essay on moral freedom

The Interplay of Freedom and Responsibility in Ethical Theory

The relationship between human freedom and moral responsibility is a crucial element in ethical theory. At the heart of this relationship lies a deep and often complex question: can we be held morally accountable for our actions if we are not truly free to make choices? This question brings us into the realm of free will, determinism, and indeterminism. In ethical philosophy, the concept of freedom is not just a casual notion; it forms the foundation for moral responsibility. To explore this interplay, we must understand how freedom, or its absence, influences our ethical obligations and whether our actions can be deemed morally right or wrong in a deterministic or indeterministic world. This blog post will delve into these concepts, examining the ethical implications of free will and its relationship to moral responsibility.

The concept of human freedom
Determinism: The challenge to freedom
Hard determinism vs. soft determinism
Indeterminism: An alternative perspective
The role of agency in indeterminism
The compatibilist position: reconciling freedom and responsibility
The ethical implications of freedom and responsibility
The role of moral luck

The concept of human freedom 🔗

Human freedom, in the context of ethics, refers to the ability to make choices that are not entirely determined by external factors such as biology, environment, or past experiences. It is the capacity to act in a way that aligns with one’s own will or reasoning, rather than being coerced or constrained by forces outside one’s control. Philosophers have long debated whether such freedom truly exists, as some argue that our decisions are influenced by factors beyond our immediate control. Despite these concerns, the belief in human freedom underpins much of moral theory, especially when it comes to assigning moral responsibility.

Determinism: The challenge to freedom 🔗

Determinism is the idea that every event, including human actions, is determined by preceding causes and that free will is an illusion. In a deterministic world, every choice we make is the result of previous events or states of affairs. This would mean that our actions are ultimately the product of factors such as genetics, upbringing, and social conditioning. From a deterministic perspective, moral responsibility could be questioned, because if our actions are predetermined, can we truly be held accountable for them?

One of the central ethical implications of determinism is that it challenges the notion of individual accountability. If human beings are mere links in an unbreakable chain of cause and effect, it seems unjust to praise or blame them for their actions. Critics of determinism argue that if we were not free to choose, we could not be said to be morally responsible for the consequences of our actions. This line of reasoning leads to the concept of moral determinism, which suggests that all moral responsibility would disappear in a deterministic universe.

Hard determinism vs. soft determinism 🔗

There are two major strands within determinism that address the problem of free will and moral responsibility: hard determinism and soft determinism. Hard determinism asserts that free will is incompatible with determinism, and because the universe operates according to deterministic laws, humans cannot be morally responsible for their actions. In contrast, soft determinism, also known as compatibilism, argues that determinism and moral responsibility can coexist. Soft determinists claim that even if our actions are determined by prior causes, we can still be held morally accountable as long as we act according to our desires and rational choices, which are consistent with our nature.

Indeterminism: An alternative perspective 🔗

On the opposite end of the spectrum lies indeterminism, which holds that not all events are determined by previous causes. Indeterminism suggests that some actions or events occur randomly, without a fixed cause. In this view, human actions might not be completely determined by prior states, and individuals may have genuine freedom in making choices. If we are not determined by external factors, the concept of moral responsibility appears to have a stronger footing, because individuals can be seen as the true originators of their actions.

However, indeterminism also brings challenges. If our actions are random or influenced by chance, can they still be said to reflect our true will? Is an action considered morally responsible if it was not the result of a rational choice but rather a random event? Critics argue that indeterminism may fail to provide a satisfying account of moral responsibility because random events are often seen as morally neutral. A truly moral action requires intentionality and rational deliberation, which randomness does not provide.

The role of agency in indeterminism 🔗

While indeterminism offers freedom from determinism, it raises the question of agency. Agency refers to the capacity of an individual to act independently and make choices. Under indeterminism, if actions are not determined by prior causes, human beings may still possess agency, but what kind of agency is this? If the choices are made in an unpredictable, random manner, then it could be argued that the agent does not have genuine control over their actions. This dilemma invites further philosophical inquiry into what true freedom looks like in an indeterministic world.

The compatibilist position: reconciling freedom and responsibility 🔗

The compatibilist position attempts to reconcile the concepts of freedom and moral responsibility within a deterministic framework. According to compatibilists, freedom is not about the ability to choose among alternative possibilities but about being able to act in accordance with one’s desires and rational deliberation. In other words, a person is free if they can act according to their internal motivations and reasoning, even if those motivations themselves are influenced by prior causes.

Compatibilism suggests that moral responsibility does not require absolute freedom from causality but rather the ability to act in accordance with one’s own nature and rational will. If a person is coerced or manipulated, they are not morally responsible because their actions are not the result of their own choices. However, if a person acts according to their own desires and reasoning, even if those desires are influenced by past experiences, they can still be held accountable for their actions. This view attempts to balance the need for freedom with the realities of determinism, offering a way to hold individuals morally responsible in a world that may not be entirely free of causality.

The ethical implications of freedom and responsibility 🔗

The debate between freedom and responsibility raises important ethical questions that affect how we think about issues like punishment, justice, and moral obligation. If moral responsibility is based on the premise of free will, then our legal and ethical systems must account for whether individuals truly have the freedom to choose their actions. For example, if a person commits a crime, should they be punished for it, or should their actions be excused because they were determined by external factors, such as their upbringing or environment?

In modern legal systems, many doctrines, such as the insanity defense, are based on the assumption that individuals who lack the mental capacity to make rational choices are not fully responsible for their actions. This reflects the belief that moral responsibility requires the freedom to make decisions, and without that freedom, moral accountability is undermined. However, it also raises the question of whether we should hold people morally responsible for actions that they may have been destined to commit due to factors beyond their control.

The role of moral luck 🔗

Another important ethical issue related to freedom and responsibility is the concept of moral luck. Moral luck occurs when individuals are judged morally for actions that are influenced by factors outside of their control. For instance, two drivers may drive under the influence of alcohol, but only one causes an accident. Should both drivers be held morally responsible, even if one was luckier than the other? The problem of moral luck further complicates the relationship between freedom and responsibility, as it raises questions about whether individuals can be held accountable for the consequences of their actions if those consequences are influenced by factors beyond their control.

Conclusion 🔗

The interplay between human freedom and moral responsibility is at the core of many ethical theories. While determinism challenges the idea that we are free to choose our actions, indeterminism introduces questions about the nature of agency and choice. Compatibilism offers a middle ground, suggesting that moral responsibility can exist even in a deterministic universe, as long as individuals act in accordance with their desires and rational deliberation. Ultimately, the ethical implications of freedom and responsibility impact how we understand moral conduct, punishment, and justice in society. As we reflect on these ideas, we are left to ask: to what extent are we truly free to make ethical choices? And can we ever truly be responsible for our actions in a world shaped by forces beyond our control?

What do you think? Is moral responsibility possible without free will? How does the concept of determinism challenge the way we view human actions and ethical responsibility?

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Human Will & Freedom and Moral Responsibility Essay

Introduction, views of hobbes, locke, and berkeley regarding human will, works cited.

Many scientists and philosophers who study human nature consider human will a controversial issue in which many different aspects exist. The following philosophers can be attributed to them, namely Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, and Berkeley. Their understanding of the definition of human will is based on the debate as to whether the will free or determined. However, Hobbes’s philosophical view of human will is more balanced.

Before considering the opinion of each philosopher regarding the human will, it will be essential to define this concept. According to Melé and Cantón, “human will refers to the human capacity to actively decide what to do instead of reacting automatically to stimuli” (157). Hobbes’ view is that man is free in that he has the liberty to “do if he will” and “to do what he wills” (Yaldir 269). It is important to note that, according to this philosopher, a person does not have enough freedom to hold his own will. On the other hand, John Locke believes that a person has no freedom regarding human will (Oyekan 64). In his opinion, the individual cannot define his human will, and that free will is only an illusion. The third philosopher, Berkeley, has the opposite view of Locke. He believes that the person has completely free human will (Bowen 119). Berkeley says that a man can choose between his actions, and their will cannot be determined.

From my perspective, the correct view is that of the philosopher Thomas Hobbes. I agree with his view that a person can act according to their will. One can choose between doing something or not, relative to whether he has the will or not to do it. However, at the level of nature and the physical level, the person cannot choose his will. In my opinion, this view is based on the fact that the sense of human identity and human brain development have not reached a stage where one could control one’s own will.

In conclusion, it is worth emphasizing that although there are many views on the notion of human will, some are balanced and close to reality. One such point of view, in my opinion, is the position of Thomas Hobbes. However, the debate about whether the human will is free or determined is long-lasting, as I think much depends on the individual.

Bowen, Brandon. Berkeley on Human Freedom and Moral Responsibility. University of Utah , 2014, pp. 116-123.

Melé, Domènec & Cantón González. “The human will and character.” Palgrave Macmillan, London , 2014, pp. 157-177.

Oyekan, Adeolu. Human Nature and Social Order: A Comparative Critique of Hobbes and Locke . Thought and Practice: A Journal of the Philosophical Association of Kenya (PAK) , Vol.2 No.1, 2010, pp. 59-71.

Yaldir, Hülya . Hobbes and Rousseau on Human Nature. St. Kliment Ohridski University Press, 2016.

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Kant’s Concept of Freedom

Immanuel Kant’s concept of freedom is a fundamental aspect of his moral philosophy. In Kant’s view, freedom is central to the moral agency of rational beings and is essential for the existence of moral responsibility. In this essay, we will explore Kant’s concept of freedom, its relation to reason and morality, and its implications for ethical theory.

Kant begins his exploration of freedom by distinguishing between two types of freedom: empirical freedom and transcendental freedom. Empirical freedom refers to our ability to act according to our desires and inclinations. It is the freedom to choose among alternative courses of action based on our personal preferences. However, Kant argues that empirical freedom is insufficient for moral responsibility. It is merely a conditioned form of freedom, subject to external influences and internal desires.

Transcendental freedom, on the other hand, is the type of freedom that is central to Kant’s moral philosophy. It goes beyond empirical constraints and is rooted in rationality and autonomy. Transcendental freedom is the capacity to act in accordance with reason, independent of any external or internal determinants. It is the freedom to act in accordance with the moral law, which is grounded in rational principles and universal in nature.

For Kant, freedom is intimately tied to reason and rationality. He argues that rational beings possess the capacity to act autonomously, which means that they are self-governing and capable of self-legislation. Autonomy is the ability to give oneself moral laws based on reason, rather than being subject to external laws or inclinations. Through autonomy, rational beings become the authors of their own actions and are capable of acting in accordance with universal moral principles.

Kant’s concept of freedom is closely connected to his moral theory, which is based on the idea of the categorical imperative. The categorical imperative is the supreme principle of morality, and it requires us to act in a way that can be universally applied without contradiction. It is a command of reason that applies to all rational beings, regardless of personal desires or inclinations.

According to Kant, moral actions are those that are performed out of respect for the moral law. When we act in accordance with the categorical imperative, we act autonomously and in alignment with our transcendentally free will. In other words, moral actions are those that are guided by reason and are not influenced by external or internal factors.

Kant argues that freedom and morality are interconnected. Moral actions can only be attributed to beings who possess transcendental freedom, as they are the ones who act in accordance with the moral law. Freedom, in this sense, is the foundation of moral responsibility. Only beings who have the capacity for transcendental freedom can be held accountable for their actions, as they have the ability to act freely and autonomously.

Furthermore, Kant distinguishes between the noumenal and phenomenal realms when discussing freedom. The noumenal realm represents things as they are in themselves, beyond our sensory perception. In this realm, rational beings are free and autonomous. However, in the phenomenal realm, which is the realm of our experience, freedom appears limited due to the influence of external and internal factors. While we may not have direct access to the noumenal realm, Kant argues that we can still recognize the existence of transcendental freedom through practical reason and our moral experiences.

Kant’s concept of freedom has significant implications for ethical theory. His emphasis on the autonomy of rational beings and the universality of moral principles provides a foundation for deontological ethics. Deontological ethics focuses on the inherent rightness or wrongness of actions, independent of their consequences. Kant argues that moral actions are those that are performed out of respect for the moral law, regardless of the outcomes or personal desires.

Kant’s concept of freedom also challenges determinism, the view that all events are causally determined and that freedom is an illusion. While he acknowledges the influence of external and internal factors on our actions in the phenomenal realm, Kant maintains that we possess a transcendental freedom that is independent of deterministic causes. He argues that determinism is incompatible with moral responsibility and the concept of transcendental freedom, as it undermines the capacity of rational beings to act autonomously.

In conclusion, Immanuel Kant’s concept of freedom is central to his moral philosophy. He distinguishes between empirical freedom, which is the ability to act according to personal desires, and transcendental freedom, which is rooted in rationality and autonomy. Transcendental freedom is the capacity to act in accordance with reason and the moral law, independent of external or internal determinants. Freedom is intimately tied to reason and moral responsibility, and moral actions are those that are guided by reason and performed out of respect for the moral law. Kant’s concept of freedom has significant implications for ethical theory, providing a foundation for deontological ethics and challenging determinism.

Morality as Freedom

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Christine M. Korsgaard 2

Part of the book series: International Archives of the History of Ideas / Archives Internationales d’Histoire des Idées ((ARCH,volume 128))

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Kantian ethical philosophy has often been criticized for its dependence on an untenable conception of the freedom of the will. Kant is supposed to have asserted that we are morally responsible for all of our actions because we have free will, and that we have free will because we exist in a noumenal world in which we are uninfluenced by the temptations of desire and inclination. If we existed only in the noumenal world, we would invariably act as the categorical imperative requires, but because we are also phenomenal beings we sometimes go wrong. The view so understood gives rise to several problems. First, the claim that purely noumenal persons would act as the categorical imperative requires may be questioned. It is not obvious why persons uninfluenced by causality should act morally rather than any other way. Secondly, if it can be established that insofar as we are noumena we obey the moral law, then the account of moral imputability becomes unintelligible. If we are only responsible because we are noumena and if insofar as we are noumena we only do what is right, then we cannot be responsible for our evil actions. Or, if we are responsible, it is so radically that no room is left for excuses. For how can we take into account the terrible temptations to which the wrongdoer was subjected, when the choosing noumenon was uninfluenced by those temptations? Finally, the view seems to require an unappealing ontological commitment to the existence of “two worlds,” and to give rise to a variety of puzzles about how what occurs in the one can influence the other.

Elevating though man’s privilege is, of being capable of such an idea as freedom of choice — [those who are accustomed only to physiological explanations] are stirred up by the proud claims of speculative reason, which feels its power so strongly in other fields. They are stirred up just as if they were allies, leagued in defense of the omnipotence of theoretical reason and roused by a general call to arms to resist the idea of freedom of choice and thus at present, and perhaps for a long time to come (though ultimately in vain), to attack the moral concept of freedom and, if possible, render it suspect. Immanuel Kant (TL 6: 378/34–35)

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Autonomy and Objective Moral Constructivism: Rawls Versus Kleingeld & Willaschek

Korsgaard’s moral theory ln the light of kant’s architectonics.

Contemporary Kantian Moral Philosophy

For another treatment of some of these same difficulties, but centered more on Kant’s views in the Critique of Pure Reason , see Henry E. Allison, “Empirical and Intelligible Character in the Critique of Pure Reason ” in this volume.

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The alternative language is used because of the difference in Kant’s own two accounts of what he is doing. I discuss this below. (All citations from the Foundations are taken from Beck’s translation.)

For some important discussions of this question see the following works: H.J. Paton, The Categorical Imperative (1947), Book IV (University of Pennsylvania Press, 1971); W.D. Ross, Kant’s Ethical Theory (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1954); Karl Ameriks, “Kant’s Deduction of Freedom and Morality,” Journal of the History of Philosophy 19 (1981): 53–80; Dieter Henrich, “Die Deduktion des Sittengesetzes,” in Denken im Schatten des Nihilismus, ed. Alexander Schwan (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1975). My own view on the matter is explained in Section 3.

Repr. Indianapolis: Hackett 1981. The appendix, “The Kantian Conception of Free Will [Reprinted with some omissions, from Mind , 1888, Vol. 13, no. 51]” was first attached to the sixth edition in 1901.

John Rawls, A Theory of Justice (Harvard, 1971), p. 5. Rawls is in turn drawing upon H.L. H. Hart, The Concept of Law (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1961), pp. 155–59. Rawls uses the distinction in separating the concept of justice, “a characteristic set of principles for assigning basic rights and duties and for determining… the proper distribution of the benefits and burdens of social cooperation” from conceptions of justice, that is, various substantive accounts of what those principles are.

You may take the belief into account in other ways, like other beliefs. For instance, you may decide to warn your friends that you may do something uncharacteristic today, and that if so they should not be upset, since you are, as we say, “not yourself.”

This is brought out well by Thomas Hill, Jr., in “Kant’s Argument for the Rationality of Moral Conduct,” Pacific Philosophical Quarterly 66 (1985): 3–23 and in “Kant’s Theory of Practical Reason” delivered at the conference Ethics and Its History , May 16–17, 1986, at the University of California at San Diego.

To understand this as a law of nature, rather than as a tautology, we must of course understand a “desire” not merely as something we ascribe to a person on the basis of her actions, but as a psychological phenomenon of some sort. This view of desire is also implied by Kant’s account of desire as an incentive, which I explain below.

More specifically, Kant associates the will’s spontaneity with the fact that it does not exist under temporal conditions and so is uninfluenced by causality, but the important point here is just being uninfluenced — by anything. I discuss the relation between freedom and time in section 6.

World“ ( Welt ) is Kant’s term, and it is in some respects unfortunate, since it has lent credence to the interpretation of the distinction as an ontological dualism. Actually these two worlds are two standpoints, or ways we have of looking at things; as I will argue in the next section, they represent a practical and a theoretical viewpoint. I have continued to use the terminology of two worlds, since it is convenient and suits Kant’s own usage. I would like to thank Onora O’Neill for urging me to be clearer on this point.

The remark is not italicized in Beck’s translation, although it is in the Akademie Textausgabe and the Paton and Abbott translations.

For a different reading than mine of the idea that the intelligible world contains the grounds of the sensible world and its laws, and of why we must conceive ourselves as among those grounds, see Onora O’Neill’s “Agency and Anthropology in Kant’s Groundwork ” in this volume.

That our noumenal choices are in some way the ground of the laws of nature is a possibility that remains open; it is enough for the argument that we do not conceive ourselves as choosing these laws.

In a footnote in “On the Common Saying: ‘This may be True in Theory, but it does not Apply in Practice” Kant speaks directly of the moral incentive as provided by the idea of the highest possible earthly good, as “attainable through his [man’s] collaboration [ Mitwirkung ]” (TP 8: 280n/65n).

For a different and perhaps more sympathetic account of the argument of Foundations III, see Onora O’Neill, “Agency and Anthropology in Kant’s Groundwork ” in this volume, especially section 6.

The view that the idea of the intelligible world plays a motivational role can also be supported by appeal to Kant’s writings on moral education, especially in the Methodologies of the second Critique and The Metaphysical Principles of Virtue (my references here are to the Ellington translation). In both, there is an emphasis on awakening the child to the sublimity of the intelligible existence which freedom reveals.

The Methods of Ethics , p. 516.

The metaphysical conception of the world also provides the ewgulative principles used in the theoretical sphere — but what those do is regulate the practice of science.

In Kantian ethics moral concepts are ideals of practical reason that are imposed on the world, by the command of the moral law, and for practical and moral purposes only. When we praise and blame we are, so to speak, applying the concept of “freedom” to another. The moral law both commands and regulates the application of this concept. I discuss this way of regarding moral concepts in “Two Arguments against Lying, ” Argumentation 2 (1988): 27–49.

I give a fuller explanation of the attitude Kant thinks is required and the moral basis for it in my “The Right to Lie: Kant on Dealing with Evil,” Philosophy and Public Affairs 15 (1986): 325–349.

In these respects Kant’s views stand in sharp contrast to the British Sentimentalists whom he admired: Hutcheson, Hume, and Adam Smith. All developed their ethical theories from the point of view of the spectator of the moral conduct of others, and took approbation and disapprobation as the central concepts of ethics, from which the other concepts of moral thought are developed. Hutcheson and Hume believe that the best moral agent is not thinking about morality at all, but acting from admirable natural affections. Smith comes closer to an agent-centered theory, for he takes the agent to act from specifically moral thoughts, but they are generated from an internal spectator .

The mysterious-sounding parenthetical phrase is “ welche Eigenschaft desselben ihn zum Gegenstande der Erfahrung macht .” I take the point to be to equate sensibility and the need for an end.

In the Introduction to the Metaphysics of Morals , the faculty of desire is “the capacity to be by means of one’s representations the cause of the objects of these representations” and the capacity to act in accordance with representations is identified as “life.” (6:211/9)

It might seem to be a problem that the Highest Good is supposed to be conceived as a divine end. How can God have an end if that is a need of sensibility? Kant explains: “For while the divinity has no subjective need of any external object, it cannot be conceived as closed up within itself, but only as compelled by the very awareness of its own all-sufficiency to produce the highest good outside itself. In the case of the supreme being, this necessity (which corresponds to duty in man) can be envisaged by us only as a moral need” (TP 8: 280n/65n).

The question of the relation between the two distinctions, perfect/imperfect, and broad/strict, is a very difficult one. These have sometimes been thought to be simply alternative terms for the same distinction, but Kant explicitly asserts that all duties of virtue are of broad obligation, while mentioning many that are perfect. He does not explain himself, and his own use of the terms does not provide clear guidance. Two important discussions of this problem are in Mary Gregor, The Laws of Freedom: A Study of Kant’s Method of Applying the Categorical Imperative in the Metaphysik der Sitten (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1963), pp. 95–127, and in Onora (O’Neill) Nell, Acting on Principle: An Essay on Kantian Ethics (New York: Columbia University Press, 1975), pp. 43–58. The main justification I have to offer for the way I use these terms in the text is that they enable me to make the explanation that follows.

In one sense I may still claim to have her happiness as my end. I may hold an end merely negatively, as something I will endeavor not to act against. The Formula of Humanity says that we must never use another merely as a means, and Kant says in the Foundations that humanity is conceived negatively, as “that which must never be acted against” (4:437/56). But Kant makes it clear that virtue is going to require a more positive pursuit of the end. He says: “It is not enough that he is not authorized to use either himself or others merely as means (this latter including also the case of his being indifferent to others)” (TL 6:395/54).

See also this passage from the Religion: “we may also think of this endless progress of our goodness towards conformity to the law, even if this progress is conceived in terms of actual deeds, or life-conduct, as being judged by Him who knows the heart, through a purely intellectual intuition, as a completed whole, because of the disposition , supersensible in its nature, from which this progress itself is derived” (6:6768/60–61); and from the Critique of Practical Reason : “Only endless progress from lower to higher stages of moral perfection is possible to a rational but finite being. The Infinite Being, to whom the temporal condition is nothing, sees in this series, which is for us without end, a whole conformable to the moral law” (5: 123/127). This is why Kant thinks that ethics leads to a view of the “immortality” of the soul, which gives us a prospect of an endless progress toward the better. Only an endless progress is adequate to the achievement of freedom, and to wiping out the original evil in our nature (Rel. 6:72/66; KpV 5: 122–24/126–28).

This is not guaranteed. The Foundations contains a well-known discussion of the worth of a man who is helpful although “by temperament cold and indifferent to the sufferings of others, perhaps because he is provided with special gifts of patience and fortitude” (4: 398/14–15), which shows that Kant thinks moral worth may be combined with a recalcitrant temperament. The discussion has unfortunately often been taken to suggest that Kant thinks moral worth must be combined with a recalcitrant temperament.

Kant’s theory of free will is sometimes described as “compatibilist” because both freedom and determinism are affirmed. This description seems to me to be potentially misleading. Most compatibilists, I believe, want to assert both freedom and determinism (or, both responsibility and determinism) from the same point of view — a theoretical and explanatory point of view. Kant does not do this, and could not do it without something his view forbids — describing the relation between the noumenal and phenomenal worlds.

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Korsgaard, C.M. (1989). Morality as Freedom. In: Yovel, Y. (eds) Kant’s Practical Philosophy Reconsidered. International Archives of the History of Ideas / Archives Internationales d’Histoire des Idées, vol 128. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-2016-8_2

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An Essay on Morality, Ethics, and Freedom Are they negotiable

Within human behavioral culture and societal norms is a sense of acceptable morality and ethics. In those same cognitive functions of perception and reaction is our sense of freedom. This essay postulates that mortality, Ethics and Freedom are a fluidic state within human culture and societal norms.

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Contemporary research in the fields of moral psychology and cognitive philosophy has provided considerable data supporting the claim that there are important similarities in the ways in which different people conceive of morality and produce moral judgments. However, one of the more pressing questions is how to account for the fact that, despite these similarities, moral judgments appear to be highly variable both on a cultural and individual level. This paper addresses this issue by developing a model which is inverted with respect to the one usually embraced by the cognitive literature on morality. Instead of analyzing the problem of moral judgment starting from all the actions that are considered impermissible, this work assumes that people first judge which actions are morally permissible. Permissibility is interpreted in terms of what each subject feels he/she must be free to do. The advantage of this inversion is that it allows us to make a connection between two lines of research that are usually considered unrelated: research on the processes underlying the production of moral judgments and research on the problem of determining how people understand 'freedom'. Regarding this latter issue, the article focusses specifically on George Lakoff's cognitive analysis of how humans develop their concepts of freedom. The starting point of Lakoff's analysis is that different groups and different individuals do not have the same understanding of 'freedom', even though everybody shares the common empirical core concept. Lakoff puts forward a model which aims to explain both the common cognitive ground of the various concepts of freedom and how these concepts depending on other cognitive elements connected to them. In this work we try to show that Lakoff's model can provide an explanation of moral judgment that accounts for both the cross-cultural and trans-individual similarities and the cultural, individual and situational differences.

Matter of Breath, Foudations for Professional Ethics, Peeters, Leuven, 2000.

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A REFLECTION ON ETHICS AND MORALS (Atena Editora), 2022

Ethics is a factor that governs the behavior of good people and that contributes to the evolution of a society because it aims at the common good; This way, it brings benefits to societies in which people base their behavior on it. It induces a person to behave in a straight line that helps to overcome the influence of emotional factors, which interfere with decision-making and individual and group performance, it also prevents that person from practicing acts contrary to practices aimed at the common good in a society. Morality can be conceptualized as the set of principles, norms or rules of behavior considered correct by a whole society, at a given time, being the result of its historical-social evolution. Globalization is based on the integration of markets and the deepening of transactions due to the great ease of communications. Economic barriers were being deactivated and the interdependence of markets intensified between economic blocks and between companies from different countries. Currently, groups of globalists are acting strongly to destroy ethical and moral values that are some of the most important pillars of societies in all countries.

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From Plato to MacIntyre, my edited collection surveys the history of Western moral philosophy by guiding students new to the subject through the work and ideas of the field's most important figures. With entries written by leading contemporary scholars, the book covers such thinkers as: Plato [by myself]; Aristotle; Thomas Aquinas; David Hume; Immanuel Kant; J.S. Mill ; Friedrich Nietzsche; The book explores the contributions of each thinker individually, while also building a picture of how ethical thought has developed through their interactions. The book includes guides to the latest further reading on each thinker.

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