Definition of Philosophy

The Ethics of Changing Jobs

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Jessica Alba gets solicited for some business by two employees of a bodyguard company while trying to enjoy a day at the park with daughter Honor Marie in Beverly Hills, Ca

Changing jobs is part of life. We all need to move on at some point in our lives. In this day and age, we can’t very well be expected to stay in one place for the rest of our lives. Yet even in cases like these, we are expected to think things through and to follow certain ethics.

Take this example. Company A has been in operation for several years. After 4 years of operation, most of its employees feel frustrated. They have gone as high as they could in the ranks and discontent is the general prevailing feeling. A competing company opens within the city, unknown to the upper management. This competing company offers a higher salary and better terms. The people within the company also deemed it necessary to try and hire the most skilled people in the original company.
Naturally, these things are kept secret from the original company.

The question now is the ethics involved – not from the perspective of the newly formed rival company but in the part of the employees who are being pirated, for the lack of a better word. Is there something wrong in them wanting to leave their current job for greener pastures? Isn’t that something normal and expected?

I’d have to say that leaving for greener pastures is all well and fine BUT leaving and immediately working for a rival company when you have an agreement with your current company NOT to work with a similar group until after 1 year of leaving is something else. Oh, did I leave that fact out in the beginning?

Here’s your question – would you do what these employees are doing? Or would you be more ethical (and perhaps less practical)?

Are you Aware of the Eco-Friendly Philosophy?

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Climate change and global warming issues have so far pushed us to lead eco-friendly lives. Many term it as going green but while others are able to cope and understand what it really means to really live an eco-conscious world, the fact remains that the whole philosophy surrounding eco-friendliness has to be further enhanced.

For one, many associate it with the color green. So with that in mind, trees, plants and nature are the first things that come into mind. This is partly true but if you want to generalize the whole eco-friendly philosophy, there is more to it that meets the eye. There is a reason why global warming and climate change are tagged part of it and if you would have your way, chances are you may discover that the branches included in it go a whole lot deeper.

You are bound to hear this topics when eco-friendly is in the air:

1. Recycling
2. Organic Living
3. Animal Extinction
4. Endangered Species
5. Alternative Energy
6. Alternative Fuel

Each of these topics are in a niche of their own. Sum them all up and they comprise the whole essence of global warming and climate change. But if you take on them separately, you may be surprised to note that they are only about 5% roughly if you want to sum up their relevance to global warming.

Al Gore hit it right when he addressed this issue. Apparently he is vindicated and today, many of us are finding our own way on how to survive this unusual glitch we are mainly responsible for.

Envy: Can it be Good?

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envyEnvy is an emotion everyone has at some point felt and needed to contend with. But what exactly is envy? When can you say that you are envious and when are you jealous? Is there are difference between the two? Is envy necessarily bad? All these questions about envy are answered in by Justin D’Arms’ paper on Envy. There he discussed the nature of envy, its rationality, and its relation to justice.

What interested me most about the whole article though is how he showed that envy is not always irrational and that despite the fact that it is often painted in a negative manner, even being considered to be one of the seven deadly sins, it can actually be benign. However, I we all understand why envy has earned its nasty reputation what with all the negative things that do tend to happen or at least the negative emotions that are invoked when the green-eyed monster makes it appearance. To be able to understand the whole concept of envy though and see why it can actually be benign, one needs to first understand its basic nature based on its definition and according to the following philosophers envy can be defined as follows:

Envy is pain at the good fortune of others. (Aristotle, Rhetoric, Bk II, Chapter 10)

Envy is a propensity to view the well-being of others with distress, even though it does not detract from one’s own. [It is] a reluctance to see our own well-being overshadowed by another’s because the standard we use to see how well off we are is not the intrinsic worth of our own well-being but how it compares with that of others. [Envy] aims, at least in terms of one’s wishes, at destroying others’ good fortune. (Kant, The Metaphysics of Morals 6:45)

In short, as D’Arms puts it arises from comparing how well you are doing with others. For the in-depth (and very fascinating) discussion on envy read Justin D’Arms’ article on Envy.

Image Source: Digerati Life

The purpose of life, or the search thereof

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Many a soul on this earth, have gone through life without meaning. Some say that Philosophy is one’s search of meaning in one’s life and others say who cares. But one should always have a purpose for every second, minute, hour, day, month and year of life. Life is short though it may last a couple of decades, tis’ still short a time. Considering that the earth has been around for a couple of billion years, life truly is short.

What is life on this earth without purpose? A waste of borrowed time, for life without meaning is nothing and if it is nothing… then why live at all. We all have a purpose on this earth whether we like it or not. Some feel damned and some don’t, some are endowed and others are average whatever place you may have in the measures set by man on his fellow man you are unique. Unique, in a way that whatever you may think is important even if others don’t pay attention or don’t mind.

It doesn’t matter what others say about your purpose or destiny, that’s their view and their’s alone. Listen deep within and understand what is inside and not what others say, life is meaningless without purpose. What is happiness without sadness, triumph without defeat and so on and so forth. He had a way of assuring that we get both sides of the picture so we’d cherish them side by side.

Go simple, “ Do your ordinary duties, EXTRA ORDINARILY WELL”. Sounds nice doesn’t it? Feels even better…..