Moral responsibility

I had a very memorable conversation with him on the particular question of responsibility, which I will here give.

The mistake, I said to him, of human moralists seemed to me to be that they treat all men as more or less equal in the matter of moral responsibility.

How often, I added, have I heard a school preacher tell boys that they could not all be athletic or clever or popular, but that high principle and moral courage were things within the reach of all.

Whereas the more that I studied human nature, the more did the power of surveying and judging one's own moral progress, and the power of enforcing and executing the dictates of the conscience, seem to me faculties, like other faculties.

I don't think that's right.

is there a moral responsibility to follow treatment instructions that's a debate that we have to have but on the side of no there isn't a moral responsibility i would point to the fact that maybe the most common symptom of schizophrenia is a almost neurological if not entirely neurological inability to have insight into yourself having a disease the disease process of psychosis itself probably inherently interferes with your ability to apprehend reality.

And then the ability to apprehend the reality of one's own illness is even harder when that illness has to do with our own minds.

You can see this even outside of the psychotic disorders.

I had a very memorable conversation with him on the particular question of responsibility, which I will here give.

The mistake, I said to him, of human moralists seemed to me to be that they treat all men as more or less equal in the matter of moral responsibility.

How often, I added, have I heard a school preacher tell boys that they could not all be athletic or clever or popular, but that high principle and moral courage were things within the reach of all.

Whereas the more that I studied human nature, the more did the power of surveying and judging one's own moral progress, and the power of enforcing and executing the dictates of the conscience, seem to me faculties, like other faculties.

Stay tuned for that.

i have no notices as such this week so what i'm going to do is i'm just going to crack on with it now i'm going to pray say the lord's prayer and i'm going to do our bible reading which i've just selected from this sunday's this coming sunday's um reading which is the 14th sunday after trinity in the church of england and i'll say a couple of things about that then i'll get to talking about the main issue on the episode so let's pray our father which art in heaven hallowed be thy name thy kingdom come thy will be done in earth as it is in heaven give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive them that trespass against us lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil amen so today interesting passage in the gospel Matthew chapter 18 and beginning at verse 15 Jesus said if your brother sins against you go and tell him his fault between you and him alone if he listens to you you have gained your brother but if he does not listen take one or two others along with you that every charge may be established by the evidence of two or three witnesses if he refuses to listen to them tell it to the church And if he refuses to listen even to the church, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector.

Truly I say to you, whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.

Again I say to you, if two of you agree on earth about anything they ask, it will be done for them by my Father in heaven.

For where two or three are gathered in my name, there I am amongst them.

Now, one of the things I find very interesting about this passage is And about the Christian view of things in general is the emphasis on personal and individual responsibility, that we are each given a moral sense of things and we are each called to act in accordance with it.

And this is true if you read the New Testament.

I saw a tweet this morning from somebody I actually respect.

I'm not saying that one should necessarily go back to that particular discourse, but I do think what has replaced the discourse of Jewish sinfulness is also very problematic, which is this notion of kind of inherent victimhood, that you're kind of chosen by God to be a victim.

And there's a reluctance to kind of look inward and think about Jewish moral responsibility in this story of victimhood.

Right, right.

So for me, reading the book, these critiques land pretty hard.

Yeah.

And yet, well, I sort of have a bunch of theories as to why, but what we've been seeing over the last couple of weeks is basically like, close to uniform defense of her by sort of middle class women like it the the women who are not defending her are few and far between i've seen very few other than perhaps a couple of girlfriends that i i have in a group chat like um it just seems to be yeah pretty pretty widely spread um kind of engagement with the notion that she's innocent either in terms of conspiracy theories suggesting that she didn't even in fact kill the kids despite the fact that she's conceded that in her pleading or you're also seeing women sort of uh acknowledging that she killed them but then also just completely negating any moral responsibility on her part uh with this postpartum psychosis explanation.

Yeah.

And I don't know what, you know, postpartum, the third child was born in May of 2022.

It implies that a stronger motive than the simple goodness of the action is required to make a moral agent feel his obligation, and that self-interest is the strongest motive which can be brought to bear upon him.

Only unfortunately, when it is brought to bear upon him, it is not The motive of moral obligation.

Between that motive and the consideration of self-interest, there is a world of difference.

The thing chiefly important to notice in this connection is that this is no accidental flaw in Hume's theory or in any theory of the kind.

Why don't you point fingers at the leaders of Hamas who don't have to take, if you're saying Israel facilitated the growth of Hamas instead of the PLO, which remember was sending people into Israel, peaceful Israel, Again, to blow up civilians, you can point fingers at leaders, but you're leaving the fundamentalist Islamist leadership in Gaza who would rather murder Jews and Israelis and non-Jews, because a lot of non-Jews died on October 7th, innocent people, rather than build up their own country.

And to me, that is hideously racist because you are absolving these Islamist fanatics Of any moral responsibility.

Well, that's because I'm getting Guattari money.

Hold on.

And you're saying it's Jews, it's the Jews, it's the Jews.

And in this case, it is the Islamist terrorists.

And you need to place the moral responsibility where it lies.

Okay, well, you've gone for about three or four minutes here.

Indeed, almost every page of the Word of God contains some warning or invitation to sinners, and all these to considerate mind must unquestionably be proofs of our present position.

It has been the more necessary not to leave unnoticed the objection which we have been now refuting, because where not admitted to such an unqualified extent as altogether to take away the moral responsibility of man, and when not avowed in the daring language in which it has been above stated, it may frequently be observed to exist in an inferior degree, and often when not distinctly formed into shape it lurks in secret diffusing a general cloud of doubt or unbelief, or lowering our standard of right, or whispering fallacious comfort, and producing a ruinous tranquility.

Not to anticipate what will more properly come under discussion when we consider the nature and strictness of practical Christianity.

Let us here, however, remark that though the Holy Scriptures so clearly state the natural corruption and weakness of man, yet they never in the most minute degree countenance, but throughout directly oppose the supposition to which we are often too forward to listen, and this corruption and weakness will be admitted as lowering the demands of divine justice, and in some sort palatating our transgressions of the laws of God.