Andy Hoyland » Ethics

Nowhere Near Weekly Ethical Debate 3

Andy Hoyland — Sun, 07 Mar 2010 18:53:39 +0000

This weeks debate comes courtesy of goodcharacter.com… because I have lots to say but don’t seem to be able to write it at the moment I thought copy and paste was the way forward:

Georgia’s hands were sweating. She was fifteen minutes into her math final when she began to panic. This exam was worth most of her grade in the class. She understood math—even liked it—and usually did really well. Her constant problem was that she wasn’t a strong test-taker. Her grades never reflected her understanding of the material she studied.

Now, here she was, once again stuck on one problem worth twenty-five points on the test, and she was drawing a blank. She put her head down on the desk and concentrated as hard as she could. She remembered doing a similar problem in class and explaining it to her friend Jessie, but now she was so stressed out by the test, she couldn’t even remember how to begin the problem.

She lifted her head and stared at her test. She listened to the clock tick on the wall and imagined her parents’ expression when she receives her report card. Jessie was sitting right in front of her. He is always a good test taker and had already solved the problem. The teacher had his backed turned and was on the other side of the room. Georgia could look over Jessie’s shoulder, get the answer, and no one would know.

Georgia needed to think quickly. She thought about how unfair it was that she regularly does badly on tests even though she works so hard in class and understands the material, too. She thought about how often she helped Jessie in class throughout the semester. What should she do?

She prided herself on doing what was right. But how right is it that she has to work in a system that doesn’t reward such hard work?

Finally, she took a deep breath. She looked to see if the teacher was still on the other side of the room, and glanced over Jessie’s shoulder just long enough to get the final answer to the question. Then, she figured out the rest of the problem on her own. In the moment, she felt great about her decision. She felt she had sort of created an ethical compromise.

But on the way home on the bus, Georgia’s good feelings started to fade. “What exactly is an ethical compromise anyway?” she thought to herself. Should she tell her teacher what she did or move forward and forget about the whole thing?

If you don’t wish to discuss that – just tell me what your homepage is. Mine is my email.

Almost Weekly Ethical Debate 2

Andy Hoyland — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 14:01:22 +0000

Ok – it’s been a little over a week but here’s another ethical debate… and as mum requested I’ve made this one more likely to impact upon our lives [sic]

The sheriff in a southern town is guarding the courthouse against a mob that is about to storm it by force, in order to capture a black prisoner and lynch him even before his trial. If the mob is frustrated, many people may be killed in the ensuing riot. Should the sheriff deliver the prisoner to the mob?

Readers Training Day A Million

Andy Hoyland — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 23:06:10 +0000

I made the mistake of turning on my laptop when I got back from swimming this evening. That was almost an hour ago.

But in the process I have fixed a few things around here so the category pages should all work and the links to comments in the sidebar now link to the comments rather than just the post where the comment is. Which is nice. I still need to finish a few things. Which is a shame as I’m getting itchy theme feet and may be changing soon. I like this one but I have to change every few months.

Anyway – in the process of fixing the category pages I realised I said I would post a bit about Readers training as and when it happens. That kind of stopped after my Exegesis post back in November. So I thought I would pick up again before going to bed.

It’s going well – I got a good solid B for my Exegesis which I am happy with. It means I’m not the typical mature student who gets a first all the time but that I still know roughly how to write an essay (which came as a bit of a surprise). Since then I have written an assignment on the theme of justice through the Old Testament and have started the next module on Ethics.

Ethics week 1 – we were given quite a few scenarios to discuss. “What would you do if…” kind of things. I thought I’d find out the ethical standards of the blog readers by sharing one with you. I can’t remember the exact wording but it goes something like this:

You’re on a plane that has been taken over by 2 armed highjackers. They are going to fly the plane into a building (ala September 11). A realistic opportunity presents itself for you to take on take one of the guns and shoot the 2 terrorists. What would you do:

1. Take the gun, kill the terrorists because it’s the right thing to do.
2. Take the gun, kill the terrorists but it’s still an immoral thing to do.
3. Do nothing, it’s all in God’s hands.

You can only choose one.

Go.