The Morality of Everyday Life: Rediscovering an Ancient Alternative to the Liberal TraditionFleming offers an alternative to enlightened liberalism, where moral and political problems are looked at from an objective point of view and a decision made from a distant perspective that is both rational and universally applied to all comparable cases. He instead places importance on the particular, the local, and moral complexity, advocating a return to premodern traditions for a solution to ethical predicaments. In his view, liberalism and postmodernism ignore the fact that human beings by their very nature refuse to live in a world of abstractions where the attachments of friends, neighbors, family, and country make no difference. Fleming believes that a modern type of "casuistry" should be applied to moral conflicts, using examples from history, literature, and religion to explain this moral ecology that refuses to divorce organisms from their interactions with each other and with their environment. |
From inside the book
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Page 6
... obligation, such as the obligation to obey local and national laws that protect property or international laws that guarantee the sov- ereign independence of nations. The example usually given is that of a neighbor drowning in a bath ...
... obligation, such as the obligation to obey local and national laws that protect property or international laws that guarantee the sov- ereign independence of nations. The example usually given is that of a neighbor drowning in a bath ...
Page 7
... obligation to do right, they tell us, does not come out of the peculiar circumstances of being a mother or a Christian or a Jew, but from a philosophical or theological commitment to a global respon- sibility as determined by a rational ...
... obligation to do right, they tell us, does not come out of the peculiar circumstances of being a mother or a Christian or a Jew, but from a philosophical or theological commitment to a global respon- sibility as determined by a rational ...
Page 9
... obligations arising from specific circumstances and experiences. Where modern philosophers (from Kant to Kohlberg) regard a mother's self-sacrificing love for her children as beneath the level of morality, folk wisdom tells us it is ...
... obligations arising from specific circumstances and experiences. Where modern philosophers (from Kant to Kohlberg) regard a mother's self-sacrificing love for her children as beneath the level of morality, folk wisdom tells us it is ...
Page 10
... obligation to pay back his victim at the ear- liest opportunity . The mere fact that a theft is a means to a good end does not make it less immoral . Catholic casuistry had its classical moment in the eighteenth century , when rigorist ...
... obligation to pay back his victim at the ear- liest opportunity . The mere fact that a theft is a means to a good end does not make it less immoral . Catholic casuistry had its classical moment in the eighteenth century , when rigorist ...
Page 12
... obligation but to invoke the equally valid counterprin- ciples that force an imperfect compromise. “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath,” was Jesus' answer to the Pharisees who criticized Him for gathering food on a ...
... obligation but to invoke the equally valid counterprin- ciples that force an imperfect compromise. “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath,” was Jesus' answer to the Pharisees who criticized Him for gathering food on a ...
Contents
1 | |
18 | |
42 | |
Too Much Reality | 69 |
Growing Up Unabsurd | 95 |
Problems of Perspective | 135 |
The Myth of Individualism | 167 |
Goodbye Old Rights of Man | 194 |
Bibliography | 235 |
Index | 251 |
Other editions - View all
The Morality of Everyday Life: Rediscovering an Ancient Alternative to the ... Thomas Fleming No preview available - 2004 |
The Morality of Everyday Life: Rediscovering an Ancient Alternative to the ... Thomas Fleming No preview available - 2004 |
Common terms and phrases
abstract Alasdair MacIntyre American ancient Antigone argued argument Aristotle Athenian Carol Gilligan casuistry Catholic century charity child Christian Church citizens civil claims common concept Creon cultural depends Descartes divine duty ethical European evil example fact father feel French friends friendship G. K. Chesterton global Goodbye Greek Growing Up Unabsurd happiness hero human rights ideal identity impartial Jefferson Jews John Johnson justice justify killed Kohlberg Kosovo language Lawrence Kohlberg liberal liberty live loyalty ment modern moral development Morality of Everyday mother Myth of Individualism nation-state nationalist natural neighbor Neoptolemus object obligation Old Rights one’s parents patriotism person Philoctetes philosophers Plato Plutarch political poor principle Problems of Perspective question reality reason regard religion religious responsibility Roman rules Samuel Johnson sense Serbs social society Stoic story strangers theory things Thomas tion tradition University Press virtue Voltaire women