An Analysis of the Nature of Blame: Reactive Attitude vs. Assessment

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PJ Koscher An Analysis of the Nature of Blame: Reactive Attitude vs. Assessment In current philosophical literature on moral responsibility, there have been recent developments on the increased focus on the nature of blame. A theory of the nature of blame claims to understand what it means for one to morally blame another for an act previously performed. An account of the nature of blame is an account of the conditions necessary for the holding of the blame relation to be deemed appropriate. There are three main accounts of the nature of blame currently in play in philosophical literature on moral responsibility: sanction, assessment, and reactive attitude. In this essay, I will provide a thorough explanation of both the reactive attitude and the assessment accounts and will show how the reactive attitude account outperforms the assessment account. Then I will introduce a common objection to the reactive attitude account and sketch how an advocate of the reactive attitude account might respond to the objection. The assessment account of blame suggests that when we blame a person for an act they performed, we reveal something negative about the person’s character. One way to explain the assessment account is to imagine a moral balance sheet. This moral balance sheet can also be thought as a demerit system. When a person acts out of a norm and is blamed, then something negative is revealed in their character. When something negative is revealed in a person’s character, their moral record is considered negative, suggesting they have lowered their moral worth. This works in the other way as well. When a moral act is performed, something positive is revealed in one’s character. When this happens, a person’s moral record is considered positive, suggesting they have increased their moral worth. In other words, when an act is praised the person has increased

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