Culture and the quest for universal principles in moral reasoning

The importance of including cultural perspectives in the study of human cognition has become apparent in recent decades, and the domain of moral reasoning is no exception. The present review focuses on moral cognition, beginning with Kohlberg's model of moral development which relies heavily on people's justifications for their judgments and then shifting to more recent theories that rely on rapid, intuitive judgments and see justifications as more or less irrelevant to moral cognition. Despite this dramatic shift, analyses of culture and moral decision-making have largely been framed as a quest for and test of universal principles of moral judgment. In this review, we discuss challenges that remain in trying to understand crosscultural variability in moral values and the processes that underlie moral cognition. We suggest that the universalist framework may lead to an underestimation of the role of culture in moral reasoning. Although the field has made great strides in incorporating more and more cultural perspectives in order to understand moral cognition, theories of moral reasoning still do not allow for substantial variation in how people might conceptualize the domain of the moral. The processes that underlie moral cognition may not be a human universal in any simple sense, because moral systems may play different roles in different cultures. We end our review with a discussion of work that remains to be done to understand cultural variation in the moral domain.     

神仙事迹和道德伦理——兼论引导太岁神崇拜的健康发展

神仙是道的化身道教是一种宗教,因此,道教是有神论者的社会实体。道教徒信仰道教就是要信神和拜神。在道教徒的心目中,冥冥之中有神灵在主宰,在赐福,在护佑,或者在惩罚作恶的人。而无论是地位最高的神,或者地位卑下的鬼,都是由道衍生出来,并且是道的体现。因此,信神和拜神就是信仰道和崇拜道。道教的神,以他们是否降生到人间作为标准来区分,可以区分为三类。第一类是没有降生到人类中间的,他们来自于先天,是“道之玄气”,“聚而成形”的,例如:元始天尊、灵宝天尊、玉皇大帝等等。第二类是曾经降生到人间的先天神灵,他们也来自于先天,但是,又…     

Projectivist utilitarianism and the satisfaction of desire

N. M. L. Nathan's argument that IDP utilitarianism, if universally adopted, is inconsistent, does not succeed. The argument requires that if an IDP utilitarian has only self-regarding desires, then none of these desires can be informed. This rests on a partial misuse of the expression satisfaction of desire. For an individual attempting to realize his self-regarding desires, the satisfaction of the satisfaction of a desire is unmeaning. The naming of an object of the desire is an intrinsic part of the phrase satisfaction of desire. Further, contrary to Nathan's claim, this suggestion does not trivialize IDP utilitarianism.     

《太上感应篇》德育思想浅析

在道教典籍中,有一部篇幅虽短,但知名度却并不亚于《道德经》的道经,它就是《太上感应篇》。《太上感应篇》,又称《感应篇》,成书于我国北宋末年,其作者不详。北宋末年被宋徽宗赐封为虚静先生的正乙道第三十代天师张继先曾为《太上感应篇》作颂,其颂文曰:“人之一性,湛然圆寂。     

The rejection of moral rebels: resenting those who do the right thing

Four studies document the rejection of moral rebels. In Study 1, participants who made a counterattitudinal speech disliked a person who refused on principle to do so, but uninvolved observers preferred this rebel to an obedient other. In Study 2, participants taking part in a racist task disliked a rebel who refused to go along, but mere observers did not. This rejection was mediated by the perception that rebels would reject obedient participants (Study 3), but did not occur when participants described an important trait or value beforehand (Study 4). Together, these studies suggest that rebels are resented when their implicit reproach threatens the positive self-image of individuals who did not rebel.     

Development in moral judgment as indicated by rejection of lower-stage statements

Previous failures of preference rating scales to identify developmental differences in moral judgment may have occurred because the focus was on acceptance of high-stage reasons rather than on consistent rejection of lower-stage reasons. Attention focused on seventh-, ninth-, and eleventh-grade students' (N = 178) rejection of the lower-stage statements that they presumably comprehend but have to varying degrees dropped from their spontaneous-production repertoire. Students rated the adequacy of the reasons presented in statements written to exemplify Kohlberg's stages 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5. Ratings of Stage 1, 2, 3, and 4 statements showed clear age discrimination (all p's < .001). As in previous preference studies, higher-stage items produced no significant age differences. Implications for evaluation of change studies were noted.     

Reasons or rationalizations: The role of principles in the moral dumbfounding paradigm

Moral dumbfounding occurs when people maintain a moral judgment even though they cannot provide reasons for it. Recently, questions have been raised about whether dumbfounding is a real phenomenon. Two reasons have been proposed as guiding the judgments of dumbfounded participants: harm-based reasons (believing an action may cause harm) or norm-based reasons (breaking a moral norm is inherently wrong). Participants in that research (see Royzman, Kim, & Leeman, 2015), who endorsed either reason were excluded from analysis, and instances of moral dumbfounding seemingly reduced to non-significance. We argue that endorsing a reason is not sufficient evidence that a judgment is grounded in that reason. Stronger evidence should additionally account for (a) articulating a given reason and (b) consistently applying the reason in different situations. Building on this, we develop revised exclusion criteria across three studies. Study 1 included an open-ended response option immediately after the presentation of a moral scenario. Responses were coded for mention of harm-based or norm-based reasons. Participants were excluded from analysis if they both articulated and endorsed a given reason. Using these revised criteria for exclusion, we found evidence for dumbfounding, as measured by the selecting of an admission of not having reasons. Studies 2 and 3 included a further three questions relating to harm-based reasons specifically, assessing the consistency with which people apply harm-based reasons across differing contexts. As predicted, few participants consistently applied, articulated, and endorsed harm-based reasons, and evidence for dumbfounding was found.