To what extent is the knowledge we employ to justify ethical decisions influenced by culture and emotion?
Knowledge determines what we think as right or wrong, what we learn (whether in school or from our parents and friends), and what we gain from personal experiences. It sets the boundary of our perspective on the world, what we believe to be common sense. The values that we are taught is a part of our cultural background and this shapes how we feel about certain concepts. However, emotions also influences what we feel about what we learn. We may decide that some values taught to us are not “correct” or worth having as a part of our personal morals. We use emotions to choose what knowledge we arm ourselves with when making decisions. With our knowledge, we can decide on our own personal logic. But logic isn’t a stable or constant rule, similar to morality. We use different logic for different situations. In some cases, we may care more for the group than for an individual. In other cases, it may be personal and we care more of our wellbeing than for society. Similar to how a person is not always an individualist or a collectivist all the time, the way we think logically does not remain the same for every ethical case we face. The group also agreed that when making a split-second decisions, especially on one that is personal, emotions will win out because there is simply no time to think about anything else. However, from our past we are taught the values that we should uphold and treasure, so our culture may influence our emotions when making that split-second decision. That is just for when we are making a choice. We must also think about the consequences. Emotions may lead us to disregard the consequences or think more of the consequences. In the example used in class on whether to kill seven kids or your own mother, both choices would ultimately be your fault and would create backlash. However, in the case of the seven kids, most of the backlash would come from people you have never met before. In the case with the death of your mother, the backlash would most certainly come from people personal to you: family and friends. Emotions and our cultural background/values may lead us to choose to kill seven kids because backlash from strangers are not as strong or hurtful as disappointment and anger from close family members. Or maybe our emotions and past history compels us to choose to kill the mother because the anger from strangers is more heavy to bear. Our logic and emotions differ from every situation. Personal choices may include more emotional responses than choices made from a third-person viewpoint. Speculations made about past decisions from/about people unrelated to you may have more cultural influences than emotional ones. Morality and logic is never purely black and white. They are grey and shifting to mould into whatever situation currently presented.
Audio of discussion:
https://drive.google.com/a/gapps.uwcsea.edu.sg/file/d/0BzP4IbA0_t3paXhnMmpVMlByQWM/view?usp=sharing