Blog Assignment #10

Ethical Decision Making Framework



FOCUS: IDEALS



NAME:JOHN RADECKI







STEP ONE: THE DETAILS OF THE CASE







(1) Choose one inquiry, from inquiries 1 - 28 (pages 114 - 117). Indicate which inquiry you chose, and then briefly explain it in your own words:

I chose to do inquiry twelve on page 115. It describes a police officer that works undercover at a local college. Her job is to make friendships, and be an informant to the police department about the drug trafficking on campus. She ends up arresting people that she had fake friendships with.

(2) Stakeholders: Name each person, group, organization, etc., that has a stake in this outcome

1. The Undercover Officer

2.The drug pushers

3. The local college

4. The police department

5. The College Students and Employees

(3) Are the details given sufficient? Why or why not?

The details of the inquiry where not sufficient enough to conclude whether what the officer did was right. She had a duty and she had to fulfill her job, but the inquiry doesn't give details on how she formed the relationships. The undercover operations are important to ending crime, but some of the their tactics can be border-line infraction on a person's privacy.

(4) What additional questions does this inquiry raise?





What did the officer do/say to the "friends" she was making?


Was she asking where to find drugs?


What was the evidence that she had to find in order to make arrests?


How many people where arrested in the end?


How close did she become with her new "friends"?





STEP 2:





1. Obligations (aka "duties"): Optional this week


2. Moral Ideals (aka "virtues"): See breakdown of ideals below


3. Consequences (aka "outcomes" or "results"): Optional this week



1. Justice- The undercover officer did not use any "playing of the favorites," and she arrested those that are guilty. Justice was served through the undercover operation, and society has benefited from her actions. (108)



2. Courage- The woman officer had to keep her identity intacted while becoming close to people she knew were involved in criminal activity. Her goal was to find the truth no matter what she had to do. (108)



3. Honesty- The undercover officer can look past the friendships that she has formed to fulfill her professional demands. She does not hold back any information that she has come up with, and she has made the maximum amount of arrests in the case. (109)



4. Gratitude- The public and the police force should show the brave police officer some thanks for what she has done. She has taken some criminals off of the campus, and made the community a better place. (109)



STEP 3



Alternative #1: The police officer could form deeper relationships that would keep her from giving evidence for certain individuals. She would be protecting her new found friends.



Alternative#2: The drug pushers could find out that she is a undercover police officer, and could harm her or leave town. This would create even more problems for the police department.



Alternative #3: If the officer was afraid to approach certain individuals, but rather just created bonds with people that she wasn't scared to be around then she would only make half the arrests. The higher in power drug pushers would just move away, or be more careful of who they talk to.





STEP 4

Examine the action taken or proposed and decide whether it achieves the greater good (the most widespread "respect for persons")...if it does not, choose one that will, from your alternatives. Where the choice of actions is such that no good can be achieved, choose the action that will result in the lesser evil.

The action taken will definitely achieve the greater good for all persons involved. She resolved justice, and she did the job that was asked of her to the fullest. Getting all the criminals off the campus will make the campus and the community that much safer for everyone involved.

1. In your own words, describe something new that you learned from this week’s assigned reading material and guidance.
The most important thing that I learned from this assignment is how to properly analyze a inquiry. I found out the meaning for each individual ideal, and it helped to make me realized that ideals are not just described with a few words. The portion of the chapter that was titled "Ideals in Conflict;" was helpful in explaining how ideals do not always work together. (107-110)


2. In your own words, describe in detail some insight you gained, about the material, from one of your classmates' blogs this week.



3. Did you post a thoroughly completed post to your blog on time this week?

Yes, I completed this blog post on time.



4. Did you ALSO print this out, so you can bring it to class and earn total points?

No, I did not attend class this week.



5. Of 25 points total, my efforts this week deserve: Insert your JUSTIFIED answer here.

Since I did not attend class I would give my blog a 10 out of 12.5. I used the readings from the book and changed the words to my own. I answered all questions, and followed the guideline.

Blog Assignment #9

PART 1

In this section, we're going to return for a moment to Chapter 7, to the section that discusses errors that are common in the analysis of moral issues (p. 89). Briefly explain each of the following errors in your own words, as if you were explaining the concept to a friend who had never taken this class (consider who, what, when, where, why, how, when); and then give an example of each one, preferably from your own past experience.



Unwarranted Assumptions: An unwarranted assumption is an error when someone unconsciously does not acknowledge all details (cutting corners). When looking at information someone that makes this error will try to separate what it says, and what is not said.

Example: When I was coaching soccer last year at the high school level, I found myself assuming that the players would know the rules. When the games started the players would break a rule, and wouldn't know about it. I was embarrassed being the coach, but it was my fault they weren't informed. After the first game we went back to the basics, and I took a whole practice taking questions and explaining the rules.


Oversimplification: Simplification is an ordinary part of our daily lives. It is crucial that we can simplify what we need to say in order to communicate properly and efficiently. The error of oversimplification is when someone leaves out information that is necessary and changes the way the person will receive the case. This is all done in order to trim-up the information, but it ends up coming off differently than the way it was originally supposed to be stated.

Example: When I would tell my parents what my grades where the week before report cards would come out, I would tell them that I was doing "pretty good". I would always leave out that I had to pass that week's test to get a B. I made it look like I knew what I was going to get, and that it would reflect a "pretty good" grade.


Hasty Conclusions: The error of hasty conclusions occurs when someone does not take the time to fully examine something before making a judgement. The problem is that someone will usually make a judgement based on first impressions, and not give the decision the adequate amount of time and focus.

Example: My friends and I wanted to take a vacation right after graduation. I said that we should get a cabin in Tennessee, and most of them said that it looked boring and they didn't want to go. They said no without even looking into the trip, and they didn't look into all there was to do. After some convincing we went, and they still talk about that trip almost daily.


PART 2

Briefly answer the following "chapter opening" questions, in your own words, based on what you learned by studying chapter eight:

1. What do we do in situations where there is more than a single obligation?

When a situation arises where there is multiple obligations, the most important thing to do is to thoroughly look at the importance of each obligation. In most cases of multiple obligations when you weigh both one will have some kind of slight edge over the other. The way to go about deciding which obligation means more to you is to ask yourself questions like "how deeply am I commited to this obligations?" and "how will not fulfilling this obligation effect my future, and my goals".

2. How can we reconcile conflicting obligations?

The way to go about reconciling conflicting obligations is to look at the good, and the bad in each of the conflicting obligations. Giving each the positive edge, and then looking at the outcome will help you to invision what effect your decision might have. An important part of reconciling is to find out which obligation can by itself fulfill something that the other simply cannot fulfill. The outcome of choosing an obligation will vary from person to person, but that is because when choosing you have to decide on the obligation that is best suited for you personally. I think it is helpful to make a list of values that are important to you, and then looking at each obligation, making sure that your choice fulfills what you believe in.

PART 3

1. In a nutshell, what is the most important thing, for you, that you learned from this assignment?
I think the most important thing that I learned from this assignment is the terms listed in part one. I knew that oversimplification, hasty conclusions, and unwarranted assumptions happen in our daily lives but I have never really looked into the technical descriptions of the terms. To realize that doing so is an error, and can lead to troublesome outcomes. I think that most of the time the errors are done unconsciously, because the negative outcome is not always right in front of you. I would like to try to avoid making these errors in the future.

2. How will you apply what you learned through this assignment to your everyday life?
I think it will be easier to realize that I need to take more time making decisions when I decide something on first impression. My goal will be to stop myself when I quickly decide something, and weigh my options to make sure that I have come up with the right conclusion. I never try to assume anything because when you do you are normally wrong, but I will try to realize and be more patient when I am dealing with someone that assumes everything.

3. What grade do you believe your efforts regarding this assignment deserve? Justify your answer.
I believe that my efforts deserve a grade in the 23-25 range. I answered all the questions fully, and I put all my answers into my own words trying to explain as clearly as I could. I read the chapter, and put forth my answers on how I perceived the information in the chapter.