On the concept of ethical categories

Abstract

Traditional ethical categories such as good, evil, conscience, honour, dignity, happiness, or more recently: responsibility, humanism, collectivism, patriotism, internationalism, etc., systematically reflect the tendencies for the development of moral relations in society. The system of categories of Marxists ethics is not to be closed or rendered one-dimensional, on the contrary, it should expand. It should be built upon the following principles: 1) it should define the basic form of ethical knowledge and relate it dialectically to all types of categories describing various levels and functions of morality; 2) it should approach the particular moral phenomena exposing all links between the basic categories and others; 3) it should determine crucial points in the development of moral relations in certain historical conditions; 4) it should generalize from moral experience of a society to use its findings for an improvement of the system of ethical categories.