role of conscience in making moral decisions - adultery

Question 1

use of conscience as reason (Aquinas)

Answer 1

• for Aquinas, reason dictated adultery was wrong but believes conscience is able to make mistakes
• imagine a man marries a widow & has sex with her but her husband is still alive his conscience cleared him to have sex with her as saw nothing wrong with it but was mistaken
• says while conscience was mistaken there was no intention to do wrong and no fault following conscience in that situation
• lacks knowledge of true facts of case lead conscience to wrong discussion but doesn’t make it wrong for person to follow their conscience

Question 2

use of conscience as acting with agape- love (sacrificial adultery)

Answer 2

• Russian army driving to meet USA & UK come across Mrs Bergmeir foraging food for 3 children & unable to get word to her kids she was taken to a prison camp in Ukraine & her husband taken to POW camp in Wales and when he returned spent weeks finding his kids but where wife was remained mystery. Learnt through sympathetic commander that her family was still searching but could only go home if ill (sent to Soviet hospital) or pregnant (back to Germany) so asked German guard to impregnate her and when verified went home where was welcomed despite means of how she got home

Question 3

use of adultery: conscience as social conditioning

Answer 3

• sociology generally views religions as social phenomenon without passing judgement on reality of God
• Durkheim ours together convincing argument that ‘God’ is a mechanism by which society’s rules are enforced
• conscience is social conditions - sanctions groups brings to bear on individual
• God is a projection of society’s powers as belief in God gives individuals moral obligation to obey society’s demands
• in Durkheim’s view of collective conscience an act is bad if society disapproves adultery of Western cultures is tolerated in a way it never had been before
  -> authority if God has declined as force in collective conscience
• adultery used to be seen as sin against God’s laws but now is reason to terminate marriage contract

Question 4

use of conscience as an aspect of super-ego

Answer 4

• 1980 Freud published Civilisation and it’s discontents where theorised thsy humanity invented civilisation to control its instinctive drives
• to keep them in check, laws made prohibiting murder, rape and adultery
• created a paradox as creating civilisation to protect ourselves from unhappiness it has become greatest source for unhappiness
• preference for civilisation or gratification can make operation of conscience depend on it
• conscience amounts to deep rooted psychological compulsions from incalculable number of sources