Conscience Flashcards
Conscience definition for Aquinas?
Conscience is an act of rational thought, conscience can be explained religiously.
Conscience definition for Freud?
Conscience is a synonym for guilt, conscience can be explained psychologically.
Two SPEC scholars needed to apply to Conscience?
Aquinas & Freud
How does Aquinas’ view of conscience differ to traditional religious views of conscience?
Aquinas view is unique, unlike other theological approaches, he does not directly link the conscience to God. The conscience is linked to God indirectly through our rationality - a tool that God has given to us to ensure that we can make moral judgements
& achieve our purpose.
Ratio definition
Reason, placed in every person as a result of being created in the image of God
Synderesis definition
Inner principle directing a person towards good and away from evil
Conscientia definition
A person’s reason making moral judgements
Vincible ignorance definition
Lack of knowledge for which a person is responsible
Invincible ignorance definition
Lack of knowledge for which a person is not responsible
What is a Real good?
An action which is actually good and consistent with the moral principles of natural law.
What is an Apparent good?
An action which someone mistakenly thinks is a real good, but they have not reasoned correctly
Phronesis definition?
Practical wisdom
Why may an individual be invincibly ignorant?
May be insane, mentally ill, or a child too young to apply their reason
and know right from wrong
Those who, through no fault of their own, are unable to access Jesus’ message in the Gospels (e.g. lived before Jesus or live in religious persecution, censored from society)
Aquinas’ example to illustrate invincible ignorance
Highly implausible (unlikely) example.
If a man were to sleep with someone other than his wife but whom he mistakenly believes is his wife & she is willing, then this is not something that he should be held morally responsible for.
Where does guilt come from for Freud?
Guilt (Conscience) comes from conflict between our superego & the Oedipus Complex
When does the Oedipus Complex develop?
Phallic Stage (3-6 years)
Libido definition?
A term used in psychoanalytic theory to describe the energy created by the survival and
sexual instincts. According to Sigmund Freud, the libido is part of the id and is the driving force of all behaviour.
Umbrella term definition?
An umbrella term is a word or phrase that covers a wide range of concepts belonging to a common category
Erich Fromm’s two consciences
Authoritarian conscience which gives us a sense of wellbeing and security, whereas others (such as those living in Nazi Germany) have a bad authoritarian conscience
where fear of punishment overrides all other feelings.
Humanistic
conscience - a higher, more developed conscience that does not look to authority figures for guidance but, trusts our own inner voice.
Umbrella term views of conscience?
Genetic predisposition-evolutionary explanations of the phenomenon. Like FREUD, this view rejects the idea that conscience is a real ‘thing’ as such; moral
thinking and attitudes simply evolved.
Dawkins argues that there is a genetic explanation for morality & evolution has
given us a moral sense, he put forward-altruistic gene (a moral gene) which has developed through the need to co-operate with fellow humans in order to ensure self-preservation. Over millions of years, we have developed an innate ‘lust to be nice’.
His observation is that animals typically display reciprocal altruism (essentially they
help each other with the expectation that the favour will be returned), whereas
humans also display non-reciprocal altruism (we help others without the
expectation of receiving anything in return – e.g. risking our own life to save
someone else from drowning).
Dawkins explains that this desire to sacrifice self for strangers is simply a ‘misfiring
of our selfish gene’ - the part of our nature that ensures our personal survival.
