Ethics implies the application of morals. It deals with the concepts of right and wrong. Accepting morality, without ever evaluating it, is no longer just goodness or righteousness. It may just be blind faith and obedience. Here lies the pivotal role of critical thinking in the realm of ethics. Ethics without the element of critical thinking is indoctrination. This is Talibanization in ordinary, everyday lives.

Ethics easily falls into the trap of making people follow the ethical rules with complete obedience and without questioning. These ethical rules have been handed down from an origin of viewpoint. It is the role and function of critical thinking to always challenge existing views, reinvestigate them in a scientific manner, evaluate the facts, and produce a conclusion that is inherently fresh, new, and can be different from the existing view.

Critical thinking simply does not accept the moral perspective that already exists – right away. This does not mean, though, that critical thinking only serves to debunk given beliefs. There are instances when, after the careful investigation of facts through critical thinking, it comes up with a conclusion that agrees with the given perspective.

There has always been a debate on the potentially destructive role of critical thinking in the established beliefs behind ethical tenets. They seem never to complement each other. The intellectually discriminating mind might always disagree with instituted ethical sensibilities. The very essence of their existence serves to contradict each other. Not necessarily so, though. Nowhere is this more readily necessary to be challenged than in the academic environment.

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Via Web Newswire/freeminds/Thaindian News