ABSTRACT
The utilitarian and deontological models have done the rounds, and there has been a return to Aristotle's virtue ethics, which has many resonances with the Hindu notion of dharma. The way each society decides on the specific virtues they would like people to follow will very much depend on the cultural values of that society. Thus the notion of dharma is what is accepted as moral behaviour in Hinduism. By leading a life of dharma, we are told that one attains well-being (abhyudaya) in this world and liberation after death. Rationality is interwoven with the notion of ethics since it is believed that reason can provide justification for the behaviour of humans. By far the most important faculty provided to humans is the faculty of reasoning. There has always been a sense of mystery about the presence of this faculty, which seems to exist a priori in humans.
