Ethics

Ethics is the branch of axiology – one of the four major branches of philosophy, alongside metaphysics, epistemology, and logic – which attempts to understand the nature of morality; to define that which is right from that which is wrong. The Western tradition of ethics is sometimes called moral philosophy.

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Assumptions about ethical underpinnings of human behaviour are reflected in every social science, including: anthropology because of the complexities involved in relating one culture to another, economics because of its role in the distribution of scarce resources, political science because of its role in allocating power, sociology because of its roots in the dynamics of groups, law because of its role in codifying ethical constructs like mercy and punishment, criminology because of its role in rewarding ethical behaviour and discouraging unethical behaviour, and psychology because of its role in defining, understanding, and treating unethical behaviour.

Axiology: Axiology, from the Greek axia (αξια, value, worth), is the study of value or quality. It is often thought to include ethics and aesthetics—philosophical fields that depend crucially on notions of value—and sometimes it is held to lay the groundwork for these fields, ...

Philosophy: Philosophy is a discipline or field of study involving the investigation, analysis, and development of ideas at a general, abstract, or fundamental level. It is the discipline in search for a general understanding of values and reality by chiefly speculative rather than observational means. The term...

Metaphysics: Metaphysics (Greek words meta = after/beyond and physics = nature) is a branch of philosophy concerned with the study of "first principles" and "being" (ontology)....