Abstract

Critical thinking texts typically treat ethical reasoning as being in principle no different from non-moral types of reasoning. I argue that there are two distinctive types of ethical argument—those which appeal to principles of right and wrong conduct, and those which appeal to consequences—and that they cannot be properly understood or assessed on the basis of non-ethical models of reasoning. The failure to recognize this produces a simplistic understanding of ethical reasoning, and contributes to the view that ethical judgments are mere expressions of personal feelings.