Right and Wrong: Fundamental Consideration

At this point, I think I have sufficient material to begin to consider the factors that make a decision "right" or "wrong" in terms of ethics.

An action that has only positive or beneficial consequences is to be considered "right" by the standards of ethics, and the decision to undertake such action is to be considered sound.

An action that has only negative or harmful consequences is to be considered "wrong" by the standards of ethics, and the decision to undertake such action is to be considered unsound.

These are very simplistic premises, and I expect that they will require revision as they are considered in greater detail, but I think that the fundamentals will hold.

If one considers all the consequences of an action, to all parties impacted by them, including any opportunity cost, and finds that they are universally beneficial or harmful, then it would be difficult to dispute the conclusion of whether the action, and the decision to undertake the action, is right or wrong.

The problem, of course, is that there are very few instances in which the outcome of an action is universally positive or negative. Given that a decision may lead to actions that have mixed consequences, the overall assessment of the right/wrong of the action involves a balance of positive and negative outcomes to arrive at an overall judgment of the soundness of the decision.

It's also worth noting that evaluating the outcomes of a single action is fundamental, but it is not the full scope of ethics. In many instances, there are multiple options for action - and at the very least, there are always two choices to be considered (to undertake an action or to refrain from doing so), and it would seem that ethics would require a decision-maker to undertake the option that is "best" in terms of its outcomes.

I'm not sure that I entirely agree with that premise - it implies that ethics is a reduced to the consideration of efficiency or productivity - and my sense is that it may be premature to begin pondering dilemmas, so I'll refrain from comparative considerations until another time, and keep focus on the ethics of a single action, with the concession that it is overly simplistic.