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Conscience (Interpretations) - Coggle Diagram
Conscience (Interpretations)
Religious Interpretations of Conscience
Saint Augustine and Friederich Schleiermacher
- The Voice of God Thesis
Romans 2:15, Saint Paul's letter to the Romans, rules that the conscience is 'the witness to the requirements of law', thus to Paul the conscience was an innate part of us that recognised our obligations under law to God
Saint Augustine took this idea even further proposing that the conscience was the innate voice of God within the human mind that was the greatest authority in moral decision making - because the conscience was therefore infallible, according to the Divine Command Theory - and thus it was a mortal sin to rule against the human conscience.
Schleiermacher agreed with such arguing that the conscience was 'The voice of God...within an original revelation of God'
Strengths and Weaknesses of the Augustianian/Schleiermacher opinion
Strengths
There is scriptural precedent in support of the opinion
The notion of an innate voice of God commands a grand authority for the theists within society, so the conscience possesses significant authority
Weaknesses
If God is within all of us, how come there is so much disagreement surrounding morality in the modern world?
If God is within all of us, how is it that so many people appear to be able to silence such a voice and commit acts of moral evil? Surely this hinders God's authority.
Joseph Fletcher's Opinion
- Conscience as a verb
'Conscience is merely a word for our attempts to make moral decisions creatively, constructively, and fittingly'
Human conscience describes the part of us which decides upon the moral course of action in a given circumstance, it is not some Catholic judge of morality
Saint Thomas Aquinas
- Conscience as a product of human reason
Aquinas believed that the ruling motivating factor behind human morality and thus conscience was the principle of synderesis (the notion of doing good and avoiding evil) that could only be achieved by an adherence to the Natural Moral Law and the absolutist Primary Precepts
Aquinas thus believed that conscience, or 'conscientia' as he proposed was a general revelation amongst man, a god-given faculty to apply the primary precepts through reason to a moral dilemma.
Now the human conscience (conscientia) was not infallible, it could be flawed in two ways: being ignorant of the primary precepts (which Aquinas deemed a sin), and being ignorant the situation (which was not a sin according to the doctrine of double effect).
Despite this innate capacity for fallacy, Aquinas believed that, as a god-given quality, the human conscience should not be ignored or else we go against God.
Strengths and Weaknesses of Aquinas' approach to the Conscience
Strengths
Aquinas recognises the tendency for human fallacy in conscience and thus accommodates to human nature
Aquinas recognises the importance of rationality as being central to human conscience
Weaknesses
Aquinas' assumption of synderesis being central to all human moral decision making is a notion that is flawed, consider psychological egoists, they would believe that human morality is solely motivated by self-interest
Aquinas' assumption that humans possess rationality as a form of general revelation is furthermore flawed when we consider that human often do not possess the capacity for reason
Bishop Joseph Butler
- The Conscience as a guide
Butler believed that the human conscience was a reflective faculty within the human being, reflective in the sense that human human morality is shaped by emotional responses to moral actions
Butler believed that there were two moral maxims to be balanced in human morality, the first being prudence (self-interest) and the second being benevolence (the interests of the community)
The Conscience was therefore the adjudicator between prudence and benevolence, it was intuitive, when we balance these maxims we do so through intuition and furthermore should feel no sense of guilt or remorse when we do so.
With the conscience being autonomous, Butler does take a rather libertarian perspective on human conscience, the idea that reward and punishment from society does not influence our morality is rather controversial
Weaknesses of Butler's Philosophy
One may critique, and certainly the ethical egoist may, that Butler's elevation of benevolence degrades our own self-interest
Counter
- Butler explicitly notes that if we are benevolent we shall naturally take care of ourselves
Elizabeth Anscombe
- believes that Butler does not take into consideration that the human conscience may not be orientated towards balancing benevolence with prudence
Nietzsche
- There is no evidence to the autonomous conscience, it is a faculty that possesses no logical truth behind it
Determinism
- A free and independent conscience is not possible, it is prone to notions of reward and punishment as psychological behaviourism argues.
Non-Religious Interpretations of Conscience
Lawrence Kohlberg
- Conscience as being independent and psychological
Stages of Development
Kohlberg believed that human beings develop conscience according to the stages of development that develop with age, although many do not develop past the conventional stages
Preconventional Stage
Stage 1 - Obedience and consequences of disobedience
Stage 2 - Self interest
Conventional Stage
Stage 3 - Requirements of law
Stage 4 - Social norms
Postconventional Stage
Stage 5 - Utilitarianism
Stage 6 - Universalibility as a ruling norm
The Dilemma of Heinz
Kohlberg uses the dilemma of Heinz as a method of understanding where a person is on the scale of conscience development
Weaknesses of Kohlberg's Approach
If human conscience development is only available to some extent by a limited number of humans, what value does such a value have holistically
Kohlberg places too much value on human reason, Hume would argue that such is unjustified, that rather human rationality should flow from internal desires rather than be governed by them.
Sigmund Freud
- Conscience as a product of the Super-ego
Freud believed that the psyche was a trinity of the ego, the super-ego and the Id (thanatos and eros)
Freud thus believed that the conscience was a part of the super-ego an internalisation of parental authority that evoked guilt and remorse if we went against such a deep seated reason
But Freud critiqued the notion of the conscience citing it as being too restrictive of the human instinct and thus must not be adhered to
Weaknesses of Freud
Freud places no value on the conscience as a means of moral decision making, and is rather narrow minded when it comes to understanding the human psyche - he ignores a wide plethora of human understanding associated with the conscience
Erich Fromm
- The Authoritarian and Humanistic Conscience
The Authoritarian Conscience
This was Fromm's notion that human conscience was orientated to loyalty to the social conscience out of an innate fear associated with breaking societal norms - the authoritarian conscience was one's submissiveness to authority possessed by society and thus was derived from Fromm's understanding of bystanders to the Nazi regime during the 1930s.
The Humanistic Conscience
This was Fromm's pioneering conscience, the moral agent who freed themselves from the collective conscience and thought with humanity in mind rather than society.
Strengths and Weaknesses
Strengths
Fromm understands human rationality and nature and furthermore provides accommodation for the conscience pioneer, unlike Durkheim.
Weaknesses
Even Fromm recognises this, but the authoritarian conscience is of course prone to societal corruption
Emile Durkheim
- Conscience as loyalty
Durkheim believed that the conscience was a sense of loyalty to the prevailing societal status quo, that God and our moral associations with God was all a construct to emphasise our loyalty to society
Durkheim furthermore believed in a societal collective conscience, that society has certain moral principles and norms that it holistically accepts and can alter if agreed upon by the society
This notion was a product of pragmatism and evolution, the notion that human instinct must be quelled in order for society to be maintained has led to the development of the human conscience
Weaknesses of Durkheim's Philosophy
If conscience is a by-product of the collective conscience, that must mean that humans are controlled by this collective conscience, but how then may this accommodate for those who go against the societal status quo
Unification of societal conscience possesses little value when one considers the plausibility of a totalitarian influence upon the societal conscience that thus makes this conscience immoral