Ethical Dualism Research Articles

Entrepreneurial Responsibility: A Conceptual Framework to Understand Ethical Dualism Throughout the Entrepreneurial Process

Entrepreneurs have been promoted as a main engine of progress. However, recent scandals and questionable behavior have led to increased discussion of entrepreneurs’ ethics. The purpose of this paper is to conceptualize entrepreneurial responsibility throughout the entrepreneurial process from an ethical viewpoint. We model entrepreneurial responsibility based on normative ethics (deontology and teleology), enabling us to better understand entrepreneurs’ active and conscious responses to their ethical duties and the consequences thereof. Our theorizing opens new avenues for scholarly research related to the ethical nature of opportunities, the interconnection of entrepreneurial intentions and outcomes from a moral perspective, and potential societal impact.

Origins of Dualism and Nondualism in the History of Religion and Spiritual Practice

In a previous article we proposed that spiritual traditions and practices emerged to counterbalance humans inherent “dualism”, or perceived separation from the world around us, by cultivating experiences of “subject-object nonduality” more commonly referred to as “unification with the divine” or “enlightenment”. This implies that religions (social and political institutions ostensibly based in spiritual practices) similarly aim towards overcoming the separation of self and other. However, many religions include dualistic elements. In particular, many religions incorporate “ethical dualism” in which certain individuals and groups are seen as essentially “good” or “bad”, a feature not seen in nondual traditions. Here, we explore this seeming paradox, highlighting an intriguing correspondence between the degree to which religions include dualistic or nondualistic elements and, respectively, the prevalence of conflict or cooperation as the organizing principle in their associated social context. We find major “dualistic” religions to be generally traceable to pastoral societies largely organized around intergroup conflict, whereas major “nondual religions” are generally traceable to societies in which large-scale cooperation and rule-based behavior was necessary for collective survival. Finally, we apply this pattern to the modern world, speculating that large-scale cooperation and rule-based behavior in modern society may be currently encouraging the renewal of nondual practices in modern social and political institutions that is indicated by the growing popularity of “spiritual but not religious” groups, and that this renewal of nondual practices may in turn set the frame for and reinforce behavior that will be necessary to address the historic challenges of our day like climate change and democratic backsliding.

Culture and corruption: An experimental comparison of cultural patterns on the corruption propensity in Poland and Russia

The development of effective anti-corruption measures relies on a sound understanding of underlying country-specific cultural patterns of corruption. However, finding these patterns faces the problem of ecological fallacies when tracing back the results of comparative macro-studies to the national level or of using ex-post explanations for cultural variances in experimental research designs. Thus, we ask how cultural patterns can explain country differences in the propensity to act corrupt without neglecting the aforementioned problems. Based on institutional theory, we model path-dependent cultural patterns at the macro, meso and micro levels promoting propensity to act corrupt in Poland and Russia. The results of experimental data gathered from students in Poland and Russia show that the extent to which legal nihilism and ethical dualism are institutionalized at the macro level, as well as the micro factors of gender-specific socialization and studying law, has a significant effect on the propensity to act corrupt.

The Death of Dionysus and Ethical Dualism: On Olympiodorus’ Anthropogony and Neoplatonic Depictions of the Manichaean Cosmos

The version of anthropogony presented in Olympiodorus’ interpretation of Socrates’ philosophical argument against suicide (In Phaed. 1.3.3.–14) suggests two important questions: about the role of ethical dualism and original sin in pagan religion and philosophy on the one hand, and about the extent of Olympiodorus’ innovativeness on the other. I argue that Olympiodorus’ time foregrounded ethical dualism as a major concern in allegorical interpretations of Dionysus’ death by dismemberment, and that certain antecedents for a dualistic view might have existed (e.g. in the theological concepts of Orphic religions). Although any attempt to establish historical connections is bound to be speculative, some sources indicate that the specific link of Dionysus’ death with ethical dualism is not necessarily an innovation contributed in its entirety by Olympiodorus. I derive my main argument from a reference by Alexander of Lycopolis, who mentions that some of the Manichaeans used similar metaphors to describe the structure of the cosmos, which is based in their teachings on an ethical conflict.

Overcoming ‘Gnosticism’? Realism as political theology

This paper takes issue with approaches that relate realist political theology exclusively back to its Schmittian and neo-orthodox roots. While not entirely denying those influences, it argues that realist thought is more accurately described as rooted in the tensions characterizing Augustine's anti-heretic diatribes rather than taking inspiration from Schmittian political theology or the ‘Gnostic’ tendencies in Protestant neo-orthodox theology. Augustine's refutation of both the Manichaean Gnostic and the Pelagian solutions to the problem of evil gave rise to a complex understanding of the relationship between human free will and original sin based on a combination of ontological monism and ethical dualism. Building on this heritage, realists can be read as rehearsing Augustine's ambiguous gesture of overcoming Gnosticism with equally uncertain success. In responding to the modern ‘Gnostic’ challenge in terms that recognized the dialectical tension between ontological monism and ethical dualism, realists such as Morgenthau and Niebuhr should rather be seen as direct heirs of Augustine's ambivalent orthodoxy rather than Schmitt's unorthodox, semi-‘Gnostic’ Catholicism. This intellectual legacy may, then, explain their abhorrence of purist positions in politics—be they quietism, pacifism or, their opposite, political messianism—and adherence to an anti-‘Gnostic’ pragmatism grounded in the tensions of Augustinian theology.

Πατρογενὴς ὕλη. Au sujet du dualisme dans les Oracles Chaldaiques

The Chaldaean Oracles are works of Middle Platonist poetry in Greek dating from the late 2nd century AD and attributed to Julian the Theurgist, who may have produced them together with his father Julian the Chaldaean. Only fragments survive, most via late antique Neoplatonists, whose many and varied individual interpretations often deviate from any meaning possibly deducible from the primary text. The question of dualism in the Chaldaean Oracles can be seen from two perspectives. From an ethical point of view, man stands in the middle between the intelligible and the material and has to choose his way. The material world is described in negative terms as a kind of netherworld and a most dangerous dwelling‑place for man who is exposed to seduction by material pleasure and attacked by demons personifying the passions ; he should turn his mind towards the intelligible. From an ontological point of view, however, matter is not an autonomous (and evil) principle, but originates from the highest entity, the intelligible Father ; for this reason, it is called πατρογενής (although this might be an inference by the interpreters of the Oracles). Ethical dualism is thus combined with ontological monism. The Chaldaean notion of not two, but three worlds, material, ethereal, and fiery (= intelligible), as well as the idea that in special cases a material body might be transformed into an ethereal one, could be interpreted as a kind of mediation of the two positions.

The Twins Stanza, Y 30.3

The Gāthic stanza Y 30.3 has always been at the center of various interpretations and controversies in Western scholarship on Zoroastrianism. Those who believe they have discovered in the Gāthās a monotheistic religion armored with an ethical dualism have made this stanza one of the pillars of their thesis. The so-called Twins stanza shows, according to this view, that the good and evil primordial spirits exist as a result of their choice between Good and Evil, which preserves not only the absolute goodness of the supreme god but also his uniqueness. More recently Kellens and others following him have given a completely different reading of the stanza. According to their account, this stanza is a speculation on the hidden processes of ritual. What the poet expresses in Y 30.3 is not a dualism, ethical or otherwise, but a psychology of the process by which man makes his choice of ritual conduct. Aside from the question of coherence, one must ask whether these accounts are borne out by the text they claim as their basis. This article addresses these two questions.

Crossing the Sacred-Profane Divide in Gnosticism and John’s Gospel

Marcel Mauss and Mary Douglas together offer a theoretical understanding of gift-giving that enables us to draw a crucial distinction between the crossing of the sacred-profane boundary in Gnostic systems and the Johannine one. This distinction is particularly evident when such crossing leads to transactions involving the offer of nourishment. The sacred and the profane do not easily mix in any system, but in Gnostic texts and John’s Gospel, the conflict between these dynamic forces of the two realms is presented as working itself out differently. This conflict is irresolvable in the former due to its substance dualism, but it is resolvable in the latter due to its ethical dualism. Gifts of nourishment accentuate this difference, such that the reciprocity and ambiguity that Mauss sees in gift-giving work out their implications differently. Conflict is shown to be accentuated in Gnostic systems, but ultimately resolved in the Johannine one.

It Takes Two: Ethical Dualism in the Vegetative State

To aid neuroscientists in determining the ethical limits of their work and its applications, neuroethical problems need to be identified, catalogued, and analyzed from the standpoint of an ethical framework. Many hospitals have already established either autonomy or welfare-centered theories as their adopted ethical framework. Unfortunately, the choice of an ethical framework resists resolution: each of these two moral theories claims priority at the exclusion of the other, but for patients with neurological pathologies, concerns about the patient’s welfare are treated as meaningless without consideration of the patient’s expressed wishes, and vice versa. Ethicists have long fought over whether suffering or autonomy should be our primary concern, but in neuroethics a resolution of this question is essential to determine the treatment of patients in medical and legal limbo. I propose a solution to this problem in the form of ethical dualism. This is a conservative measure in that it retains both sides of the debate: both happiness and autonomy have intrinsic value. However, this move is often met with resistance because of its more complex nature—it is more difficult to make a decision when there are two parallel sets of values that must be considered than when there is just one such set. The monist theories, though, do not provide enough explanatory power: namely, I will present two recently publicized cases where it is clear that neither ethical value on its own (neither welfare nor autonomy) can fully account for how a vegetative patient should be treated. From the neuroethical cases of Terri Schiavo and Lauren Richardson, I will argue that a dualist framework is superior to its monist predecessors, and I will describe the main features of such an account.

Russell Kirk and the Age of Ideology (review)

Reviewed by: Russell Kirk and the Age of Ideology Graeme Voyer Russell Kirk and the Age of Ideology by Wesley McDonaldUniversity of Missouri Press, 2004, 243 pp., $44.95 Click for larger view View full resolution Figure 1. Russell Kirk and the Age of Ideology Russell Kirk was one of the principal American conservative thinkers of the post–World War II era. He is a particularly interesting figure because, unlike many on the American Right, he was a critic of unrestrained capitalism. In Russell Kirk and the Age of Ideology, Wesley McDonald, a professor of political science, seeks to explicate Kirk's social, moral and political thought. Kirk wrote twenty-four nonfiction books, but his most famous and influential was The Conservative Mind (1953). Before the publication of this work, the American intellectual Right was dominated by libertarians, concerned primarily with economic issues. Kirk's book, along with several others, "marked the beginning of the shift in the emphasis of American conservatism away from the atomistic individualism of the libertarians toward a deeper appreciation of man's social nature." Indeed, there was a vast gulf between Kirk's thought and the pro-capitalist libertarians. As McDonald says, "Kirk did not praise the free market uncritically. He supported tariffs to protect the small farmer against a capricious global market. He deplored the ruinous destruction of the environment wrought by corporate greed and commercial excess." Unlike the libertarians, Kirk was concerned with values and "championed those enduring norms of social interaction without which civilized existence is rendered impossible." Central to Kirk's thought was the concept of ethical dualism. This notion, which is consistent with classical and Judeo-Christian teaching, holds that human beings have tendencies toward both good and evil; there is a higher self and a lower self. Kirk believed that the impulses of the lower self must be "restrained by this collective and immemorial wisdom we call prejudice, tradition, customary morality." Opposing ethical dualism are various schools of thought, identified under the rubric of "naturalism," that reject the existence of permanent ethical truths and attempt to explain human behavior "wholly in terms of external phenomenal forces explainable by science." Kirk's work can be seen as a sustained refutation of the naturalist school. The bulk of McDonald's book consists of his elucidation of various concepts and themes of Kirk's thought, all of which are interrelated. These include the moral imagination, tradition and "the permanent things," order, community and education. A principal theme of Kirk's thought is his critique [End Page 199] of ideology. To Kirk, ideology threatens the "civilized order of the Western world." Among the ideologies denounced by Kirk are the rationalism of the eighteenth-century French philosophes, the romantic idealism of the Rousseauists, utilitarianism, positivism, Marxism, Social Darwinism, pragmatism and socialism. These ideologies engendered "the belief in the perfectibility of man, the enthusiasm for social and economic leveling, the impulse for innovation coinciding with a concomitant contempt of tradition, the denial of the power of Providence in history, and the rejection of 'the permanent things,' defined as those enduring moral values which make civilized social existence possible." McDonald's book at times lacks structure and organizational coherence. Still, it is a useful introduction to the thought of a major American conservative writer. Copyright © 2005 The Curators of the University of Missouri

Machiavelli’s Science of Statecraft: The Diplomacy and Politics of Disorder

This paper calls into question the extent to which ethical dualism, broadly conceived as raison d’ état, does justice to Machiavelli’s understanding and practice of the diplomatic arts. Arguments are advanced herein that Machiavelli did not so much abandon morality as he sought, through the examples of Rome and antiquity, to find a different remedy for the disorder and violence rampant in the Italy of his day. Machiavelli’s reports in the diplomatic service of Florence illustrate qualities and skills of the diplomat often at odds with the caricature of the immoral statesman.

Marketization and Legislation in Russia

Historically, Russia has been unable to establish Rechtsstaat or the state based on rule of Law. Indeed, Russia's culture is characterized by a profound distrust of the law, or legal nihilism. Furthermore, it should be emphasized that, in addition to nihilism, Russia's culture is also characterized by the concept of ethical dualism. Ethical dualism means that the moral norms Russians apply in relationships with members of their own community differ from those in relationships with people thought to be associated with a different community. Given such a distinctive nature, Russia's culture could not be conceived of as being suited for a market economy. It might be inevitable that the political system tends to be more authoritarian in order to lower transaction costs and facilitate economic development.

In Support of Ethical Holism: A Response to “Religious Perspectives in Business Ethics”

Abstract:In much of the written work on Christian or religious business ethics, a holistic framework is assumed but not argued for practically or supported philosophically. In this article I 1) outline a position of ethical holism, explaining its logic, motives, and consequences; 2) attack the ethical dualism of Carr, Friedman, and French; and 3) defend my theory against five possible objections. My basic thesis is that if a corporation wishes to hire employees who will act in compliance with ethical codes of the corporation, employees who both have a deeply rooted personal ethic that parallels that of the corporation and who see their business practices to be an extension of their personal ethic will be better suited candidates simply because they are more likely to be compliant. In other words, personal convictions and values are relevant to hiring practices, and a view that holds personal and business ethics to be separate affairs (Carr, Friedman, French) is misguided.

Bioethics and Ethical Dualism

Bioethics and Ethical Dualism

In Vitro Fertilization and Ethical Dualism

In Vitro Fertilization and Ethical Dualism

Ethical Dualism and Church Discipline Ephesians 4:25–5:20

Ethical Dualism and Church Discipline Ephesians 4:25–5:20

Spatial and Ethical Dualism in Jewish Wisdom and Apocalyptic Literature

Spatial and Ethical Dualism in Jewish Wisdom and Apocalyptic Literature

The Racial Element in Social Assimilation

There are three historical stages in the evolution of organized society, the tribe, the state, and the nation. Corresponding with these stages are three principles of organization, kinship, authority, and citizenship. The order of these principles conforms in general to the Spencerian law of growth, for they represent a progressive change from simplicity to complexity and an increasing integration and heterogeneity. In the kinship period civilization is wholly genetic, in the ethnic period largely so. In these two periods social growth is in some degree analogous to the growth of animal species. Primitive contacts are confined largely to kindred. Now ideas of contact, as Crawley has so conclusively shown, are at the basis of all conceptions of human relations at every stage of culture. Contact is the single general test, as it is the most elementary form, of mutual relations.' In the kinship group a high degree of intensive association is generated through mere propinquity, while a corresponding avoidance of outside contacts prevents the growth of that sympathy between groups without which even the most elementary forms of co-operation are impossible. To primitive thought a stranger is a potential foe.2 Social standards being fixed wholly within the group itself, that which does not conform to these is regarde(I not only as alien but as immoral. Ethical dualism, the illuminating phrase for which sociologists are indebted to Professor Ross, exactly defines the conventional status of the individual with reference to his own group and with reference to outside groups. It is not true, however, that ethical dualism ceases with the end of the kinship period or even the ethnic period. In his social relations modern social-