Evil and moral detachment: further reflections on The Mirror Thesis

A commonly accepted claim by philosophers investigating the nature of evil is that the evil person is, in some way, the mirror image of the moral saint. In this paper I will defend a new version of this thesis. I will argue that both the moral saint and the morally evil person are characterized by a lack of conflict between moral and non-moral concerns. However, while the saint achieves this unity through a reconciliation of the two, the evil person does so by eliminating moral concerns from her character.     

Not Just “Study Drugs” for the Rich: Stimulants as Moral Tools for Creating Opportunities for Socially Disadvantaged Students

An argument in the cognitive enhancement literature is that using stimulants in populations of healthy but socially disadvantaged individuals mistakenly attributes pathology to nonpathological individuals who experience social inequalities. As the argument goes, using stimulants as cognitive-enhancing drugs to solve the social problem of poorly educated students in inadequate schools misattributes the problem as an individual medical problem, when it is really a collective sociopolitical problem. I challenge this argument on the grounds that not all types of enhancement have to be explained in medical terms, but rather at least one conception of enhancement can be explained in social terms—opportunity maintenance. Therefore, I propose that as a moral requirement we ought to explore whether stimulants could be a means of remedying underprivileged children's experiences of social inequalities that are borne from inadequate schools for the sake of increasing their chances for opportunities and well-being.     

A Broader Understanding of Moral Distress

On the traditional view, moral distress arises only in cases where an individual believes she knows the morally right thing to do but fails to perform that action due to various constraints. We seek to motivate a broader understanding of moral distress. We begin by presenting six types of distress that fall outside the bounds of the traditional definition and explaining why they should be recognized as forms of moral distress. We then propose and defend a new and more expansive definition of moral distress and examine how it can enable the development of a taxonomy of moral distress.     

Fetal Risks,Relative Risks,and Relatives' Risks

Several factors related to fetal risk render it more or less acceptable in justifying constraints on the behavior of pregnant women. Risk is an unavoidable part of pregnancy and childbirth, one that women must balance against other vital personal and family interests. Two particular issues relate to the fairness of claims that pregnant women are never entitled to put their fetuses at risk: relative risks and relatives' risks. The former have been used—often spuriously—to advance arguments against activities, such as home birth, that may incur risk; the latter implicate the nature of relationships in determining the acceptability of coercing or precluding activities. Motivated reasoning by clinicians and judges leads to inaccurate risk assessments, and judgments based on false claims to objectivity. Such judgments undermine the moral and legal standing of pregnant women and do not advance the interests of fetuses, pregnant women, families, or states.     

The denial of moral dilemmas as a regulative ideal

The traditional debate about moral dilemmas concerns whether there are circumstances in which an agent is subject to two obligations that cannot both be fulfilled. Realists maintain there are. Irrealists deny this. Here I defend an alternative, methodologically-oriented position wherein the denial of genuine moral dilemmas functions as a regulative ideal for moral deliberation and practice. That is, moral inquiry and deliberation operate on the implicit assumption that there are no genuine moral dilemmas. This view is superior to both realism and irrealism in accounting for moral residue and other crucial phenomenological dimensions of our experience of moral dilemmas.     

Psychopathy and internalism

Do psychopaths make moral judgments but lack motivation? Or are psychopaths’ judgments are not genuinely moral? Both sides of this debate seem to assume either externalist or internalist criteria for the presence of moral judgment. However, if moral judgment is a natural kind, we can arrive at a theory-neutral criterion for moral judgment. A leading naturalistic criterion suggests that psychopaths have an impaired capacity for moral judgment; the capacity is neither fully present nor fully absent. Psychopaths are therefore not counterexamples to internalism. Nonetheless, internalism is empirically problematic because it is unable to explain psychopaths’ moral deficits.     

基于道德认同理论的绿色消费心理机制

环境问题的加剧使得人们广泛关注如何保护人类赖以生存的生态环境。消费者在环保事业中扮演着举足轻重的角色。虽然,国内外已有一些关于绿色消费的研究,但是,对绿色消费心理机制的探究还不够系统和深入。借助社会认知视角下的道德认同理论探讨影响消费者绿色消费的心理机制,主要包括三方面的内容:(1)探索道德认同与绿色消费的中间机制,以及这一中间机制发挥作用的边界条件;(2)考察调节道德认同与绿色消费关系的变量;(3)检验道德认同表征与道德认同内化对绿色消费影响有何差异。基于社会认知视角下道德认同理论探讨绿色消费心理机制不仅可以丰富和发展道德认同和绿色消费相关理论体系,而且为政府和企业如何引导消费者的绿色消费提供了切实可行的建议。     

关于道德原则的几点思考

信仰缺失、经济转型和文化变革,使信仰和道德从一元化走向了多元化,并引起了人们对道德的迷茫、沉思和渴求。在追求普遍适用道德原则的过程中,绝对主义把这种原则看成亘古不变的教条,而相对主义则否定这种原则的存在。我们认为,这种原则是存在的。它是绝对性与相对性的统一,是客观性与主观性的统一,是人们对历史必须性的一种表述形式。我们必须认真研究客观规律,才能总结出有价值的道德原则、范畴和规范。     

从帛书《易传》析述孔子晚年的学术思想

本文以帛书《易传》比对《论语》中关涉《周易》的章节,从而确定这些章节是属于孔子晚年所说的话。此外,从帛书《易传》所见的哲理,-显示了晚年的孔子已经具有哲学家的形态。关心形而上的问题,并且对这些哲学问题有很深的体会。孔子说《易》,开辟了以义理研究《易经》的新途,亦展示了一个学术发展的转折点,即儒家的道德形而上学以孔子为开山。     

Indeterminism, Explanation, and Luck

I first adumbrate pertinent aspectsof Robert Kane's libertarian theory of free choice oraction and an objection of luck that has been levelledagainst the theory. I then consider Kane's recentresponses to this objection. To meet these responses,I argue that the view that undetermined choices (ofthe sort implied by Kane's theory) are a matter ofluck is associated with a view about actionexplanation, to wit: when Jones does A and hisdoing of A is undetermined, and when hiscounterpart, Jones*, in the nearest possibleworld in which the past and the laws are held constantuntil the moment of choice does B instead, thereis no explanation (deterministic or indeterministic)of the difference in outcome – Jones's A-ing butJones*'s B-ing – in terms of prior reasonsor motives of either agent. Absence of such anexplanation is one crucial factor that underliesthe charge that Jones's A-ing and Jones*'sB-ing are matters of luck. I argue that thissort of luck is incompatible with responsibility.