An Unexamined Life: A Final Reflection on Ethics, Justice, and the Human Struggle

An Unexamined Life: A Final Reflection on Ethics, Justice, and the Human Struggle

Wesley Ray | PHIL 1404: Introduction to Philosophy — Ethics | October 29, 2025

Part 1: Human Rights and the Failures of the American Social Contract

This course has provided a robust vocabulary for examining the world through an ethical lens, transitioning abstract feelings of fairness into structured critiques of the systems we inhabit. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), adopted by the United Nations in 1948, serves as a powerful, secular framework for what a just society should provide. It codifies the basic entitlements necessary for a human being to pursue a good life. From my perspective, living and working in the United States, two articles in particular highlight a profound gap between our nation’s ideals and its reality: Article 25 (the right to medical care) and Article 26 (the right to education).

Article 25: The Right to Health as a Commodity

Article 25 of the UDHR states, “Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including… medical care” (United Nations, 1948). In the United States, this right is not upheld because healthcare is not treated as a public good but as a market commodity. The prevailing “situation” is a system where high-quality health insurance is inextricably linked to employment.

As a healthcare data analyst, I see the downstream effects of this market-based model daily. The impact on individuals is devastating. It creates “job lock,” where people are afraid to leave unsuitable jobs for fear of losing life-saving insurance. It is a leading cause of personal bankruptcy, forcing families to lose their homes and savings over an illness they could not control. This systemic failure creates profound anxiety and insecurity, forcing millions to live one diagnosis away from financial ruin. The societal impact is a sicker, less productive, and more unequal populace. This is a fundamental failure of the social contract. As I argued in our discussion on Rawls, no rational person from behind the “Veil of Ignorance” would ever agree to a system that gambles their health and financial security on the lottery of their employment (Matthews & Hendricks, 2019).

Article 26: The “Luxury” of a Quality Education

Similarly, Article 26 of the UDHR states, “Everyone has the right to education… higher education shall be made equally accessible to all on the basis of merit” (United Nations, 1948). The situation in the United States directly contradicts this principle. By funding its public K-12 school system primarily through local property taxes, the nation has codified a “lottery of birth.” Wealthy neighborhoods with high property values have well-funded schools, while poorer areas have under-resourced ones.

The impact of this is the perpetuation of generational poverty and the systemic denial of equal opportunity. This is the very foundation of my argument, developed throughout this course, of “flourishing as a luxury.” A child’s access to the tools needed to pursue eudaimonia (what Aristotle termed a life of human flourishing) is determined not by their merit, but by their zip code. This system effectively creates a “survival class” and a “flourishing class.” It denies individuals the basic intellectual foundation necessary to pursue higher education, a good career, or even the luxury of intellectual contemplation, trapping them in a cycle of “survival virtues” rather than allowing them to pursue “flourishing virtues.” It is a profound failure of justice that we rationalize as “just the way things are.”

Part 2: Course Reflection

What were the most important things you learned this term and why?

The single most important thing I learned in this term was not a specific theory, but the process of using these theories as a toolkit to refine my own ethical worldview. I entered the course as a firm moral relativist, believing ethics was just a human construct for social cooperation. While I still hold that view, I now see these frameworks (like Virtue Ethics, Social Contract Theory, and Kantian Deontology) as indispensable tools for building that construct in a just and meaningful way.

The most important personal insight was the development and refinement of my “flourishing as a luxury” thesis. Using Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics forced me to articulate why I found his framework both useful (for its practical, rational approach) and lacking (for its failure to account for material necessity). Using Rawls’s Veil of Ignorance gave me the language to describe the systemic injustice of a society that denies people the foundation for that flourishing. This single idea became a central thread that connected every module of the course.

How do you plan to apply what you’ve learned?

I have already applied what I’ve learned in a deeply personal way. Our unit on Virtue Ethics prompted me to analyze my own character as a 35-year-old father working from home with a four-year-old. I used Aristotle’s framework of the “golden mean,” which I complemented with the Stoic principles of duty and acceptance found in Marcus Aurelius’s Meditations (n.d.), to consciously identify and work on the virtue of patience. I see it as a rational practice essential to my role as a father, not just a passive emotional state.

Professionally, this course has changed how I see my job. As a healthcare data analyst, I was previously a more passive observer of data. Now, armed with the critiques of Rawls and Crenshaw’s intersectionality, I feel a greater responsibility. I plan to apply this by being more conscious of how I frame data and what questions I ask of it. Instead of just reporting outcomes, I can actively work to highlight the systemic disparities I see, ensuring that my analysis gives voice to those at the intersections of race, class, and gender who are failed by our current system.

How has your understanding of ethics changed or evolved? Has this influenced how you see yourself as a global citizen?

My understanding has evolved from a simple relativism to a more robust, active Absurdism. I began the course believing ethics was a human invention to survive a meaningless universe. I end the course believing that, because the universe is indifferent, our most profound and meaningful act of rebellion is to struggle to build a just and compassionate ethical world. These theories are the blueprints for that rebellion. They are the tools we use to create meaning in the face of the Absurd. As Albert Camus (1955) wrote in The Myth of Sisyphus, “The struggle itself toward the heights is enough to fill a man’s heart. One must imagine Sisyphus happy.” This course has helped me understand that this “struggle” is not just an individual one, but a collective one.

My view of myself as a global citizen was fundamentally challenged and changed. In my discussion reply to my classmate Philip, I reflected on how his post about the real-world struggles in Uganda made my own philosophical “struggle” feel pretentious and privileged. It expanded my perspective and forced me to see it as part of a collective, global human struggle. This aligns with the Stoic ideal of cosmopolitanism, the idea found in thinkers like Marcus Aurelius (n.d.) that we are all citizens of a single, shared community. It deepened my sense of solidarity, making me realize that my own flourishing is, in a very real way, tied to the flourishing of others I will never meet.

What challenges did you face in this class, and how did you overcome them?

The biggest challenge was not intellectual but personal: it was confronting the reality of my own privilege. The “flourishing as a luxury” argument began as a critique of abstract systems, but the course discussions forced me to turn that lens on myself. The realization that my ability to even study philosophy and “struggle” with Camus is a luxury denied to so many was uncomfortable.

I overcame this challenge not by discarding my philosophy, but by accepting the critique and allowing it to refine my worldview. I overcame it by listening and integrating that feedback, which led to a more nuanced, honest, and humble understanding of my own position. This course was challenging not because the reading was difficult, but because it was effective. It forced me to think more deeply, to check my own biases, and to accept a greater sense of responsibility for the world my daughter will inherit.

References

Aristotle. (n.d.). Nicomachean ethics (W. D. Ross, Trans.).

Aurelius, M. (n.d.). Meditations (G. Hays, Trans.).

Camus, A. (1955). The myth of Sisyphus and other essays (J. O’Brien, Trans.). Alfred A. Knopf.

Matthews, G., & Hendricks, C. (2019). Introduction to philosophy: Ethics. Rebus Community. https://open.umn.edu/opentextbooks/textbooks/introduction-to-philosophy-ethics

United Nations. (1948). Universal declaration of human rights. https://www.un.org/en/about-us/universal-declaration-of-human-rights