Causing Disability, Causing Non-Disability: What’s the Moral Difference?

2020 ◽  
pp. 137-157
Author(s):  
Joseph A. Stramondo ◽  
Stephen M. Campbell
Keyword(s):  
Moral Reason ◽  
Moral Difference

It may seem obvious that causing disability in another person is morally problematic in a way that removing or preventing a disability is not. This suggests that there is a moral asymmetry between causing disability and causing non-disability. This chapter investigates whether there are any differences between these two types of actions that might explain the existence of a general moral asymmetry. After setting aside the possibility that having a disability is almost always bad or harmful for a person (a view that we have critiqued at length elsewhere), seven putative differences are considered. Ultimately, it is concluded that none of these seven factors can ground a general moral asymmetry between causing disability and causing non-disability, though each factor can provide some moral reason to avoid causing disability in certain particular cases.

scholarly journals Moral Disagreement in Anglican – Roman Catholic Relations

Ecclesiology ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 17 (2) ◽  
pp. 177-193
Author(s):  
Oliver O’Donovan
Keyword(s):  
Roman Catholic ◽  
Moral Disagreement ◽  
Moral Reason ◽  
Ecumenical Dialogue ◽  
The Reformation ◽  
Catholic Churches ◽  
Moral Difference

Abstract The belief that the Anglican and Roman Catholic churches were divided by moral disagreements came to prominence in the early 1980s and affected the direction of ecumenical dialogue. But no moral disagreements go back to the Reformation era, and the perception of moral difference has undergone many changes since that time, especially reflecting differences of social and political setting. A moral agreement or disagreement is difficult to chart with precision. It is not embodied in a formulation of moral doctrine, since moral reason functions on two planes, that of evaluative description and that of deliberation and decision. Disagreement is phenomenologically present as offence, which has its own dynamic of expansion. Addressing offence, a task involving lay, theological and episcopal contributions, is the primary way in which moral agreement has to be sought and defended.

Prioritarianism and the Separateness of Persons

Utilitas ◽  
2012 ◽  
Vol 24 (3) ◽  
pp. 365-380 ◽  
Author(s):  
MICHAEL OTSUKA
Keyword(s):  
The Other ◽  
Moral Reason ◽  
Separateness Of Persons ◽  
Moral Difference

For a prioritarian by contrast to a utilitarian, whether a certain quantity of utility falls within the boundary of one person's life or another's makes the following moral difference: the worse the life of a person who could receive a given benefit, the stronger moral reason we have to confer this benefit on this person. It would seem, therefore, that prioritarianism succeeds, where utilitarianism fails, to ‘take seriously the distinction between persons’. Yet I show that, contrary to these appearances, prioritarianism fails, in ways strikingly parallel to those in which utilitarianism fails, to take this distinction seriously. In so doing, I draw on and develop an earlier critique of prioritarianism by disentangling and pressing two distinct separateness-of-persons objections offered there. One objection is that prioritarianism is insensitive to ‘prudential justifications’. The other is that it is insensitive to the competing claims of different individuals.

Kantian indifference about moral reason

2019 ◽  
Vol 42 ◽  
Author(s):  
Adam J. Roberts
Keyword(s):  
Moral Reason ◽  
Christine Korsgaard ◽  
Philosophical Assumption

Abstract The pessimistic arguments May challenges depend on an anti-Kantian philosophical assumption. That assumption is that what I call philosophical optimists about moral reason are also committed to empirical optimism, or what May calls “optimistic rationalism.” I place May's book in the literature by explaining how that assumption is resisted by Christine Korsgaard, one of May's examples of a contemporary Kantian.

Conclusion

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Douglas I. Thompson
Keyword(s):  
Conflict Resolution ◽  
Public Goods ◽  
Moral Reasoning ◽  
Public Reason ◽  
Public Institutions ◽  
Moral Reason ◽  
Strategic Bargaining ◽  
Canadian Army ◽  
Actual Conflict

Montaigne offers what is perhaps the first historical instance of the now-ubiquitous phrase “public reason.” Whereas contemporary use of this phrase refers to activities of moral reason-giving, Montaigne uses it to refer to the health of public institutions, conventions, and activities that allow parties in potential and actual conflict to negotiate civil peace and other public goods, whether through moral reasoning, strategic bargaining, or other forms of interaction. This chapter engages with two recent instances of Montaignian public reason in action: the local negotiation of “civil alliance” between Jews and Arabs in the lands of the Palestinian Mandate in 1947–1948 and the negotiation of conflict resolution during an armed standoff between the Canadian army and Mohawk warriors outside Montréal, Quebec in the summer of 1990.

Neural and Environmental Modulation of Motivation

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas Douglas
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Influence ◽  
Environmental Intervention ◽  
Argument Proceeds ◽  
The Brain ◽  
Moral Difference ◽  
Do So

Interventions that modify a person’s motivations through chemically or physically influencing the brain seem morally objectionable, at least when they are performed nonconsensually. This chapter raises a puzzle for attempts to explain their objectionability. It first seeks to show that the objectionability of such interventions must be explained at least in part by reference to the sort of mental interference that they involve. It then argues that it is difficult to furnish an explanation of this sort. The difficulty is that these interventions seem no more objectionable, in terms of the kind of mental interference that they involve, than certain forms of environmental influence that many would regard as morally innocuous. The argument proceeds by comparing a particular neurointervention with a comparable environmental intervention. The author argues, first, that the two dominant explanations for the objectionability of the neurointervention apply equally to the environmental intervention, and second, that the descriptive difference between the environmental intervention and the neurointervention that most plausibly grounds the putative moral difference in fact fails to do so. The author concludes by presenting a trilemma that falls out of the argument.

Kant, Marginal Cases, and Moral Standing

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christine M. Korsgaard
Keyword(s):  
Life Stage ◽  
The Other ◽  
Moral Standing ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Identity Problem ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Dead ◽  
Moral Difference

According to the marginal cases argument, there is no property that might justify making a moral difference between human beings and the other animals that is both uniquely and universally human. It is therefore “speciesist” to treat human beings differently just because we are human beings. While not challenging the conclusion, this chapter argues that the marginal cases argument is metaphysically misguided. It ignores the differences between a life stage and a kind, and between lacking a property and having it in a defective form. The chapter then argues for a view of moral standing that attributes it to the subject of a life conceived as an atemporal being, and shows how this view can resolve some familiar puzzles such as how death can be a loss to the person who has died, how we can wrong the dead, the “procreation asymmetry,” and the “non-identity problem.”

Bayle, the Bible, and the Remonstrant Tradition at the Time of the Commentaire philosophique

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maria-Cristina Pitassi
Keyword(s):  
Moral Reason ◽  
Natural Light ◽  
Biblical Criticism ◽  
Absolute Norm ◽  
Historical Reality ◽  
The Bible ◽  
The Status

Bayle’s equivocal relationship to Arminianism is here examined from the perspective of the status of the Bible. Though rejecting the doctrine that every word was to be considered divinely inspired, Bayle did defend the divinity of Scripture in his polemic with Jean Le Clerc. For Le Clerc, biblical criticism could solve theological conflicts by discovering the authentic meaning of Scripture, but Bayle insisted that natural light precedes exegesis, and revelation is limited to those matters that do not conflict with reason. He dissociates himself from Socinianism by distinguishing moral from speculative reason. Only moral reason offers an absolute norm. Bayle disregards the Arminian distinction between what is against reason and what is beyond reason. His Commentaire philosophique juxtaposes the natural light that can identify divine elements in the Bible with our historical reality that frustrates its capacity for apprehending religious truths. Thus Bayle inevitably clashes with the Arminian tradition.

scholarly journals Morality and Tribalism

Jus Cogens ◽  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Claudio Corradetti
Keyword(s):  
Evolutionary Theory ◽  
Intergroup Relations ◽  
Moral Reason ◽  
Usual Order

AbstractThis contribution has two main goals which might be labelled for convenience as a pars construens and pars denstruens reversing the usual order of these terms. The first aim is to offer an overview of the main tenets of the book, while the second aim is to raise some critical concerns while remaining sympathetic to the author’s overall project. With regard to the first point, I present the context of intellectual debate where Buchanan’s contribution fits comfortably: Darwin’s evolutionary theory, anthropology, psychology, moral analysis etc. The target here is to show the internal complexity and different layers of analysis of the book. These initial reconstructions are, next, used to formulate some thoughts on what I consider possible problematic points in need of clarification. In particular, first, I hold that Buchanan presents too narrow oppositional views between intergroup relations whereupon the notion of “tribalism” is constructed. Such strong identitarian conception does not seem to depict adequately the sociological dynamics of intergroup relations. Second, I consider the terms in which it can be addressed the notion of the rise of the moral mind in evolutionary terms. The suggestion is to consider in a milder form the author’s key concept of a “Great Uncoupling” for the moral reason.

The Effect of Different Teaching Strategies on the Moral Development of Physical Education Students

1997 ◽  
Vol 17 (1) ◽  
pp. 85-98 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sandra L. Gibbons ◽  
Vicki Ebbeck
Keyword(s):  
Social Learning ◽  
Physical Education ◽  
Moral Development ◽  
Moral Judgment ◽  
Teaching Strategies ◽  
Self Report ◽  
Moral Reason ◽  
Education Students ◽  
Physical Education Students ◽  
And Behavior

This study examined the effectiveness of social learning (SL) or structural developmental (SD) teaching strategies on the moral development of elementary-age students. Participants were 204 physical education students in Grades 4,5, and 6; three classrooms in each grade were randomly assigned to control, SL, or SD groups. Self-report measures assessed moral judgment, reason, and intention; teachers rated prosocial behavior. By mid- and postintervention class-level analyses, the SL and SD groups scored significantly higher than the control on moral judgment and/or intention; by postintervention, the SD group was significantly higher on moral reason. Mid- and postintervention student-level analyses showed that the SL and SD groups scored significantly higher on moral judgment, intention, and behavior; the SD group was significantly higher on moral reason. These results provide support for the effectiveness of both social learning and structural-developmental teaching strategies on the moral development of children in physical education.

Deep Structure and the Comparative Philosophy of Religion

1992 ◽  
Vol 28 (3) ◽  
pp. 387-399
Author(s):  
Michael P. Levine
Keyword(s):  
Religious Belief ◽  
Ethical Theory ◽  
Comparative Philosophy ◽  
Deep Structure ◽  
Philosophy Of Religion ◽  
Moral Reason ◽  
Religious Thought

Through various applications of the ‘deep structure’ of moral and religious reasoning, I have sought to illustrate the value of a morally informed approach in helping us to understand the complexity of religious thought and practice…religions are primarily moved by rational moral concerns and…ethical theory provides the single most powerful methodology for understanding religious belief. Ronald Green, Religion and Moral Reason

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document