Removing the Commons defends a Lockean Left-Libertarian account of the moral conditions in which people may remove, either via use or appropriation, natural resources from the commons. I conclude that self-owning agents may remove natural resources from the commons just so long as they leave others the competitive value of their removal in a way that best affords others an equal opportunity for welfare.

Extant accounts of exploitation typically focus on either an exchange or interaction between persons, or on exploitative systems (i.e., global capitalism). We propose a new account of exploitation that focuses instead on the benefits an exploiter enjoys which are had at the expense of another, the exploited party. This account is developed by considering the benefits enjoyed by consumers (e.g., inexpensive sweatshop-made goods) and the manner in which those benefits are produced (e.g., the loss of dignity suffered by sweatshop workers). (...) On our account, an exploitative relationship need not involve any interaction or exchange between exploiter and exploited. Neither is exploitation a property of systems or institutions. Instead, we argue that a consumer who buys a shirt produced under near slave-like conditions engages in a moral wrong by exploiting the worker who made it even though the two may be far-removed in space and time. (shrink)

We argue that agents have a prima facie moral duty to help other agents fulfill their moral duties; we call this duty moral charity. The duty is an extension of the traditional duty of charity, where an act of charity is one that helps an agent fulfill her needs. The traditional focus of charity has long been limited to material needs, such as money, food, and shelter. We think this is overly restrictive and ignores other important needs. Our needs are (...) a function of our natures, which are biological, psychological, social, and moral. Accordingly, we have correlative needs in each domain given by the requirements of our nature. A moral need, following from our moral nature, is the requirement to fulfill our moral obligations. An act of moral charity aids others in fulfilling their moral obligations when it would be difficult or impossible for them to do so otherwise. The duty of charity that requires us to help the hungry and the homeless also requires that we help others do what they o .. (shrink)

In this paper I examine Thomas Aquinas’s attempt at theodicy (the reconciliation of evil in the world with the existence of an all-powerful, -knowing, and -loving God). Aquinas’s theodicy, utilizing the book of Job, maintains that God uses suffering and fear as a method to encourage us to form a loving relationship with Him. I argue that Aquinas’s theodicy fails because an all-loving God would not utilize suffering and fear as a method by which to encourage us to form a (...) loving relationship with Him. As I argue through example, loving relationships between persons are not underwritten on the foundations of suffering and fear, and as such we have no good reason to think that God would use such methods to form His loving relationships. (shrink)