REASON AS REQUIREMENT IN ETHICS

Reason is a suitable way of knowing for ethical decisions when one does not wish to question
their perception of an issue. It proves useful when consequences are considered while
understanding an issue. Reason lacks the attachment that emotion carries, it has the ability to
remain detached from a situation
Moral judgments must be backed by good reasons. Feelings can overwhelm reason .
Assess arguments – consider facts and principles –avoid prejudices. Recognize that
arguments can go wrong in so many ways. Do not let reason be overwhelmed by feeling.

MORAL REASONING
The morally right thing to do is always the thing best supported by the arguments
 Our decisions must be guided as much as possible by reason.
 Our feelings may be irrational and may be nothing but products of prejudice, selfishness, or
cultural conditioning.
 We cannot rely on our feelings, no matter how powerful they might be.
When it comes to ethical principles and justification, reason is the most useful way of knowing,
and the most important way of deciding how to act morally. This is because reason is based on
logic (at least more so than the other ways of knowing), thus it is less likely to be influenced and
changed due to the environment, your own experiences, etc. The other ways of knowing are all
much more emotionally based and feel like they are more liable to change. Reason is useful as
moral indicator because it should always stay the same and be the most unbiased way of
knowing, which allows ethical principles to be justified objectively. For example, memories
can be erased, made, changed ,etc. which would make it a less valid method in the justification
of ethical principles. However, reason is centered around facts and direct links, which can be
traced back and forth – reason can thus be the same for everyone, making it a more consistent
method of knowing how to act morally.

IMPARTIALITY AS REQUIREMENT IN ETHICS

*fair, just, equitable, impartial, unbiased, dispassionate, objective mean free from favor
toward either or any side.
Morality requires the impartial consideration of each individual’s interests. Each individual’s
interests are equal importance and the welfare of others is as important as our own. This
is a proscription of arbitraries.
SITUATIONS INVOLVING IMPARTIALITY
1. Each individual’s interests are equally important, and no one should get special treatment.
- Impartiality in its true sense requires that subjective distinctions be set aside. To
illustrate the difference between the two notions: a National Society that refuses to
provide its services to a specific group of people, because of their ethnic origin, fails
to observe the rule of non-discrimination; whereas a National Society staff member
who, in the exercise of his functions, favours a friend by giving him better treatment
than that given to others, contravenes the principle of impartiality. Therefore, staff and
volunteers should be trained to ensure that correct behaviour becomes almost a reflex.
 2. If there is no good reason for treating differently ,then discrimination is unacceptable
arbitrary.
- If you're in a contest you'd better hope the judges are impartial, that is, that they aren't
biased toward one competitor over another. When someone's partial to something
they take its part. Impartial means no part has yet been taken.

Example of Impartial Decisions

- Impartiality is the idea that the same ethical standards are applied to everyone.
- Self interest needs to be balanced with needs of others.
- Do not value one person or group more than any other .
- Each person is an individual and should receive equal respect and consideration.
- Organizations and institutions – consider how the people associated with these are
affected.

FEELINGS AND REASONS: Upsurge of feelings is natural and what we do with them is what
makes us ethical or unethical.
FEELINGS DEFINED
These are mental associations and reactions to emotions which originate in the neocortical
regions of the brain, and are subjective being influenced by personal experience, beliefs and
memories. These are next thing that happens after having an emotion, involve cognitive input,
usually subconscious and cannot be measured precisely.
EMOTION vs. FEELING
Feelings are sparked by emotions and colored by personal experiences, beliefs, memories, and
thoughts linked to that particular emotion. Strictly speaking, a feeling is the side product of your
brain perceiving an emotion and assigning a certain meaning to it. - For example, you remember
a happy memory by looking at the family picture, you may remember you we’re in joy at that
moment but at present you may feel sad.
Essentially, emotions are physical and instinctive. While they are complex and involve a variety
of physical and cognitive responses (many of which are not well understood), their general
purpose is to produce a specific response to a stimulus. Emotions can be powerful experiences,
but they usually do not last long. They sometimes make us do things we later regret. - Today, we
are angry at a colleague and want to yell at her. Tomorrow, we wish we had acted more rationally,
no matter how compelling our desire was at the time. By transforming goals and desires in the
heat of the moment, emotions can lead us to make choices that hurt our long-term interests. Doing
something that you do not want to do is one of the hallmarks of irrationality - hence, emotions
make us irrational.
REASON DEFINED
Reason – a form of personal justification which changes from person to person based on their
own ethical and moral code, as well as prior experience. It stands for the faculties of rational
reflection, sensations and experience, memory and inference, and any judgments that may be
exercised without relying on a religious faith that is unsupported by reason.
FEELING AND REASON INTERTWINED
 Feelings are not limited to good and bad, happy and sad moods. They also influence
judgments, and hence decisions, with feelings as mild as contentment, safety, and perceived
ease or difficulty of tasks to be faced. In short, they mess with our thinking minds in all sorts
of ways.
 “Sensitivity requires rationality to complete it, and vice versa. There is no siding onto which
emotions can be shunted so as not to impinge on thought.” -Mary Midgley
 Plato saw reason and emotion as two horses pulling a chariot, with the charioteer struggling
to make them work as a team.
 Emotion is not the opposite of reason. It is a different form of it. Emotion is always prompting
us to serve and advance our needs and interests.

WHEN REASON OVERRULED FEELING

We rely on our reason to guard against feelings that may reflect a bias, or a sense of inadequacy,
or a desire simply to win an argument, and also to refine and explain a felt conviction that passes
the test of critical reflection and discussion. We rely on feelings to move us to act morally, and to
ensure that our reasoning is not only logical but also humane.
WHEN EMOTION OVERRULED REASON
Emotion creates a strong opinion that is hard for reason to overcome when emotion takes over it
is hard to think of the consequences of one’s actions. It can also be constructive when working
by itself in the decision making process.
EMOTION ALONE
When emotion is left as the only way of knowing used to make ethical decisions, these decisions
are often made with little to no regard to the consequences of our actions. However, when faced
with a situation where one has prior experience, the emotions that are used to make a decision
have been tested before, thus providing a solid ground for ethical decision-making. Paul Ekman
devised six basic emotions: anger, disgust, fear, happiness, sadness and surprise.
REASON ALONE
Reason, when removed from emotion, allows a person to make conscious decisions based on
fact, with no reference to personal involvement. The use of reason as a way of knowing, allows
for the knower to see the consequences of their actions throughout the decision-making process.
There are limitations to decisions made based on reason alone, perception of situations is not
questioned as it may be with an emotional decision
“Remove emotion and we are not left rational, but adrift without meaning.” (Neuroscientist Antonio
Damasio studied people injured in specific brain localities responsible for emotion.)
Short Debate: In decision making, what must overrule, emotion or reasoning?
Ethical Dilemma: A sample case related to feeling vs. reasoning
Nursing often deals with ethical dilemmas in the clinical arena. A case study demonstrates an
ethical dilemma faced by healthcare providers who care for and treat Jehovah's Witnesses who
are placed in a critical situation due to medical life-threatening situations. A 20-year-old, pregnant,
Black Hispanic female presented to the Emergency Department (ED) in critical condition following
a single-vehicle car accident. She exhibited signs and symptoms of internal bleeding and was
advised to have a blood transfusion and emergency surgery in an attempt to save her and the
fetus. She refused to accept blood or blood products and rejected the surgery as well. Her refusal
was based on a fear of blood transfusion due to her belief in Bible scripture. The ethical dilemma
presented is whether to respect the patient's autonomy and compromise standards of care or
ignore the patient's wishes in an attempt to save her life. This paper presents the clinical case,
identifies the ethical dilemma, and discusses virtue ethical theory and principles that apply to this
situation.
What is Ethical requirement or ethical standard?
* Ethical standards are a set of principles established by the founders of the organization to
communicate its underlying moral values. This code provides a framework that can be used as a
reference for decision making processes.
* These standards are an important part of an organization’s culture. They establish the
parameters of behaviour that owners and top executives expect from employees and also from
suppliers, at least to the extent of their relationship with the organization. A corporate governance
system will put a lot of effort into communicating and enforcing these principles. This is mostly
done through behaviour modelling, which means that top executives should set the example of
how lower-level employees should act.
* These principles should serve also as guidelines for decision-making processes to help
employees align their personal criteria with the company’s perspectives as different ethical issues
arise within normal business activities. This moral “compass” is crucial to maintain unethical
behaviours down to a minimum, mostly in managerial positions.

What is Ethical Reasoning?

Most human behavior has consequences for the welfare of others, even for society as a whole.
Individuals are able to act in such as way as to enhance or decrease the quality of the lives of
others, and generally know the difference between helping and harming.
Ethical reasoning holds two roles in life:
 Highlighting acts that enhance the well-being of other people.
 Highlighting acts that harm the well-being of other people.
When an act enhances the well-being of others, it is worthy of praise from others, when an act
harms or decreases the well-being of others, it is worthy of criticism. For many people, the desire
to receive these responses from others guides the development of their personal set of ethical
standards.

Ethical Reasoning and Individual Rights

In civilized societies, people have individual rights, but it is vital that these rights coincide with the
collective rights of society as a whole. A person being denied personal rights due to the greater
good of society may feel the decision conflicts with his own ethical reasoning. While some people
believe that a person’s individual rights should be preserved regardless of the benefit or harm to
society, others deem it more important that the common good and justice be considered in a
civilized society. These opposing beliefs are a result of individual ethical reasoning.
Ethical Reasoning and the Law
The government creates and enforces laws in order to protect the citizens and the unity of society.
These laws carry punishments those who violate them in the form of fines, community service,
probation, and imprisonment.
Each individual develops his own core values and ethical reasoning according to his view of
integrity and honesty, and ability to look past the self-justification and self-deception common to
all people. Acts that have been deemed illegal may not coincide with an individual’s personal
ethical beliefs, and vice versa. Laws are often created out of widespread social convention,
whether they are seen to be fair and ethical by all or not. Some people strongly believe that certain
acts are unethical, and should therefore be made illegal. Others find certain laws to be unethical
according to their own reasoning, and feel they are a hindrance to their personal human rights.
For example, Bob believes that the death penalty is unethical and that is violates human rights.
In the jurisdiction in which he resides, however, the death penalty is a punishment occasionally
handed down by the judicial system. While Bob does not believe that the death penalty is ethical,
the law was made on the belief that it is necessary for the greater good of society.

Ethical Decisions in the Legal System

On occasion, those who work in law enforcement and the legal system find that the ethical
decisions they are required to make on a subject conflicts with the law. This may occur, for
example, when a judge finds that the resolution of a case, as dictated by law, conflicts with his
personal ethical reasoning. In such a case, the judge must follow the laws of the jurisdiction, even
if it seems to create a moral dilemma for him personally.

Institutional Ethics
In some instances, individual entities can punish or take corrective actions against a person who
has breached the company’s ethical code. For example, an accounting firm hires new employees,
who are required to read and sign the employee handbook. This handbook states that employees
must not let their personal bias interfere in any business transactions.
Allowing personal bias or opinion to dictate how a business transaction is done is not necessarily
against any law set forth by the government, but it may result in the employee’s termination as it
violates the company’s policy and institutional ethics. In serious cases, the employer may be able
to recover damages through a civil lawsuit for such a violation.

The Ethical requirements of impartiality

Impartiality Defined
Impartiality (also called evenhandedness or fair-mindedness) is a principle of justice holding
that decisions should be based on objective criteria, rather than on the basis of bias, prejudice,
or preferring the benefit to one person over another for improper reasons.
Impartial Decisions
Impartiality is the idea that the same ethical standards are applied to everyone. Ethics do not
value one person or group of people more than any other does. Impartiality requires that in making
ethical decisions we balance our self-interest with the interest of others
The requirement of impartiality
 Each individual’s interest are equally important, and no one should get special treatment
  If there is no good reason for treating people differently, then discrimination is
unacceptably arbitrary

How to manage Impartiality

LEAVE YOUR BIASES AT THE DOOR

Conducting investigations of employee behaviour or disputes between two people can be a

complicated task. When handled properly and professionally, you can avoid issues such as further
friction, low morale or costly litigation. If you decide to tackle these matters in house, it’s important
that you leave your own biases out of it. Always remain neutral to the situation (and the people
involved) and give everyone a fair chance to vocalise their thoughts / feelings no matter their race,
religion, cultural background, upbringing, neighbourhood / hometown, political stance, age or
gender.

DON’T TAKE SIDES

Never let your own suspicions sway you into taking sides. It’s natural to want to sympathise with
a particular party, especially if someone claims to be victimised or appears hurt / upset. But always
remember that taking sides is not being impartial. And it’s important to remind yourself that all
situations are different, and all have the power to surprise. Sometimes, there is a victim and a
perpetrator. Other times, the victim turns out to be the perpetrator. And most times, both parties
are victims and perpetrators to one another. So have an open mind and remain neutral because
you never know what the outcome may be.

ENCOURAGE OPEN DIALOGUE

The easiest way to resolve a problem in the workplace is to allow people the freedom to express
themselves. Whilst it’s essential to schedule in private meetings, it’s just as important to
encourage group discussion. For instance open dialogue between two opposing parties can often
be the quickest way to come to a solution. Appoint a mediator (HR manager or line manager) to
lead the agenda, to keep all discussions on track, and to ensure that debates never turn into full
blown arguments.

BE HONEST WITH YOURSELF

If you are unable to remain neutral about a particular workplace issue, it’s imperative that you
take the right action and remove yourself from the situation. Don’t let your biases or personal
relationships cloud your judgement and try to have better awareness of your own emotions.
Emotions can affect your decision making and control the way you behave, so having a better
understanding of your own feelings is important. As soon as you feel that you are no longer able
to manage your neutrality and impartiality, appoint someone else at your level who can, or take
the investigations out of house. It’s better to be safe than sorry, so even if you have minor
concerns, consult someone else for help.

Impartiality and ethical theory

In Euthypro, Socrates expresses astonishment that a young man would prosecute his own father
for murder. The conventional assumption he seems to be making (perhaps disingenuously) is that
filial relationships impose special constraints that may override other consideration, even in the
gravest matter. For Euthyphro, by contrast, a murder is a murder. The fact that it was committed
by his father has no bearing upon what he is required to do about it. He must prosecute his father
just as he would a stranger.
There are at least three distinct standards that run through these problems. One concerns the
substance of moral norms. We grant the powerful and persistent force of self interest in our lives,
and assume that morality must somehow give us reasons for constraining such motives. We grant
the rules and principles of conduct will often be useless or counter-productive in purely local or
short range terms, and assume that morality must give us reasons for acting in principle in spite
of it. We grant that our favourites and friends have special claims on our attentions, and assume
that morality must give us reasons for occasionally denying such claims. In order to provide such
reasons, moral theories standardly argue that our selfish, local and purely personal interest are
morally indistinguishable from many others and that reason require us to treat similar cases
similarly. Morality thus requires (at least sometimes) that we not play favorites, or manipulate
rules to our personal advantage, or make ad hoc expectations for ourselves. In that sense it
requires us to be impartial.
©1991 by The University of Chicago. All right reserved. 0014-1704/91/0104-0111$01.00

Conclusion
Reason requires impartiality, but not neutrality. Basil George Mitchell argues that impartiality
means not that one refrains from having a conclusion or one remain neutral on value issues, but
that one is fair in his/her arguments and in assessing the arguments of his/her opponent. Reason
is the most important way of knowing when acting morally. it does not change based on personal
experiences and variations that occur in human nature. Emotion, perception, imagination,
language, faith, intuition, and memory are all susceptible to changes and differences between
different individuals, but at the core of “cold hard reason,” the outcome of a logical argument
should be the same for everyone, no matter what.
In discussion, no one is required to respect our feelings. We can’t change someone’s mind
because we’re angry or hurt. We may change what they do out of guilt or peer pressure, but this
is the result of manipulation not conviction. If we want to convince anyone, we must use reason.
Reason is the only way for human beings to build common ground into a common good. On that
we must rely.
Reason and impartiality will always be associate when it comes to moral judgement and
decisions.
Sources:
https://pages.stolaf.edu/ein/themes/emotions-and-
reason/?fbclid=IwAR2azpyrD0oU4IVekkKJp1JbdhVqCCtMy0-
9pW47vWDDbPQWTG1r0DpPyuQ
https://prezi.com/tfqmvcyiv0lb/what-roles-do-emotion-and-reason-play-in-
ethics/?fbclid=IwAR3idEORynRms8H7d93mlwMgVvgwdHXO3EZZLgSwC_7QSYTmB1-
Oy9fQL7w
https://doingethics.com/Blog/2008/05/reason-and-
feelings.html?fbclid=IwAR3zacKQcZryPEs6kEcV2rvTD1lgujU9LkpfhwkFRLg_oaDcWwfCqn86_
mE
https://www.laughteronlineuniversity.com/feelings-and-
emotions/?fbclid=IwAR3jAcJsF8G6urzk8KJ79AqOqlI10NM3BpFVebYEuHIEqnjmxMwsP_cl-2k
https://agrainofsalt.blog/2018/11/06/reason-and-
feeling/?fbclid=IwAR1BsF0Ve2lif7UJUw_s9Se98yWZY_7zZL0PCK-wNT44V2mpfVNYvfdmXFQ
https://rationaloptimist.wordpress.com/2012/09/13/reason-versus-emotion/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19105511
https://www.jstor.org/stable/2381660?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents
https://legaldictionary.net/ethical-reasoning/