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The main mm of this study was to investigate the prophetic calling of the Church and the role of the state in the moral renewal of the South African community. The method of research followed in this study was to study primary and secondary sources, as well as appropriate biblical teachings and theological principles relevant to this study and to systematize the information therein. The gist of the study was to outline the profile and manifestation of moral decay in South African community and, to define the role of the Church and state towards moral regeneration. What transpired was that due to the profile of moral decay within the South African context, the Church and state should play a critical and positive role towards the renewal of morality in South Africa. In conclusion, the fact that the Church and the state each have a particular role to play as driving agents for moral regeneration of South African was confirmed. It is also important to stress the fact that the State cannot be value free or neutral. The word of God speaks of human governments in two-fold way: in a normative way, and in a descriptive way; telling us what they ought to do and be and what they actually turn out to do and be. Both these elements in God's word are reflected in of the Reformed Confession. Therefore, the modern-day concept of a neutral or secular state can be questioned. / Thesis (M.A. (Ethics))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2008.

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Omnipresent in Western society, the idea of progress is commonly advanced in relation to the development of animal protection law in Great Britain. Essentially, it is argued that the law now recognises that animals are worthy of moral consideration in their own right, that is, that they count or matter morally. From the concept of "animal as object" to that of "animal as person", indeed, the history of Western philosophical thinking bears witness to a progressive acknowledgement of animals (or, at least, of some animals) as full members of the moral community, along with all human beings. However, as political theorist Robert Garner argues in his book Animals, Politics and Morality, public policy is never simply a product of moral principles. Rather, influenced by pressure groups, it is the result of a process based on negotiation and compromise. That being the case, in the present thesis, I ask whether Great Britain has truly been the scene of moral progress through the development of animal protection law and to what extent one may speak of moral progress at all in relation to this area of law. Is animal protection law in Great Britain moving away from the traditional moral position that animals are exclusively means to human ends, thereby granting moral standing and equal moral status to animals The answer to this question lies with identifying the philosophical conception of the relations between humans and animals which is expressed through the body of animal protection law in this country. For animals' moral status within the law ensues directly from it. In the first chapter, following the great influence the position plays in the contemporary debate over our moral treatment of animals, I use Tom Regan's theory of animal rights to assess whether animal protection law in Great Britain reflects a conception of human-animal relations that is consistent with a recognition that animals possess moral rights. In the second chapter, I defend the view that animal protection law in Great Britain does not reflect utilitarianism - a position that has been popularised in animal ethics by moral philosopher Peter Singer. In the third chapter, building on the distinctive features of animal protection law in Great Britain which have emerged from the analysis in Chapters I and II, I contend that the law reflects "group egoism" - a form of consequentialism which falls between ethical egoism and utilitarianism. To be sure, what comes forth as the dominant position underlying animal protection law in Great Britain is that human beings protect animals only to the extent to which benefit is provided to them in return, or, at the very least, to the extent that so doing does not impinge on their interests in animal use. Does this position represent any kind of moral progress In the context of changing human attitudes towards animals and the development of animal protection law, I argue that it does. However, this moral progress carries no recognition that animals are worthy of moral consideration in their own right, that is, that they count or matter morally. Far from doing away with the traditional position that animals are exclusively means to human ends, animal protection law in Great Britain fits in with this way of thinking and grants to animals an instrumental value only.

The purpose of this investigation is to determine the extent and nature of criticism in the plays of Jacinto Benavente. Source material included the writings of such prominent critics of Spanish literature as Walter Starkie, Federico de Onis, Richard Chandler, Kessel Schwartz, Emiliano Diez-Echarri, Jose Franquesa, Federico Sainz de Robles, and Valbuena Prat. Twenty plays which best exemplify Benavente's criticism of society were selected from the dramatist's 172.

Values, legal consciousness and law This thesis deals with legal values and their importance for the decision making of legal subjects. First it introduces a general model of a world, which can be used for any world with consistent effects. From that it deduces what can be considered an individual person and how such individuals behave. Who we consider an individual is dependent on our subjective choice. While choosing a particular individual we can express their relationship to their environment with a certain attitude of thought. If mutually corresponding thought attitudes can be shared by different individuals in such a way that the conveyance of them would correspond to a certain thought of a different individual, we use the term institution. Institutions are not considered to be existing objectively, however they help us interpret objective facts. Institutions include natural and artificial persons, the state and the law. The state emerges in a power struggle, although under the influence of morality. Morality is a type of institution, which is created by an interaction among individuals and through a compromise between their aspirations. This thesis decides for a consequentialist approach to morality, while objections against consequentialism are either refuted or shown to be able to be...

Quite apart from its apparent political obsolescence, the policy of nuclear deterrence is vulnerable to attack for its seemingly obvious immorality. Nuclear war is blatantly immoral, and nuclear deterrenec requires a genuine intention to resort to the nuclear retaliation which would precipitate such a war. Therefore, since it is wrong to intend that which is wrong to do, deterrence is immoral. This thesis seeks to examine the nature of the deterrent intention as a means of verifying the soundness of the above deontological argument. This examination is carried out by first suggesting an acceptable notion of intention in general and then, after analysing the views of deterrent intention by other writers, proceeding to demonstrate the uniqueness of that intention. Having done this, and having explored the possibility that deterrence need not contain a genuine intention to retaliate, the thesis moves on to suggest and defend a moral principle which states that endeavours requiring the formation of an immoral intention may nevertheless be moral. Called the Principle of Double Intention (and based on the Principle of Double Effect), it offers a method for the moral assessment of agents who form immoral intentions within larger contexts. By applying this principle to nuclear deterrence, it is demonstrated that agents who undertake such a policy may be morally justified in doing so, provided certain conditions are met. The thesis closes with a refutation of the objection that an agent cannot rationally form an intention (such as that required in deterrence) which he has no reason to carry out. By highlighting the objection's reliance on a claimed isomorphism between intention and belief, it is shown that the objection, while generally sound, does not apply to the special case of nuclear deterrence. The conclusion suggests a framework for disarmament which results in a deterrent force structure which is both strategically effective and morally acceptable.

Thesis advisor: James A. Russell / Theories in moral psychology propose a link between emotions and moral judgments. This dissertation presents a series of studies examining whether different discrete emotions are each linked to a different discrete moral content. Some of the studies tested a proposal called CAD: an acronym for the theory that contempt is linked to violations in the community domain (C), anger is linked to violations in the autonomy domain (A), and disgust is linked to violations in the divinity domain (D). Other studies further focused on the emotion disgust: Whether acts or issues that remind humans of their animal nature elicit disgust and whether the English concept of disgust refers to a single emotional experience pan-culturally. In most of the studies we recruited participants both from America and from India (N = 3893). The findings challenged any clean mappings between different discrete emotions and different contents of moral violations. Instead, moral violations were associated with a range of negative emotions rather than with a specific one. There was no support for the hypothesis that acts or issues that remind us of our animal nature elicit disgust, and the English concept disgust, as referring to unclean substances and moral violations, is equivalent to similar concepts in two Indian languages. / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2017. / Submitted to: Boston College. Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. / Discipline: Psychology.

Thesis advisor: Jeffrey Bloechl / The genetic enhancement the human genome would be humanity’s most extreme attempt in the quest for hyperagency, and will have negative implications for our sense of humanity. Hyperagency is an extreme over-expression of our own human agency; everything is transparent, subject to our control and manipulation, and in accordance with our own interests. Modern era philosophical theories in subjectivity and agency have developed, evolved, and responded to advancements in science and technology over the past few centuries, and have all contributed to the current shift in understanding of our own humanity, influencing the rise of hyperagency in the postmodern world. The act of manipulating an organism’s genetic material for the purposes of changing and modifying its characteristics is referred to as genetic modification. The term genetic enhancement is more specifically indicative of the process of modifying nonpathological, or non-disease related genes. Genetic enhancement, in the form of germline engineering especially, exhibits a dangerous attitude of hyperagency that will have negative consequences for humanity as a whole. Hyperagency not only disrupts our sense of reverence before mystery and depth but also threatens our sense of morality in relating to the world. If continued, practices in hyperagency such as genetic enhancement will lead us to lose our sense of humanity altogether. / Thesis (BA) — Boston College, 2018. / Submitted to: Boston College. College of Arts and Sciences. / Discipline: Departmental Honors. / Discipline: Philosophy.