- What is a moral judgment?
- Elements of a moral judgment
- Examples of moral judgment
- Difference Between Moral Judgment and Ethical Judgment
We explain what a moral judgment is, what elements make it up and various examples. In addition, differences with a moral judgment.
What is a moral judgment?
A moral judgment consists of the mental evaluation of an action, conduct or decision in terms morals, that is, according to a social and cultural evaluation system that differentiates between good and bad.
Thus, a moral judgment serves to affirm or deny that some action constitutes moral (acceptable) or immoral (unacceptable) conduct, guided by certain innate considerations of the human being (the empathy, feelings, for example) and also due to social, historical, cultural, religious considerations, etc.
A moral judgment is a conscious act, in which certain elements of the situation are taken into account, such as the motivation for an act, the ends and means used, and the short, medium, and long-term consequences it produces. All this oriented towards both rational and affective reflection on what is good and bad, which is never easy to determine and can lead to dilemmas and contradictions.
Put simply, our capacity for moral judgment consists in distinguishing between good and evil as more or less absolute categories. For this reason, it depends on our moral conscience, which is instilled in us at home when we are children and later in life. school, and often through religion and the philosophy.
Elements of a moral judgment
Every moral judgment involves three different elements, which are:
- The object, which is the behavior, decision or action that is being judged morally, and therefore must be considered moral or immoral.
- The circumstances, which are context in which the judged act takes place and the conditions that accompany and condition it.
- The intention, which is motivation behind the judged action and the specific desire that is specifically sought to be satisfied.
Examples of moral judgment
Some examples of moral judgment can be seen in the following situations:
- A judge must decide whether it is moral or immoral, that is, good or bad, the action that a doctor carried out when helping a quadriplegic man who was admitted to his hospital to die, taking into account the explicit desire of the man to die and the doctor's hippocratic oath. Was it right to help him die, or did she have to prolong a painful existence against his wishes?
- The voters of a political party that, once in power, unleashed a ferocious dictatorship and slaughtered its opponents, must decide, in their hearts, whether it was right or wrong to have voted as they did. To do this, they must assess if they knew that this would happen, if there were clear indications in this regard, and if it was in their power to prevent the assassins from coming to power.
- A man learns that his son has run over a pedestrian on his way home drunk. Fearing for his son's fate, he offers his gardener to take the blame and confess to the crime in his place, in exchange for putting his sons through college and supporting his family during his time in prison. The gardener agrees, but the son must decide if it is okay for an innocent man to go to jail in his place, or if he should confess to his crime and ruin his bright future.
Difference Between Moral Judgment and Ethical Judgment
The difference between moral judgment and ethical judgment It is simple: in the first case we try to decide if a behavior, decision or action is acceptable or unacceptable, that is, good or bad; while an ethical judgment evaluates the options available to decide what is the moral, acceptable or correct way to face a dilemma and resolve it.
Thus, for example, a moral judgment can tell us whether it was right or wrong to have voted in favor of the death penalty in our State, but only an ethical judgment can tell us what would be the correct, ideal, most humane way to put it into practice. practice.