Hiltz PHIL1317 Quiz 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8. True/False + Box Words
Define externalities.
Externalities are costs of production that are not borne by the producer of the product, or paid for by the consumer of the product, but fall instead on some third party. Pollution is the most salient externality. (For more, see https://www.investopedia.com/terms/e/externality.asp).
A basic concept in Blind Spots is that ethical fading involves emotional and/or unconscious cognitive biases internal to our psyches that cause us to ignore or lose focus on ethically relevant factors.
False
According to Blind Spots, corporate managers often delegate unethical tasks to underlings, thus inducing indirect blindness to management's culpability.
False
According to the handout, 'Why so unethical?', guilt at having violated one's commitment to internalized rules was the sanction that kept people from straying from the traditional path in pre-modern societies, whereas shame was used to keep people in line with moral principles in the modern era.
False
According to these authors, bounded ethicality results from external factors in our work environment like goals and rewards, organizational pressures, and the way in which decisions are framed.
False
Bazerman and Tenbrunsel continue our engagement with normative ethics, using psychological research to help us fine-tune our grasp of the principles determining how people should act.
False
Deferring to Wendy on this issue, Socrates concedes that lowered tax rates are not a significant part of the problem of rising deficits.
False
Disagreeing with Friedman and Rodgers, Mackey holds that every corporation also has a strong moral duty to engage in philanthropy, even if doing so runs counter to the expectations of those who have invested their money in the corporation.
False
Emotional health and safety, the absence of pain and suffering, and getting sufficient rest are all on Wendy's list of tangible needs, but not skills, knowledge, social interactions or access to meaningful relationships.
False
For a Utilitarian, it can never be morally permissible to cause harm to any of the individuals who are affected by our action.
False
In Kant's ethical philosophy, dignity refers to the value people possess in virtue of their usefulness for noble causes.
False
In Socrated Comes to Wall Street, Natalie presents data about unemployment, poverty, and standards of living that supports Wendy's idea that when businesses create wealth it inevitably spreads through the rest of society.
False
In-group favoritism involves hostility towards those outside one's group, while ordinary prejudice is basically just a manifestation of our innate egocentrism.
False
John Mackey of Whole Foods agrees with economist Milton Friedman, that the primary goal of a business is to make profits for its shareholders.
False
Kant believes that actions that stand opposed to the value of reciprocity may nevertheless be in accordance with the moral law.
False
Psychological reactance refers to our tendency to maintain a moral identity by balancing ethical infractions with compensatory good deeds.
False
Socrates admits that Caterpillar's practices of freezing employee wages and pensions in times of high profits, while generously rewarding top executives at the same time, are compatible with doing its share in supporting the kind of life we want in the village, once long-term developments are fully considered.
False
Socrates agrees with Wendy's claim that the interests of shareholders take priority over the interests of employees, because the shareholders have risked more to keep the firm in business.
False
Solomon holds that there is an intrinsic conflict between ethics and the successful conduct of business, so that the legal regulation of business is the only way society can cope with amoral business practices.
False
The executives leading the Wall Street companies depicted in Inside Job managed to wreak havoc on both their own companies and the economy in general, despite the fact that they operated with a broad view of corporate social responsibility.
False
The gist of the Hand-of-Government argument is that legislation must be passed requiring the managers of corporations to adopt the broad view of corporate responsibility, since that's the only way stakeholders and society generally can be protected against the side-effects of laissez-faire capitalism.
False
The key to ethicizing corporate culture is to incorporate ethics into the firm's formal culture, including a system of sanctions (rewards and/or punishments), which will give employees a self-interested motive to behave ethically.
False
Wendy accepts the idea that the end justifies the means, and so is unconcerned with whether or not a consistently applied policy would have to be able work as a law of nature in order for actions carried out in accordance with it to count as moral.
False
Wendy is sympathetic to the idea that climate change is real and presents a major problem for future generations, but she doesn't think the issue has anything to do with her company or how she runs it, on the grounds that future generations should not count as stakeholders.
False
Wendy is unable to respond to Socrates' feigned claim that ethics is rubbish.
False
While Utilitarians place a high value on happiness, they maintain that the morality of an action is more important than its effect on happiness.
False
In SCTWS, Socrates claims that individual conscience, personal emotions, and social or cultural traditions or laws cannot provide an objective standard for ethical permissibility, since they are subjective, or at least arbitrary enough to prevent a universal consensus.
True
In Socrates Comes to Wall Street, the venture capitalist nicknamed 'Socrates' wagers that the CEO does not really believe that business is all about making money, nor that the CEO's company didn't do anything wrong.
True
In order to conform to the Categorical Imperative, it is necessary that the policy we are acting on be one that we could consistently will for everyone to follow universally. (This is evident from the fact that the Universalizability Principle is one version of the Categorical Imperative.)
True
In response to Sergio's presentation of climate change data and the problems global warming presents for future generations, Wendy tries to summarize the ethical issues this raises for corporations that challenge such claims; she details the possible consequences for various parties and articulates the individual and corporate maxims that should be tested by the Categorical Imperative.
True
In that movie, fraudulent attempts to misrepresent the company's finances were motivated in part by pressures to keep the company's stock price high.
True
In the NASA Challenger case, ethical considerations faded from consideration when Morton Thiokol executives framed the issue of whether or not to revise their engineers' no-launch recommendation as a management decision.
True
In the Tragedy of the Commons and other social dilemmas, defecting seems to be the choice that serves each party's self-interest, but cooperation is needed to prevent unacceptable consequences for everyone involved.
True
Inside Job takes the position that the financial collapse of 2007 was made possible in part by deregulation of the finance industry.
True
Inside Job was critical of Economics professors making hundreds of thousands of dollars as consultants for financial services companies and being commissioned to write papers in service of the interests of such clients, without disclosing these potential inhibitors of objectivity in their analyses.
True
John Stuart Mill holds that the value of the general happiness can not be proven by deriving it from some more basic value, but he holds that it can be shown to be valuable by the fact that people do, in fact, value it.
True
Lost jobs and lost revenue are among the harms a community suffers when a major employer pulls out.
True
Mill emphasizes that deviation from the truth weakens the trustworthiness of human assertions, and thus seriously detracts from civilization, virtue and happiness.
True
Rule Utilitarianism is primarily focused on formulating and justifying rules that would maximize social utility if adhered to, thus denying the need to apply the Principle of Utility to each particular choice situation as we encounter it.
True
Socrates accuses the CEO of not living up to her implicit promise to promote the well-being of the company's stakeholders as well as she can.
True
Socrates complains that the actions of the CEO and her client company, Exxon-Mobil, served to conceal the truth and hence impede the public's perception of global warming as a problem, thus contributing to public inaction in dealing with it.
True
Socrates maintains that all concentrations of power constitute a threat to freedom, including concentrations of economic power.
True
Socrates maintains that citizens would voluntarily authorize the use of public money to provide the infrastructure businesses need in order to flourish only if they could expect businesses to provide them with a reasonable return on this investment.
True
Socrates represents Kant's philosophy as focused on respect for human dignity and as based on principles derived from reason alone.
True
Socrates suggests that Wendy's objectivity will be enhanced if she adopts the perspective of one behind Rawls' "veil of ignorance".
True
Socrates thinks that Wendy and the other executives at her firm should take responsibility for the negative consequences people have suffered as a result of the firm's activities.
True
Socrates tries to get the CEO to see that the point of business is not just to make profits for the owners of the business, though he is willing to grant that the CEO has not lied, cheated or stolen anything.
True
That handout also suggested a possible explanation for frequent wrongdoing in business: the fragmented knowledge conditions typical of contemporary bureaucratic contexts often leave people in the dark as to the full ethical significance of their actions.
True
The Blind Spots authors believe that we are more likely to acknowledge the influence of bias and situational factors on the ethicality of others than we are to acknowledge such influences on our own thoughts and behaviors.
True
The fact that pressures to comply with the urgings of authority figures can lead individuals to compromise their personal ethics is illustrated by the Milgram experiments portrayed in the video, Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room.
True
To apply the Principle of Utility, one must consider all feasible options in the choice situation, and estimate the harms and benefits that are likely to accrue to all those affected by each option.
True
Wendy ends up agreeing with the historical Socrates' idea that happiness is obtainable by living a virtuous life, and also with his idea that vice ends up harming those who engage in it.
True
Wendy insists that profit has to be the measure of success for any business, but she proposes that optimum profits, rather than maximum profits, should be the standard — where optimum profits are those that are compatible with the long-term viability of the firm, ethics, and business' job of contributing to the kind of life we want for society.
True
When Socrates first introduces the topic, Wendy resists the idea that there is a conflict of interest attached to her dual roles as CEO and Chair of the Board of her firm, denying that this could undermine the Board's objective oversight of the CEO and her management team.
True
While the value of the general happiness warrants giving everyone equal consideration, it does not entail that efforts should be made to make everyone equally happy.
True
Define institutional corruption.
a condition wherein institutions have formal policies and practices that weaken the public's trust in said institutions, and this condition also weakens the effectivness of society because of this mistrust. This can be done through disinformation/obfuscation campaigns - notably done by the tobacco, auditing, and energy industries.
Define moral hazard.
a situation wherein a party will have a tendency to take risks because the costs that could be incurred will not be felt by the party taking the risk.
Discuss (don't just name) three ways in which moral disengagement can occur after we've engaged in unethical behavior.
psychological cleansing, selective memory, rationalization, deflecting blame, and ethical desensitization
In the last few chapters of SCTWS, Socrates, Sergio and Natalie challenge Wendy to defend her views on contemporary capitalism. Which of the following accurately express their concerns? (a) Global capitalism's tendency to invest in areas where they can pay very low wages, and where environmental and labor safety regulations are lax, can be characterized as a race to the bottom. (b) Fiscal responsibility is nothing to worry about. (c) What Wendy thinks of as observations about economic affairs are sometimes better thought of as inferences influences by the particular perspective or ideological lens through which she sees things. (d) When viewed from the perspective of the Village Creed, the syndrome of business practices endorsed by those who operate with the Business Creed does not just result in the enrichment of a minority in the village while much of the costs are born by the majority; it is rather a deliberate con job, a conscious plan to steal from the poor to give to the rich while claiming that what is going on is aimed at bringing prosperity to everyone in the village.
(a) Global capitalism's tendency to invest in areas where they can pay very low wages, and where environmental and labor safety regulations are lax, can be characterized as a race to the bottom. (c) What Wendy thinks of as observations about economic affairs are sometimes better thought of as inferences influences by the particular perspective or ideological lens through which she sees things. (d)When viewed from the perspective of the Village Creed, the syndrome of business practices endorsed by those who operate with the Business Creed does not just result in the enrichment of a minority in the village while much of the costs are born by the majority; it is rather a deliberate con job, a conscious plan to steal from the poor to give to the rich while claiming that what is going on is aimed at bringing prosperity to everyone in the village.
Which of the following statements are consistent with the views presented in Blind Spots? Select all correct choices. (a) The ordinary thought processes humans use to categorize, perceive, and judge information can lead to systematic feelings and beliefs that can be labeled as prejudiced and stereotypical, even in the absence of any overt hostility or disdain towards outgroups. (b) It is unfortunately natural for us to focus on or overweight short-term considerations at the expense of long-term concerns. (c) That we are not usually rewarded for noticing the unethical behavior of others is one reason for why we don't notice such behavior; but it is unscientific to think that we don't notice the unethical behavior of others because we are busy paying attention to other things. (d) We are less likely to perceive changes in others' ethical behavior if the changes occur slowly over time rather than abruptly. (e) A social dilemma is a situation where the interests of society are in conflict with the interests of its citizens. (f) The should self is pretty good at making accurate predictions of how the want self will behave in choice situations, and is typically objective in assessing one's behavior after the fact. (g) At the time when a decision is to be made, the want self instinctively focuses on the details of how the present situation immediately engages with the desires, impulses, fear, or intentions etc. of the individual, thus pushing ethical considerations into the background.
(a) pretty much defines what they call ordinary prejudice. (b) pretty much defines what they call overly discounting the future. (d) is what is meant by the slippery slope effect. (g) is their main point about how the want self is the source of bounded awareness.
List 3 (of the 11) beliefs constituting the "Village Creed".
1. Cooperation works better than competition -The village works together, and shares the belief that in order to succeed everyone must work together, instead of pushing other people down in order to climb any hierarchial ladder. 2. Selfishness, greed, and envy are moral weaknesses -since these things lead to competition and are not for the collective good of the 3. Every Concentration of power threatens freedom/liberty.
Discuss 5 (of the 22) beliefs included in Natalie's "Business Creed".
1. You are what you have - similar to number 5, worth in the business creed is assessed by what you have collected monetarily. 2. The wealthy create the jobs, and are responsible for the good in society -the idea that since the billionaires of the world created big companies that made a lot of jobs available, these billionaires have effectively helped society enough and earned their keep. 3.Hard work is success and everyone has the same chance of sucess -the belief that you are just not working hard enough if you are poor or unsuccessful 4. Above everything- wealth is sacred -the belief that wealth is to be praised and sought after 5. The person who dies with the most stuff/wealth wins -similar to number 1,5 the belief that life is about earning money and gaining wealth
Universalizability Principle
Act only on those maxims that you can consistently and coherently will to become a universal law.
Principle of Utility.
An action is good to the extent that it brings about beneficial or pleasurable consequences, bad to the extend that it brings out painful or harmful consequences.
Socrates and Wendy agree that several factors are involved in the essential infrastructure all businesses require to get off the ground. List at least three of them, and be explicit about what is involved in each of the categories you mention.
Essential Infrastructure includes safety public utilities, health, education, stability(laws), etc. Public Utilies such as water, electricity, and the internet is required for a business to operate in modern days. Communication such as telephone, videochat, and e-mail/mail is essential because initially when the business beings they need to get inventory from other places and make deals with others. Transportation is also essential, such as local, national, and international bridges, roads, ports, railroads and airports are all necessary so that products and people can be transported. Stability - laws, regulations, government Safety and health - businesses require police and fire departments as well as medical treatments so that their employees can feel safe and also be alive and well so that they can work.
Autonomous Beings
Kant believes that autonomous beings have the individual capacity for self-governance aka being able to endorse rules that govern their behavior. They are also rational choosing beings.
Categorical Imperative
One command that reason issues categorically or unconditionally.
Explain the differences between System 1 and System 2 thinking. Be thorough.
The characteristics of System 1 thinking is that it is unconscious, automatic, fast, effortless, emotional/instinctual and associative. The characteristics of System 2 thinking is that it is slow, deliberate, effortful, and analytic/logical.
Define motivated blindness.
The common failure not to notice or fully recognize the unethicality of others when doing so would threaten some vested interest one has with the respect to the culpable party.
In Blind Spots Ch 7 the authors claim that important parties in the tobacco, auditing, and energy industries sought to block near pareto-optimal policies that would adversely affect their interests, in part by conducting disinformation campaigns that would strengthen our natural status quo bias.
True
Psychological Egoism
The only thing that ever motivates humans to act is their own self-interest.
Ethical Egoism
This suggests humans SHOULD / ought to act and be motivated ONLY by self-interest.
Describe the "Securitization Food Chain" in Inside Job and explain how it relates to moral hazard.
This whole situation relates to moral hazard because the parties involved are being rewarded, while off-loading the responsibility and damage to other parties. This is the precise definition of Moral Hazard -- when a party will have a tendency to take risks because the actual damage will not be incurred by them.
Write out Kant's Respect Principle. (Don't describe what it entails or talk about Kant's philosophy in general. Just write out the definition.)
Treat people, whether yourself or others, always as an end in itself, never solely as a means.
According to Robert Solomon, the viability of business in general depends on mutual trust, adherence to rules, and a sense of fairness, with the result that companies who adopt practices running contrary to these values cannot reasonably expect to increase their profits in the long run.
True
According to a report by top military officers, climate change acts a threat multiplier for instability in volatile regions of the world, which may eventually require direct action by the military to maintain civil order, provide humanitarian assistance, and protect populations against political extremism and terrorism.
True
Bazerman and Tenbrunsel (in Blind Spots) attribute much of the unethicality we find in the business world to bounded awareness, which involves factors inherent in our psychology or in our choice situations that prevent us from seeing, fully appreciating, or being responsive to ethically relevant features of our choice situations.
True
Compliance programs that impose penalties on employees for unethical behavior are often problematic, since they can cause employees to lose their focus on the ethical aspects of their situation and instead adopt a cost-benefit analysis of their options in it.
True
For Wendy, actions should be considered ethically positive when they promote or facilitate the attainment of human needs, ethically negative when they prevent the satisfaction of human needs or make that more difficult.
True
Her criterion for something counting as a need, and not just a want, is that it be a necessary condition for a human being's healthy growth, development, flourishing and a basic sense of satisfaction or well-being.
True
With respect to closing the ethical gap in organizations, the Blind Spots authors recommend focusing on the organization's informal culture and identifying ethical sinkholes — these being characteristics of corporate life that make misalignment between its formal and informal values more likely. Which of the following are examples of ethical sinkholes? (Select all correct answers.) (a) Uncertainty about relevant factors can make it easier for ethical considerations to fade in favor of pressing business concerns. (b) Time pressures can reduce the cognitive resources available to our System 2 thinking, leading to more reliance on our System 1 thinking. (c) Adopting a long-term horizon when considering ethical implications of immediate choices can lead to gross errors of judgment. (d) Isolation of individuals or groups from other colleagues or corporate leaders can lead those isolated to develop norms that diverge from the corporation's officially stated norms.
a, b, d
The authors of Blind Spots offer some recommendations on how to close the gap between the should self and the want self. These recommendations include which of the following? (Select all correct answers.) (a) Try to imagine what the concrete details of an upcoming choice situation are going to be like and what your want-self motivations are going to be like in response to them, while rehearsing in your mind how you how you intend to handle all that. (b) Don't fall for the alleged effectiveness of precommitment devices, like publicly committing to a decision ahead of time or sharing your intentions with a respected friend or colleague. (c) While in the choice situation, deliberately focus more on the abstract, high-level aspects of the situation than on the emotionally charged particulars, and try to think of how others would view how you are handling the situation if they were present. (d) Approach each new situation as it comes, rather than burdening yourself with the difficult task of achieving an objective, unbiased assessment of how well you've handled ethical choice-situations in the past.
a, c
Which of the following are views that Wendy ends up endorsing as her dialogue with Socrates' proceeds? Select all that apply. (a) The point of social cooperation among human beings is to provide for a better life, which is to be achieved by dividing up society's various jobs in an efficient way. (b) Government's job in society is to provide the material infrastructure needed for businesses to thrive and to regulate markets to ensure economic efficiency. (c) While fairness and respect are desirable moral values, these are not necessarily part of the kind of life that society should be trying to provide. (d) The principles people ought to be guided by "in the village" are to do no harm and to treat others appropriately. (e) Having a clearly articulated and communicated mission statement and code of conduct overseen by an ethics officer is sufficient to sustain an ethical corporate culture.
a, d (These are the two sides of the "ethical yardstick" Socrates points out is implicit in what Wendy has been saying.)
Define outcome bias.
evaluating the quality of the decision after you already know the outome of the situation, and using the outcome in determining the quality of the decision