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A group of bloggers discussing philosophical ideas as well as the profession of philosophy
Browsing All posts tagged under »Moral Responsibility«
Romantic Dysfunction, BPD, and Moral Responsibility
It is commonly argued that for one to be morally responsible, one must have control over one’s actions (see here for a run-down on arguments for that claim). Now, one does not generally concede that a person is moral pariah simply because the person is in the deepest stages of love, even if we do tend to […]
Book Release: Free Will and Moral Responsibility
November 4, 2013 by Justin Caouette
It brings me great pleasure to announce the release of my first edited volume, Free Will and Moral Responsibility (co-edited with Ish Haji). For those interested in purchasing the book here is a link to amazon and here is the publisher’s press release. Below you can find a summary to the book. “Determinism is, roughly, the […]
Does Blameworthiness Require Wrongdoing?
February 11, 2013 by Justin Caouette
A commonly held presupposition is that a person can be blameworthy only for acts that are considered morally wrong. I’ll refer to this as the ‘blameworthiness requires wrongness’ (BW) principle. Recently, a few philosophers began denying this principle citing cases where it is morally permissible to act in a certain way even though such acts […]
The Nature of Blame
September 26, 2012 by Justin Caouette
What is the nature of blame? Recently, I took my prelim exam in the Philosophy of Mind and one of the questions I answered was on the reactive attitudes and their effect on how we perceive what the nature of blame is. I found the question quite intriguing, and, the purpose of this post will be […]
James Holmes: How his case can shed light on discussions of Moral Responsibility.
July 24, 2012 by Justin Caouette
In a recent blog post in Scientific American the author, Larry Geenemeier, suggests that the accused Colorado Shooter was lacking cognitive control and points specifically to one’s cognitive ability in order to try to make sense of the actions in Aurora, Colorado and other recent events by similarly profiled assailants. Though I agree that we […]
Parental Obligation, Abortion, and Choice
June 19, 2012 by Justin Caouette
Many of those that believe a woman should have a right to choose (whether to abort or keep her baby) also believe that men should have to pay child support, but, is holding both of these statements consistent? Fairly recently, feminist philosopher Elizabeth Brake (2005) has argued that it’s inconsistent and unfair to hold that […]
Forgiveness: How does it work?
June 12, 2012 by Justin Caouette
My current philosophical interests are centered around the metaphysics of moral responsibility. This forces me to deal with the assumed underlying epistemic and control conditions. It also forces me to consider blame; when one is worthy of it (blameworthiness), how we normally ascribe it (active blame), and how we move from blame and holding one […]
Organ Procurement: Are Changes Needed to Ensure Fairness?
June 12, 2012 by Justin Caouette
In this short post I’ll be asking two important and related questions regarding organ procurement as it is currently practiced: (1) Are the currently policies surrounding organ transplantation fair? And, (2) Is it practical to make changes to the current policies? Here I’ll deal mostly with question (1) and offer only some brief remarks with […]
Is ‘Flopping’ a Form of Cheating in Basketball?
June 6, 2012 by Justin Caouette
Yesterday, while watching game 5 of the NBA Eastern Conference Finals I witnessed a flop in the 4th quarter by Boston Celtics player Ray Allen. Watching him flop (by flop I am referring to acting as if a player was fouled when in fact the player wasn’t in an attempt to convince the refs that […]
Psychopaths: Morally Responsible?
May 24, 2012 by Justin Caouette
In April I gave a talk at a Free Will/ Moral Responsibility conference near my hometown in Massachusetts on the culpability of psychopaths. There, I argued that psychopaths are morally responsible for their actions because they have the necessary cognitive mechanisms one needs to properly judge an action as morally right or morally wrong. Now […]
Some Opening Remarks
May 22, 2012 by Justin Caouette
My aim for setting up this blog is to foster an intellectual web discussion by both philosopher’s and non-philosopher’s alike by raising some concerns and posing some questions that come about while researching in the areas of Ethics, Metaphysics, and Epistemology. I invite comments and discussion from all disciplines and not only from my colleagues […]
Books by Contributors
A Philosopher's Take 
January 22, 2014 by Ray Aldred
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