A second-order violation is a desire that a first order desire would be one's will. If I desire, not just a desire to work out but that desire to work out rather than eat a cookie be effective in bringing one to workout rather than eat a cookie. It is in having second-order volitions that Frankfurt regards as essential to being a person. A wanton is an agent without a second order volitions. They are beings with first order desires but they don't care about their desires.
Categorical imperatives leave no room for ifs, they are absolutes, however morality is a concept that is relative to human beings, is it a concept of our mind? Can we ever know the answer to my previous question? Kant believes that there is just one maxim that each action embodies, so we can test the morality of the act by looking if we can universalise the maxim, however there are so many variables of those maxims that may lead to a given action, some of these may be able to universalise, some won't be, and that in itself is a flaw of Kant's categorical imperative. Kant stated himself: "One should only act on a principle that one can will to be universal law". This is how that quote works: If we decide to lie, we imagine what would happen if everybody lied, lying itself would become normal, and the concept of truth (and lying itself) would disappear.
However, the idea that humans are naturally selfish seems to be radical. Perhaps, this idea is too general and some people could be altruistic. Also, it can argued that right realists do not contemplate over the causes of crime well enough and only consider coming up with practical solutions. Furthermore, right realists identify biological differences as one of the fundamental reasons why crime occurs. They claim that if one individual is innately stronger than someone else they are inclined to commit criminal acts.
Simpler questions would be “Is Dr. Smith’s intentional practise of omitting important information relevant to his client’s treatment ethical?” or “Is Dr. Smith’s failure to report his client’s actions to the authorities morally justifiable?” Both would be good questions, but I believe the question the study guide asks us to consider embrace both of these questions. The possible answers to the question are “yes” or “no”. I will be using rule-based utilitarianism and Kantian deontology to analyse this case study. There is not enough information to consider act-based utilitarianism: Act-based utilitarianism essentially says that one should perform that act which will bring about the greatest amount of good (“happiness”) over bad for everyone affected by the act. Each situation and each person must be assessed on their own merits (Thiroux, 2004, p. 42).
'Only Hard Determinism is justifiable' Discuss. Determinism is the idea that all actions are governed by laws outside of one’s control. Some philosophers believer that one’s ability to make free choices is an illusion whereas, others state that there is something else beyond understanding that may cause one’s actions to be determined. There are a variety of theories which are response to dealing with debate about free will and determinism. Hard determinism is the theory that human behaviour and actions are wholly determined by external factors, and therefore humans do not have genuine free will or ethical accountability.
Actions are then just if they sustain or are consonant with such harmony. Such a conception of individual justice is virtue ethical because it ties justice (acting justly) to an internal state of the person rather than to (adherence to) social norms or to good consequences; but Plato's view is also quite radical because it at least initially leaves it an open question whether the just individual refrains from such socially proscribed actions as lying, killing, and stealing. Plato eventually seeks to show that someone with a healthy, harmonious soul wouldn't lie, kill, or steal, but most commentators consider his argument to that effect to be highly deficient. Aristotle is generally regarded as a virtue ethicist par excellence, but his account of justice as a virtue is less purely virtue ethical than Plato's because it anchors individual justice in situational factors that are largely external to the just individual. Situations and communities are just, according to Aristotle, when individuals receive benefits according to their merits, or virtue: those most
A person is not morally responsible for his action if it is “the result of unconscious forces” or “drive” of which the person knows nothing (Hospers, pgs 115,119). Hospers goes on to explain that a “lucky few are sometimes able to overcome” such forces (Hospers, pg. 120). These arguments apply to James Fallon’s circumstances. By his own admission, Fallon credits positive parental involvement for shaping his character therefore inhibiting further development of the “unconscious forces” of heredity from manifesting.
Student: Course: Instructor: Date: Determinism vs. Free Will Philosophers have argued over the issue of mankind’s freedom, ever since the beginning of time, Some such as Holbech argue as he did in his work “Are We Cogs in the Universe,” that mans fate has always been pre-determined. While others like Kane argue as he did in his work,” The Significance of Free Will” that man is free to make his own choices but is affected by past decisions. I have taken the works of Holbach an Kane and I will discuss them here to a small extent while, trying to give my own honest opinion on their different stands on of Free Will. Holbech, like many early philosophers believed that mans fate is already pre-determined. He argued on many occasions “that man like nature is under the same immutable law as the universe and all that is within her.” In following his thought pattern this would suggest that if a tree falls in the woods that it did not fall of its own accorded, but was chopped down by a logger; in continuing this though did the logger chose that tree or was his chose predestined.
A scientific determinist will say that any choice we make is merely an illusion of free will. We see the choices we make as free will because of the inherent complexities involved with the mind. Although we do not fully grasp the complexities of the human brain, scientific determinism states that, knowing everything there is to know about the rules of the universe we would be able to determine what a person was going to do. On the other hand, free-willists believe that humans do in fact have free will. There is some amount of causal powers attributed to the brain that cannot be simply by analyzing the electromagnetic-fields and quarks in the brain.
When looking at Kant's definition of free actions: if it does not suffer coercion or constraint, either physical or psychological, for example not being afflicted with the threat of violence or an addiction then the action is free. However, Kant would also argue that our free decisions are still confined within the causal chain, thus it may have been free from a macro sense but the decision is, in many ways, still an aspect of causation. I could not have done otherwise. But, as it has already been established, Kant's notion of freedom is different to that of both the Determinist and Libertarian arguments, in the sense that, his argument follows the claim that: I could have done otherwise if the situation that led to my decision was different. However, Sartre would argue against Kant's understanding of freewill claiming it as