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In philosophy, moral responsibility is the status of morally deserving praise, blame, reward, or punishment for an act or omission in accordance with one's moral obligations. [ 1 ] [ 2 ] Deciding what (if anything) counts as "morally obligatory" is a principal concern of ethics .
Moral character or character (derived from charaktêr) is an analysis of an individual's steady moral qualities. The concept of character can express a variety of attributes, including the presence or lack of virtues such as empathy , courage , fortitude , honesty , and loyalty , or of good behaviors or habits ; these attributes are also a part ...
It states that an action can only be moral if it is motivated by a sense of duty, and its maxim may be rationally willed a universal, objective law. Central to Kant's theory of the moral law is the categorical imperative. Kant formulated the categorical imperative in various ways.
Many laws create a paradox by placing the burden of proof of good moral character on the applicant while such a proof, but not the law, necessitates that the evaluators assess the beliefs and values of the applicant. [12] Good moral character is the opposite of moral turpitude, another legal concept in the United States used in similar instances.
Given the notion of equating moral responsibility with voluntary action, however, moral luck leads to counterintuitive solutions. This is illustrated by an example of a traffic accident. Driver A, in a moment of inattention, runs a red light as a child is crossing the street. Driver A tries to avoid hitting the child but fails and the child dies.
Legal moralism is the theory of jurisprudence and the philosophy of law which holds that laws may be used to prohibit or require behavior based on society's collective judgment of whether it is moral. It is often given as an alternative to legal liberalism, which holds that laws may only be used to the extent that they promote liberty. [1]
Moral agency is an individual's ability to make moral choices based on some notion of right and wrong and to be held accountable for these actions. [1] A moral agent is "a being who is capable of acting with reference to right and wrong." [2]
Frankfurt's examples are significant because they suggest an alternative way to defend the compatibility of moral responsibility and determinism, in particular by rejecting the first premise of the argument. According to this view, responsibility is compatible with determinism because responsibility does not require the freedom to do otherwise.