Claim An action is morally correct if the amount of good that results from the action is greater than the amount of bad that results from the action Reason When assessing the morality of an action the results of an action are more important than the inten

Is an action morally correct only if the amount of good resulting from the action is greater than the amount of bad that results from it? Some may reason that when assessing the morality of an action, the results are more important that the intent of the person performing the action. Others may believe that results are a culmination of a lot of factors other than the intent and hence the result of an action is no yardstick to measure the moralistic intent of the person performing an action. In my view, the intent of the person performing an action is more important than the result of his action.

First of all, we must understand that the amount of good or bad resulting from an action is no touchstone to judge the moralistic intentions of a person. For example, a doctor treats an terminally ill patient with a morally correct attitude. The doctor does his best, by following his hippocrates oath. He ethically treats his patient but the result of his actions is not in tune with his moral conduct. The terminally ill patient's health result is more bad than good. But does this proove that the doctor's efforts were unethical or amoralistic? No. Consequently, simply going by the results of an action is a wrong way to assess the morality of an action.

A second instance would be a scenario in a school. A teacher's job has duties and responsibilities of inculcating good morals, values and ethics in children. He follows this duty moralistically by reading aphoristic stories or teaching good manners and values. But still, some of his students may turn out to be depraved. This result is not parallel with the efforts put in by the teacher. Moreover, the intention of the teacher is moralistically good but due to other circumstances like the parental role models and peer groups of the student, the student may turn out to be the black sheep. If we were to go by the way this student has turned out, we may erroneously conclude that the teacher's actions were unethical. However, the intent of the teacher was always good and hence we must assess a person's morality by their intent.

Finally, we cannot claim a action is morally correct only by looking at the results because a lot of circumstances go into play when we talk about the results. It is not a directly proportional to the morality of the performer. Another instance that proves this is the protests that recently happened in Wall Street. The intentions of the protestors were moralistic. They wanted equality in economic conditions of the country. But, the results were not proportional to their moralistic intentions. Not much good resulted than bad from their moralistic actions.

In conclusion, we must always assess the morality of an action by the intention of the person than by making the results a yardstick of their morality. In my view, as stated in the instances of a doctor treating his patients, a teacher 's case or the protests in Wall Street, one can gather evidence that the amount of good or bad that results from an action is not the way to judge if an action is moralistically correct.