Ethics week 5 discussion

Read about the life of a moral reformer or examine the life of your own moral hero or heroine.

Optional: If you need help thinking of a moral reformer, you can find examples on CNN Heroes. This page lists CNN’s hero award recipients from 2019.

Respond to the following questions:

• What motivated the person of your choice to continue, even when the cause seemed hopeless?


• Was the motivation a sense of duty grounded in reason or sentiment or both? Explain.


• Does your response to the above question agree with Kant’s claim that morality is grounded in reason alone?

Source

CNN.com. September 7, 2019. CNN honors 10 men and women for making the world a better place. https://www.cnn.com/2019/10/30/world/cnn-heroes-top-ten-2019/index.html

also reply to this student response- one paragraph

Hello Professor and Classmates,

     The person that I have selected as a moral reformer is Mary Calhoun Brown, co-founder of Lily’s place, a neonatal withdraw center in Huntington W.V. Lily’s place is a neonatal withdrawal center that helps babies born with opioid and other narcotic addictions. Brown and her co-founders, Sara Murray and Rhonda Edmunds, both nurses, recognized a need after seeing many withdrawing infants pass away after being sent home from the hospital. Lily is the name of one of those infants. I believe that these three remarkable women do have a sense of moral duty that is grounded in reason, sentiment, and faith. There were no infant treatment centers for Neonatal Abstinence Syndrome (NAS) and opioid exposure. Two of the founders, being nurses that have seen suffering and loss of life due to opioid withdrawal, along with their own sentiment of caring and kindness is what motivated them to establish an aftercare center for the most vulnerable victims of the opioid epidemic.

     Immanuel Kant’s moral philosophy posited that a person actions determine his or her moral worth. Also that our actions do not depend on consequences but on our whether they fulfil our duty. Quite simply, doing the right thing, even if there is no benefit (even a negative consequence) to you for doing it other than the fulfilment of knowing you did what was right to do. I believe that Lily’s place is grounded in reason and sentiment alone. I feel these ladies saw a need and felt a moral duty to provide care for neonatal victims.

Thank you,

Vikki