conscience

Question 1

what is Newman’s view of conscience ? and How does St. Paul support this view ?

Answer 1

• an immediate inner voice and is effectively God speaking directly to us. This is evidence for the existence of God
• support with St. Paul. ‘Woven into the very fabric of our creation’ . We just know right from wrong.

Question 2

outline Aquinas view with the use of ‘synderesis’, ‘ratio’ and ‘conscientia’

Answer 2

• doesn’t view conscience as the ‘voice of God’, but rather a combination of the natural desire to what what is right, and reason ( both of which are created by God )
• synderesis = the natural inclination to do good and avoid evil. This is part of gods design for human nature
• ratio = reason, which is also part of a human nature designed by God. It is a practical faculty because it not only works out what is the right thing to do, but also what is practical given the circumstances (phronesis)
• this is the intellectual process of combining synderesis with ratio to reach a decision . The end decision.

Question 3

explain Aquinas’ vincible and invincible ignorance

Answer 3

• invincible ignorance = when we make mistakes when our intention was good but we were wrongly informed. These are not sins.
• e.g. a friend who buys a plane ticket as a gift, and then the plan crashes, is not blameworthy.
• vincible ignorant = when we are not properly informed because we fail to use our common sense, or fail to acquaint ourselves with the facts.
• e.g. if a drunken man crashes his car into a minibus then we cannot claim that he is innocent because he knows that drink driving is illegal. Even if he is a foreigner he cannot claim that he didn’t know the laws because he is capable of finding them out

Question 4

two strengths of Aquinas view

Answer 4

• if explains why God might give conflicting messages ( which is possible if we subscribe to Newmans’s view- e.g. why would God tell some Christians to condemn homosexuality, and others that gay marriage is good?)
• If Christins disagree then Aquians view suggests that a least one side has wrongly applied their reason
• it explains how we come to change our minds on moral issues - our reason can be developed through education?

Question 5

3 weaknesses of Aquinas view

Answer 5

• conscience feels more intuitive than Aquinas suggests. Often feel first than apply reason later. More like gut reaction
• Freud suggest that social/ environmental factors affect our moral views and play a part in our reason. What is regarded as rights differs even after we have applied ratio.
• E.g. whether an abortion is permissible after rape might evoke a different response in catholic Ireland than in London
• there is a tension between his idea that conscience can make mistakes but you should always follow your conscience

Question 6

for Freud what is our psychic apparatus

Answer 6

• The ID, EGO and SUPEREGO
• Id = desires and drives. Self centred and pleasure seeking. Our libido ( sex drive) is a part of this. Evident in young children who are fascinated by their sexual organs. Unconscious
• Ego= rational self. Realistic. Mediates between ID and need for social interaction. Unconscious
• Superego = internalised voice of authority figures. When our libido re emerges at puberty it is accompanied by the superego - the internalised, subconscious voices of parents telling us to ignore sexual feelings. Punished ego with guilt. Conscious

Question 7

explain Freud’s links between God and guilt

Answer 7

• in primitive times tribes were dominated by a father figure, and the younger males, frustrated by his dominance, his demand for sexual restraint ( and jealous with his relationship with his mother) rose up to other throw and kill him.
• in time they realised that his dominance was necessary, and so experienced ambivalent feelings towards him
• this made them feel guilt about their own sexual behaviour

Question 8

explain why for freud God is like a father figure

Answer 8

• we have feelings of ambivalence towards him.
• we seem him as sustainer, but also dominated and one who demands sexual restraint.
• When we give way to our natural desires we feel guilt and we pass this guilt onto our own children

Question 9

explain Fromm’s development of Freud’s ideas

Answer 9

• we have an authoritarian conscience
• but through life we also develop a humanistic conscience
• this is a kind of inner voice which questions our own personal integrity
• times when our humanistic conscience should over ride out authoritarian one

Question 10

two strengths of Freud

Answer 10

• sees his ideas on conscience as scientific fact.
• Piaget recognises some truth in his argument. E.g. a heteronomous stage of morality where children were only good because they had been told what was right and wrong. They didn’t question this until they developed an autonomous morality later in life
• Dawkin’s would agree with his rational view of the world and his dismissal of God as an objective truth. Freud was a pioneer and his ideas freed many people from feelings of guilt and oppression

Question 11

three weaknesses of Freud’s view

Answer 11

• links our morality to our upbringing, but this would suggest that we would all have very different moral views. What is right often seems to be shared across all people. Suggest there is a objective moral truth
• his work on the unconscious mind cannot be falsified so his view isn’t really scientific as he claims
• only explains conscience as guilt, does not explain why some people seem driven to stand up against authority, rather than in obedience to it.
• Fromm provides solution to this through humanistic conscience

Question 12

define conscience

Answer 12

peoples inner sense of right and wrong

Question 13

what do discussions about conscience consider

Answer 13

what is is
where it comes from
whether the conscience can be a reliable source of moral knowledge

Question 14

Aquinas did not think that…

Answer 14

conscience was an independent special faculty of power capable of telling people what is right or wrong.

Instead, he thought that the conscience is an aspect of human reason

Question 15

2 similarities between Aquinas and Freud’s ideas on the conscience

Answer 15

• both see it as an individual making moral decisions, rather than the voice of God
• both agree that guilt can be disruptive for humanity

Question 16

differences between Freud and Aquinas views on God

Answer 16

• Aquinas sees that conscience as the activity of God God reason, Freud doesn’t include the idea of God at all in his account of the consciences
• Aquinas understands guilt in terms of feelings of being to blame for moral wrongdoing , whereas Freud sees guilt in terms of internal conflict between different aspects of the personality
• Aquinas understands the conscience as the workings of the human reason when making moral decisions . Freud sees it as working on a more subconscious level
• Aquinas sees wrongdoing in terms of sin, and right and wrong in terms of the will of God. Freud does not have an idea of right and wrong as absolute values, and sees them in terms of the norms of society