Conscience and Other Virtues : : From Bonaventure to MacIntyre / / Douglas C. Langston.

• Superior document: Title is part of eBook package: De Gruyter Penn State University Press Complete eBook-Package Pre-2014
• VerfasserIn: Langston, Douglas C.,
• Place / Publishing House: University Park, PA : : Penn State University Press, , [2021]; ©2001
• Year of Publication: 2021
• Language: English
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (200 p.)

Conscience, once a core concept for ethics, has mostly disappeared from modern moral theory. In this book Douglas Langston traces its intellectual history to account for its neglect while arguing for its still vital importance, if correctly understood.In medieval times, Langston shows in Part I, the notions of ";conscientia"; and ";synderesis"; from which our contemporary concept of conscience derives were closely connected to Greek ideas about the virtues and practical reason, although in Christianized form. As modified by Luther, Butler, and Kant, however, conscience later came to be regarded as a faculty like will and intellect, and when faculty psychology fell into disrepute, so did the role of conscience in moral philosophy.A view of mature conscience that sees it as relational, with cognitive, emotional, and conative dimensions, can survive the criticisms of conscience as faculty. In Part II, through discussions of Freud, Ryle, and other modern thinkers, Langston proceeds to reconstruct conscience as a viable philosophical concept.Finally, in Part III, this better grounded concept is connected with the modern revival of virtue ethics, and Langston shows how crucial conscience is to a theory of virtue because it is fundamental to the training of any morally good person.

Table of Contents

Frontmatter -- Contents -- Acknowledgments -- Introduction -- PART I: HISTORICAL BACKGROUND -- 1 Classical Background to Discussions of Conscience -- 2 Bonaventure's View of Conscience and Synderesis -- 3 Aquinas on Conscience, the Virtues, and Weakness of Will -- 4 Scotus and Ockham on Synderesis and Conscience -- 5 Luther and the Rise of Conscience as a Faculty -- PART II: THE CONTEMPORARY DISMISSAL OF CONSCIENCE -- 6 Freud and Ryle on Conscience -- 7 Conscience as Something Other Than a Faculty -- 8 More Traditional Views of Conscience -- 9 The Existence of Conscience -- PART III: CONSCIENCE AS A KEY TO VIRTUE ETHICS -- 10 Conscience Among the Virtue Ethicists -- 11 Conscience and Virtue Ethics -- 12 Conscience and Other Virtues -- Appendix: Macintyre's Project -- Bibliography -- Index