Category Archives: Ethics

Psychologists on Virtue Signaling

From “Moral Outrage Is Self-Serving, Say Psychologists”: When people publicly rage about perceived injustices that don’t affect them personally, we tend to assume this expression is rooted in altruism—a “disinterested and selfless concern for the well-being of others.” But new … Continue reading

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The Ethics of ‘No Borders’

Breitbart reports: “Italy Releases Evidence of Open Borders NGO Taking Migrants from People Smugglers”. In terms of a consistent philosophical ethics, such would be the logical extension of liberal ‘All are welcome’/ ‘No borders’ types. In fact, their philosophy ought … Continue reading

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Virtue Signaling as Guilt Alleviation

Rothschild & Keefer, “A cleansing fire: Moral outrage alleviates guilt and buffers threats to one’s moral identity”, Motivation and Emotion, April 2017, Volume 41, Issue 2, pp 209–229. Here’s the abstract: Why do people express moral outrage? While this sentiment … Continue reading

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Peter Singer’s Arc

Strict utilitarianism is the libertarianism of moral philosophy. If you want to see how odious utilitarianism can be (it’s natural trajectory?), read this account of the infamously-utilitarian philosopher Peter Singer’s recent opinion piece.

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Alasdair MacIntyre on the BenOp

From Alasdair MacIntyre’s seminal philosophy book After Virtue (hat tip: Rod Dreher): It is always dangerous to draw too precise parallels between one historical period and another; and among the most misleading of such parallels are those which have been … Continue reading

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Lifeboat Ethics

From Derb, I learned of this decades-old article by Garrett Hardin, “Lifeboat Ethics: the Case Against Helping the Poor” (Psychology Today, September 1974), which provides a useful thought experiment surrounding the problem of pathological altruism: So here we sit, say … Continue reading

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The New Yorker: Martha Nussbaum

In The New Yorker, Rachel Aviv (ahem) has a large profile on the incredibly prodigous, but hopelessly liberal, moral philosopher Martha Nussbaum. I’ve read some of her literary criticism and once, about 20 yrs ago, attended an informal lecture of … Continue reading

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Cuban Illegals in Ecuador ask for Direct Airlift to U.S.

Drudge linked to this story from the Miami Herald: Roxana Acanda, a Cuban who has lived in Ecuador since 2013, is about to start the long trek from Quito to the United States. Although she does not know exactly when … Continue reading

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Reflections on Bernard Williams

Nakul Krishna has a well written piece on the late, great, moral philosopher Bernard Williams, one of the giants of 20th century moral philosophy, as told through the lens of his (Krishna’s) own experience as a philosophy grad student: [Morality: … Continue reading

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Benedict Option FAQ

Rod Dreher has assembled a “Benedict Option FAQ” for a very heady, ambitious, and interesting topic he’s been posting a lot about in the past several months, what is, in short, a call for Christians to retreat a bit and … Continue reading

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