THEO 204 - Final Exam Sheet 2023 Questions and Answers well explained
We have seen how the debate about freedom and determinism roughly corresponds to the
debate about faith and reason. Explain what this means.
● Believers in free will (or freedom) argue that at least some human actions are the result of the
free rational choice of humans.
● There is a parallel between this and the Christian argument that through reason human beings
have the capacity to discern between good and evil and to direct one’s actions toward the good.
● Also, the human person has the capacity to develop and grow and so has the capacity to
choose good over evil. (Freedom)
What are the key elements of Christian ethics?
● Early Christian communities never considered that they had received a complete code of
morality to deal with every situation.
● The point of reference for Christian ethics is Jesus Christ and the demands he makes on those
who follow him.
● The early Christians also drew on the Hebrew Scriptures and eventually on the New Testament.
● The Bible has a variety of ethical perspectives.
● We see tensions within scripture that gives rise to creative thought concerning morality.
What shaped the history of the christian traditions reflection of moral living?
A. Hebrew Bible
B. New Testament
C. Relation between faith and reason
a. (Shaped the history of the christian ethics on moral living)
D. Philosophy of Plato and Aristotle
What are the three meanings of the word good?
1. Satisfaction → Personal desires and interest
2. Harmony → Social structures are stable
3. Value → Commitment to historical progress
What is the foundation of ethics?
● The foundation of ethics is going through the moral operations which come from our moral
foundation, which consists of being in a concrete situation that demands a response.
● The Moral Process → the process we go through when we try to figure out what we ought to do
1. Experiencing
2. Understanding
3. Judging
4. Deciding
● Foundation → performing the operations of insight judgement and decision
● The Five Moral Operations
1. Understanding Facts → What’s going on?
2. Judging facts → Is it so?
3. Understanding Value → What am I going to do?
4. Judging value → Is that the right thing to do?
1
, 5. The act of decision → Am I going to do it?
What is evil?
● The relationship between human sinfulness and the problem of evil
● Human sinfulness → promotes or contributes to evil
● Evil → Creates situations in which evil can exist and flourish
● Evil is not an entity
● Evil → Force in history that leads to the diminishment of human persons and societies
● Thomas Aquinas → Light vs. Darkness
○ Evil is similar to the darkness, which is an absence of light
● When contemplating the existence of evil, we must look at the vicious circle of human sinfulness
and evil
● Evil and Social Structures
○ Human sinfulness creates evil by destroying social structures
○ Social structures of evil provide opportunities for human sinfulness to flourish
● 3 Main Forms of Evil
1. Betrayal → Judas (betrayal by someone who was once trusted)
2. Delusion → Adolph Hitler (how delusional thinking leads to evil)
3. Terror → Concentration camps (fear and use of terror)
● 3 Types of Human Development
1. Biological
2. Sensitive
3. Intellectual
How do human acts lead to the deterioration of social structures?
● Tour de France athletes
● They must satisfy the evil social structures components
○ One athlete cheating gives him a huge competitive edge
○ So another athlete cheats in order to keep up with the first athlete
○ Then another one cheats in order to keep up with the first two
○ And so on...until everyone has to cheat in order to be competitive
How do structures of evil promote human sinfulness?
● The Tour de France components
● These components give the athletes the motivation to cheat.
○ Athletes → use steroids
○ Sponsors → Push the athletes to win
○ Doctors → provide the steroids
○ Fans → watch the sport and pay a lot of money to attend it
○ Sponsors → Push the athletes to win
What are the limitations of moral horizons?
● Growing up in a family who teaches their children that certain ethnical groups or races are
“bad”.
● The children will grow up never knowing any better, they will just be going off what they have
been taught their entire lives, and that is racism
● The people they trust the most are telling them this, and these racist sentiments are all around
them
2
We have seen how the debate about freedom and determinism roughly corresponds to the
debate about faith and reason. Explain what this means.
● Believers in free will (or freedom) argue that at least some human actions are the result of the
free rational choice of humans.
● There is a parallel between this and the Christian argument that through reason human beings
have the capacity to discern between good and evil and to direct one’s actions toward the good.
● Also, the human person has the capacity to develop and grow and so has the capacity to
choose good over evil. (Freedom)
What are the key elements of Christian ethics?
● Early Christian communities never considered that they had received a complete code of
morality to deal with every situation.
● The point of reference for Christian ethics is Jesus Christ and the demands he makes on those
who follow him.
● The early Christians also drew on the Hebrew Scriptures and eventually on the New Testament.
● The Bible has a variety of ethical perspectives.
● We see tensions within scripture that gives rise to creative thought concerning morality.
What shaped the history of the christian traditions reflection of moral living?
A. Hebrew Bible
B. New Testament
C. Relation between faith and reason
a. (Shaped the history of the christian ethics on moral living)
D. Philosophy of Plato and Aristotle
What are the three meanings of the word good?
1. Satisfaction → Personal desires and interest
2. Harmony → Social structures are stable
3. Value → Commitment to historical progress
What is the foundation of ethics?
● The foundation of ethics is going through the moral operations which come from our moral
foundation, which consists of being in a concrete situation that demands a response.
● The Moral Process → the process we go through when we try to figure out what we ought to do
1. Experiencing
2. Understanding
3. Judging
4. Deciding
● Foundation → performing the operations of insight judgement and decision
● The Five Moral Operations
1. Understanding Facts → What’s going on?
2. Judging facts → Is it so?
3. Understanding Value → What am I going to do?
4. Judging value → Is that the right thing to do?
1
, 5. The act of decision → Am I going to do it?
What is evil?
● The relationship between human sinfulness and the problem of evil
● Human sinfulness → promotes or contributes to evil
● Evil → Creates situations in which evil can exist and flourish
● Evil is not an entity
● Evil → Force in history that leads to the diminishment of human persons and societies
● Thomas Aquinas → Light vs. Darkness
○ Evil is similar to the darkness, which is an absence of light
● When contemplating the existence of evil, we must look at the vicious circle of human sinfulness
and evil
● Evil and Social Structures
○ Human sinfulness creates evil by destroying social structures
○ Social structures of evil provide opportunities for human sinfulness to flourish
● 3 Main Forms of Evil
1. Betrayal → Judas (betrayal by someone who was once trusted)
2. Delusion → Adolph Hitler (how delusional thinking leads to evil)
3. Terror → Concentration camps (fear and use of terror)
● 3 Types of Human Development
1. Biological
2. Sensitive
3. Intellectual
How do human acts lead to the deterioration of social structures?
● Tour de France athletes
● They must satisfy the evil social structures components
○ One athlete cheating gives him a huge competitive edge
○ So another athlete cheats in order to keep up with the first athlete
○ Then another one cheats in order to keep up with the first two
○ And so on...until everyone has to cheat in order to be competitive
How do structures of evil promote human sinfulness?
● The Tour de France components
● These components give the athletes the motivation to cheat.
○ Athletes → use steroids
○ Sponsors → Push the athletes to win
○ Doctors → provide the steroids
○ Fans → watch the sport and pay a lot of money to attend it
○ Sponsors → Push the athletes to win
What are the limitations of moral horizons?
● Growing up in a family who teaches their children that certain ethnical groups or races are
“bad”.
● The children will grow up never knowing any better, they will just be going off what they have
been taught their entire lives, and that is racism
● The people they trust the most are telling them this, and these racist sentiments are all around
them
2
