“We can no more respect and tolerate vast differences in notions of human wellbeing than we can respect or tolerate vast differences in notions of how dieses spreads or in the safety standards of buildings and airplanes.”

Interesting take for sure, but how does this affect our work as marketers?

First, let’s take a look at where he’s coming from to get a better understanding about what he’s saying.  

A lower level moral theory class will often focus on three major (and oversimplified) theories of normative ethics: Utilitarianism, Deontology and Virtue Ethics.

• Utilitarianism follows the train of thought that an action is “good” if it creates the greatest amount of happiness for the greatest number of people. Read: Bentham, Singer, Mill.
• Deontology, or more specifically, Kant’s Categorical Imperative states that you should “act only according to that maxim whereby you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law.” Read: Kant and Rawls.
• Virtue Ethics, born out of Aristotle’s work titled, Nichomachean Ethics, generally focuses on the concept that people and societies “flourish” when their actions fulfill a duty or purpose neither to excess or deficiently. Think: “everything in moderation.” Read: Aristotle.
  

(Sorry for the philosophy lesson).

The road block to applying each one of these moral theories practically is the charge of moral relativism. Of course each philosopher addresses how their particular theory overcomes relativity, but when two theories butt up against one another – the argument, with out fail, reverts to: who are you to say you’re right and I’m wrong (not without a sense of irony).

Harris, on the other hand, is adamant that science can defeat the moral relativism road block. If there is a right and wrong way to treat a disease and a right and wrong way to build a building, then why can’t we use science and neuroscience to say something like: “it is wrong to murder your daughter if she is raped” or “it is right to provide people with access to clean drinking water.”

From Harris’ talk: “Just admitting that there are right and wrong answers to the question of how humans flourish will change the way we talk about morality. And will change our expectations of human cooperation in the future.”

Hmmm. This certainly implies that there must be a right and wrong way to do business, or for our purposes, a right and wrong way to market a product.

It’s not unfair to say that corporate America and big business in general seems to have adopted a set of morals bound only by the maxim: if we’re making profits our actions are good.

One only needs to have scanned the headlines of any major publication in the last 10 years to see that corporate malfeasance is rampant and, in some cases but not all, the marketing industry is complicit.

Aside: I’m not saying all big business and all marketers are consciously engaging in immoral activity. However, “I was only doing my job” didn’t work as a defense in 1945 and it doesn’t work now.

What does this mean for marketing?

I think it means that we need to pay closer attention to the relationship dynamic we create with our clients. No one wants to be a Yes Man, but sometimes we lose sight of what’s right and wrong in the greater scheme of things. If we forge ahead as business partners and marketing advisors, I think we’ll find that we’ll move further and further away from being letter shops and web site developers.

Individually, if we stay current on what’s happening around us and seek opinions and information that resides outside of our disciplines – like Sam Harris’ TEDTalk – we’ll be better able to identify the tough questions and perhaps even venture an answer.