what is ethics? remarkably few people seem to fully understand the subject, including most moral philosophers. thus, as you might imagine, this piece is going to be written at a fairly deep level, suitable for those with some background in ethics or utilitarian thought. that said, we’ll generally aim to use terms and concepts that any smart and attentive individual could understand. the goal is to illuminate these ideas as clearly as possible without diluting their intellectual depth.
when we see a bird tending to its egg at great personal cost, or stags engaging in ritualized dominance contests rather than fighting to the death, or humans instinctively rushing to help someone having a medical emergency—these are all just biological phenomena, which we can understand in the same way we understand why moths are attracted to light or why we crave sugar.
to see how fundamentally subjective ethics is, let's start with a classic ethical thought experiment known as the trolley problem. the basic scenario invo