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6 - Moral Ignorance

from Part II - Problems and Puzzles of Culpability

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 October 2018

Larry Alexander
Affiliation:
University of San Diego
Kimberly Kessler Ferzan
Affiliation:
University of Virginia
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Summary

Our theory of criminal law rests upon one bedrock claim: When an actor knowingly imposes risks on the morally and legally protected interests of others in circumstances that evince his insufficient concern for those interests, he is culpable and deserving of punishment. That claim presupposes that the actor in question is capable of seeing that others’ interests give him a reason to refrain from endangering them. In this chapter we take up considerations that may cast doubt on such a capability, considerations that are independent of the free will/determinism debate and its bearing on moral responsibility. Those considerations are total blindness to moral reasons (psychopathy), blindness to the strength of moral reasons, and misidentification of moral reasons. In the next chapter, we consider blindness to, or to the strength of, one particular kind of moral reason, namely, deontological constraints.
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Reflections on Crime and Culpability
Problems and Puzzles
, pp. 95 - 107
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2018

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