Moral Purposes

Blogspot- July 7,2008

Moral Philosophy: Pojman describes 5 purposes of morality. Do you agree with him? why or why not? As a teacher, what part do you play as a moral agent?

I thought that Louis Pojman’s views on morality were quite interesting. He seemed to believe that if a moral set of rules are followed then everyone will better off. His five purposes of morality are:

1. To keep society from falling apart
2. To ameliorate human suffering
3. To promote human flourishing
4. To resolve conflicts of interest in just and orderly ways
5. To assign praise and blame, reward, and punishment and guilt

Although these purposes are somewhat simplistic in wording, I do generally agree with these ideas. I think that most civilized societies try to follow some set of moral codes and these purposes are some of the reasons why. I think that if all people felt more of a sense of duty to follow a set of moral codes then maybe people’s lives would be happier and more fulfilled. Although morality may not necessarily be a legal issue, I think that the last purpose definitely happens because people feel a sense of guilt if they don’t do the right thing. Another idea I thought of related to the last purpose is how many awards are given out to people or groups for doing “good” or charitable deeds. This relates to people being rewarded or praised for following a set of morals.

As a teacher, I do feel a strong sense of being a type of moral agent or at least a role model. Personally, I teach in a Catholic school so the idea of religion is also brought into the discussion of morality. There are many times throughout a day that I think about what I am doing or saying and how the children are interpreting that. Being a teacher, students are always watching you. They want to see how you react to various situations and how you handle so that they can use that as a guide. Luckily the school I am at now has parents who make an effort to be involved in their communities and discuss moral issues with their children. Other schools I have been in, the students have had a lack of that at home which made it even more important to not just be a good role model, but to also discuss situations and morals directly with the students. I think that when you spend so many hours a day with children, you have such an impact on them that anything you can do to improve their sense of morality and help them think about how they can be better people is beneficial. This can be concepts as simple as helping out a colleague, speaking to others in a respectful tone or more developed ideas like starting community service projects and getting the students involved in ways to help their classmates and their community. I really believe that the most important thing children can learn is to be a good and kind person. That is more important than learning math facts or how to spell. Hopefully parents and other community members are involved in this process as well, but as teachers we definitely have a role in helping students to become moral people.