Morality
This theme runs through several big questions. Here are the ones where it plays out.
The questions that illuminate it
To whom do we owe moral consideration?
Where we draw the circle, we decide whom we may use without scruple and whom we must spare: too narrow, it licenses cruelty; too wide, it makes ordinary life impossible. To take a position is to say who truly counts, and how far what we owe extends to other beings.
How much does morality demand of us?
Is it enough to harm no one, or must we give without respite as long as some misery remains to be relieved? A modest morality leaves us in peace but can cover indifference; a demanding one ennobles, but can leave us guilty of all we failed to do. To take a position is to say where duty ends and the heroism no one can require begins.
What makes an action morally good?
One and the same action can be approved or condemned depending on whether we look at its results, the rule it follows, the character it reveals, or the care it shows toward others. To take a position is to choose which of these compasses to follow when they do not point the same way.
Do moral norms hold for everyone, everywhere, and always?
If morality holds everywhere, we can condemn slavery or torture wherever they are practised, at the risk of imposing our norms as the measure of all; if it depends on cultures, we respect differences but lose any right to denounce cruelty elsewhere. To take a position is to say whether "it's their culture" ends every moral argument.
What gives morality its authority?
Everyone feels that some things are simply not done, but where does that demand get its force? If the good is grounded in God, a society that loses its faith risks losing its morality too, and the line ascribed to Dostoevsky looms: if God does not exist, everything is permitted. If morality rests on reason, on feeling, or on an inherited agreement, it survives secularization, but it remains to be explained why it still binds those who no longer want to play along. To take a position is to say what really upholds our duties, and what would be left of them the day that support gives way.
Should we assign blame and credit?
Praising a child, resenting a friend, taking pride in a success, blaming ourselves for a fault: we spend our days assigning blame and credit. Yet what each of us is, talents as much as leanings, was largely made without us, and one can admire a skill while knowing its acquisition owed nothing to the will. Whether our acts are determined is a neighbouring question, with its own axis; what is decided here is an attitude: to take merit and fault seriously, to keep them as tools, or to let go of them. To take a position is to say what we owe one another in praise, reproach, and forgiveness, and what would become of our bonds if we stopped keeping accounts.