Browsing by Subject "Morality"
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Item 12(2011) Rapoport, BernardItem The aim of dialectics In Plato's Euthyphro(2015-12) Fallis, Lewis Bartlett; Pangle, Thomas L.; Stauffer, Devin; Pangle, Lorraine; Tulis, Jeffrey; Muirhead, RussellThis dissertation presents an analysis of Plato’s dialogue on piety, the Euthyphro. The aim of the dissertation is to understand the nature of piety and its connection with morality. Chapter One introduces the topic of the dissertation, discusses two aspects of its political relevance, and justifies the decision to turn to Plato, and specifically Plato’s Euthyphro, for guidance on the question. Two weaknesses of contemporary approaches to the investigation of piety are discussed here, in order to highlight by contrast the strengths of Plato’s approach. Chapters Two and Three present an analysis of Plato’s Euthyphro, with special attention to what the dialogue can reveal about the connection between piety and morality. Chapter Four is a conclusion discussing the limitations of the study, the understanding of piety conveyed by Plato’s Euthyphro, and the aim of Socratic dialectics, understood as a means of testing whether moral opinions might be a condition of pious experiences.Item Ethical consumerism and parenting in a new urbanist neighborhood in Austin, Texas(2015-05) Cabrera, Sergio Antonio; Williams, Christine L., 1959-; Auyero, Javier; Adut, Ari; Fridman, Daniel; Rudrappa, SharmilaThis dissertation examines how people understand themselves---and, therefore, others like them---to be "good people." Recent decades have witnessed enormous changes in the American cultural landscape, changes which have eroded, replaced, or transformed many of the institutions which Americans once more exclusively relied on (at least ideologically) to construct their moral identities. In this dissertation I argue that today where, how, and what people buy matter a great deal in how they define themselves as good people. I show, moreover, that these consumer choices contribute to new forms of social inequality. This project utilizes in-depth interviews with 31 residents of the Mueller neighborhood in Austin, Texas who are parents of young children. The first part of this dissertation illustrates how, in the case of Mueller, ethical consumerism is a product of particular social settings. I draw on Muellerites' experiences with ethical consumerism to challenge conventional understandings of (1) what compels people to engage in ethical consumerism, and (2) the relationship between self-interest and civic behavior. Second, I explore how liberal, progressive ideals held by residents of Austin---and residents of the Mueller neighborhood in particular---coexist with gentrification and persistent inequalities in surrounding neighborhoods. Third, I explore how middle-class parents in Mueller interpret and negotiate dominant discourses regarding the need to shelter children from market influences, and the cultural work that these parents engage in to draw distinctions between the types of consumerism that are acceptable for their families and those that are not. I conclude with a discussion of the relevance of my findings for social theory and understanding contemporary inequalities.Item Exploring naturalistic conceptions of ‘a moral person’ for Koreans(2010-05) Kim, Sunghun; Falbo, ToniEducational PsychologyItem Frontiers of need : humanitarianism and the American involvement in the Nigerian Civil War, 1967-1970(2014-12) McNeil, Brian E., 1982-; Lawrence, Mark Atwood; Toyin, Falola; Jeremi, Suri; Brands, H.W.; Borstelmann, ThomasThis dissertation focuses on American foreign policy toward the Nigerian Civil War, a conflict most famous for the images of starving women and children from the secessionist state of Biafra. In response to this unprecedented humanitarian crisis, more than 200 nongovernmental and voluntary organizations emerged in the United States alone, all calling for the U.S. government to intervene in the Nigerian Civil War. Despite this immense public pressure, policymakers in Washington were reluctant to violate Nigerian sovereignty and become involved in the conflict. This dissertation looks specifically at how American policymakers responded to this challenge from below and constructed a policy for the humanitarian problem that was designed above all to placate concerned citizens at home. By analyzing the American involvement in the Nigerian Civil War, this dissertation argues that the push for humanitarian intervention in the United States stemmed from a crisis of morality in American foreign relations during the 1960s. It reinterprets the 1960s as a period of moral crisis when many Americans questioned the morality of U.S. foreign policy and sought an alternative moral framework for America’s role in the world. For activists concerned about the Nigerian Civil War, humanitarian intervention represented a path for overcoming the perceived immorality of the Cold War. This dissertation, then, argues that humanitarian intervention abroad was primarily a domestic battle, one that revealed the fault lines of two competing conceptions of what should guide the future of American foreign policy.Item The Hart-Dworkin debate and the separation thesis of legal positivism(2010-08) Chechik, Grigorina; Martinich, Aloysius; Koons, Robert C.In the postscript to The Concept of Law, H.L. A. Hart describes the on-going debate inspired by his book, focusing on the criticisms of Ronald Dworkin. In this essay, I will discuss Dworkin’s criticisms of Hart, as well as Hart’s responses, showing that while Hart responds adequately to some criticisms, he fails to respond adequately to others. I will also reconstruct and evaluate the arguments given for and against the separation thesis by Dworkin and Hart. Finally, I will argue that the debate about the separation thesis – the thesis that morality and law are separable – is misguided, conflating as it does two distinct questions. These are the questions of what the positive law is, that is, the law that is posited in a specific time and place, and of what the natural law is, that is, the law that (if it exists) is universal and timeless. Once we distinguish these questions, we will see that the answer to the question of whether law is separable from morality depends on which sense of ‘law’ is relevant, and that there are two different answers corresponding to the two senses of positive law and natural law. Positive law is separable from morality while natural law is not.Item How political identities are developed and maintained(2021-08-02) Ashokkumar, Ashwini; Swann, William B.; Pennebaker, James W.; Gosling, Samuel D.; Boyd, RyanIn a time of heightened partisanship and political polarization, people’s political identities are increasingly producing detrimental outcomes. To address the dangers of extreme political identities, we need to understand how such identities form and are maintained. My overarching goal is to examine how people’s political identities develop and how people protect such identities from threat. Specifically, after an introductory chapter (Chapter 1), I examine how political identities develop via everyday social interactions with fellow group members (Chapter 2), and how people protect their political identities when they are faced with threat from political opponents (Chapters 3) or from fellow partisans (Chapter 4). The dissertation features several distinct methodological approaches. In Chapter 2, I analyze daily conversations occurring within three large online political groups to understand the processes through which people’s political identities develop over time. Chapter 3 examines how people protect their political identities from identity-threatening content on social media. Chapter 4 examines how people strategically respond to reputational threat caused by the moral transgressions of fellow partisans. Each of these chapters is comprised of an article that either has been published at peer-reviewed journals or is in preparation for submission (Ashokkumar & Pennebaker, in prep; Ashokkumar et al., 2020; Ashokkumar et al., 2019). Bringing together insights from the three sets of studies, the dissertation concludes with a discussion of dynamic processes associated with political identities and argues for taking a multimethod approach to studying identity.Item Individual differences in responses to moral dilemmas(2023-04-05) Luke, Dillon Mathew; Gawronski, Bertram; Gosling, Samuel; Swann, William B.; Neumann, Craig S.Considerable research in moral psychology has provided evidence for disagreement in the resolution of moral dilemmas pitting the greater good against adherence to moral norms. One potential explanation for this disagreement lies in stable individual differences between people, which has been supported by past research suggesting that differences in moral-dilemma judgments are stable over time and related to individual differences in cognition, emotion, antisocial traits, and beliefs and attitudes. While past research is informative, traditional measurement of moral-dilemma judgment confounds the influence of several factors, rendering the meaning of disagreement in moral-dilemma judgments ambiguous. To address these limitations, the purpose of this dissertation was to provide more nuanced insights into disagreement in moral-dilemma judgments by using the CNI model of moral decision-making to separately quantify sensitivity to consequences, sensitivity to moral norms, and general preference for inaction versus action in responses to moral dilemmas. Across three lines of research, the current work examined (1) the temporal stability of individual differences in the three factors (Article 1) and (2) relations between individual differences in the three factors and basic personality traits (Article 1), political ideology (Article 2), and facet-level psychopathy (Article 3). Findings from Article 1 provided evidence for high stability in sensitivity to consequences and sensitivity to moral norms, which was comparable to that of the Big Five personality traits, but lower stability in general preference for inaction versus action. Findings across Articles 1-3 revealed an unexpectedly strong contribution of basic personality traits to disagreement through relations with all three factors (Article 1), an unexpectedly weak contribution of political ideology to disagreement through sensitivity to consequences (Article 2), and an expectedly strong contribution of interpersonal and affective psychopathic traits to disagreement through sensitivity to moral norms (Article 3). Together, these findings have important implications for theories of moral judgment and provide a novel theoretical framework for understanding disagreement in moral-dilemma judgments, which may be used to develop tailored interventions to reduce real-world disagreement.Item Insidious morality : on the connections between “good intentions”, bad faith and anti-black racism(2016-08) Jackson, Auburney Shaleace; Marshall, Stephen H.; Makalani, MinkahThis report is delivered in two parts and aims to accomplish two endeavors. First, is to complete an examination of the insidious underside of morality identified by Friedrich Nietzsche in relation to black studies. As such, I give a brief account of Nietzsche’s critique of morality and the virtue of pity; review the debate between black studies scholars of whether Nietzsche should be utilized for the project; and further contextualizes the weighted importance of the previous debate by reviewing context of the historical condition of Blackness as identified by black studies scholars in the school of Afro-Pessimism. I argue that Nietzsche offers an opportunity to see that activism under the guise of ‘goodness’ insidiously perpetuates harm against Black folk and that it is the speech of ‘goodness’ which renders the mechanics of this violence invisible. Secondly, I argue that a Sartrean understanding of bad faith (mauvaise foi), reveals how the liberal Ally is able to perpetuates this harm against Black folk without guilt.Item An interdisciplinary inquiry into the ethics codes of the helping professions : interpretations of moral principles and professional responsibilities(2011-05) Iakovakis, Clarke Lawson; Westbrook, Lynn; Zhang, YanHelping professionals help people to achieve optimal functionality and fulfillment in the physical, psychological, emotional and intellectual domains. Well-defined ethical standards for practitioners are crucial to such a vital endeavor. This study analyzes the official codes of ethics produced by the professional organizations of five of the helping professions: librarianship, psychology, social work, nursing, and education. In the ethics codes is sought interpretation of four moral principles—respect for autonomy, justice, beneficence, and non-maleficence—and four professional responsibilities—fidelity, veracity, privacy, and confidentiality. These are grounded, respectively, in the “common morality” or the core norms exercised by all morally serious people, and the “professional morality,” or the core norms exercised by all moral professionals. How do the professions define, interpret, and express the principles and responsibilities? This interdisciplinary study clarifies and allows comparison of the expressed values of each profession. It is a critical examination of professional codes of ethics, and an argument for their explicit grounding in a larger morality.Item Moral conflict in marriage(2018-05) Lloyd, Rachel Rose; Vangelisti, Anita L.Dyadic conflicts may emerge for a variety of reasons however some conflicts are viewed as more influential than others. Moral conflicts are viewed as particularly critical to relationships due to their possible intractable nature (Vallacher et al., 2010). The first goal of the current study was to examine theoretical perspectives from a variety of academic fields to identify the types of moral conflicts that are experienced in marriage. Secondly, this study addressed the perceived conflict management strategies used by a partner during a specific episode of moral conflict. Lastly, the study investigated how the communication strategies used during a moral conflict contributed to relational satisfaction. The present study surveyed 235 married individuals and found that individuals experienced ten types of moral conflict, some of which may be unique to marriage (e.g., loyalty, authority over assets of equal ownership, free will/determinism). Results also indicated that those who perceived their partner also thought the conflict had a moral nature, were more likely to see their viewpoint as superior, despite indicating that they were able to understand their partner’s position. In addition, those who thought that their partner had similar perceptions of the moral nature of a conflict felt that their partner displayed negative emotions during conflict (e.g., crying, depressed), but did not show behaviors attempting to avoid or deny the conflict. Lastly, individuals who perceived their partner as using integrative strategies were more satisfied with their relationship, whereas those who viewed their partner as using distributive strategies expressed lower levels of relational satisfaction. Findings also demonstrated that people felt less satisfied with their relationship when their partners used avoidance or denial during moral conflict and more satisfied with their relationship when their partner displayed expressions of negative affect. Implications about conceptualizing moral conflict in marriage are discussed as well as suggestions for future inquiry.Item Moral reasons and moral sentiments(2010-05) Vogelstein, Eric; Deigh, John; Dancy, JonathanMost philosophers believe that morality gives us reasons, and that those reasons apply necessarily and universally. I refer to this rather general view as the Normativity Thesis. My dissertation is (1) a defense of the Normativity Thesis, and (2) an inquiry into what form the Normativity Thesis should take. I defend the Normativity Thesis on the grounds that morally wrong action always provides sufficient reason for criticism of the wrongdoer. I then argue that sufficient reason to criticize always involve the failure on the part of the criticizable person to respond to her own reasons. Thus, morally wrong action involves the failure to respond to reasons. It is commonplace to capture the relationship between reasons and morality as follows: Necessarily, for all A, x: if A’s doing x was morally wrong, then when A did x, there was a reason for A not to do x. This thesis, however, is in tension with a prominent theory about reasons for action, Humeanism: Necessarily, for all A, x: if A has a reason to do x, then A has some desire that will be served by doing x. The tension results from the fact that it appears to be possible that someone lacks any desire that is served by ii refraining from immoral action. I provide a novel argument for Humeanism, inspired by Bernard Williams’ famous argument for that thesis. Thus, I argue, since we have very good reason to accept Humeanism, the standard way of specifying the Normativity Thesis is problematic. I suggest that given Humeanism, we are compelled towards a specification of the Normativity Thesis that gives a central role to what I call moral sentiments: compassion and respect. On my view, the normativity of morality derives from reasons to have those sentiments, rather than reasons for action. Finally, I suggest that this view of the normativity of morality provides strong but non-conclusive reason to adopt a particular view about the nature of the property of moral wrongness, or what it fundamentally is to be morally wrong -- a view that again places moral sentiments at center stage.Item Morality and creativity part 1(2016-05) Morgan, Courtney Guitar; Lewis, Robert J. (Assistant professor); Drumwright, MinetteAll too often, ethics are not only thrown out the window in creative brainstorming sessions but barred from entry under the guise that ethics stifle the creative process. A clear sense of ethics in line with those of mainstream society is considered a desirable characteristic (Amabile, 1988). Ethics may, however, have a negative effect on creativity—another desirable characteristic (Amabile, 1988). By integrating trait activation theory and recent literature in media psychology, the current study tests the effects of reading and assessing morally ambiguous (vs. clear) narrative resolutions on creative thinking via a divergent thinking test. Results show evidence consistent with the idea that trait creativity, when activated by morally clear story-resolutions, leads to greater performance on a divergent-thinking test, whereas trait creativity is unrelated to performance after exposure to morally ambiguous story-resolutions. So, while there may be positive associations between unethical behavior and creativity, the current study shows that not all activators of creativity are “dark."Item Morality and the person : the person is the touchstone for morality(2010-12) Oakley, Katherine Louise; Seung, T. K., 1930-; Higgins, Kathleen M.This thesis is concerned with tracing out the manifold connections between personhood and morality to argue that morality is based on fundamental properties of the person, and therefore a moral philosophy that ignores or truncates the person is one that fails to understand the central function of morality in our social practices and understanding of the self. It is at the same time to argue that morality is integral to personhood and enters the construct of the person at the most basic level. My method is to exploit our sense that our concept of the person exists to capture that which makes us more than natural beings. First, persons must self-define. What it is to be a person is not given. Persons, and each person, must create an ideal of the person to act, and through action try to realize that ideal and through that process in fact realize themselves. Second, the human psyche has its own needs and drives unrelated to those of the physical being that propel the being towards personhood. Third, persons have depth. When we recognize a being to be a person, it is evidence of depth that we recognize. Without depth persons would not be. We have evolved a specialized vocabulary -- a moral vocabulary -- that both recognizes that depth and facilitates its creation. Together these entail that the person cannot be constructed without that construct being eventually set in moral terms, and that sociality is a basic unit of analysis of the person: persons exist as beings who recognize each other and exist in a matrix of recognition within which persons come to be. In as much as existing as a person is the proper form of existence for our kind and personhood is dependent on the voluntary activity of other persons, existence as a person must as far as possible be guaranteed. This is the foundational task of morality and the source of its basic requirements.Item “Privileged glimpses into the human heart” : the empathic narratives of Heart of Darkness and The Great Gatsby(2018-05-03) Shear, Richard James; Friedman, Alan WarrenWhile comparative analyses of Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness and F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby have repeatedly and fruitfully discussed similarities in their structure, theme, and characters, little has been written about the integral role that empathy plays in shaping both narratives. This essay draws on recent philosophical, psychological, and literary theories of empathy to analyze how Marlow and Nick’s descriptions of empathic experience, displays of empathic behavior, and use empathy to imaginatively reconstruct others’ experiences in narrative reveal that these narrators’ engagement with empathy ultimately encourages readers to reflect on its functions and limitations as well as the nature of its relationship to story-telling. While Marlow and Nick criticize and at times condemn Kurtz and Gatsby they also identify and are drawn into ambivalent empathic relationships with Kurtz and Gatsby that allow them to understand and reconstruct the mental states of these men whose ideas conflict with the norms of their respective societies. Although the content and narrative method of Marlow and Nick’s narratives reveal their capacity for empathy, their retrospective and subjective empathic accounts are always mediated by their own beliefs, biases, and blind spots, and therefore their ability to empathize with others and accurately reconstruct others’ mental states is limited. Nonetheless, these narrators display a capacity for empathy that, at least according to their own limited perspectives, is largely absent from the egocentric, narrow-minded, and prejudiced societies in which they find themselves. Ultimately, Nick and Marlow’s empathic understanding of others, particularly Kurtz and Gatsby, inspires and enables them to construct narratives that critique the immoral and dehumanizing norms of their societies and speak to empathy’s ability to provide humans with an awareness and understanding of others’ experiences that can facilitate moral action.Item Problems of supererogation(2017-05) Grigore, Nora; Dancy, Jonathan; Woodruff, Paul, 1943-; Higgins, Kathleen; Stangl, RebeccaMy main thesis is twofold: I will account first for the difference between problems of supererogation, and then for their relatedness. First, I will claim that it is very likely that there is no one problem of supererogation, but rather a family of problems of supererogation. Secondly, I will claim that the problems of supererogation are related due to the fact that they present conflicts between various aspects of supererogation and one particular view about morality, a view that I will call the “legalistic” view of morality or “morality of law”. Therefore, a first step in my approach of the problem of supererogation will be to show that what has been considered as “the” problem of supererogation consists, rather, in a multitude of problems intricately linked. The second and the third chapters of the thesis will be concerned with this enterprise, of differentiating between various kinds of problems of supererogation. A second step will be to show that most problems of supererogation are connected because they are engendered by an opposition to a particular view of morality. This will be the main point of the fourth chapter. My position will be that whenever a moral theory has adopted (explicitly or not) a legalistic view of morality, that theory will become a hostile environment for the concept of supererogation. I will end by proposing some hypotheses about what could be a more welcoming theoretical environment for supererogation, namely by proposing “morality of virtue” as a likely candidate.Item Sexual morality : factor structure, individual differences, and cross-cultural variation(2017-05) Asao, Kelly Eiko; Buss, David M.; Woolley, Jacqueline; Meston, Cindy; Neff, LisaAcross every society there exist moral rules governing the sexual domain. Nonetheless, extant theories have largely ignored the domain of human conduct most heavily and universally moralized—sexual conduct. Across numerous studies, I investigate people’s intuitions about sexual morality, including individual and cross-cultural variation. The goals of the research program were threefold. First, this research created a comprehensive taxonomy of sexual moral behavior—the Sexual Morality Inventory. Factor analysis revealed distinct factors that we named the Seven Pillars of Sexual Morality. A second goal was to determine if variation in sexual morality could be predicted based on other key individual difference variables. Across two studies, I found that gender, religiosity, mating strategy, and personality predict individual differences in people’s moral codes of sexual conduct. Finally, in collaboration with researchers in 37 countries, I discovered which sexual acts are universally moralized (e.g., sexual coercion) and which vary from culture to culture (e.g., short-term sex). Collectively, this program of research is the first to comprehensively study sexual morality and contributes significantly to our understanding of morality and sexuality.Item Sexual morality, evolution, and religion(2022-08-01) Crosby, Courtney Lynn; Buss, David M.; Meston, Cindy M.; Legare, Cristine; Gawronski, Bertram; Hixon, GregSexual morality is pervasive. Little is known about why norms surrounding sexual behaviors exist, and which individual differences drive variation in moral judgments of sex. This dissertation combined two models purporting to explain variation in religiosity to understand variation in moral judgments of sexual behaviors more broadly: the reproductive religiosity model and the idea that religions enhance within-group cooperation. The reproductive religiosity model posits that interest in long-term mating with high levels of reproduction leads to perceptions of sexual behaviors such as promiscuity, homosexuality, or abortion as morally wrong, as the behaviors are associated with promiscuity. Cooperating to moralize sexual behaviors may ensure paternity certainty, or signal an individual’s cooperative capacity. The dissertation examined if an interaction between reproductive and cooperative concerns amplified moral judgments toward 15 sexual behaviors for individuals (N = 1,057; 474 men; 574 women; 9 participants identifying as “other”); how religious individuals (n = 534; 250 men, 280 women; 4 participants identifying as “other”) differed from non-religious individuals (n = 523; 224 men, 294 women; 5 participants identifying as “other”) in their moralization of sex; and which aspects of religion most influenced moral judgments toward sexual behaviors for religious participants. Exploratory analyses examined how perceptions of disease vulnerability, broader conceptualizations of morality, and conservatism were associated with moral judgments of sexual behaviors, if there was a link between religious affiliation, reproductive, and cooperative concerns, and how religious affiliation differed by age and sexual orientation. The study replicated previous research showing that greater reproductive concerns, religiosity, moral concerns, and conservatism were related to harsher moral judgments of sexual behavior. Results suggest that reproductive—but not cooperative—concerns are important for moral judgments toward only two sexual behaviors, but that variation in religious components, moral foundations, or conservatism explains variation for moral judgements of sex more broadly. Future research may consider expanding the current methodology to examine which sexual behaviors are associated with perceptions of cheating, how other emotions impact moral judgments of sex, how perceptions of harm vary according to the actor engaging in sexual acts, and how non- Western religions influence perceptions of sex.Item Terrorism, television, and torture : post-9/11 morality in popular culture(2015-05) Beicken, Julie Anne; Ekland-Olson, Sheldon, 1944-; Young, Michael P; Carrington, Ben; Browne, Simone; Charrad, Mounira MayaThis dissertation analyzes government documents and popular media to explore how 9/11 altered the moral stance on torture in the United States. It considers the emergence of a mainstream consequentialist legitimization of torture, wherein torture is construed as a lesser evil to that of terrorism, in contrast to the deontological position embodied in international law and treaties that torture is always prohibited. Rooted in both political and cultural sociology, this project argues that 9/11 resulted in "cultural trauma" (Sztompka, 2000) in the United States, the evidence of which can be found in a series of government memos from the early 2000s and in the increased portrayal of torturers-as-heroes in popular media. Specifically, a great deal of post-9/11 media that depicts the 'War on Terror' relies on a torturing hero to fight terrorism and thwart terrorist attacks. Jack Bauer of Fox's hit series 24 is the quintessential archetype of this new trope, but the interrogators of Zero Dark Thirty and Showtime's show Homeland also follow suit. Through a content analysis of the above listed media, as well as ABC's torture-heavy primetime series Scandal, this project finds that post-9/11 media represent torture as justifiable, effective at gaining life-saving information, and entertaining. In order to track this moral shift, this project analyzes both government documents and pieces of popular media through ethnographic content analysis. It uses Ekland-Olson's (2011) model for how moral systems change, which argues that boundary drawing and the resolution of dilemmas are at the heart of establishing new moral positions. In the case of the 'War on Terror,' a boundary has been drawn around terrorists and potential terrorists, deeming them Others who are undeserving of protective mechanisms such as the law. The Othering of suspected terrorists draws on the history of antagonism towards Islam as incompatible with democracy and the West (Said, 1977). This project attends to the Islamophobia of torture-heavy media that depict Muslims and Arabs as unassimilable Others posing a persistent threat to the Western way of life. It concludes that torture has become a frequent practice of the U.S. government and a staple of post-9/11 entertainment media.