Social Science Homework Help

  Due in 7 hours **** 550 Turabian FORMAT DISCUSSION BOARD TWO REPLIES: Is it ever moral to break a promise? A rational analysis and conclusion. ****** YOU MUST WRITE THE STUDENT NAME THAT YOU ARE REPLYING TO SO I KNOW Which Reply goes to which student. 

Thread: The Reading & Study materials this module/week discuss the complex issue of poverty, and the moral imperative of promise-keeping is mentioned several times. After reviewing the Reading & Study materials, compose a 500  word argument that is objective, carefully-constructed, and free of emotion. Be sure to carefully define your terms. You are encouraged to support your position with rational arguments, fitting examples, and expert sources. Any quotes or information used from sources other than yourself must be cited using footnotes in current Turabian format and will not count towards the total word count.

******DB Reply Student 1 Steven****

1.) Why is promise-keeping morally important?

Keeping a promise is morally important because it defines you as a person one can trust. We should strive to honor our word when making that promise. Now with that said I also believe it is important to outweigh the cost of that promise. Is it a promise we can truly keep or is it a promise that could have a different end result based on unforeseeable situations like that of the Haiti and the western world promises made for aide, rebuilding and help. There are many times in my personal life that I respond in doing something “Lord willing”, because somethings are out of my control.

2.) Is it ever morally permissible to break a promise?

Stated in our reading this week and as I stated above, the unforeseen future is something as individuals have no control over. Both parties the giver of the promise and the receiver of the promise should have that understanding, but many times that understanding fails. Looking at it from a Biblical world view, we shouldn’t put our hopes in man but in God. If we had that understanding and accepted that man can fail us than the result of a broken promise won’t be as detrimental for the receiver of the promise. So to answer this question is hard because I have the potential of putting myself in a contradicting bind, and I recognize that, but ultimately should we make promises, no, but do we, yes. Is it morally permissible or allowed to break a promise, I would have to say, yes.

3) If you answer “yes” to #2, then what are the conditions that render promise breaking morally acceptable.

I do believe that under certain conditions it is morally acceptable to break a promise or your word. There can be situations like rsvp’ing to a wedding invite. For example my brother is getting married in Mexico and my husband is in the military. Though we have given my brother our word that we would be there in June of 2020, there would be an understanding of breaking that word due to weather, flight cancellations, or my husband not given permission through the military to go. But, like I stated in the first answer its not so much that we make promises it more of a “Lord willing”.

N/A

4)  Is it morally obligatory to break a promise?

This is where it can get contradictive a bit, because I think it truly depends on the situation, which why I believe our reading stated it perfectly “This makes promising something of a risky business”, because it is. Its is so hard to give a definitive answer because of the contradictories that come along with it. Promises can also be rated as highly important to not so important there for not a big deal. In this case we run into, “by what and who’s standard” is the promise seen as most important to the least important. Who gets to determine that? The giver or the receiver of the promise. So to answer this question I’m going to give a very light yes.

5) If you answer “yes”, to #5, what are the conditions that render promise-breaking morally obligatory?

I believe that any promise that was made and keeping that promise would harm either party of the made promise or someone outside of it would be conditions rendered for.

*****DB Reply Student 2 Evt*****

Promise keeping is morally important because we give our words to others that we will do an obligation for them to help benefit and promote their well being. Making a promise also means putting others needs before your own, and that is why it is morally important because you have people who begin to rely on you and look up to you to fulfill an obligation.

Now, everyone is entitled to their own personal opinions and when it comes to the question is it ever morally permissible to break a promise? My opinion is yes, because when it comes to a promise, your own needs and well being comes first before others. Like for example, when you go fly on an airplane, in the safety demonstration they say in the event of an emergency and oxygen masks are deployed, make sure you put yours on before helping others. So to help others, you need to be in good health and well being so you can promote that to fulfill an obligation.

As I have already said breaking a promise or keeping a promise is just like an airlines safety demonstration. A person needs to be in their own well state before helping others. So to know that it is moral to break a promise is by judging the result. Now being selfish is completely different then caring for yourself, when your selfish you automatically think of yourself before thinking of others, but caring for yourself, you still think of others, but before you can help them you need to help yourself.

Morally obligatory means to knowingly break a promise, you forced yourself to break a promise. When you force yourself to break a promise then that is not moral because it starts to fall in the category of being greedy. However, like a fine print there is always conditions, like I said before it may be alright if your morally obligately break a promise as long as you are taking care of yourself so you help improve your ability to help others or by looking for a beneficial end result, even if it means you did not fulfill your promise. Like everything in society, the end result is always what determines if it is moral or immoral, like a firefighter, they make an obligation to save people in disaster situations, like 9/11. With their bravery to enter the World Trade Center in the Smokey and life threatening situation, they still made an obligation to save many people as possible, however some firefighters weren’t able to make it back out. But when we look back we see their courage and bravery making it moral.