Joseph Butler - PowerPoint Presentation

Slide1

Joseph Butler

Starter – Reminder of Butler from timeline

Odd One Out…

Conscience Animals Humans

Intuitive Reason Innate

Selfless Selfish Golden Rule

God Wrong ConscienceSlide2

Joseph Butler (1692-1752) Intuitive Conscience

Butler

thought that our

natural instincts

and affections are shaped by reason in two ways:Prudence (self-interest)Benevolence (the happiness of others)He believed that it was the faculty of conscience (or reflection) that distinguishes us from other animals.Slide3

Joseph Butler (1692-1752) Intuitive Conscience

‘There is a principle of reflection in men by which they distinguish between approval and disapproval of their own actions… this principle in man is conscience.’

(

Dissertation on the Nature of Virtue)For Butler, conscience directs us away from focusing on ourselves and towards the happiness or interest of others.Slide4

Joseph Butler (1692-1752) Intuitive Conscience

He agreed with Aquinas that conscience could both determine and judge the rightness and wrongness of actions.

However, he believed that conscience was activated in situations without any introspection and that

It has the ultimate authority in ethical judgements.Slide5

Joseph Butler (1692-1752) Intuitive Conscience

He argued that conscience

‘Magisterially exerts itself spontaneously.’

He held that conscience gives us instant intuitive judgements about what we should do.

He wrote:‘Had it strength as it has right; had it power as it had manifest authority, it would absolutely govern the world.’Slide6

Joseph Butler (1692-1752) Intuitive Conscience

N.B.

Conscience

for Butler is both authoritative and automatic in the way it operates when a moral decision needs to be made.He held that conscience was at the very essence of our humanity and that it had a vital place in human experience.He believed that

conscience

was a person’s

God given guide

to

right conduct

and that its demands

must

therefore

always

be followed.Slide7

Butler’s View of Conscience Evaluated

D.M. Mackinnon

rejects

Butler’s

idea that conscience is a capacity.He objects that Butler gives to intuitive judgements of conscience an ultimacy and an authority that they can’t have.Intuitive judgements vary from person to person and need rigorous appraisal

.

Further, an

intuitive conscience

, which is

obeyed unquestioningly

, could be used to

justify

all sorts of acts.

For this reason, the Catholic Church adopts

Aquinas’

position

, which gives

weight

to

conscience

but allows for

error

when

conscience

directs a person to go

against

the

law of God

through

ignorance

.Slide8

Conscience: Nineteenth Century Thought

John Stuart Mill

said that

Conscience

can either be strong or weak and That a strong conscience needs to be developed.“It is not because men’s desires are strong that they act ill, it is because their consciences are weak. There is no natural connection between strong impulses and a weak conscience. The natural connection is the other way.”(J.S. Mill ‘Essay on Liberty’)Slide9

Questions

1 – Tie together the notion of self-respect with that of focusing on others

2 – How can Butler’s view that conscience can never

be

mistaken, explain criminal behaviour?3 – How does God fit into Butler’s conscience?4 – How is conscience that separator between sentient beings?5 – What does it mean to act immorally?6 – How does Butler’s view differ from Aquinas’?7 – What do two A-words do to help explain Butler’s point?8 – What does D.M Mackinnon have to say on the subject?Slide10

Extension and Summary

Ext – When finished take Mill handout

from teacher. How does this challenge Butler’s view?

Plenary – re-do the odd ones out on the mini-whiteboardsNow on the other side, form a sentence for each one