Question 1: I picked this question because I believe the answer lies in both of the choices, yet can be covered in one. I believe that it is important to both be a good person and to perform good acts, but if I had to pick one, I would choose that it is more important to be a good person, therefore choosing virtue ethics over action ethics. This I believe because if someone is a good, kind-hearted person, then they will by default perform good acts out of the good of their heart. On the other hand, a person who just performs good acts may be doing this for selfish reasons other than to benefit whomever the good act is for. For example, someone may choose to do a good act such as helping an elderly neighbor only to uphold their own reputation or maybe because someone told them to. However, a truly good person would go help that neighbor because it would benefit the neighbor first and foremost.

Question 2: No, the ends do not always justify the means. For example, a person may be attempting to do a very kind deed for another person, but if they go about it in an unethical way, then the deed is not justified because the means to achieve that deed were not virtuous. This answer relates back to my answer about being a good person as opposed to only performing good acts. It is like if a person did a very good deed for the community, such as donating to the poor or organizing an event, but only did it to either boost their own reputation for something such as a campaign or maybe for some sort of reward from an outside party. In this case, the end is a moral, ethical cause, but the means to achieve them were not backed up with a good reason that was in the best intent of the subject of their good deed.

Question 6: The topic of a life’s worth is one that is sacred and important and therefore cannot be taken lightly. I believe that my own life worth is the same as the lives of every other person, regardless of their own ethics and moral decisions. Each person was created equally on this Earth, and therefore each person’s life is of utmost importance, and must be taken with the same sincerity. However, what makes this a complicated question is that humans by nature are selfish even though we do not mean to be. It is in our initial instinct to look out for the best interest of both ourselves and those that we love, which we translate into valuing their lives more than others.  So, all in all, our lives are all worth the same, but because of human nature and our ability to grow closer to other people and their ideals, we value some lives over others’.