Question Number Four:
Does Vance have a moral obligation to help his aged parents financially, despite the opposition of his partner Lola? (Ruddick and English)
Ethics is the study of human conduct or in other words the study of moral behavior. All human beings use ethics in their daily actions and decisions, but few have the opportunity to probe into the core of ethics. When Socrates said in 399 B.C., "The unexplained life is not worth living" he was encouraging man to examine his way of life and ways of moral decision making. Ethics not only aims to discover the rules that should govern a moral life, but the goods one should aim to acquire in their life time. Ethics aims to explain why and how man acts the way he does and to shape the way man lives and acts; Some philosophers say that reason is the criterion for making moral judgments, others say that duty and obligation rule moral decisions. (Whitlock, 28)
William Ruddick, arguing for the Life Prospects Principle, states that the parents are obligated to provide life-prospects, or life possibilities, for a child. (Houlgate, 247) These prospects are to be within grasp of the child's reach and considering possible future life changes that could affect both he child and the parents. When Vance married outside of his parents chosen familial religion, Vance deviated from the chosen parental path. Riddick maintains that by narrowing the choices for Vance, they alienated him when he chose to marry outside of the religious boundaries set for him.
Moral obligation, in Vance's case, is a battle between loyalty to himself, his religion, his parents' wishes and his wife, as well as his own children. All relative characters within this web of questions regarding morality are based o ...