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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 .
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.
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.
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 ...
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.
Moral authority has thus also been defined as the "fundamental assumptions that guide our perceptions of the world". [3] An individual or a body of people who are seen as communicators of such principles but which does not have the physical power to enforce them on the unwilling are also spoken of as having or being a moral authority.
The problem of free will has been identified in ancient Greek philosophical literature. The notion of compatibilist free will has been attributed to both Aristotle (4th century BCE) and Epictetus (1st century CE): "it was the fact that nothing hindered us from doing or choosing something that made us have control over them".
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]