ABSTRACT
We discuss the concept of ethics from a classical philosophical perspective and from an Aristotelian foundation.
We contrast the two 18th-century philosophers David Hume, representing an empirical approach, and Immanuel Kant, with a more idealistic approach.
With respect to the empirical approach of Aristotle and Hume, our main problem is the human perception/apprehension/comprehension of the surrounding world and whether differences in that may affect the content of ethical structures.
With respect to the Kantian view, we analyze Kant’s categorization in “Das Ding an Sich” and “Das Ding für Sich” and explain how he could have arrived at those categories, where the former concept both in its approach to reality and also from a mathematical point of view exactly coincides with the approach of the neoclassical axiomatic structure.
The human understanding of the world is widened with Hobbes’ analysis of whether humans are moral creatures or calculating beasts, which underlies the distinction between the reflexive and/or the creative intellect.
We end the chapter with discussions of Moore’s paradox and the problem of induction as a scientific tool, particularly in the social sciences.
