Ethics in America

Ethics originated as a study by Aristotle. The term derived from the Greek word meaning 'habits', so, accordingly, his analysis is coordinated with his Psychological theory. What he proposes is the self-inculcation of acquired habits, based on the principle of moderation, his conclusion being that Happiness consists in moderate conduct. In other words, Ethics was originally conceived of as a program of self-cultivation. Over the centuries, the term got conflated with the term Morality, which was derived from the Latin 'mores', meaning 'customs'. Hence began a subtle shift in scope from the personal to the general. Thus, when Middle Age theologians appropriated Ancient Philosophy for religious purposes, the notion more easily adapted to the Scriptural adherence to impersonal legalistic formulas, such as the Ten Commandments. Now, despite, in the intervening recent centuries, the attempts of major Ethicists such as Spinoza, Kant, and Mill to recapture in their programs the original sense of self-development, the most prevalent connotation in contemporary of America of the issue is the Medieval one, namely 'Morality' as obedience to religious precepts. Meanwhile, 'Ethics' is usually relegated to guiding narrow, specific spheres of activity. Hence, Ethics in America might be described as a lost art.