, he considered how each would affect his friends, and made his decisions accordingly.

As far as duty-based ethics goes, it is hard to find a character that perfectly represents this.  Other than the policeman perhaps, there weren't many characters who were purely or strongly motivated by following the law.  Most of the novel's characters were motivated by their own desires or by the people around them.

The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde certainly had some interesting perspectives on moral decision-making.  Each character was motivated by something different.  As with the film Source Code, I believe that our perspective as an audience changes based on our narrator.  Different points of view can justify different actions, and different motivations behind moral decisions.  I think one argument presented through novel is the author's answer to the question, Who decides what is morally right?  I believe that Stevenson is of the opinion that it is up to each of us to decide for ourselves, and to try to do so selflessly.

Group Meeting #5

April 8th post by Thomas Luminoso

In the assigned reading there were many questions of moral decision-making. Many of the religious laws that were stated were stated very plainly as to the rules you must follow in order to be a good person. I found that the Religious law was quite far from say, something like virtue ethics and the golden mean. That’s because something like the golden mean tells you that there is more leniency and balance with your moral decision making while the Bible tends to be cut and dry with what is right and wrong. For this reason I find Biblical morals to function more like duty based moral, where you have a set of rules that you are suppose to follow and if you don’t you are sinning. A very clear example of this is Exodus 20:1, which states the Ten Commandments. The commandments are very clearly stated as to how you are suppose to act, for example, “ You shall have no other God before me”. This is very clearly stated; there is really no way to manipulate the rule in any way. What I do find to be interesting is that people who read the bible tend to read it many different ways. Some read the text with a more “Golden mean” way of thinking. For example, one might say that a child stealing candy from a candy store isn’t that same thing as someone robbing a bank and therefore one is more of a sin than the other. Others may interpret this rule as more plain writing and follow it as stated with no leniency in practice.

An example of a more utilitarian form of ethics can also be found within one of the assigned Bible readings. In the story of the Pharaoh telling the midwives to kill all of the baby Hebrew boys the midwives decide that it was best for the most number of people to not kill the babies. They follow a more duty-based form of ethics because they aren’t doing it because of their duty to Religious Law. However, they are also doing it because they want to help the people around them. Even though them saving the boys were going against the laws of the Pharaoh they decided to follow their own moral code.

From what I’ve concluded from these readings the Bible tends to display duty based moral code based off of religious law. However, the writing itself can be related and used by looking at it from different moral codes such as Utilitarianism and Virtue ethics, as I had mentioned above.

Biblical Texts

The different passages in the assigned Bible reading each display different forms of ethical arguments on how we should decide what is morally right. As each of them are in the Bible, any believer could be backed up in how they choose to make moral decisions. The articles gave us different ways to think about why we choose the ethical patterns we do, whether based on virtues, duties, or consequences.

In Matthew 5:17-48, virtue ethics are represented through the reasons behind our actions as humans. As explained in the article, Jesus taught us not to do wrong based on what was in our hearts. It seems to be a set of teachings that should guide us in what we should think about an action before doing it.

Exodus 20:1-17 reinforces duty-based ethics. The "external source of authority," as the article describes it, lays down rules and guidelines by which we should direct our lives. It is meant to instill a sense of obligation which we can use to judge our moral character and decisions. It reminds me of the common phrase, "What Would Jesus Do?" (although the passage took place before His birth.) If it's set for us in the Ten Commandments, we can remind ourselves of how to behave based on what God has commanded of us.

I find the difficulty of consequentialism for Biblical scholars particularly interesting. Although I've argued that consequentialism seems the most logical way to decide moral decisions, I myself tend to see things more black and white, based on a virtue ethics point of view. The way our online reading discussed Exodus 1:8-22 was especially enlightening to me. I've tended to be of the belief that the way you look at a situation can change whether one's actions were morally right. The Pharaoh would have seen the midwives' actions as wrong, because they disobeyed their external source of authority. A virtue-based ethics opinion could either see their lying as wrong, or their obedience to God as right. A consequentialist would see their actions as right because the end results justified the means of getting there.

Romans 7:14-25, finally, resonates with me the most, as I'm sure it does other readers. What the article described as the internal struggle of our own morality is something that each of us deal with. We long to lead upright lives, and are disappointed in ourselves when we do not live up to expectations, either set by us or by God. It's another interesting aspect to the moral debate when we think about how aware we are of our own limitations and downfalls.

The final article, "The Hebrew Women are not like the Egyptian Women," cast some light on the strength of the women in Exodus 1:8-22. Their fear and respect of God was greater than their fear and respect of the Pharaoh. They were brave in their actions and obedient to God, and for all of this they were rewarded. Although this passage can back up consequentialism, as I discussed above, it also shows that their personal motivations behind their actions was rooted in their hearts, and therefore also backs up virtue-based ethics.

The readings this week were particularly interesting in showing how different Bible passages make arguments for different classic categories of ethics. They each have their logic and foundations, and it definitely depends on each person and their situation in life to determine how they choose to decide what is morally right.

Biblical Passages for Normative Ethics

For this week’s reading, four passages from the Bible were read to evaluate normative ethics.

The first passage was from Matthew 5:17-48, and it was Jesus speaking to a crowd of people going through the Ten Commandments. Jesus was trying to get us, as listeners/ readers, to reinterpret the Ten Commandments. As I was reading through this, I felt like Jesus was trying to get across that no sin is greater or lesser than the other. He wanted us to realize that even ‘internal sins’ are just as bad as violent external crimes. This relates to normative ethics because Jesus is describing how we ought to act. This particular passage begins with duty-based ethics, and then goes into virtue ethics. When he begins saying one of the Ten Commandments, for example Do Not Murder, he says yes, murder is bad, but it goes beyond that. This is when he discusses virtue ethics because he is talking about how our internal sins reflect our character. In virtue ethics, there are specific traits that can be used to describe a good character, and Jesus is using the Ten Commandments to describe these traits.

The next passage lists the Ten Commands again, but it is very straight forward. This passage falls under the duty based ethic category of normative ethics. All of the Ten Commandments that God gave to Moses to tell his people are listed out in very simple sentences, with no exceptions. This is duty based ethics because a higher authority is telling us to obey them and there is no way around disobeying them.

Exodus 20:8-22 was the next passage that was read. Pharaoh saw that the Israelites were increasing in number and would soon overpower his own forces. In Pharaoh’s mind, the best way to solve this problem was to turn the Israelites into slaves, and suppress them. The end result of this would be that his crown would be saved, the land would still be his, and his Egyptian people would also be saved. This is consequentialist ethics because the end result favored all Egyptians and the Pharaoh, which is the Pharaoh’s mind was a good end result. This plan was not working well enough, so Pharaoh ordered that all Hebrew boys that were born must be thrown into the Nile. These midwives did not obey the Pharaoh yet instead they obeyed the Ten Commandments, which said Do Not Murder. This viewpoint of the passage is duty- based ethics. It can also be interpreted as the midwives knew that the end result would be more beneficial if they obeyed God and not the Pharaoh. This viewpoint is consequentialist ethics.

The last passage that was read was Romans 7:14-25, and it describes our sinful human nature. This passage just falls under normative ethics in general, which is defines as how humans ought to act. Within all of us is a sinful nature, meaning we really cannot decide to do good on our own. If you are wanting to be good and wanting to be more like Jesus, then we begin to fight our own human nature. Only God can help us conquer this sinful driving force within all of us, and he can help us act more and more like Jesus. This passage really describes the internal moral struggle that we all face.

Source Code

This week, the Source Code was watched to help us learn more about normative ethics. Captain Colter Stevens was killed while flying a helicopter in Afghanistan, but his brain and part of his body was saved for the purpose of Source Code. Source Code was created to be a way to perform time reassignment, and they put their resources to use to evaluate a horrible train crash that was caused by a bomb. Colleen Goodwin was the one instructing Stevens through his eight minute missions back into the train as Sean, a man who was killed because of this crash. They were able to revisit the crash over and over again to hopefully prevent the future arrack.

The main character, Stevens, was at first just concerned with himself. He wanted to know why he was there and what happened with his men from Afghanistan. He was even using the eight minutes in the train to research who source code was and what happened to him. As he learned more and more information about himself, he finally began thinking of others. He tried many times to find out who the bomber was or even to just try and save one person, Christina. Because of Stevens behaviors, I would say that his attitude towards this situation changed after time which in turn changed his ethics. In the beginning, when he was concerned with himself, he was displaying ethical egoism. This is a type of consequentialist ethical standpoint were the action is good if it only benefits the one acting. So Stevens was only doing things to benefit himself in the beginning and he wasn’t thinking of the other people. When Stevens’ behaviors changed, he was displaying another form of consequentialist ethics; Stevens was displaying ethical altruism. Ethical altruism is when everyone except the one acting benefits, and that’s exactly what Stevens wanted. He wanted to try as hard as he could to save the people on the train as well as other people from a future attack. After that he wanted his life support to be turned off, and he didn’t ask for any recognition for his actions.

Another main character was Dr. Rutledge, the one who was in charge of Source Code. He displayed utilitarianism, which is another form of consequential ethics. He wanted the sum of his actions to be good, so he still did things that were wrong but the good actions outweighed them. I think Dr. Rutledge wanted to help fight terrorism, but he also wanted to make a name for himself. He began to use Stevens as just another piece of equipment in his lab, but in his mind it would help even more people than just the one he was harming.

Lastly, Goodwin displayed duty-based ethics in the beginning. She would just listen to everything that Dr. Rutledge told her to do in regards to Stevens. She would always make sure with Dr. Rutledge that Stevens could know the information she wanted to give him, or that it was okay to continuously put him back into the train. But after a while, Goodwin began to feel bad for Stevens and she went against her boss, Dr. Rutledge, to help Stevens. She realized that Stevens was a human, just like her, and not another piece of equipment like how Dr. Rutledge viewed him. In the end, I think that both Goodwin and Stevens did the right thing.

March 31st, 2016 source code

            The complications of moral decision making is a major theme in the development of our characters. This makes for a moral paradox due the ambiguous nature of what is right or wrong. What it seems to come down to in this film is whether the value of one human life is more important than the life of millions.  Through the rationalization of each individual we can see different representation of normative ethics.

            When looking at Captain Colter Stevens as a character, you could say that he mostly represents Ethnic Altruism; which is a form of consequentialism, which says that any action to benefit you is wrong and any action to benefit others is right. This fits his character the most because even though he knows that he wont be benefiting at all personally in letting them use his body, he decides to help them find the bomber anyway. When looking at Colleen as a character you seem more of the instability in the more decision making, it becomes more complicated. For her she must rationalize whether the deceiving of Captain Stevens is worth saving all those lives. She does follow through with deceiving Captain Stevens, which means she falls more in the category of Utilitarianism, which is Kant’s theory that we should do what is best for the most amounts of people. Even though Captain Stevens will continue to have to use his body without his knowledge, she would be saving many lives. Even when looking at more morally ambiguous character such as Dr.Rutledge, he can justify his actions through normative ethics. More specifically he fits into the mold of Ethical egoism. This is the theory that an act is morally right if the total good of any action is favorable towards the agent of the act.  In Dr.Rutledge’s case he fits this criteria in that if the program shows good results then he will get recognition for his program, which we can tell to be of ultimate concern based of his choice to not tell Captain Stevens that they were going to wipe his mind and restart it again instead of letting him die. While Colleen justified this action because it helped the most amounts of people, Dr, Rutledge justified it due to the personal reward that it will bring him. Even though they both produced the same end result.

What can then be concluded by this movie is that the end result of any given moral decision can produce the same result using different normative ethics. They each used the same category of consequentialism but had different focuses in their moral code. Captain Stevens used Ethnic altruism, Colleen used Utilitarianism, and Dr.Rutledge used ethnical egoism. We can also conclude that some of them don’t really line up with our on individual values based of the disproval of certain characters.