Allyson says,
I'm trying to write something about fairness, and keep confusing morals and ethics, which is embarassing, and something I often do. I have no idea why the concepts keep scrambling in my head.
I know this looks like bon bon, but it's really Bob Bob. Let me get to your question about the morals/ethics distinction.
I should say, this is a distinction that we (professional philosophers) don't really talk about much--at least, I don't remember it from any of my classes; I might have missed it in an introductory class--, so take my comments with a grain of salt.
Morality has to do with obligations, permissions, and forbiddings. So, you can be morally obligated to do something (say, save your drowning child); morally permitted to do something (say, take a swim); and morally forbidden from doing something (say, drown your child, or simply not help your drowning child even though you easily could).
Ethics is often taken to be broader than morality. That is, ethics includes morality as one of its branches. Other topics of ethics include: virtue (e.g., what are the various virtues out there (like courage, temperance, modesty, prudence, etc.), and what does it take to be a virtuous person); moral psychology (what goes on, psychologically, with a person when she is trying to do what she ought or ought not do; what does an obligation, as opposed to something completely non-moral, 'feel like'); political philosophy (how should we set up our government, etc.); meta-ethics (in virtue of what facts is it the case that moral obligations, virtues, justice, etc., exist at all?); and so on.
I hope that's not too convoluted.
I see a lot of conflation of morals and ethics in definitions, Allyson, so you'll have to state your playground clearly if you borrow axioms, or just define them yourself.
That's helpful, bob bob, thank you.
I got Thai mild yellow curry chicken with potato and green pea. And it is delicious.
I had the Chicken Platter from Ray's: chicken, rice and lentils, grape leaves, roasted potatoes, salad.
Mmmmm....lentils from Ray's. Roasted potatos...mmmmm.
I got a roasted chicken sub from Cap't Sub with olives, pickles and lettuce. It was very green and beige.
The issue that is bugging me is the 11th Hour v. Universal problem. Legally, Universal is in the right. But the ethics/morals get muddy for me, due to their encouragement of guerilla marketing, that they never made their legal position clear in terms of copyright (banner contests using their images without any warning about selling those images), and how far their copyright reaches. For example, if one is selling a t-shirt with the Chinese characters for Serenity, and advertising it as a Serenity t-shirt, has a line been crossed?
If the company encouraged fans to market for them, hired fans as extras in a film, and used fandom as a marketing angle (the movie would not have been possible without their campaigns which used copyrighted images without permission), is it ethical to demand 9K from a fan for back licensing fees? It is legal, but is it moral/ethical, given the circumstances?
No one demanded money from me for using copyrighted images on the Variety ad, because it was to their benefit and I did not make any money off of it.
Is it implied that fanart should only be distributed at cost to the fan for the pure enjoyment of promoting something they love?
I'm all for the C&D. But I'm pretty muddy on demanding the licensing fee for teh above reasons. It's definately a feeling rooted in my curious protectiveness of fandom, but there does seem to be an ethical dilemna on both sides of the issue to me, if I remove the legal issue of copyright.
In international news - WTF?
Israeli jets clash with German ship near Lebanon
BERLIN (Reuters) - Two Israeli warplanes and a German navy vessel have clashed off the Lebanese coast, the Defense Ministry in Berlin said on Wednesday without giving further details.
Germany daily Der Tagesspiegel earlier on Wednesday quoted a junior German defense minister as telling a parliamentary committee that two Israeli F-16 fighters flew low over the German ship and fired two shots.
The jets also released infra-red countermeasures to ward off any rocket attack, the paper quoted him as saying.
The minister did not say when the incident happened or what had caused it, the paper said.
"I can confirm that there was an incident," a ministry spokesman told Reuters on Wednesday. An investigation was underway and he therefore was unable to provide further information, he added.
An Israeli military spokeswoman said she was checking the report.
Germany assumed command of a United Nations naval force off the coast of Lebanon 10 days ago and has sent a force of eight ships and 1,000 service personnel to join the international peace operation in the region.
The naval force is charged with preventing weapons smuggling and helping maintain a ceasefire between Israel and radical Lebanese-based Islamic group Hezbollah.
Germany assumed command of a United Nations naval force off the coast of Lebanon 10 days ago and has sent a force of eight ships and 1,000 service personnel to join the international peace operation in the region.
Geez, and *Germany* was told to behave because of possible "we still blame you for things your grandparents did" issues.
