Lack of precison in warfare is inevitable once civilians and military are mixed up with each other, which is increasingly the case in modern war. So one could say then that war becomes entirely immoral, but this makes it even more likely that ruthless people will use civilians in their military operations. Or one could say that one will try to distinguish as far as possible between civilians and insurgents, which is a pretty empty policy once the bullets start flying. Right now the US and British military in Afghanistan have responded to pressure from the Afghan government to unleash less remote bombing operations to cut down on civilian deaths, and this has resulted predictably in increased military deaths among the allies. Before we throw up our hands and say that moral decision making is impossible, we should reflect on the fact that in much of morality agents are put in difficult situations and have to choose the better of unpleasant alternatives. So rather than trying to establish a UN policy...

Knowing the original language of any author one is reading is helpful, but do not expect Heidegger to become suddenly clear once you can read him in German. He puzzles just as many Germans as he does everyone else!

Well, it is just this sort of case that gives surrogacy a bad name, of course. It depends on whether a contract in these circumstances is valid or not, and that is a legal not a moral issue. I suppose it would also be relevant to know what carrying someone else's child actually meant in this case, that is, is this Stacy's child implanted in her sister, or is the mother the sister and the father Stacy's husband, or what. Even advocates of abortion would be a bit disturbed by the idea of the sister deciding to have an abortion because she was a bit bored of being pregnant, especially if she had agreed to carry the fetus. It is a bit like being given a bag of money by someone and agreeing to carry it to the bank because the owner was too weak to do so, and then feeling fatigued and throwing it away en route, perhaps. So I can think of some real problems in abortion here even if in general it is not perceived as being immoral in general.

No, the law is not perfect or even adequate in assigning moral blame or approval, but then no smoke without fire does not work epistemologically or morally either.

You should ask the Stanford Encyclopedia, but it is certainly up there as a significant topic in the thought of Aristotle and Confucius, for example, and continues to be one of the areas of ethical discussion much debated by everyone. I suppose there is a tendency for etiquette to be seen as trivial and class-based, but at its best it represents the rules for treating people which do not fail to respect them and deals with them appropriately, morally speaking. Philosophers tend to prefer to discuss moral issues when they are rather dramatically presented, as in choices between killing people, or who is going to be saved and who not when not everyone can be saved. These issues do not fortunately arise for most of us most of the time, but etiquette does, and gives us a real opportunity to embody our beliefs in behavior.

You have some rather inaccurate views on Islam. Islam has nothing to say about female circumcision, although it is true that the practice is not uncommon in some Muslim societies. It is also not an Islamic practice to assault wives for leaving the house without permission, although again it does go on. Just because such practices exist in Muslim societies does not mean that they are Islamic. But you raise an interesting issue, how far can the mutilation of an infant or child be justified if carried out for religious reasons? It is accepted now I think largely because it is held to be good for the child, not as you suggest for religious reasons. This is the difference between male and female circumcision, the former is generally supposed to be a benign and helpful procedure, the latter the reverse. I suppose the question is how confident we are that the procedure is helpful, and how important is it that it be carried out at such an early age, as against interfering in the rights of the individual to...

You raise a very interesting issue. but surely Kerry is right on this. He was arguing that although he himself had moral views that disapprove of abortion, if most of the electorate do not share those views,and they don't in the United States, then those views should not be made part of law. In a democracy law derives its power from the will of the majority, and the majority may agree on something that others regard as immoral. The law has authority because it is enacted to satisfy the majority. The next issue that stems from this is whether someone who feels the law is immoral should obey it, since we are not morally obliged to obey every law however terrible it might be, despite what Socrates suggests as he is awaiting his execution. But that is of course another issue entirely.

There is a similar issue in the book by Rabelais called Pantagruel and Gargantua, I vaguely recall, where someone in the street enjoys smelling roast meat, and the owner of the meat prosecutes him for stealing the smell without paying for it. I believe that the decision of the court was to award the owner of the meat damages which consisted of the clink of money. There are all sorts of ways we may benefit from our neighbor's behavior. The value of our house may rise because our neighbor keeps his house in a high state of repair, or because of the loveliness of his garden. Does that mean that he is entitled to a share in the sale of my house? Or I may enjoy listening to my neighbor singing out of his window as he shaves. It seems to me in these cases the neighbor can make no legitimate moral demands on us since these are free goods that others are entitled to enjoy. If using the service presents no security risks to the neighbor, then we can use it. But of course it does and so there are good...

I suppose we have the right to sponsor the sort of environment we favor, other things being equal, and where species live off each other we have to accept that there will be victims and there will be victors. Introducing a new and dangerous species seems wrong unless it has some practical benefit, or was designed to save it from an imminent disaster. Wiping out a species irretrievably reduces variety, and there is no reason why we should not value variety in our idea of an environment and seek to foster it, perhaps for aesthetic reasons alone.

I don't know about the decorous issues involved here, but paying cash does not help the employee avoid income tax. He or she will be expected to report tips, at least in the United States, and I am sure elsewhere also. Putting that aside, and it is not that relevant since the question relates to the direct purpose of paying cash, it might depend on your view of the state and its taxes. If you think that those taxes are improperly used, then you might want not to contribute to them in any way you can avoid, hence using cash is a good idea. On the other hand, you may think that despite that citizens have a duty to participate in the tax system fully, since we ought all to obey the law. Is hiding income a slippery slope, leading eventually to more serious offenses against the state and each other like theft? It could well be argud that it was so it seems to me that if the express purpose of paying cash is to evade tax obligations, then it is wrong. Countries whose citizens see the state as a body to...