study guide for HONS 250 final exam
H2
Readings

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Pieper

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justice and the virtue of being enabled to give what is due (habit)

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religion (duty unto with God), respect (to those in public office), piety (parents and country)

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wrongdoer: greatest harm done when inlalienable rights are violated (because created by God)

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natural right is what is due to him on the basis of the nature of the thing

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personality: freedom, imperishability, and responsibilit
H2
Plato's Republic

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eudaimonia: blessed by the Gods

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5th century in Pelopoennesian War

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virtue: excellence, "arete"

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never do harm: worse for the wrongdoer

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Thrasymachus: those in power decide what is just

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ius: just/right

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"nature," something innate

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egoism: benefitting self, incentive to do just things, grounding, opposite is altruism

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3 types of good desired: for own sake, for what comes from it, for the benefits

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compelled by law/enforced & gods are watching and detrimental to soul and habitual vice

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specializations, spiritedness

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poets vs gods: gods are models, cannot be miscontrued, only allow certain poets

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we want godlike guardians so form them! self-mastery and moderation

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rightly ordered love that introduces fine adn the beautiful

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myth of the metals - auxiliaries and guardians/rulers and craftsmenm - better suited does not equal better, not a class matter but role natural to you

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"like soldiers" everyone happy but the guardians, so what's in it for them? everyone's happiness is the goal

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tripartheid soul: calculating and deliberate (guardians & reason), spirited (auxiliaries & passions), thirsting and desiring (appetites)

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dominant traits in these roles, mini city within our souls

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nature: goes on of its own accord

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wisdom: excellence in reason

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courage: spirited in moderation and appetites

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justice rules, lovers of wisdom, learning and nurture mind, selfless love for it, controlled attachments

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review: definition, profitability, imaginary city, gyardians, minding own business, soul

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4 cardinal virtues

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metaphysics: things that are eternal, according to reason, orderly, divine

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divided line: visible and invisible, things, images, beliefs, imagination, mathematical, understanding, and thought

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human soul: imagination, belief, thought, understanding

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sun = the good, source of the light which we then see and can grasp

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justice = the end, participating in the good

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wisdom clears up confusion, outcome benefit drives our actions

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good: that which is desired

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aristocracy = kingship

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justice is profitable for the afterlife, earthly benefits, higher pleasures, and health of the soul

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we are capable of prviate injustices (not to self because not in justice sense)
H2
Readings

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Nicomachean Ethics

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commutative: transaction, given what is due as payment

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distributive: distributes common goods proportionately

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retributive: corrects for the inequality or injustice of a crime using punishment

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justice is relational

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proportionate to their merit (not meritocracy)

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divine justice, sin causes imbalance of scales

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Saint Basil

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the rich should distribute their wealth lavishly

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selling their children into slavery

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drought; because the rich will not share

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death: starvation

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pursue virtue, charity: selfless love

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lending with interest is bad because the borrower makes himself a slave to the lender

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neither the rich nor poor should borrow

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show mercy ourselves

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was rich and able to criticize

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preparing detachment, not causing stumble nor death for others

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warped view of necessity

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stewardship, what is due to God, our trust in Him to provide

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in commutative, God gave, now we owe God and to give freely others

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virtue is not zero-sum, give out of your excess

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willing redistribution due care, voluntary act

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spiritually depriving them

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Trial as test (do the right thing), message (wake up and realize), and distributive (goes around comes around)

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greed, impatient, in charging interest

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consensual exploitation, self-destructive to the soul

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Aquinas

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justiceL virtue in which we are directed to one another

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piety relates to the fourth

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every man is to love himself

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we are able to judge (as the damned) cannot bring depth upon themselves

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precepts of justice and charity

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desires out of order due to the fall

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moral law in considering alwful

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God as giver and taker of life
H2
Readings

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Pieper 6

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4 terms: commutative, destributive, rectifying, retributive

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subgroups, voluntary vs involutnary

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justice, proper to rulers

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ruler has goods for the people, positive and negative goods

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geometric proportion, based upon merit deserving-ness

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commutative is arithmetic proportion

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beauty in justice

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equals in commutative justice that's what we are

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order and sacred calling since we humans are capble of injustice, so difficult task of discernment

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prudence: practical wisdom

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tension of collective vs individual good

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stimilus checks, undiscerning template

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retribution becomes more exchange and closer to commutative, long way around

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stewards: according to basil, commutative between God and man, whereas distributive to poor

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virtue of religion, unpayable debt within obligation but will be rewarded

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inflation is evidence of it not being retributive

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democratic involves both impartiality and morality so not pure democracy so majority

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Merchant of Venice

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no jews in this time, Elizabethan context

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goods: things that're desired like money, love

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4 loves: agape (sacrificial), sturge (family, kindred), philia (friendship), eros (desirous)

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worried about the good of the other. highest form

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vs concern for mutual/collective

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vs pursuit of own good

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love = affection and goodwill

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feeling (passive) + action of willing

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caritas -> caris = expensive, beloved

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no justice in friendship according to Nicomachean

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jewish worried about being driven out of business

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ethnic religious divide tjat Christians had: prohibition toward usury

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promise of 3k in 3 months or pound of flesh

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Anronio's word and Shylock's trust, mutual commutative

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fides = that which is promised will come to pass

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good faith and bad faith, truthfulness of promise and intention to keep

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tacit = unspoken agrement upon entering conversation, room, lies thereafter are bad faith

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conscience = judgment of reason, application of moral law

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promise keeping isn't perfect duty

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misinformed at time

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Jessica leaving father to marry Lancelet, her money

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Shylock giving away daughter, privilege

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2 great debts: love and money

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Hobbes: justice as covenant, Aristotle: justice as equality

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Shylock and Antonio, 3k ducats and return/1lb of flesh (exchange of money)

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Bassanio and Portia, wear ring and pledge (exchange of promises)

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Bassanio and Antonio, exchange of friendship/love

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no longer personal, not basis of history

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revenge, restitution

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reason must rule for justice to be in place, Aristotle

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ring, manifestation of faithfulness and reminder

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honestus: respectable

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cannot favor Antonio and let him off, undermining the law if so, Duke will render it

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civil justice, calling in the jew, late payment, Antonio resigned spirit

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inhumanity of not showing mercy, mercy seasoning justice

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Bassanio wanting to bend the law, spare Antonio's law

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Shakespeare mocking laws to protect Christians

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alien vs Christian citizen (contingency in Venice)

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Shakespeare disagreeing with prejudice, describing ay it is or simply anti-semitic?

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post Henry VIII, purging of Jews/Catholics, in England

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Inhumane Shylock -> Christian aritotle

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Antonio owes Shylock (also owes to God)

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Christ's sacrifice balances scale against sin, mercy in place and through Belthazar, Shylock now owes Antonio

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Shylock's standard applied to himself

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God and providence?
H2
Readings

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Hobbes

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Father of Modern Political Philosophy

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conflating value and equality

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rests on contentedness

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warlike posture

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state without order

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passions cannot blame

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deterministic view of man set in stone

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Plato" reason rules

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Hobbes: law rules

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reason is simple, faculty of cleverness

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right of nature: self-preservation

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Aquinas: laws of nature and moral law, natural laws, divine laws

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paradoxically law down laws

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tacitly consented to social contract

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religion as coerciec to "predict" end but don't worry, doesn't ocunt and no freedom

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"justice:" is keeping a conenant

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"laws of nature:" humans are not free to engage in self-destructive behavior

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common coercive power

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prudence: nothing more than the fruits of experience

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two cardinal virutes: force and fraud

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Locke

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receive intellectual hertiage from him

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Hobbes: state of nature flows into state of society, deterministic view

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Locke: state of nature and state of society which can flow in and out of state of war

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governmental coercion sets justice and rules

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reason dictates laws of nature to us, primary is not to self-destroy

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Aristotle says we cannot, Hobbes says it's unnnatural to

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deterministic sounding or normative, not really descriptive

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Hobbes: tap dances around "God" but Locke: says it made for God, therefore cannot harm others made by Him

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Hobbes: egoism and more descriptive

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dominant in international relation

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certain security in Locke's state of nature

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punishment to cause perosn to repent, deter him and others, reparative

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Retributive: punisha and can assume and self-defend

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law in own hands

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law owning = citizen

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state of war: aggressor seeks to destroy another man

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state of natrueL condition where everyone has executive power to punish

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majority rules: principle reigns in a society or commonunity with laws

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Kant

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subjects may never revolt

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soverign ruler has right over land and the people

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state has right to inspection, to tax to fundd churches, and to distribute offices to puhlic officials

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when someone commits a crime, they lose their dignity

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murder, must be executed

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Rawls

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iberal political philosopher

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innovative attempt by Rawls

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"original positiom": rational agreement in guided

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"veil of ignorance": obstructs view of individual future of natural inequalities (like class position, social status, intelligence, strength; difference in interest, ends/goods to pursue)

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worst is maximized, maximin solution

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way to administer in a sense of distributive

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Aristotle would say distributive proportional to merit

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priority of individual is very Enlightenment liberal thinking

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Hobbes and Locke would say state of nature is prior to society and into tacit agreement

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Rawls would say give up rights and agree to principles, no going back (irrevocable, indisputable) which are (individual liberty and help least advantaged)

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this is hypothetical, thought experiment to extract principles of true justice

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Plato would say use resources for best so the whole succeeds

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whereas Rawls says use resources for least so whole succeeds

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irrational and means of suppression of sexism and racism

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war conventions, rules of war laid out which mirrors Rawls and ignorance

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good theory has good explanatory power

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principles of common good does not equal utilitarianism

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Original position: hypothetical position of equality in which the principles of justice are chosen

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principles of social justice: exisiting social and economic inequalities should be rearranged to the greatest benefit of the least advantaged and there should ne fair and equal distribution of opportunity to accumulate social goods

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justice consists of fairness

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the prinicples are what every rational man would arrive at

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Delgagdo

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microaggression: small acts of racism resulting from widespread assumptions about racial matters is historically racist places such as the US (between those of different races, cultures, or genders that can be interpreted as non-physical aggression (pg.2)

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tenets of CRT, belief that racism is ordinary or commonplace and that whites benefit from being part of a system in which racism is commonplace

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nonessentialism: the belief that no person has a single, easily characterized identity

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intersectionality: someone falls in between two of the minority groups (pg.10)

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Interest Convergence: different groups share the same interest (pg.9)

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Social Construction Thesis: race and races are products of social thought and relations (pg.9)

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Voice-of-Color Thesis: your able to have a thought about racism because of their different histories and experiences with oppression (pg.11)

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Critique of Liberalism (pg.26)

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Critical race theory wants equality of results

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A group that has been discriminated against and bears the social and economic consequences of that, now merits extra opportunity and social goods given to them to redistribute because that is what is just]

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Sandel

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big picture view, setting conditions so principles will be followed

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empirical, measurable and abstract principles

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CRT: critiquing liberalism

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Rawlsian libertarianism

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Utilitarianism boasts a single principle: maximize greatest good

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forward thinking in view of consequencesno limitations, nor competing principles

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now called consequentialism

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Liebrtarianism: like free market capitalism, to each his own, society won't intervene to support

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freeriding with such large scale

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Kant and 3 critiques of reason, ethics, good

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the self: will (capacity and in accord with moral law, transcends and pure practical reason) and inclinations (ends concerned, can corrupt will)

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freedom from inclinations is true freedom

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inclinatinos are an encumberance (external pressures)

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collective ends also outside

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Kant: categorical imperatives act in nonconttradictory way, treat self as end

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Rawls" takes Kant and make it more practical and political

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encumbered by arbitrariness of nature (holds you back) like poverty

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procedural republic, historic account of US according to Sandel

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fair procedures follow but more entangled and less attached

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government and resources and entitlements

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more dependent = more entangeld

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attachments = freedom

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not pointed to common good anymore

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Weil

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threefold: animality, humanity, personality

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personhood, man = sacred

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the good: source of the sacred

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perfectionism is impersonal and therefore sacred

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truth, goodness, beauty: silent

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beauty cries out and points to truth and goodness

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truth and affliction, allied

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suffering does not equal affliction

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key: wisdom

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grace and love of God restores

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words can enlighten

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Wojtyla
H2
Comparisons

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Utilitarianism:

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promote the welfare and collective good has priority

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Libertarian:

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like a a direct democracy and choose their rights and stick with it

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let nature run its course

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Rawls:

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equal opportunity,

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just society the welfare state,

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the right is prior to the good

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individuals must be given equal chances to choose their end

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Sandel:

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we should protect humans from the collective

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the knowledge of the good makes it possible to harm the good

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impersonal: the things that are built into us, the good and evil is violated

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if human beings have personality, they are sacred, it's not that you are sacred, but the source of sacred is outside of you, the impersonal

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have a relationship with the Lord

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like Plato, tell and show people what is good
H2
Kant

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source of rights is from society.

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you cannot self contradict yourself--this is morally wrong.

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when murdering your monarch or rebelling against them, you are ultimately destroying the basis of rights-your society-yourself.

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overall distinction: about self contradiction and the rule of the supreme leader while Hobbs is all about determinism (this is how it is).

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even if it's a bad ruler, it's better to have a law rather than none Bauer).

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supreme ruler has power to tax, inspect, oversee land.

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citizen is not based on land ownership (like Locke).

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last thing: head of the state is source of law (Kant) vs. people the source of law (Modern). The ruler cannot be punished-it's "absurd" (Kant)

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natural right includes justice and distributive justice.

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"A priori" is toward what's prior, doesn't need any grounding.