Revista de Ciências Políticas e Assuntos Públicos
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Reasoning about Ethics Crafting a Minimum Common Ground

Aejaz Ahmad

When we face moral situations, we either act impulsively or instinctively or intuitively or we act after careful deliberation (i.e., reasoning). In this paper, I shall show/explicate, first, how reasoning meticulously (to reason about issues) creates what I shall call a “Minimum Common Ground” (MCG) which is a pre-requisite condition for proper domain of ethical reasoning. This Minimum Common Ground is defined as a minimum arrangement in which parties involved in an ethical issue appreciate and acknowledge each other’s reasonable viewpoints, which if not acceptable to all, must not hurt anyone. Second, I shall argue, with plausible examples, that none of the other ways such as acting impulsively, acting intuitively or acting instinctively succeed in creating that ‘Minimum Common Ground’. This use of reason must have a streamlining effect to cure the extra-demanding or excessive traits of biases, prejudices, interests and so on for a proper exercise of ethical reasoning. In other words, the task would involve the identification of rational instincts, rational impulses, rational intuition and so on for the creation of more viable and effective MCG. Finally, I shall discuss two Indian experiences - India’s move toward Non-Alignment Movement and the Indian story of multiculturalismto show how Indian state have crafted that “Minimum Common Ground” when confronting ethical problems just after her national liberation.