فهرست مطالب hossein atrak

The subject of this research is to examine the nature of ꜥUjb and Takabbur (Arrogance) from Ghazali's point of view. Ghazali defines ꜥUjb as valuing a blessing and being pleased with it by forgetting God's blessings or valuing any kind of benevolence to others. By proposing the concept of "Idalal", he emphasizes its separation from ꜥUjb. Idalal, which is the equivalent of being proud of one's actions, is praising one's good deeds, especially worship, and expecting a reward from God. "Kibr" is considering oneself superior to others because of the quality of perfection that he has. "Kibr" is a moral and emotional attribute. "Takabbur" is the practical crystallization of arrogance and behavior that shows self-conceit and superiority of a person over others. Contrary to the concept of ꜥUjb, in which self-conceit is not compared to another. There are different types of ꜥUjb and Takabbur. ꜥUjb is sometimes for voluntary actions such as worship, fighting, charity, etc., and sometimes for involuntary affairs, such as beauty, physical strength, lineage, etc. Takabbur is sometimes in front of God and sometimes in front of prophets and other people. These moral vices are followed by many disasters including: forgetfulness of sin, pride, laxity in acquiring good deeds.

This research endeavors to introduce a novel concept in ethics, namely ethics based on the primacy of existence, drawing upon Aṣālat al-wujūd, the theory of the primacy of existence in ontology. Mullā Sadrā's philosophy, which has three basic tenets—the primacy of existence, substantial motion (Ḥarakat-i Juharī), and gradation in existence (Tashkīk-i wujūd)—is the basis for this doctrine. The primacy of existence holds that quiddity is a mental construct and that existence is fundamental. The writers distinguished between two conceptions of ethics in this regard: one based on existence and the other on quiddity. Human quiddity is fixed and does not grade, hence ethics based on quiddity's primacy will always be fixed and the same for every individual. Moral obligations are universal and shared by all individuals. On the other hand, moral obligations for humans might vary depending on their existential status, according to ethics grounded in the primacy of existence. Moral oughts and ought nots are established by human existential grades in this ethics. This ethical model is flexible and dynamic.

The present article investigates the signification of miracle to the prophet’s prophethood from the rational and logical viewpoints in the context of Islamic theology. After proving the necessity of the prophethood with the help of the ‘Rule of Grace’, most of the Islamic theologians consider miracle as the main reason for affirming the claim of someone who claims God has called him to prophethood. Most of theologians maintain that miracle is enough evidence for affirming such a claim, but a few of them criticize this idea. That the miracle rationally signifies the prophethood, and being called by God as a messenger can be stated in two ways. One is that the mere issuing of a miracle by the claimant to prophethood can rationally and logically affirm his prophethood. The other is that by adding some introductory items to the miracle and compiling an authentic logical deduction, one can affirm someone’s claim to prophethood. It seems that both explanations are defective. The deficiency of the first explanation is that the miracle in itself has no logical signification to prophethood and affirmation of the claimant. At most, it shows the agent’s power to perform extraordinary actions, not more. The second explanation is faced with numerous critiques such as vicious circle in argument, deficiency in attributing miracle to God, simultaneous fallacy, deficiency in being miracle as a sign of prophethood, non-homogeneity of reason and claim, the drawback of miracle’s being extraordinary, criticizing the premises of the argument, and the prophethood’s no need for miracle. Finally, the result of the present study is that miracle has no rational signification for prophethood, and prophethood and guiding the human beings do not necessarily require miracle.

The present study investigates Mullā Ṣadrā’s strategies for treating death anxiety and its philosophical foundations. It also aims to suggest some philosophical and ontological strategies to decrease modern Man’s anxiety when thinking about death based on some of Mullā Ṣadrā’s philosophical principles, such as the principiality of existence, the union of the intellect with intelligible, the trans-substantial motion, theism, religiosity, and believing in the Hereafter. According to Sadrian philosophy, Man’s life is meaningful and purposeful, and being has been created based on divine emanation. The human soul is corporeally-originated; however, its essence changes because of its union with the intelligible and its own trans-substantial motion and attains higher levels of being though going through different existential grades. This developmental move continues until reaching the origin of being and does not end with death. It also grants meaning to Man’s life and decreases their death anxiety. Mullā Ṣadrā is an existential philosopher who advocates a supernaturalist, theistic, and procedural approach to death. The reality of death in Mullā Ṣadrā’s philosophy is a part of Man’s process of existential development. Some of the strategies that can be inferred from his philosophy to reduce death anxiety include following a teleological approach to the world, being’s view of God as pure connection, believing in the Hereafter and Man’s resurrection after corporeal death, advocating ontological evolution, and having a developmental view of death.

Divine Conceptualism is a solution to the problem that Platonism poses for theism. This view is put forward by Alvin Plantinga and Greg Welty, two contemporary American philosophers, argues for a Platonic realism about propositions, possible worlds, and mathematical abstract objects; That is, although it considers these abstract objects to exist, it considers them to be concrete and not abstract, and in order to reconcile with theism, it considers these objects as the thoughts of God. Craig, a contemporary American theist philosopher, argues that this view can not be considered a sutible solution; Because it is not acceptable to consider abstracts as mathematical objects as concrete; In addition, conceptualism has difficulty in justifying false propositions. Conceptualism also requires God's attribution to malicious thoughts, and in Welty's interpretation of conceptualism, the challenge of Platonism remains. Examining what has been done, it seems that some of Craig's objections to Welty and Plantinga's view of conceptualism are true. More serious objections of conceptualism can also be introduced into Welty and Plantinga's views. Plantinga and Welty have neglected intuitive(direct) Knowledge and reduced God's knowledge to acquired(indirect) knowledge; For if the knowledge of God is to be regarded intuitively, while at the same time realizing the realities of mathematics, propositions, and possible worlds, these objects are simply present in the existence of God; Not in the sense of separate concepts.

Contemporary Platonists acknowledge that some abstract objects, such as mathematical objects, exist necessarily, eternally and independent. On the other hand, biblical theism and classical theism acknowledge that God is the sole ultimate reality. This is the challenge that Platonism has posed to the theology of the Scriptures and classical theology, as a result of which God is not the only independent, necessary, and uncreated reality. William Craig, a contemporary American theist philosopher, believes that theism is undone by Platonism. Thus a theist cannot hold a Platonic realist view of abstract objects; And believes that abstract objects exist and are also uncreated, necessary and eternal. Craig believes that believing in beings with these qualities is incompatible with God's perfection, and the doctrine of creation. Craig cites some biblical verses to prove his view of the incompatibility of Heavyweight Platonism with traditional Christian theism. He believes that by moving from a realistic to an  Anti-realistic view of abstract objects, the above challenge will be solved. Craig's arguments do not seem to be defensible in view of wisdom rudiments   in the science of Asul (the science of principles) And the use and generalizations of the creation from the verses cited by him is not correct. In the end, Craig's main claim of passing from the Platonic realism to the view of anti-realism seems perfectly justified, although his method does not seem correct.

Swinburne, a contemporary philosopher of religion, is a thinker who defends the existence of God against atheists. The question of this article is, "What reading of theism does Swinburne draw?" And is this view of theism a proper view of God? Considering the examination of the problem of evil, and the most challenging attributes of God from Swinburne's point of view, he can be introduced as a moderated classical theist; Because he explains the most important attributes accepted in classical theism with a different interpretation. He denies eternal eternity. It also denies maximal immutability and suggests minimal immutability. Regarding absolute science, he offers a more adjusted reading than the classical view. It seems appropriate to introduce Swinburne's theology as "modified classical theology"; Although according to his analysis of absolute knowledge, he is on the slippery slope towards outspread theism; But his confrontation with the problem of evil is different from the approach of outspread theology. Based on the analysis, it can be said that Swinburne's view of God has many problems. This article examines Swinburne's theism with a descriptive-analytical method.

Abstract"Omniscience" is an attributes of classical theism that affects how it is understood in other doctrines of classical theology, such as immutability, God's Free Will, and man's Free Will. Swinburne, the contemporary English philosopher of religion, argues that the classical notion of Omniscience is not coherent, but incompatible with human free will, God's free will, the first- person propositions, the Tense propositions, and ultimately the scripture; therefore, he has gone beyond the classical notion of "Omniscience" and has provided a more modified explanation of this concept.He believes that because the knowledge of God is limited or because of logical rules; Or because of plans that God has not yet decided; Or God Himself has limited His knowledge, He does not diminish His worship. But Swinburne's modified of Omniscient theory does not seem to be compatible with other attributes of God, such as creative. It can be said that Swinburne has erred in stating that knowledge is limited to Propositional knowledge and considers knowledge of God to be of that type; because in addition to Propositional knowledge, intuitive knowledge can be obtained and God's knowledge can be considered as such. Because Swinburne considers God to be temporal; When God has imposed this restriction on himself, there can be no preference to a specific time.

Most of the Islamic theologians, particularly Shiites, who believe in prophets’ infallibility assert that Adam’s act in eating the forbidden fruit was not a sin. They have provided some justifications for Adam’s act. The most significant justification is that God's prohibition of eating the fruit was not obligatory but advisory. In another justification, Muslim theologians attribute Adam's sin to his children and generation. Other justifications belong to those theologians who accept that Adam's act was a sin done in disobedience to God's necessary prohibition. They justify his act in these ways: 1) Adam was misled by Satan's oath; 2) He committed the sin out of oblivion or mistake; 3) His sin took place in the heaven; 4) That was a minor sin; and 5) Adam was not a prophet when he committed the sin. The current study aimed at analyzing these justifications. In conclusion, according to some evidence, it seems that God's command to Adam was not advisory. Accordingly, Adam's sin was neither minor nor unintentional. The kind of command, advisory or necessary, or the place where sin was committed is not important. What matters is that Adam disobeyed Gods’ strict and direct command. Since a prophet should obey all God's commands, Adam’s act was a sin.

This paper discuss moral judgment of lying from Kant’s point of view. According to Kant, Lying is a great vice and the key of all evils. He define lying as “to tell something which is not in your heart”. Most of the people think that lying is wrong due to its harms to others, but Kant says that lying is wrong even if it does have any harm to others and has been told by good intention. He knows lying wrong because of destroying human worth. He counts not telling the lie as a perfect human duty to others and to oneself. The main question of this research is this: is lying prohibited absolutely from Kant’s view or he permits some kind of lies?  The result of this research shows Kant has different views on lying in his different works. He permits some kind of lies in his former works like Lectures on Ethics and says that lying and deception is permitted in defense of oneself. But, in his later works like Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals and “On a Supposed Right to Lie from Altruistic Motives”, Kant makes lying absolutely prohibited.

This article firstly presents the glimpse of the revelation in the word and term and references to the concept of manifestation in the Ibn Arabi’ view, it studies the nature of revelation. In his view, however, revelation is at some stage devoid of any words, but the divine revelation in its descending’ levels (Tanzil’ levels), firstly in an imaginal catharsis it takes place in the heart of the prophet out of the time and in its final level of Tanzil placed in form of words for warming and preaching people by the prophet. In his view, clear signs of revelation are not accompanied by a prelude to thinking. This decline of revelation is accompanied by the explanation of the revelations by Ibn-Arabi, it shows the essential difference between prophetic revelation and inspiration: First, the prophetic revelation comes with the angel's revelation, and the prophet must preach what he receives, contrary to the inspiration; Secondly, although some types of revelation, such as the revelation of mysteries occur in dream, but the epistle of revelation has an non-dreaming nature; Thirdly, the prophetic revelation assign to the prophets, after the termination of prophecy, it has been cut off contrary to inspiration, therefore, none of the saints cannot act contrary to the law of the final prophet.

This paper examines the implication of the verse ‘ عهدی الینال الظالمین] ‘which means: ‘My covenant does not include the unjust’] on the prophets’ infallibility. According to the verse, God’s covenant (i.e., prophethood or Imamat) does not include the unjust people. On religious definition, committing a sin is an instance of injustice. Hence, the meaning of the verse is thatthe one who attains prophethood has never committed a sin. This implies the infallibility of the prophets. A controversial case in here would be a man who has committed a sin and then repented of his sin. Does the term ‘unjust’ describe this man after his repentance? Most of Shiite theologians claim that the word ‘ الظظظالظمظیظن) ‘the unjust) is a general and logically universal word which involves any unjust person who has committed a sin, even if he has repented. The author, however, is against this reasoning.The word ‘ الظالمین ‘is a derivative noun. According to the discussion of derivative in Ilm-u Al-Usoul, the true meaning of the derivative nouns is when an instance of that noun has actually that attribute. Accordingly, an unjust person is a person who is unjust now, not a person who has committed a sin but has now repented of it and never committed a sin again. In sum, the paper argues, the verse ‘ ینال ال ‘does not imply the absolute infallibility of the prophets; it only implies that the prophets had not been unjust at the time when they attained prophethood.

From Mulla Sadra's point of view, the existence of a disabled person is the same as that of a relative and has no independence and is one of the levels of existence of a cause. The effect of radiation from existential expansion is the real cause. In Sadra's intellectual paradigm, all causes are related to the real cause. The extension of existence is limited to the essence of the burden, and other causes come from the channels and mediators of grace. It is not only the existence of the active agent that is documented in him, but all his affairs are also documented in the real agent, and each of them extends the existence and all the existential affairs to the agent, because the agent's agent is the same as belonging to him. By analyzing Mulla Sadra's views and relying on the rule of substantial motion, some of the consequences of this type of attitude are: ultimate happiness and moral perfection, a sense of closer closeness and face-to-face knowledge of God, responsibility and moral duties as much as existential dignity, expansion of dignity. Inherent in all creatures, attaining existential freedom. This descriptive-analytical article seeks to examine the moral consequences of the objective view of the existence of a disability based on the views of Mulla Sadra.

There are different meanings of the word “God” that have been used by philosophers throughout the history of philosophy, such as theism, pantheism, panentheism, deism, and etc. The subject of this paper is the concept of “God” in Plato’s philosophy. Considering Plato’s different treatises that have the most theological material, it can be said that he has not meant a single concept of this word. In The Republic, given the characteristics that have been attributed to God, like simplicity, transcendental, it seems that his conception of God is close to theism. In Phaedo, since Plato does not give any role to the gods, it seems that we are encountered a Plato without God. In Timaeus, we encounter two candidates, Demiurge and the world’s soul. Some philosophers consider Demiurge as a myth and the world’s soul as Plato’s God. According to this view, Plato can be regarded as the source of inspiration for the Pannanteists. In contrast, some other believe that the world’s soul here is a myth and Demiurge is Plato’s God. This viewpoint is closer to ​​theism. In the Laws, since Plato mentions some attributes to God, such as three absolutes, the origin of moral obligation, and etc. His conception here is very close to theism. On the other hand, the “first self-moved Mover” presents a panentheistic conception of God. His various treatises also provide evidence in favor of the unknown God of the Negative Theology. Thus, there are various conceptions of God in Plato’s philosophy.

In this paper, the attributes of Jesus as the second person of Trinity in Christianity and Muhammadan Reality in Islamic Theosophy were compared. The term ''Muhammadan Reality'' in Islamic Theosophy refers to transcendental and divine being of Muhammad rather than his human and historic existence. According to this research, both Jesus and Muhammadan Realities have divine attributes. They are lights of God, the Word or the Pen of God, the creators of the word, omniscience, omnipotent, omnibenevolent as well as the intermediaries between God and humans. In this study, it is demonstrated that what happened to Jesus in Christianity, it has also happened to Muhammad in Islamic theosophy with some differences. The influence of Greek philosophy, especially Platonic, in ascribing these attributes to Jesus in Christianity and Muhammad in Islamic theosophy is undeniable. There is a strong temptation among the scholars of both religions, Islam and Christianity, to extend Jesus and Muhammad to the level of divinity and godhead.

Originally introduced by Plato and Aristotle, Moderation Theory in Ethics is the most prevalent theory of ethics among Islamic scholars. Moderation Theory suggests that every virtue or excellence of character lies in the mean between two vices: excess or defect. Every ethical virtue comes from moderation in actions or emotions and every ethical vice comes from excess or defect. This paper suggests that while Islamic scholars have been influenced by this doctrine, they have also developed and re-conceptualized it in innovative ways. Kindī, Miskawayh, Avicenna, Rāghib Isfahānī, Nasīr al-Dīn Ṭusī, and others are among the Islamic contributors to the subject. Some of their innovations in this theory are as follows: bringing together Aristotle's doctrine of the mean with Plato's psychology (by Kindī), dividing virtues into four higher genuses, dividing vices into eight higher genuses, setting various kinds of vices and virtues under these higher genuses (by Miskawayh), adding the vice qualitative criteria to Aristotle's vice quantitative criteria (excess and defect) (by Ṭusī), dividing various conceptualizations of justice (by Avicenna), adding religious and mystical virtues into the existing list of virtues (by Rāghib Isfahānī), and proposing a comprehensive model for curing diseases of the soul. This paper seeks to establish the main contributions of these Muslim scholars to Moderation Theory and elaborate on this theory’s evolution within the Islamic world.

The Reliability Argument and the Purpose-Refutation Argument are the two most important logical arguments that have been alleged by Islamic theologians, and Shia in particular, for proving divine prophets’ infallibility. According to the Purpose-Refutation Argument, if prophets were not infallible, God’s purpose in sending them for guiding people would be unattainable, because in this case, people by following the examples of prophets, would be led astray and consequently commit sins. Based on the Reliability Argument, if prophets commit sins, have mistakes, and fade into oblivion, people would lose their confidence in them. For that reason, prophets must be completely infallible and incapable of sinning (minor or major). This paper argues that there are some serious objections to these two arguments: People can rely on prophets without any need of their absolute infallibility; God can attain His goal by sending fallible prophets; The arguments involve is/ought fallacy, and the conclusion is more restricted than the claim of prophets’ complete infallibility.

This paper in the context of Mulla Sadra’s Philosophy studies this issue from his point of view that what effects the theory of “Super-Abstraction Existence of the Soul” have on individual life style. It is obvious that individual life style has very close relationship with the kind of person’s thinking and attitude to the world. In other words, the type of attitude and thinking of everyone determines his/her life style. An atheistic has different style and life style from a theist. According to Mulla Sadra, individuals’ attitudes are different based on their existential expansion. What is meant by the “super-abstraction existence of the soul” is that human soul which is an non-material existent in his evolutionary path after separation from his the material body and becoming an absolute abstract existent can go beyond of this level and reach to the super-abstraction existential level and separates even from his quiddity and getting pure being. In this level, human soul unites with God which is super abstract being. By analyzing Mulla Sadra's views and emphasizing on his substantial movement principle, we inferred some of the effects of this super-abstraction attitude to human soul on individual life style which are monism, non-materialistic attitude to the life, internal peace, change in worship way, and happiness in light of existential expansion. This article, with a descriptive and analytical method, seeks the influence of the super-abstraction attitude toward the human soul on individual life style.

This paper in the field of Islamic theology scrutinizes the implication of the verse Aṭīʿū on the infallibility. The verse (اطیعوا الله و اطیعوا الرسول و اولی الامر منکم) “Obey Allah and obey the Messenger and those of you who are in authority” (Q. Nisa /59) is one of the most important Quranic reasons that Islamic theologians have prepared for proving the infallibility of prophets, especially Islam prophet. Muslim theologians have made a reason like this: 1) God has absolutely commended Muslim believers to obey the Messenger and those who have authority on others among them. 2) If they were not infallible, God’s absolute command to obey them would be wrong. 3) But God never is wrong. 4) Therefore, they were infallible. The author thinks that this reasoning is wrong. According to some evidences, God’s command to obey the Messenger and who are in authority is not absolute. On the other hand, there is no correlation between God’s absolute command to obey someone and his infallibility.

Although some Muslim scholars have been affected in their ethical system by ancient Greek philosophers, they have also added some Islamic teachings to it and established a combined ethical system (philosophical and religious). Raghib Isfahani, the author of Al-Dharīʿa, is one of these Muslim scholars whose ethical system in this book should be regarded as a combined Islamic Virtue Ethics. It is the combination of Quranic and Philosophical Virtue Ethics. The general framework of his theory is philosophical adopted from Aristotle's and Plato's Virtue Ethics, however, the content of his theory is completely Islamic and Quranic. One of the significant innovations of Raghib in philosophical Virtue Ethics is adding religious virtues to moral virtues. He added theses four religious virtues: Hidāya (God's guidance), Rushd (God's supplement), Tasdīd (God's giving strong will to individuals) and Taʾyīd (God's assistance) to Plato's four ethical virtues (wisdom, temperance, courage and justice). He has called them Tufīqī virtues. According to Raghib, there is no way to obtain virtues but by God's guidance and supplement. By inspiration from Quran, he divided justice into absolute and conditional one. This innovation help us in reconciling Muʿtazilites and as Ashʿarites dispute in being moral goodness and badness rational or religious.

One of the most challenging issues in medical ethics is a permission or prohibition of euthanasia. Is a patient with an incurable disease who has lots of pain permitted to kill oneself or ask others to do that? The main reason advanced by the opponents is the absolute prohibition of murder. Accordingly, the meaning of murder plays a key role in determining the moral judgment of euthanasia. The aim of this paper is to confirm the role of intention in moral judgment of euthanasia and eliminate the name of unjust murder from voluntary euthanasia. The Intention of an agent determines the name of the act and whether it is right or wrong.  An important point that dose not taken into account in the definitions of murder, killing as well as their ethical judgment is considering the attributes of being unjust and forcible. Killing a human being is neither intrinsically good nor bad, but its ethical judgment depends on the way that happens, i.e. just or unjust. Every killing is neither bad nor unethical except unjust one which is both bad and unethical. The attribute of “unjust” has been mentioned in the definition of murder in Islamic jurisprudence, law, traditions, and Quran. Owing to this argument, on one hand, it is true to state that voluntary euthanasia is not unjust and forcible murder (the test of correct negation), and on the other hand, it is not true to say that voluntary euthanasia is unjust and forcible murder (the test of incorrect predication). It can be concluded that voluntary euthanasia is an independent title other than unjust murder and does not have its judgment.

This article addressed one of the issues of research ethics that is called the nature of plagiarism coupled with involvement of intention. By definition, plagiarism is the attribution of others’ works to one’s own. This may be done intentionally and/or unintentionally. Some researchers believe that intention is not involved in the nature of plagiarism and an author who forgets to make references to the used sources has committed plagiarism since this forgetfulness has led to the attribution of others’ work to one’s own. In contrast, some experts call such a person a wrongdoer, not a plagiarist.

By likening this problem to the issue of involvement of intention in telling a lie, the author separates two kinds of plagiarism: act-plagiarism and agent-plagiarism. The intention does not involve in the act-plagiarism (to be an act an instance of plagiarism), but it is involved in the agent-plagiarism (to call someone plagiarist). As a result, an author who forgets to make reference is not a plagiarist, but his/her act is an instance of plagiarism.

This paper briefly reviews different views of the nature of revelation (waḥy), and then states that, in accordance to mystical views of the analysis of the stages of being and the manifestation of God in these stages, and thus, the Quran is not necessarily detached from prior stages of being and is present in each stage as appropriate to that stage. Thus, the Quran is present in the “Before-God” and “the Mother Book” stage down to the material stage, existing in condensed (ijmālī) or expanded (tafṣīlī) forms. Given the stages of being, the first expanded verbal presence of the Quran would be in the imaginal world (‘ālam al-mithāl), in which material accidents exist without the existence of the matter itself. Given the missionary revelation and the place of Gabriel (or Jabra’īl) therein, the paper argues that since forms of the imaginal world are present to the angel of revelation, and he is the one to whom the revelation is attributed, the attribution is genuine, indicating his active presence in the revelation, which is the formulation of Quranic words at the stage of detached and attached imagination and sending it down to the heart of the Prophet.

Constructivism is a theory that believes moral judgments are not real things but they are constructed by practical reason in a rational procedure for resolving practical problems in front of us. Christine Korsgaard, a contemporary American philosopher, is a Kantian constructivist, whose theory I consider in this paper. She is a radical constructivist and disagrees with moral realism and denies moral truths even as abstract facts. According to Korsgaard moral judgments are constructed by rational agents. She believes moral and political principles are generally solutions to human practical problems. She justifies the normativity of moral obligations from this point that they are constructed by agent for resolving his problems. There are some objections to Korsgaard’s constructivism; one of them is to place humanity as the source of value.
Keywords: Korsgaard, constructivism, practical problem, humanity.


One of the traditional problems in moral philosophy is the nature and entity of moral truths and judgments. Do humans themselves make and construct them or are they facts and truths in the world which humans just discover? Are moral truths and values subjective or objective? Subjectivism and objectivism have been two old rivals in this question. But some philosophers have proposed a new theory between them that is called Constructivism. According to this theory, moral truths are not real and objective, but are constructed by human practical reason. In this view, an action is morally right when there is a sufficient reason to perform it. In this paper I will discuss Korsgaard's constructivism.
1. Definition of Constructivism
Constructivism is a theory about the justification of moral principles. It is the view that moral principles are the ones agents would agree with or endorse if they were to engage in a hypothetical or idealized process of rational deliberation. The differences about related criteria for this rational process and deliberation have produced several varieties of constructivism like Humean, Aristotelian, and Kantian (Bagnoli, 2011).
2. Korsgaard’s Constructivism
1-3. Normative Question
Korsgaard’s Constructivism is an answer to the main question in history of moral philosophy which she calls normative question. That is a central question about moral requirements. We see that they are inescapable in the sense that they provide reasons to act regardless of an agent’s desires and interests. So the question is: from where do they get their authority and obligatory force on us? Why do we make ourselves observe moral duties and principles? What is the origin of moral obligations? What are our reasons for justifying moral obligations? (Korsgaard, 1996: 9-10(
2-3. procedural moral realism
Korsgaard is an anti-realist philosopher. This thought that “human beings simply have unconditional or intrinsic value” is a realistic one standing in contrast to Korsgaard's constructivist thought that claims “we must confer value even upon ourselves” through certain allegedly necessary uses of ethical concepts. She distinguishes two kinds of realism: substantive moral realism and procedural moral realism. “What distinguishes substantive from procedural realism is a view about the relationship between the answers to moral questions and our procedures for arriving at those answers. The procedural moral realist thinks that there are answers to moral questions because there are correct procedures for arriving at them. But the substantive moral realist thinks that there are correct procedures for answering moral questions because there are moral truths or facts which exist independently of those procedures and which those procedures track” (Korsgaard, 1996: 36-37). She disagrees with the former and agrees with the latter.
3-3.proceduralism
The constructivism Korsgaard embraces is a form of proceduralism according to which the rightness of answers to normative questions is grounded in the fact that these answers are yielded by principles deriving from procedures with some special status. Evaluative and normative facts are not there as abstract facts to be met with or discovered through theoretical investigation of the nature and structure of rational agency, but are constructed through our actual practical activities. “Values are constructed by a procedure, the procedure of making laws for ourselves.” (Korsgaard, 1996: 112)
For Korsgaard, the relevant procedures at the source of normativity are procedures involved with willing, and what gives them their special status is that they are practically necessary for us—formal procedures rational beings must employ simply to function as agents at all. Everything starts with the nature of the will and the procedures according to which it must operate if it is to function as a will at all (FitzPatrick, 2005: 654-655(.
4-3. Constructivist and resolving problems
In Korsgaard's opinion when we are faced with a practical problem in our life and we don't know what the right action is, the solution is not in looking after a normative moral reality in the world and expecting to discover it, but it is in constructing a practical solution for that problem. She thinks this solution depends on an adequate conception of that problem. For a constructivist, ethical or political principles are solutions to practical problems we are already stuck with (FitzPatrick, 2005, p. 657-658), and this is how normative force is explained: “If you recognize the problem to be real, to be yours, to be one you have to solve, and the solution to be the only or the best one, then the solution is binding upon you.” (Korsgaard, 1996: 114)
According to Korsgaard, the source of normativity in moral obligations is in our humanity and moral identity. Because of self-consciousness, human beings do not do something just out of their desires; rather they ask themselves whether it is right to act on the basis of desire. Korsgaard agrees with Kant that humanity is a value in itself and says that our reasons to do something determine our identity and nature.
She says: “we must therefore take ourselves to be important” and “humanity, as the source of all reasons and values, must be valued for its own sake” (Korsgaard, 1996: 122). Our human identity imposes unconditional obligations to us, whether we are women or men, of this or that ethnic group, of this or that religious or social group, and so on. Therefore, our human identity is the source of our moral norms and obligations. The violation of these obligations amounts to the loss of our identity. Humanity is a significant part of us. There are strong and weak points in Korsgaard theory. One of the strong points, we think, is a successful justification of moral differences in applied ethics. On the other hand, it seems that, in addition to certain objections to Korsgaard’s moral theory, it is also subject to objections to Kant’s moral theory, such as the objection that humanity and human practical identity cannot always serve as a successful criterion for the recognition of moral actions.
1. FitzPatrick, William J. (July 2005) "The Practical Turn in Ethical Theory: Korsgaard’s Constructivism, Realism, and the Nature of Normativity", Ethics, Vol. 115, No. 4, pp. 651-691.
2. Lenman, James and Shemmer, Yonatan (2012) Constructivism in Practical Philosophy, Oxford University Press.
3. Nagel, Thomas (1996) "Universality and the reflective self", in the Sources of Normativity, edited by Onora O'Neill, Cambridge University Press.
4. Korsgaard, Christine M. (1996) the Sources of Normativity, edited by Onora O'Neill, Cambridge University Press.
5. Korsgaard, Christine M. (1996b) Creating the Kingdom of Ends, Cambridge: Cambridge University.
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