12. Criticisms of the idea of the Conscience
- Created by: Alasdair
- Created on: 26-06-17 21:12
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- 12. Criticisms of the idea of the Conscience
- Friedrich Nietzche's (1844-1900)
- Nihilistic views assert that concepts like right or wrong do not exist
- Life is intrinsically about ability of individual to control his or her own life
- Power of will. as Nietzche calls it
- Thus there is no need for the conscience
- Indeed the conscience exists to prevent personal freedom
- It is a barrier to self-realisation
- Bentham's philosophy
- Regards conscience as inhibition when it comes to issue of greatest good of the greatest number
- He argues that hermits, whose conscience has led them to reject wealth and live as paupers, are condemned because they have a misguided idea of pleasure
- Conscience is therefore a product of a false understanding of what pleasure is
- Karl Marx
- Contemporary of Nietzche
- Argued life is about group and not individual
- Saw conscience as part of individualism that emerged historically to preserve wealth and power of capitalist classes
- Conscience is a way of exerting control
- Feudal society, the Church and nobility controlled the thought processes of peasants
- Therefore, conscience is determined obedience to Church's lws
- In more recent times the needs of capitalist economy mean that conscience is grounded today in Protestant work ethic
- Richard Dawkins
- The Selfish Gene
- Human beings are controlled by genes which exist to help human species survive
- Evolutionary process creates morals
- The conscience is simply biological process
- Relativists
- e.g. Richard Rorty
- Maintain that there is no such thing as universal moral values
- Thus the conscience is simply a person's sense of guilt when he or she goes against their own inclinations or that of their group
- Friedrich Nietzche's (1844-1900)
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