Moral Philosophical Perspective Research Articles

The Other – a troublesome dyad?

ABSTRACT The ‘Other’ can be near to us, or far from us. We are in-relation with both. Given that, we explore whether, from a moral philosophical perspective, the ‘near-other’ is in tension with the ‘far-other’. We argue that we find our relationship with the near-other through a transcendent metaphysical empathy derived from the noumenon, which is manifest in the phenomenon as compassion and justice. We then argue that perceived differences in the phenomenon mean that we do not reliably transfer this empathy for the near-other, to the far-other. Further, empathic and constructive dialogue is made more difficult because of our proclivity to actively engage in ‘othering’ those not-like-us. Properly, moral decision-making is positioned in a space cognizant of the other. Near-otherness makes consensus in the decision-making process easier, while far-otherness makes consensus more difficult. In our post-modern, multicultural and multifaith era, we need to be alert to the other’s perspective, to find a way to have a meaningful dialogue and thus achieve consensus in our moral decision-making.

PRACTICE OF QUEUEING AS A CATEGORICAL IMPERATIVE FOR A FAIR SOCIETY

Alisdair MacIntyre argues that there are three stages of moral philosophical perspective for an individual. These are, the individual (1) being on a life-long quest towards a telos between birth and death, (2) who arrives in an inherited historical and social identity that is only partially constituted and (3) needs to exercise relevant virtues in one’s life. Departing from these three moral stages I build on Alasadair MacIntyre’s narrative in After Virtue with the purpose of focusing and highlighting one specific human practice. This practice is the practice of queueing and in this article I argue that it functions as a signpost for whether fear treatment is a shared societal practice that also must hinge on what MacIntyre labels to be an intelligible action. On his turn MacIntyre is known to criticize modernity, individualism as lacking morality making human survival beyond despair. MacIntyre perceives virtues as philosophical values and foresees that the collapse of a virtuous life is an inherent derivative of an unintelligible and unfair society. This article aims to demonstrate that queueing is an intelligible human action that is to be labelled as virtuous social order and a form of distribution of justice.

Uneven Distribution of Wealth through Political Manipulation as Expressed in J. M. Magaisa’s Poetry: A Moral-Philosophical Perspective on the Politics of the New Era

Most Africans in the democratic South Africa face challenges of extreme poverty and are subject to laws that were created for them without proper consultation and relayed to them in the form of the Constitution. This is contrary to the ideologies proclaimed during the struggle for liberation from colonial rule as well as the promises made by the politicians when canvassing for elections. This article serves as a reminder to the politicians who use political manipulation to get into power, and then forget about their promises and the Constitution of South Africa. Using the moral-philosophical approach and the text analysis method to examine the protest poems by J. M. Magaisa in Xikolokolo nguvu ya Pitori (1987), the paper aims at demonstrating that true democracy is “government for the people by the people” and it helps its citizens alleviate poverty rather than voting and then remaining in dire conditions while politicians amass wealth. Different areas of disempowerment through uneven distribution of wealth will be illustrated. Only the stanzas relevant to the discussion will be analysed. The findings, recommendations and conclusions will be provided.

‘Guilty of Having Been Obedient’

Abstract One of the most debated subjects among academics and experts in the fields of International Humanitarian Law and International Criminal Law is the principle of individual criminal responsibility for war crimes. Even more contentious is that aspect of the principle relating to crimes committed under superior orders – a legal strategy employed by many defendants at the Nuremberg war crimes trials. This paper contributes to the debate by establishing the extent to which Article 33 of the Rome Statute, which adopts the conditional liability approach, is justified. The article achieves its objective by critically discussing the subject from a combination of legal, psychological and moral philosophical perspectives. It presents a historical account of the superior orders defence, highlighting how two conflicting liability doctrines, absolute liability and conditional liability, have traditionally been applied by the courts, and taking a stance in favour of the latter. The article, however, underlines some pressing questions that Article 33 raises. It offers a brief exegesis of the emotion of fear to show how it may destroy voluntariness, arguing that as a modifier of voluntariness, grave fear, in certain circumstances, should exculpate perpetrators in claims of crime under superior orders, even where the orders were manifestly unlawful.

The (Mis) Use of Language in Nigerian Political Campaigns (NPC): Moral Philosophical Perspectives

Language is an important instrument of communication in every society. Through it, human beings interact, relate, and forge ahead. Through language, human beings are able to adapt to their environment and make meaning out of life. It can be used for good or for evil. Language can be used properly or it can be abused or misused. This paper examines the use of language in political campaigns in Nigeria. It argues that language is often misused or abused in political campaigns in Nigeria. Language is used to cajole, intimidate, demean and degrade human dignity in Nigeria. Ethically the way language is used in political campaigns in Nigeria is unacceptable. The paper used a critical analytic and hermeneutic method to decipher the issues involved. It finds and concludes that there is a need for politicians to behave morally in their use of language during political campaigns to build a better society.

ПОРТРЕТНЫЙ ОЧЕРК ВС.Н. ИВАНОВА 1920-х – НАЧАЛА 1930-х гг. В КОНТЕКСТЕ СОБЫТИЙ ЭПОХИ

The aim of this article is to determine the features of the genre and the moral-philosophical perspective of Vsevolod Ivanov’s portrait essays of the 1920s – early 1930s published in Vladivostok non-Bolshevik newspapers (Russkiy krai, Russkaya armiya, Vechernyaya gazeta), in Harbin émigré periodicals (newspapers Svet, Gun-Bao, the magazine Rubezh). To achieve this aim, using a semantic-cognitive approach, the author of the article studied archival materials of periodicals of the Russian Far East and Far Eastern emigration and introduced into academic discourse new unexplored factual material contributing to filling gaps in the history of Russian literature and journalism of the 20th century. Ivanov’s portrait essays are analyzed in the context of the sociopolitical and cultural life of the Far Eastern Republic (FER) that existed in the Russian Far East and the large-scale emigration of Russians to China. The author considers the dynamics of Ivanov’s portrait essay genre development. It acquires elements of the memorial and obituary essay, the genre of the literary portrait as a reflection of the progress of the national historical-literary process in the mother country and in the diaspora caused by the spiritual-moral confrontation of the political forces of Russia, the ideological split in the national culture of Russia due to the events of October 1917. The author of the article relies on historically significant material: the memorial essay with the conceptual title “Justified Avvakum” actualizes the problem of a reasonable and balanced attitude to changes, the correlation of evolutionary and revolutionary principles in the development of society. Ivanov raises the question of personal, moral, and civil responsibility for the fate of his country in the essay “The Blood of the Tsar”, which recreates the tragic events of the execution of the family of the Russian Tsar Nicholas II by Bolsheviks. In the analysis of obituary portrait essays about the tragic losses of Russian literature of the Silver Age (“Conversant with Secret (In Memory of A. Blok)”, “In Petrograd the Bolsheviks shot the poet Nikolay Gumilev”), the author of the article concludes about the originality of the creative potential of Ivanov, who, using elements of the genre of the literary portrait, demonstrates the synthesis of scientific, literary, and journalistic writing. The portrait essays of Ivanov’s prominent contemporaries, figures of politics and culture (“Admiral Kolchak”, “Semenovshchina “, “Prof. D.V. Boldyrev”, “Vasiliy Fedorovich Ivanov”) complement the complex picture of the sociocultural context of the era with relevant axiological aspects identified in the essays. The author of the article considers Ivanov’s reference to the iconic figures of the turning epochs in the fate of Russia as a peculiarity of his journalistic position in relation to history as a criterion of truth and moral value of a person.

Confinement of Pregnant Women for Protection of the Unborn

The conflict between the rights of women and unborn take an ugly turn when one speaks of confinement of women for protection of their foetuses. The very thought seems perverse because we delve into the negative aspect of the rights discourse - rights are in modern times used as weapon to correct moral depravity. The relationship between the mother and her foetus, particularly the aspect of maternal care towards the unborn is more a matter of course than rights’. Thus, in case of pregnant women-foetal relationship, what essentially was a part of maternal responsibility and innate to motherhood gets reduced to rights and becomes a matter of legal duty rather than a moral responsibility. From the moral-philosophical perspective, it may be viewed as a debasement of the relationship from both sides - the mother refuses to alter her lifestyle of addiction for the sake of the unborn upon which the latter is up in arms against the former with the charge of abuse. This work maintains that the rights discourse is ill equipped to understand the problem, as law cannot be perceived as the panacea of all ills.

On the Discursive Appropriation of the Antinatalist Ideology in Social Media

Antinatalism, a relatively recent moral philosophical perspective and ideology that avows “it is better not to have ever existed,” has spawned a new social movement with an active presence in social media. This study draws on the discourse historical approach (DHA) to critical discourse analysis for offering a firm understanding as to how the collective identity of the Facebook antinatalist NSM is formed. The findings from the analysis of the situated interaction among the NSM’s members demonstrate that collective identity is far from a knitty-gritty concept, but a dynamic schema that includes a plethora of micro-interactions. Individuals constantly negotiate its meaning in context, as they seek to streamline the antinatalist system of ideas with their lifeworld through a web of interlocking schemata, discursive and rhetorical strategies.

An Interpretation of Mencius’ Theory of Human Nature by J. Greene’s Dual-Process Model

제선왕은 흔종을 위해 끌려가는 소의 슬픈 모습을 보고 측은지심(惻隱之心)을 느꼈다. 그리고 소를 풀어주라 명했다. 반면 눈에 보이지 않는 양을 소 대신 흔종의 희생 제물로 삼으라 했다. 이는 시비지심(是非之心)의 발로라 해석된다. 맹자는 측은지심에 의한 정서적 교감의 상황과 시비지심에 의한 합리적 추론의 상황을 서로 구분하여 판단하고 행동해야 한다고 주장한다. 신경과학에 의하면 인간의 뇌는 이중적으로 작용한다. 복내측 전전두 피질 (ventromedial prefrontal cortex)을 중심으로 한 정서적 기능을 담당하는 뇌의 영역은 인신적(personal) 딜레마 상황에서 우세하게 작용한다. 반면 배외측 전전두 피질(dorsolateral prefrontal cortex)을 중심으로 한 추론적 활동을 담당하는 뇌의 영역은 비인신적(impersonal) 딜레마 상황에서 우세하게 작용한다. 조슈아 그린은 이중과정모형(dual-process model)을 통해 이러한 신경과학적 성과에 대한 자신의 입장을 정당화한다. 그는 인신적 딜레마 상황에서 대부분의 사람들이 정서적 반응에 따라 판단하는 현상을 의무론적인 것이라 해석한다. 반면 비인신적 딜레마 상황에서 대부분의 사람들이 추론에 따라 판단하는 현상을 공리주의적인 것이라 해석한다. 그린은 공리주의적인 자신의 도덕철학적 입장에 따라 인신적 딜레마 상황에서조차 추론이 우세한 공리주의적 판단을 해야 한다고 주장한다. 이러한 그의 입장은 신경과학적 연구 성과에 부합하지 않는다. 아리스토텔레스는 정서와 추론능력을 통합적으로 고려하여 판단해야 한다고 주장했다는 점에서 역시 신경과학적 성과에 부합하지 않는다. 맹자는 정서적 교감을 우선적으로 판단해야 할 경우와 냉정하게 합리적으로 판단해야 할 경우를 구분할 것을 주문한다. 정서적으로 판단해야 할 경우에 추론이 앞서면 냉정한 사람이라 평가되며, 반대로 추론에 입각하여 냉정하게 판단해야 할 경우에 감정이 앞서면 일을 그르치게 되기 때문이다. 이 글은 맹자의 입장이 현대의 신경과학적 성과에 부합한다는 점을 보이고자 한다.King ‘Xuan’ of Je(齊宣王) felt compassion(惻隱之心) when he saw the sadness of the cattle being dragged for the sacrifice. And he commanded to release the cattle. Instead, the king said to make an unseen sheep a sacrifice. This is interpreted as a result of feeling righteousness(是非之心). Mencius argues that we should make distinction between the situation of emotional sympathy triggered by the mind of compassion and the situation of the rational reasoning triggered by the mind of righteousness and act based on that distinction. According to neuroscience, human brain works by a dual process. The region of the brain responsible for the emotional function centered on the ventromedial prefrontal cortex predominates in a ‘personal dilemma’ situation. On the other hand, the area of the brain responsible for inferential activities centered on the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex is predominant in the impersonal dilemma situation. Joshua Greene justifies his perspective on this neuroscientific outcome through a ‘dual-process model’. He interprets the phenomenon that most people judge according to emotional reaction in the situation of ‘personal dilemma’ as deontological. On the other hand, the phenomenon that most people judge according to reasoning in the ‘impersonal dilemma’ situation is interpreted as utilitarian. According to his moral philosophical perspective of utilitarianism, Greene argues that utilitarian judgment should prevail, even in the ‘personal dilemma’ situation. This perspective is incompatible with the results of neuroscientific research. Aristotle also fails to comply with neuroscientific outcomes, as he argues that emotional abilities and reasoning abilities must be judged in an integrated manner. Mencius orders to distinguish between cases where emotional sympathy is judged first and cases where judgment is rational. If emotions are preceded by reasoning when he should judge emotionally, he is judged to be cold-hearted. On the other hand, if we are ahead of our emotions when we have to judge it by reasoning, our results will not be good. This article intends to show that Mencius’ perspective is compatible with contemporary neuroscientific achievements.

Caught between ‘Crossfire’ in the Context of Bangladesh

In recent times, the law enforcement agencies of Bangladesh are universally appreciated for their constitutive and plucky attitude to extremist gangs inside the country. Contrariwise, a suspicious incident of a particular form of extrajudicial killing; Crossfire is fading their achievements. Initially, it was a media term, but now widely used to express the murder of a criminal or accused in a gunfight event between members of law enforcement agencies and criminal groups. This occurrence is facing enormous criticisms in the home and abroad and considered as a violation of human rights. Though public notions about these incidents are surprisingly flexible and they consider this for a prognosis to remainder culprits. This paper analyzed the justice idea of both groups; who are for and against this event from a moral philosophical perspective in the context of Bangladesh. Both the utilitarian idea analyzed by Jeremy Bentham (consequences) and John Stuart Mill (individual human rights) echoes the voice of these two distinct groups respectively. However, the article advocates for a distinctive idea of justice known as deontological philosophy proposed by Immanuel Kant. This moral ideology concentrates on universal human rights and keeps the consequences aside. Considering the fact ‘Crossfire’, this paper believed there is no alternative to ensuring justice and enacting moral duty of law enforcement agencies to indemnify security and safety of the citizen of Bangladesh.

Consuming Antinatalism in Social Media: A Discourse Historical Analytic Approach

Antinatalism, a relatively recent moral philosophical perspective and ideology that avows ‘it is better not to have ever existed’, has spawned a new social movement with an active presence in social media. This study draws on the discourse historical approach (DHA) to critical discourse analysis for offering a firm understanding as to how the collective identity of the Facebook antinatalist NSM is formed. The findings from the analysis of the situated interaction among the NSM’s members demonstrate that collective identity is far from a knitty-gritty concept, but a dynamic schema that includes a plethora of micro-interactions. Individuals constantly negotiate its meaning in context, as they seek to streamline the antinatalist system of ideas with their lifeworld through a web of interlocking schemata, discursive and rhetorical strategies.

Guilt without fault: A qualitative study into the ethics of forgiveness after traumatic childbirth

When a life is lost or severely impaired during childbirth, the midwife and obstetrician involved may experience feelings of guilt in the aftermath. Through three empirical cases, the paper examines the sense of guilt in the context of the current patient safety culture in healthcare where a blame-free approach is promoted in the aftermath of adverse events. The purpose is to illustrate how healthcare professionals may experience guilt without being at fault after adverse events, and Gamlund's theory on forgiveness without blame is used as the theoretical framework for this analysis. Philosophical insight has proven to be a useful resource in dealing with psychological issues of guilt and Gamlund's view on error and forgiveness elucidates an interesting dilemma in the field of traumatic events and medical harm in healthcare, where healthcare professionals experience that well-intended actions may cause injury, harm or even death to their patients. Failing to recognise and acknowledge guilt or guilty feelings may preclude self-forgiveness, which could have a negative impact on the recovery of midwives and obstetricians after adverse events. Developing and improving support systems for healthcare professionals is a multi-factorial task, and the authors suggest that the narrow focus on medico-legal and patient safety perspectives is complemented with moral philosophical perspectives to promote non-judgemental recognition and acknowledgement of guilt and of the fallible nature of medicine.

From Ideology to Metametanarrative (Addendum to Consuming Antinatalism in Social Media)

Despite Lyotard’s proclaimed end of metanarratives in a post-modern predicament, metanarratives appear to be making a comeback. This is the case for antinatalism, a relatively recent ideological formation or moral philosophical perspective that has spawned a new social movement with an active presence in social media. The organizational and structural aspects of NSMs render them amenable to being labeled as ‘post-modern’. In this context, the emergence of ideologies as moral philosophies, such as antinatalism, loom like an outsider, or like a retro fissure in a plastic canvass. The reason is that antinatalism shares the holistic, fundamentalist and totalizing discursive traits of modernist metanarratives that were heralded by Lyotard (1984) as being outmoded in a post-modern condition. Yet, this metanarrative is also different in fundamental aspects from traditional metanarratives. These aspects pertain to its rhetorical self-reflexivity and to its pre-occupation with rooting the propounded arguments in empirical particulars, rather than in a metaphysical or transcendentalist realm. This new form of metanarrative I call metametanarrative as it constitutes a philosophical regression, so to speak, in a pre post-modernist cultural milieu.

Living my narrative: storying dishonesty and deception in mental health nursing.

This article proceeds from MacIntyre's moral philosophical perspective of individual human lives constituting unified narratives, in the context of co-evolving framing and guiding master narratives. This perspective accords specific episodes in people's lives the status of significant component parts of their developing, storied and enacted individual histories. From this philosophical base, autoethnographic principles will be employed in providing accounts from my own professional life narrative strand as a mental health nurse educator that speak to the issue of institutionalized dishonesty and deception in mental health nursing education and practice. On the basis of my pre-existing experience of publishing in nursing journals and scholarly identity, my argument will proceed from contesting the idea of an imagined stable foundational professional ethos underpinning mental health nursing practice, against which to judge professional dishonesty and deception. Using illustrative, relatively recent short stories, drawn from my lived-experience base as a mental health nurse educator, I will argue throughout at implicit and explicit levels that dishonesty and deception are always an inevitable part of the lives of mental health nurses and their educators. This is because of a constant gap between the nursing rhetoric and ideology that both groups espouse and how they actually behave on a day-to-day, mundane level, in and out of work and classroom practice. This gap shows up the public front of what mental health nursing is supposed to be about as dishonest and deceitful window dressing. I will assert that the many first-person, lived-experience accounts in mental health nursing teaching and publication are important educational resources in reducing this gap at professional practice, academic, and informal levels. Such storied accounts may also be useful in moving nurses and their educators towards more morally and ethically sensitive and reflexively attuned positions around what they talk and write into existence.

The issue of moral consideration in robot ethics

This paper discusses whether we should grant moral consideration to robots. Contemporary approaches in support of doing so centers around a relational appearance based approach, which takes departure in the fact that we already by now enter into ethical demanding relations with (even simplistic) robots as if they had a mind of their own. Hence, it is assumed that moral status can be viewed as socially constructed and negotiated within relations. However, I argue that a relational turn risks turning the as if into if at the cost of losing sight of what matters in human-human relations. Therefore, I stick to a human centered framework and introduce a moral philosophical perspective, primarily based on Kant's Tugendlehre and his conception of duties as well as the Formula of Humanity, which also holds a relational perspective. This enables me to discuss preliminary arguments for moral considerations of robots.

Gross National Happiness: A Philosophical Appraisal

For more than 40 years, the Kingdom of Bhutan has eschewed evaluating its socio-economic status in terms of Gross Domestic Product and has instead done so under the heading of ‘Gross National Happiness’ (GNH). As part of the upswing in international interest in well-being as the proper final end of development, it would be apt to critically explore the approach that has been in use for several decades. In this article, I expound the central elements of GNH and discuss their strengths and weaknesses from a moral-philosophical perspective. I conclude that while GNH covers some blind spots missed by influential Western indices with which readers are likely to be more familiar, the latter, along with Martha Nussbaum's Capabilities Approach, also have corrections to offer the former, inviting a fascinating cross-cultural exchange about how to understand the nature of well-being for purposes of public policy.

Una triplice Vergangenheitsbewaltigung. La politica del passato in Germania

- The article discusses that specific aspect of German political culture known as Vergangenheitsbewältigung, i.e. the going over the totalitarian past through a threefold reworking: judicial (trials, convictions, political and administrative purges), economic (compensations and reparations) and cultural (a deep historical knowledge of what happened, the working out of moral and law criteria for judgment, an at least symbolic declaration of solidarity towards the victims). The German case is interesting because of its uniqueness. First of all, from the judicial point of view, the way the past was reworked has had an extraordinary impact, being at the root of present developments in international criminal law. From the political and the moral-philosophical perspectives, no other population has so thoroughly re-defined its identity with respect to its past: constitutional and post-national patriotism are a case in point. One more exceptional aspect is that, after the reunification, Germany has lived through a new Vergangenheitsbewältigung which suggests interesting comparative considerations.

Saving lives in road traffic—ethical aspects

AimThis article aims at giving an overview of five ethical problem areas relating to traffic safety, thereby providing a general framework for analysing traffic safety from an ethical perspective and encouraging further discussion concerning problems, policies and technology in this area.Subjects and methodsThe problems presented in the article are criminalisation, paternalism, privacy, justice and responsibility, and the reasons for choosing these are the following. First, they are all important areas in moral philosophy. Second, they are fairly general and it should be possible to categorise more specific problems under these headings. Ethical aspects of road traffic have not received the philosophical attention they deserve. Every year, more than 1 million people die globally in traffic accidents, and 20 to 50 million people are injured. Ninety per cent of the road traffic fatalities occur in low- and middle-income countries, where it is a growing problem. Politics, economics, culture and technology affect the number of fatalities and injuries, and the measures used to combat deaths in traffic as well as the role of road traffic should be ethically scrutinised. The topics are analysed and discussed from a moral-philosophical perspective, and the discussion includes both theory and applications.Results and conclusionThe author concludes with some thoughts on how the ethical discussion can be included in the public debate on how to save lives in road traffic. People in industrialised societies are so used to road traffic that it is almost seen as part of nature. Consequently, we do not acknowledge that we can introduce change and that we can affect the role we have given road traffic and cars. By acknowledging the ethical aspects of road traffic and illuminating the way the choices society makes are ethically charged, it becomes clear that there are alternative ways to design the road traffic system. The most important general conclusion is that discussion concerning these alternative ways of designing the system should be encouraged.

Values, preferences, and the citizen-consumer distinction in cost-benefit analysis

This article examines criticisms of cost-benefit analysis and the contingent valuation method from methodological and moral philosophical perspectives. Both perspectives argue that what should be elicited for public decisions are attitudes or values, not preferences, and that respondents should be treated as citizens and not consumers. The moral philosophical criticism argues in favour of deliberative approaches over cost-benefit analysis. The methodological perspective is here criticized for overemphasizing the importance of protest responses and anomalies and biases in contingent valuation, and for failing to provide the necessary information needed to make public decisions over the allocation of scarce goods. The moral philosophical perspective is criticized for: failing to provide criteria for distinguishing between values and preferences, assuming impartiality requires expression of values and not preferences; failing to recognize the diversity of forms of expression of values, including expression of values through monetary evaluation; and assuming that cost-benefit analysis is necessarily an implementation of a utilitarian political philosophy. The article concludes by showing that deliberative decision-making mechanisms can be overly demanding on citizens, and argues for greater openness in the potential moral justifications of cost-benefit analysis.

Ethical Dilemmas of Psychologists — A Swedish Example in an International Perspective

The Swedish Psychological Association is, like the inter- national psychological community as a whole, commit- ted to ethical issues in the professional conduct of its members. The discussion on the professional conduct of psychologists will probably never cease, since new chal- lenges and difficulties in psychologists' work, which are of interest to us all, are continuously arising. At least two reasons for this commitment can be given. The first is the welfare of the patients or clients who receive help from professionals — the moral-philosophical perspective — and the other is the welfare of the profession — the so- ciological perspective. The analysis outlined here fol- lows directly from those perspectives, and holds good not just for psychologists but for other professions too.