From Morality To The End Of Reason

Many philosophers think that if you're morally responsible for a state of affairs, you must be a cause of it. Ingmar Persson argues that this strand of common sense morality is asymmetrical, in that it features the act-omission doctrine, according to which there are stronger reasons against performing some harmful actions than in favour of performing any beneficial actions. He analyses the act-omission doctrine as consisting in a theory of negative rights, according to which there are rights not to have one's life, body, and property interfered with, and a conception of responsibility as being based on causality. This conception of responsibility is also found to be involved in the doctrine of double effect. The outcome of Persson's critical examination of these ideas is that reasons of rights are replaced by reasons of beneficence, and we are made responsible for what is under the influence of our practical reasons. The argument gives rise to a symmetrical, consequentialist morality which is more demanding but less authoritative than common sense morality, because reasons of beneficence are weaker than reasons of rights. It is also argued that there are no non-naturalist external practical reasons, and all practical reasons are desire-dependent: so practical reasons cannot be universally binding. The question is whether such a morality possesses enough authority to command our compliance. This seems necessary in order for us to cope with the greatest moral problems of our time, such as aid to developing countries and anthropogenic climate change.

Ingmar Persson presents a new analysis of common sense morality—in particular the act-omission doctrine and the doctrine of double effect. He traces both doctrines to a theory of rights and a conception of responsibility as based on causation, and provides an original account of what it is to have a reason for action.

Sam Harris dismantles the most common justification for religious faith--that a moral system cannot be based on science.

The Critique of Practical Reason is the second of Immanuel Kant's three critiques. It follows on from Kant's Critique of Pure Reason and deals with his moral philosophy. The second Critique exercised a decisive influence over the subsequent development of the field of ethics and moral philosophy, beginning with Johann Gottlieb Fichte's Doctrine of Science and becoming, during the 20th century, the principal reference point for deontological moral philosophy. Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) was a German philosopher, who, according to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy is "the central figure of modern philosophy." Kant argued that fundamental concepts of the human mind structure human experience, that reason is the source of morality, that aesthetics arises from a faculty of disinterested judgment, that space and time are forms of our understanding, and that the world as it is "in-itself" is unknowable. Kant took himself to have effected a Copernican revolution in philosophy, akin to Copernicus' reversal of the age-old belief that the sun revolved around the earth.

An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals (EPM) is a book by Scottish enlightenment philosopher David Hume. In it, Hume argues (among other things) that the foundations of morals lie with sentiment, not reason. An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals is the enquiry subsequent to the Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding (EHU). Thus, it is often referred to as "the second Enquiry". It was originally published in 1751, three years after the first Enquiry. Hume first discusses ethics in A Treatise of Human Nature (in Book 3 - "Of Morals"). He later extracted and expounded upon the ideas he proposed there in his second Enquiry. In his short autobiographical work, My Own Life (1776), Hume states that his second Enquiry is "of all my writings, historical, philosophical, or literary, incomparably the best."

Some argue that atheism must be false, since without God, no values are possible, and thus "everything is permitted." Walter Sinnott-Armstrong argues that God is not only not essential to morality, but that our moral behavior should be utterly independent of religion. He attacks several core ideas: that atheists are inherently immoral people; that any society will sink into chaos if it is becomes too secular; that without religion, we have no reason to be moral; that absolute moral standards require the existence of God; and that without religion, we simply couldn't know what is wrong and what is right. Sinnott-Armstrong brings to bear convincing examples and data, as well as a lucid, elegant, and easy to understand writing style. This book should fit well with the debates raging over issues like evolution and intelligent design, atheism, and religion and public life as an example of a pithy, tightly-constructed argument on an issue of great social importance. "In his call for sincere dialogue with theists, Sinnott-Armstrong provides a welcome relief from the apoplectic excesses of Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens, while also addressing objections to homosexuality and evolution frequently raised by evangelical Christians." --Publishers Weekly "[I]t is accessible and lively, my hope is that it will be widely read, especially by theists."--Peter Lamal, The Humanist "... the clarity of this text successfully defuses many erroneous claims about religion and morality, both popular and academic; this volume certainly deserves a wide audience in this increasingly secular and skeptical world." -Choice "Morality Without God? is an engaging, pithy book arguing against the necessity of God and religion for a robust morality. Walter Sinnott-Armstrong has distinguished himself as a leading philosopher in his work on metaethics and moral psychology, as well as books on moral and epistemological skepticism, and in Morality Without God? he commendably succeeds in writing a philosophically respectable introduction to the problems facing religious morality suitable for virtually any audience." --Philosophia Christi

Immanuel Kant’s Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals is one of the most important texts in the history of ethics. In it Kant searches for the supreme principle of morality and argues for a conception of the moral life that has made this work a continuing source of controversy and an object of reinterpretation for over two centuries. This new edition of Kant’s work provides a fresh translation that is uniquely faithful to the German original and more fully annotated than any previous translation. There are also four essays by well-known scholars that discuss Kant’s views and the philosophical issues raised by the Groundwork. J.B. Schneewind defends the continuing interest in Kantian ethics by examining its historical relation both to the ethical thought that preceded it and to its influence on the ethical theories that came after it; Marcia Baron sheds light on Kant’s famous views about moral motivation; and Shelly Kagan and Allen W. Wood advocate contrasting interpretations of Kantian ethics and its practical implications.

Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason is a key element of the system of philosophy which Kant introduced with his Critique of Pure Reason, and a work of major importance in the history of Western religious thought. It represents a great philosopher's attempt to spell out the form and content of a type of religion that would be grounded in moral reason and would meet the needs of ethical life. It includes sharply critical and boldly constructive discussions on topics not often treated by philosophers, including such traditional theological concepts as original sin and the salvation or 'justification' of a sinner, and the idea of the proper role of a church. This volume presents it and three short essays that illuminate it in new translations by Allen Wood and George di Giovanni, with an introduction by Robert Merrihew Adams that locates it in its historical and philosophical context.