First Do No Harm: ethics of morality, amorality, and immorality

 

     "First Do No Harm" (FDNH) is an adage that applies to the medical profession as well as variants of which as used by a high-tech company as their stated guideline. While this seems quite straight-forward, it rarely is. However, it is an ethics question that should be "top of mind" with every analysis of action, decision, or behavior.

     In the case of medicine, most treatments have possible, even likely, side-effects. It is always a judgement call as to whether the medicine, or treatment, is likely to do more good than harm. Both the effects of the treatment and the potential side-effects are on various sliding scales. Effects range from Very unlikely to help to almost guaranteed to help. Potential side-effects move along the sliding scale from unnoticeable to greatly affecting the quality of life. The side-effects have an additional sliding scale which ranges from extremely unlikely to occur to almost guaranteed to happen.

     Even if these sliding scales can be adequately defined, it is impossible to put any situation on a specific point on all of the scales. Effects, side-effects, and likelihoods are going to vary from person to person. Additionally, the importance of those effects, side-effects and likelihoods are going to vary also. Because this is true, FDNH evaluation often should be relegated back to the patient, rather than remaining solely with the doctor. For cases where (in the weighted opinion of the doctor) the positive effects are likely to be small and the potential negative side-effects have a large chance to be significant and quite harmful it makes no sense for the patient to not have the last word.

     Moral behavior for an individual or business must include the aspects of doing the best that one can -- with the least negative and the most positive. Actions should also be equivalent for all people, groups, and circumstances. For instance, if a salary freeze is in effect for a company then it should apply to all -- from the CEO or President to maintenance staff. I remember one year, in a large research company, when a salary freeze was put into effect -- but executive staff was given a 25% increase. Immoral and highly destructive to company morale and productivity.

     Evaluation of morality of actions and behavior always fall into a subjective arena. There will always be trade-offs and a variety of formulas of actions that affect different people in various ways. Sometimes, companies will allow the employees to choose between possibilities. One company presented the options of compensating for a lowered income stream by laying off a large number of people or taking a pay cut for all employees. When given explicit choices, I am proud to relay that the decision which is supportive of the most people is most often taken.

     What about immoral, or "bad",  behavior and actions? Usually immoral behaviors end up counter-productive and do not survive -- as long as such behavior is visible and subjected to external response and criticism. It does not make business sense to do "bad" things deliberately if the result is negative to the bottom line. In addition, doing "bad" things deliberately reduces corporate competitiveness. It is one of the major reasons why corporations are typically supportive of inclusive policies. Inclusive policies increase the customer base, increase the intellectual and physical pool of employees, and (not quite universally) adds to the corporate image. Non-inclusive, or discriminatory, policies do the opposite.

     One multinational megacorporation formalizes the trade-offs between positive effects and negative effects. When they set up their spread sheets for production and marketing, there are spots, in the rows and columns, for potential deaths and how much such deaths (or significant health effects) will cost in terms of legal costs, settlements, and PR hits that might affect the bottom line.  The company does not particularly WANT bad effects but they are very tolerant of living with such if profits are maintained -- they follow the definition of an amoral corporation. They are often at the target end of boycotts but the percentage market hit of those participating in the boycotts are also weighed into the spread sheet. Alas, not surprisingly, the spreadsheets often indicate that they can make more profit by allowing avoidable side-effects. And the boycotts have only moral value and do not significantly affect profits.

     Moral -- trying to do the most good and the least harm. Amoral -- trying to personally benefit the most while taking into account the repercussions of negative behavior; the negative behavior can be evaluated as excessive by outside forces. Immoral -- doing the most harm in spite of negative consequences.

     While these aspects of ethics can certainly be viewed in other manners, these are one set of usable criteria.

Secondary effects: don't stop before the hows and whys

      When I am buying an oven, I look over the "self-cleaning" ovens. Why? It really isn't that much trouble to clean an oven (though my preference is to avoid the harsher chemicals which make it the easiest to do). Self-cleaning ovens do it by allowing very high (higher than most cooking is done at) temperatures to burn away drips and spills and leave only ash and easily cleaned residue. In order to do this, it is necessary that the oven walls be durable against both extreme heat and changes in temperature. It is also necessary to have good insulation around the oven so that the surrounding cabinetry does not catch fire or otherwise be damaged.

     So, I don't care that strongly about an oven being able to self-clean. But the characteristics of a self-cleaning oven -- the insulation and solidity of the oven walls -- provide energy saving side effects, and a more uniform internal heat, that I DO want.

     I am not a personal fan of cosmetics, preferring the unmodified beauty that exists in almost all people. But, since cosmetics are often applied in the same areas that also need protection from the sun, they can be modified to provide the Sun Protection Factor (SPF) that is useful to prevent aging, and damage, of the skin. Note that, in this case, the side effect is deliberate -- as normal cosmetics have rather low sun blocking capabilities.

     Back in 2017, Neil deGrasse Tyson, for whom I have great respect as a scientist and as an advocate of science, decided to put in his oar concerning the value and/or potential problems of Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs). His bottom line was simple -- we've been modifying the genetics of plants and animals for thousands of years -- there is no reason to be afraid of them now. The larger science associations agree with him -- American Association for the Advancement of Science as well as the National Academy of Sciences and the European Commission,

     While I have disagreements about modern GMO creations being in the same category as those in the older traditions of hybridization and selective breeding and other "natural" methods -- I will not claim to have the scientific knowledge or backing to argue against the general safety of GMOs. Note, I still say "general" -- I still think that proper testing should be done against all foods, medications, and other items that will come into either internal, or external, contact with our bodies.

     But, the investigation of Neil deGrasse Tyson stops too soon. To the best of my knowledge, he never went further into the "why" of GMOs and the potential dangers posed by that.

     There are many reasons why a zygote may be genetically modified. Perhaps the manipulator wants to make the food tastier, or more resistant to grasshoppers, or larger, or have a greater percentage of protein produced. All good reasons (though some other qualities may degrade when one quality is improved). But many food crops are presently being modified primarily for the purpose of being able to better survive applications of herbicides and pesticides. In that way, an herbicide can be applied (perhaps rather heavily) to a food crop and it will survive while the "weeds" (undesired thriving plants) cannot.

     So, on a first order, perhaps the GMO crops pose no danger to people eating them. But, on a second order, the modifications are often done to allow large amounts of pesticides and herbicides to be used -- which ARE, by definition, harmful to living organisms. In particular, glyphosate-based pesticides, considered to have quite bad effects on people, are banned in many parts of the world. Glyphosates have been found in (relatively) large amounts in human and other tissues.

     I am sure that you can think of other examples where one needs to go beyond the "what" to the "why". Or go beyond the "what" to the "how". We often think of side-effects as not predicted -- but sometimes the side-effects are the primary long-term effects of a process. This can apply to physical products, software, business, or social interactions.