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. |
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Page 3
... reason, he is afraid to do away with himself: Although he may want to “die, to sleep,” he is worried about the ... reasons for regarding him as foolish and immoral, but Hamlet might easily reply to them: “You be- lieve in your traditions ...
... reason, he is afraid to do away with himself: Although he may want to “die, to sleep,” he is worried about the ... reasons for regarding him as foolish and immoral, but Hamlet might easily reply to them: “You be- lieve in your traditions ...
Page 5
... reasons , the employees are acces- sories to murder . In discussion with her friends and allies , the talk is all of the human rights of the unborn , but the young mother has learned from her Cal- abrian grandmother that it is often ...
... reasons , the employees are acces- sories to murder . In discussion with her friends and allies , the talk is all of the human rights of the unborn , but the young mother has learned from her Cal- abrian grandmother that it is often ...
Page 6
... reason and applied universally to all cases, regardless of special circumstances or location. But the priest has never taken the trouble to read St. Thomas Aquinas, much less to study the real tradition of natural law, which teaches ...
... reason and applied universally to all cases, regardless of special circumstances or location. But the priest has never taken the trouble to read St. Thomas Aquinas, much less to study the real tradition of natural law, which teaches ...
Page 15
... reasons why the text of this book is studded with allusions to myths, plays, novels, and films. If moral and social questions are not reducible to logical abstractions—which is my central point—then it 16 The Morality of Everyday Life ...
... reasons why the text of this book is studded with allusions to myths, plays, novels, and films. If moral and social questions are not reducible to logical abstractions—which is my central point—then it 16 The Morality of Everyday Life ...
Page 20
... reason of place , time , or circumstances , are by some chance more tightly bound to you . ” 3 A Christian saint , if he had the power to do everyone good , would be obliged to exercise it , but such powers belong to the divine and not ...
... reason of place , time , or circumstances , are by some chance more tightly bound to you . ” 3 A Christian saint , if he had the power to do everyone good , would be obliged to exercise it , but such powers belong to the divine and not ...
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