Pod Posted June 10, 2017 Posted June 10, 2017 In podcast 2316 Daniel Mackler, a guest host who is into self-knowledge as much if not more than Stef, asks Stefan how he would determine moral responsibility. Stefan responds by saying moral responsibility is determined via the person's use of morality to influence others' behavior. An example is used where a child molester inherently in his actions is saying to the child "the satisfaction of my wants is the good" while violating that standard with the child because sexual abuse is not something the child wants. I'm confused because I don't know if Stefan means someone is morally responsible for every decision they make following their first use of moral reasoning to another, or if a person is morally responsible for the situation to which he uses moral reasoning to justify his own actions (again to another person). For example... is it: Bob argued why it was ok for him to steal his sister's dollar when he was 6 years old, therefore Bob is morally responsible for every action forward of 6 years old because he has demonstrated an understanding of morality. Or is it... Bob argued why it was ok for him to steal his sister's dollar when he was 6 years old, therefore Bob is now morally responsible for the theft of his sister's dollar. Basically, is that specific action of justifying what you did to another person confirmation of your knowledge of ethics? Or do ethics apply regardless of whether you use ethical arguments to justify your actions to another person? The question is, how would you know someone understood ethics if they didn't try to justify what they did to another person?
ofd Posted June 10, 2017 Posted June 10, 2017 Quote he question is, how would you know someone understood ethics if they didn't try to justify what they did to another person? How much does it matter if somebody understands ethics? The outcome of actions matters, not the intent.
Pod Posted June 10, 2017 Author Posted June 10, 2017 6 hours ago, ofd said: How much does it matter if somebody understands ethics? The outcome of actions matters, not the intent. It may not in some cases but regardless, how would you determine moral responsibility?
ofd Posted June 10, 2017 Posted June 10, 2017 From the situation and the frequency that person did something wrong. If a person eats a cherry in a supermarket it's not as bad as stealing money. If a person keeps on committing immoral actions, you have to either assume that the person is too dumb to act functional in a society or that he or she is evil. The mind of other people is a black box. You can't look inside it, and justifications or the claim to not know something may be post hoc rationalisations. Furthermore, Kohlberg showed that morality develops in discrete steps and that children at the age of 4 / 5 have moralistic intuitions and that they can emphasize with other people. Actions that have direct consequences are pretty simply from a moral perspective. What's more difficult is to judge actions that have indirect consequences that come into effect some tiem in the future.
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