Making the Philosophical Leap From Diversity to Ethics
“You wanted to talk about ethics,” UC Irvine philosophy professor Ermanno Bencivenga said, nearly an hour into our conversation, “but I have been talking about ethics all along.”
Hmm. What I thought we’d been talking about was philosophy, maybe some sociology, but not much of what I considered ethics--the study of right and wrong.
I devoted Wednesday’s column to Bencivenga’s interesting, if not controversial, philosophical view, which calls for incorporating a wider range of voices into public and private decision-making. Adults would acquire these voices, Bencivenga argued, in much the same way that a child explores new things and rejects rigidity.
So what’s that got to do with ethics?
“Ethics is simply a matter of living out all that we’ve been saying,” Bencivenga said. “You can be theoretical about [incorporating diversity of opinion and outlook], but then throw it out,” he said. “This is what happens to most academics. They’re interested in diversity, sometimes, but at a theoretical level. When it comes to applying it to their lives, they become rigid, just like the next person.”
I asked if he thinks it is an almost instinctive reaction in human beings to shun, if not openly fight, diversity. “I think it is,” he said, “and people need to be reassured about it, because it is only by going through this fire that we become more powerful.”
In your scenario, I asked, what is an ethical person? “An ethical person is somebody who will not act in uninterested defiance of everybody else’s concerns or interests,” Bencivenga said. “Somebody who will be careful and patient with others, somebody who will know how to listen, somebody who will be able to do justice to the complexity of issues. Someone who will come to a considered decision, sometimes an agonizing decision, but still with a full awareness of how complicated a problem is.”
Doesn’t that make decision-making rather difficult? Yes, he said, but embracing the philosophy will move us toward our as-yet-unrecognized potential to become more ethical human beings.
Perhaps sensing that I needed an object lesson, the professor offered what he called the “fiascoes” of the Orange County bankruptcy and the ongoing UCI fertility clinic scandal.
Regarding the latter, in which three doctors are accused of various wrongdoing, including the misappropriation of women’s eggs, he zeroed in on what he called the “inhuman behavior” of those involved. That is a direct product of the rigid, “results-oriented” nature of their work, he said, and typical of contemporary society.
“What happened is that the doctors were given a task--one for which they were richly rewarded--and they performed the task. You want babies, we’ll give you babies . Do you see how there is no consideration for all the things that come to bear on it? It was machine-like.”
Orange County’s bankruptcy sprang from a similar well, he said: “In both cases, the county and the academic community had some problems; they found some magician who proposed a solution, and they didn’t want to look into the solution, how it worked. They were just happy to get all this money; they didn’t want to know where it came from. In fact, when people raised questions internally [at UCI], they were silenced. Similarly, in Orange County, this guy was doing all sorts of tricks with money, but as long as the dividends were coming, nobody really wanted to inquire.”
That kind of results-oriented philosophy, which by definition narrows the number of factors used to determine one’s actions, could also be applied to such diverse scandals as Sen. Bob Packwood’s sexual behavior and police brutality. “The reason Packwood was able to do that for so long was because of how effective he was in a certain way, how much Bob Dole wanted him around to move certain levers in Congress so things would pass. He was an effective man,” Bencivenga said.
Ditto for police brutality, he said: “A police officer might say, ‘You want these people under control, I’ll put them under control. That’s my job, and I’ll do it. Don’t come and give me a hard time, because that’s what I’m paid to do, and it’s my responsibility to the community.’ ”
Ethics, Bencivenga said, is “associated with feeling a sense of responsibility for one’s actions. How do you apply that? Simply by considering all the constituencies that have a legitimate claim on you, who might legitimately demand something of you. In that way, when you do something, you feel you have to negotiate what you’re doing with all those people around you who make demands.”
He had now come full circle, back to his philosophy that society would benefit from a more expansive consideration of diverse viewpoints.
By doing that, Bencivenga said, human morality would widen and deepen. “We have a potential for being more ethical,” he said. “Given how many different points of view are represented around us, we have a possibility of incorporating more and more of this, and making our decisions ever more considered, ever more respectful of others.”
Dana Parsons’ column appears Wednesday, Friday and Sunday. Readers may reach Parsons by writing to him at The Times Orange County Edition, 1375 Sunflower Ave., Costa Mesa, CA 92626, or calling (714) 966-7821.