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I usually avoid ethical topics on this blog because there are too many to follow and ethics isn't my area of interest or teaching. However, I noticed this article in the Chronicle today by Robert J Sternberg, dean and professor of psychology at Tufts:

A New Model for Teaching Ethical Behavior - ChronicleReview.com

...eight steps of behaving ethically:

1. Recognize that there is an event to react to.
2. Define the event as having an ethical dimension.
3. Decide that the ethical dimension is significant.
4. Take responsibility for generating an ethical solution to the problem.
5. Figure out what abstract ethical rule(s) might apply to the problem.
6. Decide how abstract ethical rules actually apply to the problem, in order to suggest a concrete solution.
7. Formulate an ethical solution, at the same time possibly preparing to counteract contextual forces that might lead you to act unethically.
8. Act.

Seriously. This is "New"?  Like... to Plato?  Honestly. What is "new" here? The idea of putting them into a checklist? How can teaching students to follow a prescribed checklist possibly train students to "Take responsibility" (3) or "Recognize" that ethical issues arise where they might not expect them (1)?

To be fair, Sternberg isn't precise enough to tell us if these steps are meant to be an analysis of ethical behavior, a prescription for behaving ethically, or (as the title suggests) a model for teaching ethical behavior. He states (before the 8):

Consider these eight steps of behaving ethically and how my students responded, or didn't respond, to the ethical challenge I presented.

and after:

I have argued that ethical behavior typically requires eight steps, and that if you miss any one of them, you are not likely to behave fully ethically. (emphasis mine)

No he hasn't. He hasn't argued that, and he certainly isn't justified in the 'typically requires' claim. He has posited a model, which he then uses to analyze the deficiencies of his students. Nowhere does he argue that this model is (a) the correct model (b) better than other models or (c) the only model available. Any of THOSE arguments would have amounted to an "argument." This is just a bit of self-aggrandizing pseudo-philosophy.