"...ethics are never timid, rarely convenient, and always vital."?

Question

"...ethics are never timid, rarely convenient, and always vital." What does this mean to you and to the way you live your life?

Answer 1

Alfred L. Hurwitz, the man who gave us that quote, must be the kind of man my dad called "thoughty."

Bleeding-edge ethical behaviour is *not* conventional or cautious, contrary to one respondent's suggestion. Fortunately for us all, most societies have internalized our conventional or cautious group ethical behaviours through legal structures. Yet evolution never stops: also fortunately for us all, some few among us show sufficient courage, when they sense unfairness, to articulate it and act upon it.

I'm thinking of people like Canada's Stephen Lewis. His work for Africa's millions of defenceless souls has certainly not been convenient. If he weren't such a morally vigorous man, he could have become Canada's prime minister, could have become a billionaire or Booker Prize winner. But no. After stints as a young politician and writer, Lewis jumped at the chance to be Canada's UN ambassador and then a UNICEF director.

Lewis's last decade as the UN's special envoy for HIV/AIDS, in his own words -- in his wife's words -- has drawn him to exhaustion and the brink of madness. Talk about vitality! With ferocity and clarity, he still rages about the vile bureaucratic behaviour of the World Bank, the U.S. government, the UN itself.

Such vitality emboldens us all. So in the end, and for each of us, ethics is what we do every day. I treat my brother, my friend and the stranger on the other side of Earth as I'd like them to treat me. I share my financial luck with my brother; I share bocce games and beer with my pals; I write letters for Amnesty International to make those damned torturers stop.

Why? For sure not to get to some sweet hereafter. I do it to live fully in the sweet now.

Answer 2

Ethics is a deep conventional viewpoint. An ethical person
has all their marbles, all the right answers. Unusual is the field
of ethics. Know why? Economix is the thrust of their seat. A
real life in the real world, you should be more cautious then
ethical. Unfortunately the real interaction opportunities are
sports, pizza and art. Sort of mixing magic. Truth, fareness,
sharing, and hope are the positive vibes I like about ethics.

Answer 3

"ethics" is a little too broad. Could you elaborate a little more.