Editing Descriptive ethics (section)

==Description==
Descriptive ethics is a form of [[empirical]] research into the attitudes of individuals or groups of people. In other words, this is the division of philosophical or general ethics that involves the observation of the moral decision-making process with the goal of describing the phenomenon. Those working on descriptive ethics aim to uncover people's beliefs about such things as values, which actions are right and wrong, and which characteristics of moral agents are virtuous. Research into descriptive ethics may also investigate people's [[ideal (ethics)|ethical ideal]]s or what actions societies reward or punish in [[law]] or [[politics]]. What ought to be noted is that culture is generational and not static. Therefore, a new generation will come with its own set of morals and that qualifies to be their ethics. Descriptive ethics will hence try to oversee whether ethics still holds its place.

Because descriptive ethics involves empirical investigation, it is a field that is usually investigated by those working in the fields of [[evolutionary biology]], [[psychology]], [[sociology]] or [[anthropology]]. Information that comes from descriptive ethics is, however, also used in philosophical arguments.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Greene |first1=Joshua D. |s2cid=9063016 |title=Beyond Point-and-Shoot Morality: Why Cognitive (Neuro)Science Matters for Ethics |journal=Ethics |date=July 2014 |volume=124 |issue=4 |pages=695–726 |doi=10.1086/675875}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Sinnott-Armstrong |first1=Walter |last2=Wheatley |first2=Thalia |last3=Sugden |first3=Sherwood J. B. |title=The Disunity of Morality and Why it Matters to Philosophy |journal=Monist |date=2012 |volume=95 |issue=3 |pages=355–377 |doi=10.5840/monist201295319|doi-access=free }}</ref>

[[Value theory]] can be either normative or descriptive but is usually descriptive.