The double look
Abstract: Some authors use biology to interpret questions of psychology and sociology. This is the reductionist tradition —our behaviors would emanate from our physical constitution. Cultural symbolism is sought in biology, and if it is not found there, it would be illusory. I deliberately take a polemical example, the concept of race, to show that: … Read more
How to renew ethics? Almost all ethical discussions start from an established morality. That is, every new moral rule is born in a circular way from laws set in stone. This conservatism protects our essential ideals. But the new rules seem exposed to the risk of inbreeding. Do they really adapt best to the frenetic … Read more
Thinking about evil is not just about burning yourself in it With ‘Evil in modern thought‘, essayist Susan Neiman revisits Nietzsche and Arendt to condemn a resignation from contemporary philosophy about evil. She sees the Holocaust as such an exorbitant evil that it requires a complete overhaul of ethics, not just deconstructing world history. An … Read more
Morals Test Bench Philomag’s newsletter is back in force after the summer break with a study of 1098 students in 10 countries comparing utilitarian and deontological morals. By testing students’ behavior through games of dice and sums to be won, researchers come across a counterintuitive result: those who proclaim their attachment to an intangible moral … Read more
The philosopher’s outstretched hand I have not found a better synthesis on this subject than a remarkable issue (60) of Cités published in 2014 (french): “What do cognitive neuroscience think and want?”. The theme allows the confrontation between philosophers and neuroscientists about the mind/body problem. Yves Charles Zarka, for philosophers, begins by giving a hand: … Read more
Messianic collectivism Utilitarianism is a flawed philosophy, we have seen, since it can lead to the deliberate killing of innocent people, in defiance of a deontology more fundamental to the human being. But how is this possible, since it claims to represent the D of soliDarity, that is to say the interest of the greatest … Read more
Tumor passion Am I personally responsible for a morality that society would find inappropriate? This question, which attacks that of free will head-on, has no simple answer. Let’s look at the case of an American who, in 2000, suddenly became a sexual aggressor. Married and without history until then, he is unexpectedly passionate about prostitution, … Read more
Scoop: an obese man killed by a philosophy teacher! The previous article drowned you in trolleyology. Philosophers study the moral value of our choices. Utilitarianism appears fundamentally flawed in terms of ethics. It calculates the formula of the maximum number of lives by mocking the destroyed units. It represents the pure D of the human … Read more
One foot in the dilemma In the trolley problem, I explicitly take the utilitarian morality that prevails in the majority of responses on the wrong foot. I stage the companion of the man sacrificed to save 5 others. Whoever killed him must explain his action in front of her. The man was not destined to … Read more
Let’s get on board the trolleyology with David Edmonds, author of Would you kill the Fat Man? He details variants of the trolley problem, its philosophical interpretations, and its connections with the neurosciences of morality. Appear choices made personally by the philosophers summoned but no normative theory. Is it a preserve that must continue to … Read more