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Ethics

If I was given an opportunity to either send 800 dollars to an area that is suffering from famine and save the lives of a dozen people from starvation or give the money to my sibling to purchase books she needs for college, I would go with the first option of donating the money to the starving people. There are many reasons why I would make this decision, and they have to do with my belief in the greater good of my actions and the values I hold about what is morally wrong and morally wrong. I would decide to donate the money to the less fortunate and later find a way to find money to purchase books about my sister. At every opportunity, I get, I believe that my actions should be an indication of who I am as a person. I feel that by choosing to give the money to my sister, I would be doing an injustice to the people who are starting. This is because when you compare both situations, the people who are in starvation are in more dire need than my sister, and giving the money to my sister rather than them would be like signing their death certificate. Further, although both victims need basic needs, I feel that the problem of hunger is more severe than education hence there is a need to address the needs of the people who are affected by this problem more. The fact that they are a dozen means that I will be helping more people by donating as opposed to my sister who is alone.

My decision-making process aligns more with the moral theory of utilitarianism, one of the most influential theories of morality in history. The theory holds that the right action is one that directly produces a balance of happiness over unhappiness for the parties concerned. In this regard, happiness is the only intrinsic good and what matters the most is the amount of happiness that is derived from performing an action. To determine the correct action one only needs to calculate the amount of happiness derived from all actions and select the one that generates the most happiness. In this case, the act of donating the 800 dollars to the starving lot will bring a lot of happiness and satisfaction than giving the money to my sister. Although my sister will also be happy that she will purchase the books, the people who were rescued from starvation would be happier. In this theory, the moral thing to do is to select an action that brings more benefits to society and in this scenario, donating the 800 dollars to people who are on the brink of starvation is the right thing to do.