How Ethics Can Help You Make Better Decisions | Michael Schur ![rw-book-cover](https://wsrv.nl/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fassets.pippa.io%2Fshows%2F67587e77c705e441797aff96%2Fshow-cover.png&w=512&h=512) ## Metadata - Author: [[TED Talks Daily]] - Full Title: How Ethics Can Help You Make Better Decisions | Michael Schur - Category: #podcasts - URL: https://share.snipd.com/episode/aa0d565b-0497-4563-9705-a4de3f1413d8 ## Document Notes ## Highlights - **Michael Schur's Fender Bender Story** - Michael Schur shares a story about a minor fender bender involving his wife during Hurricane Katrina. - He tried to negotiate avoiding a car repair by donating to charity, which led to a moral dilemma and widespread attention. Transcript: Michael Schur I royally and epically screwed something up. So, 2005, my wife, JJ, driving along in slow-moving traffic, bumps into the guy in front of her. Police officer looks everything over, doesn't see any damage. They exchange numbers, and they go on their way. A couple days later, we get a notice that the guy wants $836 because, according to him, the entire fender needs to be replaced. This is happening during Hurricane Katrina. JJ and I had just been to New Orleans on a trip. We had really fallen in love with this beautiful city, which was now literally underwater. I was very riled up. This was hitting me really hard. So I went and I looked at the guy's car, and if I got very close and I strained my eyes, I could just barely see this little line on the crease. It looked like the mark you make with a pencil on the wall when you're trying to hang a picture. And I told the guy, essentially, that he shouldn't care about this. I told him that things like this were why car insurance rates in L.A. Were so expensive. I told him that cars get little dings and dents all the time, and he was stupid to care about that. I told him that there were more important things in life than this, like Hurricane Katrina. And then I made him an offer. I said that I would donate $836 to the Red Cross Katrina Relief Fund, in his name, if he agreed not to file this claim and fix his car. He said he would think it over. So I went back to work, and as very confident people are wont to do, I started telling all my friends about how awesome I was being. And then they jumped in and started pledging more and more money if this guy would agree not to fix his car. So suddenly it was $2,000, then it was $5,000. In like a day and a half, I had pledges from hundreds of people all across the country of more than $25,000 if this guy would agree not to file an insurance claim and fix his car. And by the way, he has no idea this is happening. He is completely in the dark. I started a blog where I gave people hourly updates. Yeah, it's beginning to dawn on you what a bad idea this is, right? I started a blog, gave people updates. I got media inquiries from news programs, from NPR. I had a dream of rescuing New Orleans by myself with nothing more than my computer and a fire hose of self-righteous anger. And then I started to ([Time 0:04:00](https://share.snipd.com/snip/67784ca0-9e1d-451b-9145-f9328982faf5)) - **Kantian Ethics on Universal Rules** - Kant's categorical imperative asks us to consider if our actions' rules could be universal without causing harm. - Schur realized his negotiation would create a bad universal rule and treat the other person as a mere means to an end. Transcript: Michael Schur That help us make better decisions and become better people. For example, I learned about Immanuel Kant and the categorical imperative. So Kant says when we're about to do something, we have to design a rule or a maxim that we could will to be universal, meaning we have to imagine what if everyone did what we're about to do, What would happen to the world? Would it be okay or would it get all screwed up? So the maxim I'm designing here is something like anytime two people are in any kind of negotiation, one of them can drag into the negotiation an entirely unrelated global calamity And tell the other person that they shouldn't care about whatever they care about because they should care about that instead. That world would suck, right? Like, your sister borrows five dollars from you, you ask for it back, she says, how dare you care about five dollars when the polar ice caps are melting, no one wants to live in this world, Right? Kant also says, by the way, that you should treat people as ends in themselves and not a means to an end, meaning you shouldn't use people to get what you want. Well, guess what I was doing? I also learned about Aristotle and the study of virtue ethics. So Aristotle says there are certain qualities we should all have, things like generosity and courage and friendliness and mildness, and he wants us to practice them every day so that We not only have them, we have them in the exact right amount. We don't have a deficiency of them, and we don't have an excess of them. Now, virtue ethics can be kind of maddeningly imprecise, but at the very least, it was pretty clear that I was exhibiting an excess of anger and maybe a deficiency of friendliness. I wasn't nailing it, is the point. Like, I definitely was not getting it exactly right. Then I learned about utilitarianism, made famous by Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill. And this one actually gave me a shred of hope that I was doing something good, because utilitarians only care about the results of our actions. They only care that we are creating more happiness and pleasure than we are pain and suffering. So yes, I'm being obnoxious and moralistic and eye-handed to this guy, causing him some amount of pain, but an enormous amount of money is going to be given to people in great need. So the amount of happiness I'm creating outweighs the amount of pain and suffering. The utilitarians also said that when we're calculating the amount of happiness or pain we've created, we can't just think about the one person we're dealing with. We have to think about the fact that everybody in our society will now both know this happened and will fear that it could someday happen to them. And since we've already seen what a terrible, stinky world I was trying to create, everyone in our society would become a little bit bummed out and sad by what I did. And so the total amount of pain and suffering I've created might actually outweigh the happiness. I never got a straightforward answer, obviously, because Aristotle never wrote about, like, fender benders involving horse-drawn carriages in ancient Athens. But at the very least, it sure felt like Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill would be a little disappointed in me. And it sure felt like Aristotle would be a little annoyed. And it sure felt like Immanuel Kant would wave a disapproving finger at me. And if all of the world's greatest philosophers are on one side of a debate and you are on the other side, you messed up. Okay, so I called the guy. I apologized profusely. ([Time 0:07:50](https://share.snipd.com/snip/bad5ca9d-8bcc-43f7-801d-3cb5cd4f7494)) - **Aristotle's Virtue Ethics Balance** - Aristotle's virtue ethics emphasizes having the right balance of qualities like generosity and friendliness. - Schur recognized he showed excess anger and lacked friendliness in his approach to the car accident dispute. Transcript: Michael Schur Means to an end, meaning you shouldn't use people to get what you want. Well, guess what I was doing? I also learned about Aristotle and the study of virtue ethics. So Aristotle says there are certain qualities we should all have, things like generosity and courage and friendliness and mildness, and he wants us to practice them every day so that We not only have them, we have them in the exact right amount. We don't have a deficiency of them, and we don't have an excess of them. Now, virtue ethics can be kind of maddeningly imprecise, but at the very least, it was pretty clear that I was exhibiting an excess of anger and maybe a deficiency of friendliness. I wasn't nailing it, is the point. Like, I definitely was not getting it exactly right. Then I learned about utilitarianism, made famous by Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill. And this one ([Time 0:08:50](https://share.snipd.com/snip/1538c594-8dff-4cc8-937b-7144b2fcaabb)) - **Utilitarianism and Moral Complexity** - Utilitarianism focuses on the outcome to maximize happiness and minimize suffering for the greatest number. - Schur saw his actions caused pain to one person but funded relief for many, leading to moral complexity. Transcript: Michael Schur Is the point. Like, I definitely was not getting it exactly right. Then I learned about utilitarianism, made famous by Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill. And this one actually gave me a shred of hope that I was doing something good, because utilitarians only care about the results of our actions. They only care that we are creating more happiness and pleasure than we are pain and suffering. So yes, I'm being obnoxious and moralistic and eye-handed to this guy, causing him some amount of pain, but an enormous amount of money is going to be given to people in great need. So the amount of happiness I'm creating outweighs the amount of pain and suffering. The utilitarians also said that when we're calculating the amount of happiness or pain we've created, we can't just think about the one person we're dealing with. We have to think about the fact that everybody in our society will now both know this happened and will fear that it could someday happen to them. And since we've already seen what a terrible, stinky world I was trying to create, everyone in our society would become a little bit bummed out and sad by what I did. And so the total amount of pain and suffering I've created might actually outweigh the happiness. I never got a straightforward answer, obviously, because Aristotle never wrote about, like, fender benders involving ([Time 0:09:30](https://share.snipd.com/snip/7f9fc8ae-5731-4aac-9110-6b6bc71ddead)) - **Prepare for Moral Dilemmas** - Prepare for moral dilemmas by studying ethical theories before facing them. - Understanding these theories improves your chances of making better human and moral decisions. Transcript: Michael Schur Moral dilemma. That is just a fact of life on Earth. There will be a dilemma in which there is no clear rule to follow. There is only a kind of vague investigation, and everything you do seems like it might be wrong. So how do you prepare for that? By reading theories of ethics and understanding what they say, what they mean, how they purport to help us make better decisions and become better people. And by the way, just reading these theories is no guarantee that you will actually make the right choice when you're inside one of these complicated and tangled ethical dilemmas. You can take all the practice half-court shots you want at the YMCA, but when you set foot on the floor of the NBA arena and there are 15,000 screaming fans, you're probably still going To throw up an air ball, right? But if you've prepared, you will increase your odds of success. You will increase the chances that you sink the shot or that you at least get the ball close enough to the rim that you don't embarrass yourself and become a meme. ([Time 0:12:50](https://share.snipd.com/snip/faecdb06-5111-4d92-8145-3dfa2ae6030b))