1. Is it more important to be a good person or to perform good acts (virtue ethics vs. action ethics)?

Like a lot of my other classmates, I think it is more important to be a good person. You can be a good person and do good things. But, a lot of the time you can do good things and not be a good person. For example, if you’re a volunteer at a soup kitchen, you are doing something good. But, the reason you are volunteering is because you need a certain amount of volunteer hours as part of your probation sentence. You most likely aren’t a good person if you’re committing crimes. A good person would volunteer for the sake of helping others. Or you could be volunteering just for the recognition, like how celebrities give to charities to get more fame. The difference is that an action is completed once, while a virtue is in your personality/mentality for life. A good person (virtue) has the natural capacity to do good things (action). There are specific cases where you can do both, but in general, that isn’t true.

4. Do ecosystems matter for their own sake, or do they only matter to the extent that they impact humans (ecocentric ethics vs. anthropocentric ethics)?

I think in the culture in America, we say we care about the ecosystem, but really we only care for the sake of our human lives. You hear people talking about the polar ice caps melting and how the east coast is going to be underwater. How will humans survive underwater? You don’t hear about how all the plants, not only in the ocean but on the east coast, will survive. Or talk about how that will affect our resources on the east coast. I think we aim to be ecocentric, but we only do it for ourselves, which is anthropocentric. Another example could be how people say we’re using up all our natural resources. But, are they upset that the resources will be gone or that humans will not be able to sustain life without them? Going back to other points in this module, humans do not allow for distributive justice when it comes to the sake of the ecosystem or humanity. To me, as long as humans stay self-centered like they are now, the ecosystem will not matter just for its own sake.

5. Do the pleasure and pain of non-human animals matter as much as the pleasure and pain of humans (speciesism)?

I don’t think the pleasure and pain of non-human animals matter as much as humans’ pain and pleasure. Like the module says, speciesism is already prevalent in our society today. That is why humans make decisions, rule countries, and are basically at the top of the food chain except for freak accidents with animals. Clearly, it is not okay to purposefully abuse animals. But, I think it is okay to kill animals for food. Like most people, when I eat chicken nuggets, I’m not concerned about whether that chicken had a good life or was in pain. Speciesism is in place in our society so that we don’t have people electing dogs as president or worshiping cows. I think it makes sense because we are the dominant race on earth. We care about our pets’ feelings, but not as much as the feelings of our best friends or family. Non-human animals feel pain and pleasure but I think to say their feelings matter as much as humans is hard to back up considering the speciesism in our society today.