The painter Gauguin abandoned his wife and family. Which seems a pretty rotten thing to do. Eventually he went to the South Seas to paint. He painted masterpieces. So now his abandoning of his family doesn't look so rotten after all. However, if aesthetic opinion changes and Gauguin's work comes to be classed as second-rate, his abandoning of the family once again takes on a sinister aspect. Can the consequences of an action determine its moral value so clearly?

What is ethically the difference between a prostitute and a model? They both make a living by selling their body, and the fact that there is sex in one activity seems to me not enough to morally judge a prostitute.

When a child asks a question like "Where do babies come from?", why do all parents consider giving an answer that is far from the truth? once on TV, a parent, in respnse to this very question raised by his baby, he stated:"When a father and a mother love each other very much, they close their eyes, and they make a wish.". For a child, that seems pretty convincing, but not at all truthful. My question is: is that really moral?

Does moral relativism claim that moral statements are descriptive or prescriptive? Anything I read on the topic never seems to make it clear! Surely if it claimed they were descriptive then moral relativism would be nothing more than saying that there is no right and wrong in the sense that we commonly think of it, it actually doesn't matter what we do. But alternatively, how could anyone genuinely believe that moral statements are prescriptive, in such a way that fundamental moral values are dependent on subjective circumstances, e.g. that if I (or my culture) believe murder is right then it is genuinely a good thing for me to do to murder someone? Basically I can't understand the point of the former interpretation and I don't understand how anyone could possibly believe the latter - so what is moral relativism?

Mary Warnock says we have a right to have children. It's a question I asked myself in the waiting room of a fertility clinic as I was registering for IVF treatment - it's a question I continuing asking myself as I see more and more gay fathers flying off to exotic lands for their offspring through surrogacy. How can we conciliate the right to have children with the exploitation of women? Best regards Pensiero Rome, Italy

What makes people cruel?

What is forgiveness? If I forgive someone for some misdeed, does that mean they are no longer obligated to correct that deed? Or is forgiveness simply an attitude change, when one chooses not to remain angry? Also when I say "I forgive you", is that a performative speech act? Or is it possible to forgive someone without saying it (or contrarily, to say you forgive someone when not really forgiving them).

I am a married man of 11 years with two children under 9 years. My wife and I are on the verge of a divorce and are waiting until after the holidays and figuring out the logistics of the house, finaces and child care. Nine months ago I met a younger married woman and since then we have been having an affair. We talk, text, email almost every single day. We see each other once or twice a month sometimes 2-4 days at a time. The emotional, mental and physical realtionship we have is amazing. We are like bestfriends and lean on each other for daily life issues. While my marriage is over her marriage is just starting the process of needing to change things drastically or it is over forever. She has been married for 4 years and has no children so while there is not as much to worry about it is still a very hard decision and she is taking things day by day. There is no doubt that we love each other but we obviously know there are many obstacles. 1) we are married 2) I have two children and she has none (and I have had a vasectomy) 3) I am 12 years older than her 4) we live an hour and a half away from each other. All of these issues have been discussed and other than her marriage we have come up with mutual options. The problem is we really love each other and are so much alike, her counselor has actually mentioned the words "Soul Mate". We have told each other numerous times that we'd leave each other alone so we could make clear decisive decisions in our own personal lives and if it is meant to be then it will happen. The problem is we can't stop talking we always migrate back to each other. I can honestly say she is my bestfriend and cant imagine nothaving her in my life somehow even if it is just as friends. Do I leave her? Do I fight for her? Am I just lonely and find our relationship comforting? I don't want to mess her life up but I want to be happy also.....

From reading these pages I can tell all the contributing philosophers are decent and moral folk - anti-racist, feminist, compassionate, well-meaning, etc. but my question is, why should you be, especially if you hold no truck with an afterlife? Why not act immorally if you can get away with it and avoid jail and it is to your personal benefit? Does not behaving morally presuppose moral absolutes which I thought modern philosophy had done away with? I read an argument where ethical differences were described as being in the same boat only some get seasick and some don't (Alisdair MacIntyre) but again this is presupposing that philosophers all agree everyone should be "good". Why not be bad? Or is it all about tenure? (joke!)

We recently learned about racial profiling in my social studies class. While I disagree that it is unethical (and plain old incorrect) to assume that all people of a certain race are criminals, there did seem to be some logic behind the idea that I didn't want to bring up in class. I am not a racist and am in fact involved in closing the achievement gap in my school district, so although this question is definitely not PC, I am hoping I can ask it here without being judged: If statistics show that for whatever unfair reason (maybe because of discrimination), a greater percentage of people of race A become alcoholics or grow up in poverty or something, and statistics also show that alcoholics or people who grow up in poverty are more likely to commit crimes, then isn't it only logical to conclude that a randomly-chosen person of race A is more likely to be a criminal than a randomly-chosen person of race B? I acknowledge that there is definitely some circular logic going on here, and saying "he's of race A, so let's go after him and see if he's a criminal" will only further the discrimination that caused the disadvantage these people are at in the first place. However, the point my teacher was making was that racial profiling is 100% racist and 0% truthful/logical. Isn't he kind of incorrect? (It could be the case that the races that were being profiled negatively were not the ones that had higher rates of alcoholism, in which case racial profiling would be incorrect and I guess racist, but I'm pretty sure that's not the point my teacher was making). I came across a similar issue when I was looking for car insurance (I recently got my driver's license). Where I live, the price of car insurance is lower for girls my age than for boys, because girls get in fewer accidents, apparently. If the state believes that this ("gender profiling", in a way) is ethical, then why isn't racial profiling? Is it because one is less PC than the other, or are these two scenarios actually not analogous? Sorry this question is so multi-faceted and huge (and horrifyingly politically incorrect). Thanks so much to anyone who answers!!