Confronting the Causes of Racial Discrimination Some claim that the United States is not a racist nation, and that may be true in an important, but very narrow sense. The presence of conscious, intentional racial prejudice has subsided. And only a small percentage of Americans view expressed racially biased views as acceptable in open society. This trend is a welcome development, […] Ver
The Silk Road: Paved by Grandiosity All of us are prone to overconfidence regarding all manner of skills and characteristics, including ethicality. (See our video: https://ethicsunwrapped.utexas.edu/video/overconfidence-bias). When that overconfidence approaches grandiosity, danger lurks. We just read Nick Bilton’s engaging and moderately terrifying American Kingpin — the story of «Silk Road” founder Ross Ulbricht, who’s website became the Amazon for drugs, guns, […] Ver
Aunt Becky Goes to Jail: Revisiting the College Admissions Scandal Although we have blogged about the Varsity Blues admissions scandal before, actress Lori Loughlin (“Aunt Becky” of “Full House” fame) and her fashion designer husband Mossimo Giannulli just entered guilty pleas to charges of conspiracy to commit mail and wire fraud and were sentenced to two months and five months in prison, respectively. It seems […] Ver
Stopping COVID-19: A Behavioral Ethics Guide We act immorally when we do unjustified harm to objects of moral worth, such as other people. In the midst of a pandemic, when we ignore the best scientific guidance and refuse to wear masks, physically distance, or avoid crowds, we act immorally unless the view “I’m going to do what I want to do […] Ver
Operation Warp Speed and the Psychology of Conflicts of Interest At this moment in time, it seems as though there is nothing more important than developing a vaccine for Covid-19, the coronavirus that has launched a worldwide pandemic. The world hungers for such a vaccine that might enable us to return to some semblance of normalcy. President Trump has named Dr. Moncef Slaoui to lead […] Ver
Do You Walk the Talk? The Impact of Moral Credentialing Moral equilibrium is an interesting concept. The idea is that people tend to keep a running scoreboard in their heads that compares their image of themselves—usually as “good folks”—with their actions. If people do something that doesn’t live up to their normal moral standards, their mental scoreboard goes into deficit and they may actually look […] Ver
Jack Abramoff’s Fall from Disgrace In 2005, Jack Abramoff was the most influential lobbyist in our nation’s capital. He then suffered a fall from grace and today, with an amazing trifecta, may have cemented his reputation as the most infamous lobbyist of all time. First, Abramoff’s corrupt actions as the most powerful lobbyist in America in the late 1990s and […] Ver
A Failure of Moral Imagination Thousands of Americans have been shocked over the past few days as they watched a video of a white woman near Torrance, California as she targeted a racist rant at a young woman of Filipino ancestry: Get the f*** out of this world, get the f*** out of this state and go back to whatever […] Ver
Black Lives Matter: “I don’t think we get another chance to fix this” These are trying and emotional times, which is to be expected after we have all seen videos of Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin murdering an unarmed black man, George Floyd, over the course of nine minutes right in front of our eyes. If this tragic event does not open all our eyes to the evils […] Ver
«Working the System» – Euphemisms Inflict Collateral Damage on Integrity Operation Varsity Blues is just about in our rearview mirror. Most of the 56 people indicted in this college admissions scandal have pled guilty. Yesterday (May 21, 2020), the highest profile defendants, actress Lori Loughlin (“Aunt Becky” of the TV series Full House) and her husband, fashion designer Mossimo Giannulli, changed their not guilty pleas, […] Ver