Repression and Moral Reasoning: An Outline of a New Approach in Ethical Understanding
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Hannes Nykänen
Abstract
The aim of the paper is to show that moral reasoning is not really reasoning in the sense usually assumed in moral philosophy. Instead, moral reasoning is one aspect of repressing conscience. The formal dimensions of moral reasoning function as a repressive depersonalisation of our sense of being an I who stands in a relationship to a you. For instance, “moral principle” invokes a formal and hence impersonal understanding of a moral problem. The thinking person loses her sense of being a particular person related to another particular person and focuses instead on the moral principles with their inherent, systematic implications. However, and as I will show in connection to so-called moral dilemmas, the thinking person does not actually act in the rational manner that is presupposed by reasoning. Instead, moral reasoning will reveal itself as a discourse for repressing conscience. Part of the aim of the paper is to show that, contrary to what is generally assumed, repression is a morally related phenomenon that arises as a result of a person’s difficulties with acknowledging the character of a moral difficulty; an acknowledgement that is an essential aspect of moral understanding.
© 2015 by Walter de Gruyter Berlin Boston
Artikel in diesem Heft
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- Frontmatter
- How to Read the Tractatus: Traditionally, Resolutely, or Iconologically?
- Russellian Monism and Epistemic Pessimism
- Repression and Moral Reasoning: An Outline of a New Approach in Ethical Understanding
- 10.1515/sats-2014-0005
- Different Interpretations of Hegel’s Logic and Metaphysics
- Aarhus Lectures – Third Lecture: The Prospects of Schelling’s Critique of Hegel
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Artikel in diesem Heft
- Who will advise us?
- Frontmatter
- How to Read the Tractatus: Traditionally, Resolutely, or Iconologically?
- Russellian Monism and Epistemic Pessimism
- Repression and Moral Reasoning: An Outline of a New Approach in Ethical Understanding
- 10.1515/sats-2014-0005
- Different Interpretations of Hegel’s Logic and Metaphysics
- Aarhus Lectures – Third Lecture: The Prospects of Schelling’s Critique of Hegel
- Who will advise us?
