Natural Law

Question 1

Aristotle

Answer 1

Everything in life has a telos and are driven towards this
reason is used to descover telos
eudemonia occurs when we live virtueously

Question 2

Aquinas

Answer 2

christianised natural law
god given telos and god given moral code (natural law) to discover this telos
primary precepts as ethical guidelines
real and apparant goods
if actions allign with telos - union with god will occur

Question 3

John Finnis

Answer 3

7 basic goods
humans use practical reason for ethical decisions
laws should promote the universal goods

Question 4

Bernard Hoose

Answer 4

following natural law is valid if and action causes a greater balance of ontic good compared to ontic evil - morally justified - gives double effectv more flexibility

Question 5

Hugo Grotius

Answer 5

morality exists seperately to god
human nature has an inclination towards peace

Question 6

Rosseau

Answer 6

humans are born with natural instincts but society can corrupt them

Question 7

Satre

Answer 7

humans create their own meaning rather than they are given a universal telos

Question 8

Nielson

Answer 8

cultural relativism - cantv be one universal telos or form of human nature due to different cultures
moral values differ within cultures so there is not one ‘singular’ morality

Question 9

What are the points to debate that Natural law is outdated

Answer 9

1. having extra-marrital sex was a death sentence because single mothers struggled to survive and reproduction was needed due to the amount of babies that died - same principle applies to homosexuality
2. 60-70 times the murder rate in aquinas’ time
3. socio-economic conditions no longer apply
4. aquinas theory of the primary precepts that he descovered through ‘reason’ was actually just acknologing what was good for people in his time period and socio-economic condition

Question 10

What is modern science’s rejection of the ‘telos’

Answer 10

Francis Bacon says the concept of ‘telos’ is unscientific modern science view is that the universe is just composed of atoms in fields of force and there is no space in scientific understanding for ‘telos’ to exist
Physicist sean carrol says that purpose is not built into the ‘architecture’ of the universe
evolution can be explained for moral behvaiors such as empathy in herd species - dawkins

Question 11

Psycologists Freud and Skinner Criticism of natural Law

Answer 11

Culture and social conditioning is a better explanation of what develops our moral compass that ‘telos’

Question 12

What is Fletchers criticism of natural law

Answer 12

Cross cultural-moral variation
if we all had the gift of reason to descover the primary precepts to guide us twoards telos then there would be much more moral agreement in the world

Question 13

Barths crticism of natural law

Answer 13

‘the finite has no capacity for the infinite’ - natural law has a dangerous overeliance on human reason
reason is unreliable so should not be used and therefore we could be worshipping the wrong thing
we should solely rely on sola scriptura

Question 14

What is JP2’s criticism on Hoose’s proportionalism

Answer 14

true telos is to follow God not to secure happiness, following Gods law is more important than enabling flourishing
the point of natural law is our intentional allignment with God’s moral law. That is our Telos