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Ethics

I am married to a man who earns a considerable amount of money doing a job he enjoys. It is possible for me to earn a similar amount of money, but I now feel considerable discomfort in the profession that over the years has allowed me to do so. My preferred work (writing fiction) will bring in no money in the short term and has little chance of a lot of money in the end. Is it ethical to choose to earn less, and yet to share the rewards of my husband's salary - the big house, nice car, holidays and so on?

I would have thought that this sort of decision was one to be made by you and your husband jointly. How your household earns its income is for the two of you to decide, and it is also for the two of you to decide how that income will be used. I can well understand that there might be emotional costs to writing full-time and so not making much (if any) money doing it. The concerns you express already reveal some of those costs. But they can be mitigated in various ways. If your husband were to be truly supportive of your writing and believed in what you were doing, that would presumably go a long way. You could think of yourselves as investing the income you could otherwise earn in your writing. Perhaps that will pay off financially and perhaps it will not. But perhaps there are more important things than money, and you are really investing in them.
Children
Ethics

Is it philosophically defensible, or morally right, to inculcate your child to an organized religion when you yourself do not firmly believe in it? Along the same line, is there anything wrong about avoiding religious topics with your child with the intent that the child will choose her own set of beliefs when she becomes more mature?

The first sort of reasoning (not that I need to tell Jyl) goes bythe name "Pascal's Wager". It has been the subject of much controversy.The best recent paper I know is by Alan Hájek. See his"Waging War on Pascal's Wager", Philosophical Review 112 (2003), 27-56. Alan also wrote the Stanford Encyclopedia article on Pascal's Wager , which is presumably a better place to start for those who are interested. Letme offer a slightly different perspective on the question originallyasked. I don't think I'd want to say that it is permissible to"inculcate" one's children in a religion one doesn't accept. But thatis strong and fairly loaded language. I actually know two people whoare in the something like the following situation. (I could be wrongabout some of the details, so if anyone guesses who I've got in mind,don't assume I'm right. The situation is officially hypothetical.) Alexand Tony are white academics and have adopted two black children. Theybelieve very strongly that, as the church is and...
Ethics

In googling around for an old boyfriend, I found only these details about him: 1) that he and his wife live on the opposite coast and have an unlisted phone number; and 2) that he, his brother, and sister all have unclaimed funds in a bank in the city where they were born and lived until they were teenagers, when their mother moved them to another state. I also discovered his brother's address and phone number. Would it be personally intrusive (thereby ethically questionable) to send a letter to the brother, letting him know about the unclaimed funds?

Without knowing more about your relationship to these people, it's impossible to answer your question. But if you're worried about proprieties or consequences, but sincerely want to be helpful, contact the brother anonymously. Send a postcard, sign it, "An Old Friend", and reward yourself for being a nice person.
Ethics

Jane Doe, a senior person at a public relations agency, with expertise in one industry, has begun freelancing for a major newspaper. The articles do not disclose Jane's corporate affiliation; rather a generic description of Jane is given at the end of each article ("Jane Doe, an expert in ...., is a --- consultant"). The topic of the articles do relate to Jane's clients at the public relations agency (i.e., article topics are in line with the industry focus). Specific companies are not named in the articles and it isn't possible to say if Jane is indirectly promoting her clients' goals because the public relations agency does not disclose a list of client names, although it is clear that one client is a government-related agency. Jane is using her public relations agency email address for her articles work, and is interviewing experts for her articles during "normal" work hours. It seems to me that this is an ethical conflict of interest. If I'm employed by a university, say, and write articles on the...

I don't have a whole lot to say about your analysis of this situation. It seems to me that you are plainly right that Jane has a conflict of interest, in so far as her freelance articles could promote the interests of her clients.
Ethics

Why should society put such a high value to the act of taking an oath. Oath to say the truth, Oath to become a Citizen, Oath to take an office, Oath to serve a commission, etc. Oath is only as good as a person taking the oath, so what is different about a person expressing an opinion or a belief and doing it under oath? Is our society correct in accepting a higher level of integrity or commitment because of the ceremonious nature of it? After all, it is not difficult to act out an oath as a matter of convenience and not have any sincere feelings about the act.

One way to think about oaths would be to regard them as a ritualized form of promise . If so, then one aspect of these questions is: What's the significance of promises? There's a difference between saying that one plans to do something, which can certainly create reasonable expectations and moral obligations secondary to those expectations, and promising to do it, which creates moral obligations that are not secondary to and do not require any such expectations. So one purpose of oaths might be simply to create the sorts of moral duties a promise would. Whether one who makes a promise, or takes an oath, takes those duties seriously is, of course, another matter. Another aspect of the questions is: Why should promise-making be ritualized as an oath? I can think of two kinds of answers worth exploring. One might be that the public and ritual character of oath-taking might encourage taking it seriously. (Perhaps that used to be true more so than it is now.) Another might be that the...
Ethics

A man calls a woman a whore, and is promptly beaten by the woman's husband. The husband justifies the beating as an appropriate response to disrespect. His friends agree. Are they correct?

That response seems a little extreme to me. I would have thought it fairly obvious that the husband should (and would) be arrested for assault and battery.

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