‘World’s worst banker’.....

[bindeweede]

According to The Times, Sir Fred Goodwin is back in employment. Well, a pension of £342,500 probably doesn't go as far as you would expect.

Fellow Edinburgh architects expressed amazement at the appointment. “This is a guy who was once branded ‘The world’s worst banker’,” said one. “Why on earth would you want to appoint someone like that?” one said.

Ah, but, anonymous quotes.........

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/new...cle6990445.ece

[Pebble]

According to The Times, Sir Fred Goodwin is back in employment. Well, a pension of £342,500 probably doesn't go as far as you would expect.

]

Now thats what I call 'recycling trash' - a true green company.

[Graham Lappin]

According to The Times, Sir Fred Goodwin is back in employment. Well, a pension of £342,500 probably doesn't go as far as you would expect.

Admittedly I am being highly speculative but I like to think that long in the future, society will look back at this type of thing with moral outrage - a bit like we do with slavery today. I may be too optimistic?

[asthmatic camel]

Admittedly I am being highly speculative but I like to think that long in the future, society will look back at this type of thing with moral outrage - a bit like we do with slavery today. I may be too optimistic?

Society already does! The thing is, Fred Goodwin played by the current rules of the game, however greedy and incompetent he might be. Want to change the rules? Good luck with that!

[tolman]

I wonder, with a pension the size of the one he has, at his age, how much would the company paying it stand to gain if he met with an unfortunate accident?

[asthmatic camel]

One wonders what happened to the NatWest pension fund, which was producing an annual surplus of £2 billion when the bank was taken over by Sir Fred and RBS.

[Graham Lappin]

.... Want to change the rules? Good luck with that!

Do societies not evolve? Are the ethics of modern western society not more sophisticate and developed than those of say, ancient Rome? Is it not reasonable to predict this evolution to continue so that what might be tolerated today, even if tacitly, becomes unacceptable and therefore outlawed by society of the future?

[DrS]

Are the ethics of modern western society not more sophisticate and developed than those of say, ancient Rome?

Now that is a very interesting question ... OK OK to me, anyway.

I would say that in many respects ancient Roman ethics were every bit as developed and sophisticated than modern western society. The Stoics, for example, could hold their own with any modern Christian.

[Graham Lappin]

Now that is a very interesting question ... OK OK to me, anyway.

I would say that in many respects ancient Roman ethics were every bit as developed and sophisticated than modern western society. The Stoics, for example, could hold their own with any modern Christian.

So are human ethics hard wired into our brains or do they evolve in a Darwinian sense? (Totally out of my intelectual depth, by the way so please be gentle with me )

[DrS]

What a fascinating question! and one I am in no way equipped to answer. A joint investigation perhaps between science and humanities!

From my own perspective, rather than ethics being hardwired, I would think it likelier we have an urge to reason, and that this is what gives rise to considerations of ethics.

[asthmatic camel]

Do societies not evolve? Are the ethics of modern western society not more sophisticate and developed than those of say, ancient Rome? Is it not reasonable to predict this evolution to continue so that what might be tolerated today, even if tacitly, becomes unacceptable and therefore outlawed by society of the future?

Over what period of time? The Romans have already been mentioned, and they borrowed many of their ideas from the Greeks. Both their empires fell, as did ours. Just because something isn't considered acceptable in today's Britain doesn't mean that it won't be in the future.

[Pebble]

Do societies not evolve? Are the ethics of modern western society not more sophisticate and developed than those of say, ancient Rome? Is it not reasonable to predict this evolution to continue so that what might be tolerated today, even if tacitly, becomes unacceptable and therefore outlawed by society of the future?

Do the fundamentals of what we consider 'just' change, or merely the groups we choose to apply them to?

Male Roman citizens had rights rather similar to those we now enjoy, I believe. The laws on fraud may have been less developed, but they had the concept.

Slaves, women, children, animals have certainly made strides recently - but I am less certain that the basic ethics have changed.

Whether societies evolve might be a different question. In return for the protection we get as part of a society, our freedoms are restricted. Democracy could be seen as handing back some of this freedom to the citizens, but we have much less freedom in respect of our financial affairs and much less privacy than was previously the case.
If one accepts evolve as adapt to the prevailing conditions in order to survive, then societies certainly evolve - but whether that is always in the direction of increasing sophistication is less certain.

[Tony Williams]

So are human ethics hard wired into our brains or do they evolve in a Darwinian sense? (Totally out of my intelectual depth, by the way so please be gentle with me )

More likely to do with the need for people to cooperate with each other when living together in groups. This requires certain behavioural norms (you don't kill or steal from a member of the group, for instance).

You see the same in intelligent social animals; they also have the equivalent of an ethical code, and have been observed to help and defend other group members, and to share out resources. Such animals can display a strong sense of fairness, and can get upset if one member of the group is treated better than they are, for instance.

So to answer your question, we have evolved to have the capacity for ethical behaviour hard-wired into us.