This book focuses on the degree to which certain moral and legal doctrines are rooted in specific passions that are then institutionalised in the form of criminal law. A philosophical analysis is developed of the following questions: when, if ever, should hatred be overcome by sympathy or compassion? What are forgiveness and mercy and to what degree do they require - both conceptually and morally - the overcoming of certain passions and the motivation by other passions? If forgiveness and mercy (...) indeed are moral virtues, what role, if any, should they play in the law? (shrink)

Achilles is vindictive; he wants to get even with Agamemnon. Being so disposed, he sounds rather like many current crime victims who angrily complain that the American system of criminal justice will not allow them the satisfactions they rightfully seek. These victims often feel that their particular injuries are ignored while the system addresses itself to some abstract injury to the state or to the rule of law itself – a focus that appears to result in wrongdoers being treated with (...) much greater solicitation and respect than their victims receive. If the actual victims are noticed at all, they will likely be told that there is another branch of law – tort law – that has the job of dealing with private injuries and grievances and that, if they pursue this route at their own expense, they might ultimately get some financial compensation for the wrongs done to them. However, just as Achilles felt that mere compensation was inadequate to the kind of injury done to him by Agamemnon, many of these victims will often claim that the injuries they have suffered do not admit of financial compensation. How, they might ask, can a dollar value be set on the humiliation and degradation they have experienced? They might also note that those who injure them tend, unlike Agamemnon, to be judgment-proof – so lacking in resources as to be unable to make any meaningful contribution to any compensation package that the victim may win. (shrink)

This book focuses on the degree to which certain moral and legal doctrines are rooted in specific passions that are then institutionalised in the form of criminal law. A philosophical analysis is developed of the following questions: when, if ever, should hatred be overcome by sympathy or compassion? What are forgiveness and mercy and to what degree do they require - both conceptually and morally - the overcoming of certain passions and the motivation by other passions? If forgiveness and mercy (...) indeed are moral virtues, what role, if any, should they play in the law? (shrink)

The problem of justifying legal punishment has been at the heart of legal and social philosophy from the very earliest recorded philosophical texts. However, despite several hundred years of debate, philosophers have not reached agreement about how legal punishment can be morally justified. That is the central issue addressed by the contributors to this volume. All of the essays collected here have been published in the highly respected journal Philosophy & Public Affairs. Taken together, they offer not only significant proposals (...) for improving established theories of punishment and compelling arguments against long-held positions, but also ori-ginal and important answers to the question, "How is punishment to be justified?" Part I of this collection, "Justifications of Punishment," examines how any practice of punishment can be morally justified. Contributors include Jeffrie G. Murphy, Alan H. Goldman, Warren Quinn, C. S. Nino, and Jean Hampton. The papers in Part II, "Problems of Punishment," address more specific issues arising in established theories. The authors are Martha C. Nussbaum, Michael Davis, and A. John Simmons. In the final section, "Capital Punishment," contributors discuss the justifiability of capital punishment, one of the most debated philosophical topics of this century. Essayists include David A. Conway, Jeffrey H. Reiman, Stephen Nathanson, and Ernest van den Haag. (shrink)

Introduction. Murder, some may suggest, is to be defined as the intentional and uncoerced killing of the innocent; and it is true by definition that murder is wrong. Yet wars, particularly modern wars, seem to require the killing of the innocent, e.g. through anti-morale terror bombing. Therefore war must be wrong.

The article is a critical reply to jesse kalin's "a note on singer and kant" ("ethics", 1968). Kalin had argued that kant's categorical imperative entails absurdly counterintuitive consequences--E.G. That it is wrong to punish people. Against kalin, It is argued that such consequences are not entailed by the categorical imperative if it is properly interpreted. A proper interpretation involves, For example, Distinguishing the categorical imperative's function as a criterion for imperfect duties from its function as a criterion for perfect duties.

There are certain recurring objections to Locke's theory of legitimate government and the conception of natural rights on which it is based. These objections generally take the form of showing that most of Locke's claims in the Second Treatise stand largely as ad hoc assertions, defended—if at all—not by philosophical argumentation but by appeals to theology or intuition. These criticisms might be called external criticisms of Locke's theory because they focus, not upon the coherence of the theory or the perplexities (...) which prompted Locke to adopt it, but rather upon the justifications for that theory. Important as these criticisms are to an ultimate evaluation of Locke's success, my purpose here is neither to reiterate them nor to defend Locke against them. Rather I want to develop a purely internal criticism of his view. For I shall argue that upon any acceptable interpretation of at least one of Locke's central natural rights claims, this claim will not be able to perform the crucial task envisioned for it by Locke—namely, provide a key premise for the moral justification for passing from a pre-civil society to a civil society that is responsible to its citizens. (shrink)

Psychologist Sharon Lamb and philosopher Jeffrie Murphy argue that forgiveness has been accepted as a therapeutic strategy without serious, critical examination. Chapters by both psychologists and philosophers ask: Why is forgiveness so popular now? What exactly does it entail? When might it be appropriate for a therapist not to advise forgiveness? When is forgiveness in fact harmful?

Christopher Bennett has introduced a new inquiry into the capital punishment debate by looking at whether the role of executioner is one in which it is possible and proper to take pride. He argues...

Internal and External Questions. The most profound questions in ethics, social philosophy, and the philosophy of law are foundational; i.e., they are questions that call the entire framework of our ordinary evaluations into doubt in order to determine to what degree, if at all, that framework can be rationally defended. Such questions, called “external” by Rudolf Carnap, are currently dominating my own philosophical reflections and are forcing me to rethink a variety of positions I have in the past defended.

This essay is a critique of the two chapters on jealousy in Jerome Neu's book A Tear is an Intellectual Thing. The rival — as anobject of both fear and hatred — is of central importance in romantic jealousy, but it is here argued that the role of the rival cannot be fully understood in Neu's account of jealousy and that shame (not noted by Neu) must be seen as central to the concept of jealousy if the role of the (...) rival is to be fully understood. (shrink)

This article discusses the way in which substantive criminal law is generally taught in United States law schools and argues that more room should be given in these courses to familiarize students with the horrendous nature of much of our criminal law system—in particular the terrible conditions faced by most prison inmates after conviction.

Based on a series of lectures delivered at the University of Virginia in October 1981. Includes bibliographical references and index.

Current economic conditions have coincided with the implementation of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act and forced public health officials to consider how to ethically incorporate compliance into their already strained budgets, while maintaining the integrity and intent of the legislation.As of April 14, 2003, the HIPAA Privacy Rule provides a new federal floor of protections for personal health information. The Privacy Rule establishes standards for the protection of health information held by many physicians’ offices, health plans, and health (...) care clearinghouses. The Rule protects personal health information by establishing conditions regulating the use and disclosure of individually identifiable health information by these entities, also referred to as covered entities. The Rule does not prevent the daily operations of health care establishments. (shrink)

We have all been victims of wrongdoing. Forgiving that wrongdoing is one of the staples of current pop psychology dogma; it is seen as a universal prescription for moral and mental health in the self-help and recovery section of bookstores. At the same time, personal vindictiveness as a rule is seen as irrational and immoral. In many ways, our thinking on these issues is deeply inconsistent; we value forgiveness yet at the same time now use victim-impact statements to argue for (...) harsher penalties for criminals. Do we have a right to hate others for what they have done to us? Providing a nuanced approach to a proper understanding of the place of our strongest emotions in moral, political, and personal life, and using lucid, easily understood prose, this volume is a classic example of philosophical thinking applied to a thorny, everyday problem. (shrink)

As is usually the case, Susan Bandes has written an engaging essay that gives us much to think about.1 Of course I do not agree with her that I have “asked the wrong question” in asking if the voca...

The essays in this collection explore, from philosophical and religious perspectives, a variety of moral emotions and their relationship to punishment and condemnation or to decisions to lessen punishment or condemnation.