Theories of the Conscience
- Created by: Hannah
- Created on: 15-11-13 19:46
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- Conscience
- Newman
- 'I toast the Pope, but I toast conscience first'
- Agreed with Aquinas - conscience is the ability to appreciate and apply moral principles
- However, his approach was more Intuitive - much like Butler
- When someone is following their conscience they are to an extent following a divine law as given by God
- Conscience is God's voice giving us moral direction - conscience is more than a sense of reason
- Conscience detects the truth that already exists You must follow your conscience as it is the divine law
- Guilt is the consequence of not obeying the voice of God
- Freud
- The human psyche is inspired by powerful instinctive desires which have to be satisfied
- Humans create the 'ego', which takes account of the realities of the world and society
- A 'super-ego' internalises and reflects anger and disapproval of others
- A guilty conscience is created which grows into a life and power of its own, irrespective of the rational thought and reflection of the individual
- The mature and healthy conscience is the ego's reflection about the best way of achieving integrity
- The immature conscience (the super-ego) is a mass of feelings of guilt
- The psychological account of conscience is modern, but can undermine both of the previous religious views
- The human psyche is inspired by powerful instinctive desires which have to be satisfied
- Butler
- Conscience is the final moral decision maker
- It distinguishes between approval and disapproval of human action
- Humans are influenced by two basis principles, self-love and benevolence
- Conscience directs us towards benevolence and away from self-love
- 'our natural guide, the guide assigned us by the Author of our nature'
- Aquinas
- Conscience isn't an inner knowledge of right and wrong, but a device or faculty for distinguishing right from wrong actions
- People basically tend to the good and away from evil (the synderesis rule)
- Conscience is 'reason malking right decisions'
- There are two parts to making moral decisions:
- synderesis is right reason, an awareness of the moral principle to do good and avoid evil
- conscientia distinguishes between right and wrong and makes moral decisions
- It is a sin not to follow your conscience
- When people do evil they are following an apparent good - their conscience is mistaken
- Augustine of Hippo
- God was and is the source of all goodness
- all other supposed virtues such as goodness and justice are just aspects of virtue, which is GOD.
- divine love binds all the aspects of virtue to the one virtue which is God?
- The Conscience emerges from this outflow of divine love
- The conscience is God's love poured forth to human beings; it is when God speaks to the individual.
- Since God is perfect love and virtue any divine experience will reveal the inadequacies of being human and also our inability to do anything about it.
- Conscience is more important than the moral teachings of the Church. Some put it greater than the Bible
- Augustine says the conscience cannot be questioned. Many find this hard to accept. Is it Gods voice or self-delusion? ,Contradicts God if person A does something different to person B in the same situation.
- Newman
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