This proposal explores two distinct ways of understanding how people make moral decisions: one approach sees morality as emerging from our individual intuitions about specific situations, while another compares moral reasoning to a marketplace where people negotiate ethical trade-offs. Both frameworks attempt to explain real-world ethical behavior, but they differ in their underlying assumptions and practical implications.

The Competing Frameworks

Intuition-based reasoning suggests our sense of right and wrong comes from countless specific judgments we've made throughout life—like custom-tailoring each ethical decision to fit our accumulated experiences. In contrast, the moral markets approach views ethics as negotiation space where conflicting values get balanced, similar to how buyers and sellers find compromise prices in economic transactions.

Key questions for comparison include:

• Which framework better explains why reasonable people disagree on ethical issues?
• How does each handle situations where moral principles conflict?
• Which produces more consistent decisions when applied to real-world dilemmas?

Potential Applications and Stakeholders

Ethicists could use this comparison to develop better models of moral reasoning, while policymakers might apply these insights to navigate complex legislative trade-offs. Business leaders facing ethical dilemmas and individuals examining their own moral choices could also benefit from these more dynamic approaches to ethics.

Three groups show particular interest:

1. Academic researchers seeking robust moral theories
2. Institutions needing practical decision-making tools
3. The general public interested in understanding ethical conflicts

Implementation Pathway

A minimal starting point could involve publishing accessible comparison essays to gather feedback. More comprehensive work might proceed through three phases:

First, reviewing existing literature to map the conceptual landscape. Next, analyzing where the frameworks agree and diverge through thought experiments. Finally, designing empirical tests—like presenting moral dilemmas where the approaches predict different outcomes—to see which better matches real-world decisions.

The ultimate value lies in potentially developing ethical decision-making tools that acknowledge the complexity of real-world morality, where perfect solutions are rare and compromise is often necessary.