Ethics reflection paper assignment

lntroduction;

Even though there are good reasons why he is not the morally shallowest person in the story, Lenny Mendel does not engage in deep ethical reflection, especially after he visits the hospital and meet the nurse. The questions of whether it is right to use a dying man as a means to lure an engaged woman away from her fiance and whether it is good to do so by deceiving both lskowitz and Miss Hill in the process are moral consideration that seem worthy of deep ethical reflection.Such reflection--and the duties, virtues, motives, choices, intentions, and results it could lead to--might enable Mendel ( and all of us) to overcome obstacles to moral progress such as fear, being overly judgmental, selfishness, refusing to judge, desire, low self - esteem, and lust.

Topic:

The topic for this paper is for you to judge whether personal moral progress is important enough for you to engage in the sort of deep ethical reflection that Mendel did not. Specifically identify what deep ethical reflection involves and requires - things like fair judgment, honesty, thinking beneath the surface of our beliefs, considering others in addition to ourselves-- and then support why it is or is not the case that personal moral progress is important enough for you to engage in such difficult and demanding reflection. What is such progress and why is it worth all the effort?

Clarifications:

Your purpose in writing this paper is to explore the thoughts, questions, confusions, and insights you have had throughout our discussions of this story in even greater depth. It is important that you share your thinking process with me, rather than simply the conclusion you reach as a result of this process. This issues you will grapple with are difficult but you will write a better paper if you allow yourself to become entangled in these difficulties rather than avoiding them. Your paper will not be judged on the basis of its results but rather on how thoroughly you respond to the topic, It should not re-tell the story nor should it be a report on the story or on the author. l am looking for your reflections on the story within the context of our class discussions about it ; discussions whose focus has been ethics -- the philosophical study of morality.