An ethical dilemma is a situation that will often involve an apparent conflict between moral imperatives, in which to obey one would result in transgressing another. A moral imperative is an ethical responsibility. ...

This is also called an ethical paradox since in moral philosophy, paradox plays a central role in ethics debates. For instance, an ethical admonition to "love thy neighbour" is not always just in contrast with, but sometimes in contradiction to an armed neighbour actively trying to kill you: if he or she succeeds, you will not be able to love him or her. But to preemptively attack them or restrain them is not usually understood as loving. This is one of the classic examples of an ethical decision clashing or conflicting with an organismic decision, one that would be made only from the perspective of animal survival: an animal is thought to act only in its immediate perceived bodily self-interests when faced with bodily harm, and to have limited ability to perceive alternatives - see fight or flight. Ethics is a general term for what is often described as the science (study) of morality. In philosophy, ethical behavior is that which is good or right. ... Real life ethical decisions are studied in sociology and political science and psychology using very different methods than descriptive ethics in ethics (philosophy). ... The medical idea of (grievous) bodily harm is more specific than legal ideas of assault or violence in general, and distinct from property damage. ... This article or section should include material from Fight-or-flight The flight or fight response, also called the acute stress response, was first described by Walter Cannon in the 1920s as a theory that animals react to threats with a general discharge of the sympathetic nervous system. ...

However, human beings have complex social relationships that can't be ignored: If one has an ethical relationship with the neighbour trying to kill you, then, usually, their desire to kill you would likely be the result of mental illness on their part, stories told to them by others, e.g. their daughter claims you raped her. Such conflicts might be settled by some other path that has strong social support. Societies formed criminal justice systems (some argue also ethical traditions and religions) to defuse just such deep conflicts. Such systems always impose trained judges who are presumed to have an ethical relationship and also a clear obligation to all who come before them. An ethical relationship, in most theories of ethics that employ the term, is a basic and trustworthy relationship that one has to another human being, that cannot necessarily be characterized in terms of any abstraction other than trust and common protection of each others body. ... This article does not cite its references or sources. ... Criminal justice system flowchart Criminal Justice refers to the system used by government to maintain social control, prevent crime, enforce laws, and administer justice. ... Ethics is a branch of philosophy dealing with right and wrong in human behaviour. ...

Refuting ethical dilemmas

Ethical dilemmas are often cited in an attempt to refute an ethical system or moral code, as well as the worldview that encompasses or grows from it.^{[citation needed]} Ethics is a general term for what is often described as the science (study) of morality. In philosophy, ethical behavior is that which is good or right. ... It has been suggested that this article or section be merged into Morality. ...

These arguments can be refuted in various ways, for example by showing that the claimed ethical dilemma is only apparent and does not really exist (thus is not a paradox logically), or that the solution to the ethical dilemma involves choosing the greater good and lesser evil (as discussed in value theory), or that the whole framing of the problem is omitting creative alternatives (as in peacemaking), or (more recently) that situational ethics or situated ethics must apply because the case can't be removed from context and still be understood. See also case-based reasoning on this process. Look up paradox in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ... The term framing can have several possible meanings: framing (telecommunication), where it relates to synchronization framing (economics), where it relates to rational choice theory framing (World Wide Web), where it relates to the use of multiple panes within a web page framing (communication theory), where it relates to the contextual... Peacemaking is a form of conflict resolution which focuses on establishing equal power relationships that will be robust enough to forestall future conflict, and establishing some means of agreeing on ethical decisions within a community that has previously had conflict. ... Situational ethics (also known as Situationism) refers to a particular view of ethics,faggot that states: (J. Fletcher, Situation Ethics (Westminster, Philadelphia, 1966). ... Situated ethics, often confused with situational ethics, is a view of applied ethics in which abstract standards from a culture or theory are considered to be far less important than the ongoing processes in which one is personally and physically involved, e. ... Case-based reasoning (CBR), broadly construed, is the process of solving new problems based on the solutions of similar past problems. ...

There are many examples of moral dilemmas; for instance, a more up to date dilemma is abortion. A woman who has been raped but found out that she is now pregnant from the rapist can choose whether to abort or to keep the fetus. The question is "whether the fetus has rights and, if so, how they are to be balanced against the right of the mother." Peter Vardy. A further confounding factor is that pregnancy may threaten the life of the mother, thus implicating the mother's right to life, rather than her rights of bodily integrity and personal choice. This is a disambiguation page — a navigational aid which lists other pages that might otherwise share the same title. ...

Perhaps the most commonly cited ethical conflict is that between an imperative or injunction not to steal and one to care for a family that you cannot afford to feed without stolen money. Debates on this often revolve around the availability of alternate means of income or support, e.g. a social safety net, charity, etc. The debate is in its starkest form when framed as stealing food. In Les Misérables Jean Valjean does this and is relentlessly pursued. Under an ethical system in which stealing is always wrong and letting one's family die from starvation is always wrong, a person in such a situation would be forced to commit one wrong to avoid committing another, and be in constant conflict with those whose view of the acts varied. The social safety net is a term used to describe a collection of services provided by the state (such as welfare, universal healthcare, homeless shelters, and perhaps various subsidized services such as transit), which prevent any individual from falling into poverty beyond a certain level. ... A charitable organization (also known as a charity) is a trust, company or unincorporated association established for charitable purposes only. ... Les Misérables (translated variously from French as The Miserable Ones, The Wretched, The Poor Ones, The Wretched Poor, The Victims) (1862) is a novel by French author Victor Hugo, and among the best-known novels of the 19th century. ...

However, there are few legitimate ethical systems in which stealing is more wrong than letting one's family die. Ethical systems do in fact allow for, and sometimes outline, tradeoffs or priorities in decisions. Some ethicists have suggested that international law requires this kind of mechanism to, for instance, resolve whether WTO or Kyoto Protocol takes precedence in deciding whether a WTO notification is valid. That is, whether nations may use trade mechanisms to complain about measures each other takes regarding climate change. As there are few economies that can operate smoothly in a chaotic climate, the dilemma would seem to be easy to resolve, but as at the family scale, it is possible to invent fallacious excuses to steal or put a restriction on trade, and these tend to cloud the actions of all who do so with legitimate desperation. Resolving ethical dilemmas is rarely simple or clearcut and very often involves revisiting similar dilemmas that recur within societies: An ethicist is one whose judgement on ethics and ethical codes has come to be trusted by some community, and (importantly) is expressed in some way that makes it possible for others to mimic or approximate that judgement. ... This article or section is in need of attention from an expert on the subject. ... For other uses of the initials WTO, see WTO (disambiguation). ... Kyoto Protocol Opened for signature December 11, 1997 in Kyoto, Japan Entered into force February 16, 2005. ... Variations in CO2, temperature and dust from the Vostok ice core over the last 400,000 years For current global climate change, see Global warming. ...

According to some philosophers and sociologists, e.g. Karl Marx, it is the different life experience of people and the different exposure of them and their families in these roles (the rich being constantly stolen from, the poor in a position of constant begging and subordination) that creates social class differences. In other words, ethical dilemmas can become political and economic factions that engage in long term recurring struggles. See conflict theory and left-wing politics versus right-wing politics. Karl Heinrich Marx (May 5, 1818, Trier, Germany – March 14, 1883, London) was a German philosopher, political economist, and revolutionary. ... Social class refers to the hierarchical distinctions between individuals or groups in societies or cultures. ... In sociology, conflict theory states that the society or organization functions so that each individual participant and its groups struggle to maximize their benefits, which inevitably contributes to social change such as changes in politics and revolutions. ... “Leftism” redirects here. ... It has been suggested that this article or section be merged into Left-Right politics. ...

Design of a voting system, other electoral reform, a criminal justice system, or other high-stakes adversarial process for dispute resolution will almost always reflect the deep persistent struggles involved. However, no amount of good intent and hard work can undo a bad role structure: A voting system is a means of choosing between a number of options, based on the input of a number of voters. ... Electoral reform projects seek to change the way that public desires are reflected in elections through electoral systems. ... Criminal justice system flowchart Criminal Justice refers to the system used by government to maintain social control, prevent crime, enforce laws, and administer justice. ... An adversarial process is one that sets up a specific and focused conflict, typically with rewards for prevailing, often in the form of a game. ... It has been suggested that Adjudication be merged into this article or section. ...

Roles within structures

Where a structural conflict is involved, dilemmas will very often recur. A trivial example is working with a bad operating system whose error messages do not match the problems the user perceives. Each such error presents the user with a dilemma: reboot the machine and continue working at one's employment, or, spend time trying to reproduce the problem for the benefit of the developer of the operating system. Often such dilemmas are resolved by our economic commitments: While other users who will see the same message in future may want our feedback about errors, sad for them, they haven't paid us for it. An operating system (OS) is a set of computer programs that manage the hardware and software resources of a computer. ... A boot device gets a computer up and running, kick starting itself from simple startup processes to a fully operating system. ...

So role structure sabotages feedback and results in sub-optimal results since no provision has been made to actually reward people for reporting these errors and problems. See total quality management for more on addressing this kind of failure, and governance on how many ethical and structural conflicts can be resolved with appropriate supervisory mechanisms. Total Quality Management (TQM) is a management strategy aimed at embedding awareness of quality in all organizational processes. ...

See also

Roe V. Wade Holding Texas law making it a crime to assist a woman to get an abortion violated her due process rights. ...

External links

• A List of Ethical Dilemmas
• The Generalized Structure of Ethical Dilemmas
• The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy entry