morals/ethics continued

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eeun's picture
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morals/ethics continued

Continued from thread-hijacking in PowerMacs...

Quote from catmistake:

Ethics and morality apply to people, more specifically, persons. A company is not a person, nor is it a group of people (for these purposes, we’re not using the word that way, like a military unit, or a social gathering), it is an abstract construct, an institution created to conduct business.

Semantics. You’re talking definitions only, I’m talking consequences. Yes, by definition alone, you are correct. You can’t be immoral to an inanimate object or an abstraction.
However, Jon is correct in the actual results. You screw over a company, it hurts the people who are trying to make a living running it, it hurts all their employees who make a living working for that company.


And lets not forget that although laws are supposedly based in morality, if you break the law it doesn’t necessarily mean that you are acting unethically, as the laws themselves sometimes have shown themselves to be propped by unethical attitudes.

Entirely true. Legality and morality meet of most of the time, but not all of the time. The old example:
Is it moral to steal a loaf of bread when it’s the only way to feed your kids? Yes, even though it’s breaking the law.
Is it moral to steal a loaf of bread because it’s convenient? No, and whether you’re stealing from an individual or a ‘corporate abstraction’ does not make it any less of an immoral act because...

As I said, I have abandoned my previous moral constructs, which were based on who or what the acts were done to, to the evaluation of the acts themselves. It is what you do that is important, not who or what you do it to.

...those actions still affect people, directly or indirectly, as individuals and the broader community. I think we’re pretty much on the same page here, aside from the wordplay above.

Which brings me back to my original post, that I feel using a service a business provides for a fee and not paying for it, is unethical. No moral equivalence here, I won’t gauge -how- unethical it is, but it is still not a moral act.

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Ethics and "The Corporation"

For those further interested in these issues as they relate to International businesses, I strongly recommend seeing the documentary film "The Corporation", currently playing across the country at the Landmark chain of theaters. I did catch at least one factual error, but I think that the general issues raised are important and should be heard.

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Officespace and online services...

The movie Officespace also makes some interesting points once you get past the campiness of some of the characters and the initial justification of outright theft.

But seeking to level things between yourself and your employer is an entirely different thread unto itself.

Anytime you have to have a registered membership in a online service or community, you should abide by the rules they have and respect the intent in which they were written. Otherwise, plenty of 'free' services are out ther, such as our own pastry-based world here.

It is not my place to pass judgement on the person, just the act. Acts are what tend to matter most and acts are what get you elected or imprisoned. People are basically good, they just do things they really should not.

--DDTM

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angel dragon at it again

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=14911&item=5113582434&rd=1

To continue, by the logic presented, anything that hurts a company, hurts the people that work there...

so, are you saying that the competitive marketplace, which runs companies under left and right, causing unemployment, etc., and capitalism in general, is unethical? (of course you're not... I'm just fooling around)

Individuals are the ends, not the means.
-Immanual Kant (paraphrased)

The crowd is untruth.
-Sören Kierkegaard

Our enemies are innovative and resourceful, and so are we. They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country and our people, and neither do we.
-George W. Bush
http://ap.tbo.com/ap/breaking/MGBCWNR3JXD.html

now... why can't the Democrats come up with a decent candidate?

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Re: angel dragon at it again

so, are you saying that the competitive marketplace, which runs companies under left and right, causing unemployment, etc., and capitalism in general, is unethical? (of course you're not... I'm just fooling around)

Heh...better to keep discussions on the 'fun' level. Wink

There were a couple wonderful Warner Brothers cartoons that probably aren't shown anymore that summed up capitalism and free market wonderfully. I think one of them was a country mouse visiting the city mouse, and another had Elmer Fudd as showmaker with a bunch of neo-con elves.

There was a joke saying among Russians on their socialist paradise: "We pretend to work, and they pretend to pay us."

Individuals are the ends, not the means.
-Immanual Kant (paraphrased)

But Kant was a drunk.

now... why can't the Democrats come up with a decent candidate?

Or the Republicans? Probably the same reason we Canucks can't find a decent politician:
Those who aspire to power are usually the least qualified to wield it.
(can't find an attribution for that likely paraphrased quote).

I'll volunteer to rule the world.
I'm sure I'd be kind. Acute

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[quote]Our enemies are innova

Our enemies are innovative and resourceful, and so are we. They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country and our people, and neither do we.
-George W. Bush

"Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, well, you won't fool me again."
-George W. Bush

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Who quote?

StrongBad,
I think he was quoting The Who
"... fool me twice, 'won't get fooled again' "

which is still kind of ridiculous considering the gravity of the context

Jon
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[quote]There was a joke sayin

[quote]There was a joke saying among Russians on their socialist paradise: “We pretend to work, and they pretend to pay us.

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