Albert Carr Is Business Bluffing Ethical Pdf File

“is Business Bluffing Ethical”. Generally, for Carr, to bluff in business is to engage in some. Bluffing in poker, though a form of deception in order.

Carr Study Questions

(The Carr article is available at: http://reserve.lib.usm.edu/BRUTONS/58305.pdf)

Albert Carr's 'Is Business Bluffing Ethical?,' although written in the 1960s, is still widely readin Business Ethics classes.Studentsoften find it persuasive and appealing, and it expresses attitudes that are byno means uncommon among business persons.Nonetheless, Carr’s arguments can be challenged at several points.

Beforeturning to criticism, however, it is important to be clear about Carr'sconclusion and the argument by which he hopes to convince us of it.The main argument is a straightforwardargument by analogy:

1) Poker and business have many things in common: both aregames, both 'have a large element of chance,' in both to win one musthave 'steady skill,' and in both 'ultimate victory requiresintimate knowledge of the rules, insight into the psychology of other players,a bold front,' etc. Most importantly, bluffing is permissible according tothe rules of both poker and business.

2) Bluffing in poker is also morally permissible.

3) Therefore, bluffing in business is morallypermissible.

One might think that Carr is not in fact claiming 3).For example, he says at one point that'decisions in [business] are, in the final test, decisions of strategy notof ethics,' and you could take this to mean that business decisions areneither ethical nor unethical, which is to say that business is a realm whereethical evaluations do not apply.Theproblem here is that Carr uses 'ethics' and 'morality' in two differentsenses.In one sense, Carr means bythese terms what he alternatively calls 'private' or'religious' or 'church' ethics - the moral standards thatmany of us learn from our parents and use in our everyday interactions withothers (e.g. the Golden Rule, 'love your neighbor as yourself,'etc.).In another sense, Carr means'ethics' and 'morality' to refer to the distinctive norms that apply to aparticular kind of practice, such as poker or business, in the same way that hesometimes speaks about the 'special ethics' of business.When he says business decisions are 'ofstrategy not of ethics,' he means that private or church ethicsdo not apply to them.But when Carrwrites that, 'in their office lives [business people] cease to be privatecitizens; they become game players who must be guided by a somewhat differentset of ethical standards,' he is obviously speaking of ethics in thesecond 'special' sense.So heis claiming 3); bluffing is morally permissible in business, even though it isoften not permissible in other contexts. Let us refer to 3) as the narrowthesis.

At thesame time, Carr has in mind a much more ambitious conclusion.It seems he wants to condone not onlybusiness bluffing, but a wide range of morally questionable business practices.He writes, 'as long as a company doesnot transgress the rules of the game set by law, it has the legal right toshape its strategy without reference to anything but its profits.'This again I take to be a bit of sloppinesson Carr's point: of course a company has the legal right to do anythingthat is not against the law, no one denies that.What he means to say is that a company hasthe moral right to do anything that is not against the law in order tomake profits; this is what the 'special ethics' of business is allabout.We can reconstruct his reasoninghere by adding the following claims to the argument sketched above:

4) In fact, anything permitted by the rules of business ismorally permissible (in business).

5) The rules of business permit everything that is notagainst the law.

6) Therefore, everything that is not against the law ismorally permissible (in business).

Let's refer to 6) as the wide thesis.The merits of Carr's argument depend quite abit on whether we're talking about the narrow or the wide thesis.Carr, unfortunately, tends to jump back andforth between them, but it is important to see at the outset that they differconsiderably.Freddy fazbear pizzeria simulator download.

Questions:

1. For those unfamiliar with the game, poker allows a playerto with a good hand to raise the stakes of the bet so as to potentially winmore money.But one can also raise thestakes with a weak hand - this is a bluff.The strategy is to make others think you have a good hand so they'll all'fold' and you'll win without necessarily having the best hand.Briefly describe a business “bluff” mostclosely analogous to a poker bluff.Isthis bluff also morally permissible?

2. Describe two differences between poker and business thatundermine Carr’s analogy.

3. Describe two of Carr’s illustrations of ethicallyappropriate business practices that seem relevantly different from the pokerbluff.(Even if we accept that businessbluffing is okay, are all of the practices he describes really analogous tobusiness bluffing?)

4. Describe a counterexample to Carr’s wide thesis, i.e., abusiness practice that is within a company’s legal rights (other than theexamples given so far either by you or Carr) that is nonetheless morally wrong.

No keywords specified fix it. Once you place your order you will receive an email with the password. Typical business practices violate the rules of ordinary morality e.What about negotiating business deals?

After all, he seems to be giving them a license to behave just as they please. This entry has no external links.

A maxim cannot be universalized if it contains a logical contradiction or a contradiction between two wills.Bluffing, according to Carr, is not entirely cheating but not entirely telling the truth either. Therefore, Carrs is right in claiming that business activities such as business bluffing are not morally wrong, that the only standard that people in business should follow is legality and profits. Contact Order Price quote.

Thus, there is no contradiction involved in bluffibg universalized practice of business bluffing.In other words, the analogy Albert Carr makes between business and poker is weak. Oddo – – Journal of Business Ethics 16 3: Businsss of Western Philosophy.

Of course, we do need to address what counts as too high of a cost but this is an issue that has been addressed in standard ethical theory. After all, you can be sure that your competition will do this and nothing more so if you decide to run your business by extra-legal moral principles you will suffer as a result. Business Bluffing – Business EthicsHowever, within the business field it seems to encounter neither logical us nor contradiction between two wills and thus can be universalized to the business field.

Let us create a perfect paper for you today! Its Demise as a Subject Unto Itself. This has been used care practical business strategy. So people will not believe any promise and promise will not be taken as a promise and wont be able to achieve its goal. Gillespie specifically outlines three of these cases.This article has no associated abstract.So, the claim that business ethics must be different to accommodate this is unjustified.

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