PHILOSOPHY 52 School gerston Hag ANALOGY AND SYMBOL ANALOGY SYMBOL Analogy – compares the normal use of a word to • Developed the theory that religious its religious use, used by Aquinas and Aristotle language could be symbolic but Univocal –words with identical meaning in distinguished between a sign/symbol different statements • Signs are just conventional whereas a Equivocal – words with entirely different symbol requires participation meanings in different sentences • Religious language has the Aquinas – we can deduce 4 ways of making characteristics of a symbol judgements – strength of any analogy depends on • If you say “God is love” - utterance is not similarities; similarity only exists in identical merely a sign of what God is but a relations/properties; good analogies are based on participation in the reality of God underlying principles; they do not need to assume • Religious statements do not give us acquaintance literally true about God but they are Aristotle – the apophatic way says human cognitive language is wholly inadequate in describing God • May have a limited lifespan, changing in but we do not need to assume it tells us nothing power or meaning AQUINAS J. H . RANDALL JR Analogy of attribution – something about an • Argues religious symbols are non-cognitive author/maker from the product he has created and non-representative (does not stand for (eg “the bread is good” suggests “the baker is any reality beyond itself) good” • Religion is a human activity and contributes to human culture • Based on the belief that God is creator of the universe so everything comes from him • Eg a piece of music speaks to us in a way Analogy of proportion – from a lesser object, say translated into anything else something else such as God has proportionately • Religion has it it’s own world like music – more of the same quality (eg a 3yo is good at arouses certain feelings Character drawing might be good at drawing for a 3yo, not • God is another aspect of our psyche and compared to an artist spirituality so it makes no sense to ask if this is “true” • doesn’t apply to God – we can ‘t say God is proportionately more just than us as he is • We don’t need to determine truth/accuracy infinitely more just than us of God as a symbol, religion is a human enterprise which performs a valuable function but symbols are PROBLEMS OF ANALOGY non-representative Brummer – God’s nature is not accessible to us Creativity Creativity as use of an adjective only tells us what humans PROBLEMS OF SYMBOL mean by it • Is symbol any better than analogy? - Ramsey – there has got to be something in tells us what the terms do but not what language we can use to describe God; Disclosure they mean situation – happens when see something beyond • If God simply stands for the unknown reality/understanding vs Qualified Model – nature of God, how does symbol Organiser language models something else participate? – is the symbol the entire Barth – Ramsey/analogy is mistaken – we cannot proposition or the underlying concept approach God through language based on our of the goodness of God? Aspiration experience • What are the different levels of participation with a symbol? KS5 Knowledge KS5 Knowledge Organiser Haggerston School Ethics Conscience Knowledge Organiser Kohlberg’s 3 levels of conscience Freud’s view of conscience as an aspect of the Super-Ego Durkheim’s view of sanctions in society: Fromm’s 2 types of conscience: 1. Pre-conventional: established in childhood through reward and Psyche – Freud’s term for the human mind and personality. God is a useful idea: Authoritarian Conscience: punishment – right behaviours are rewarded and wrong behaviours are Super Ego: controlling, restraining self. Controls the Eros and God is a useful idea in society, giving us a moral obligation to obey • Society is designed to make us obey rules and conform to punished. Thanatos. Acts as an “inner parent” and gives moral commands. society’s demands. Conscience is part of our loyalty to society and norms. 2. Conventional: the development of good relationships with others The conscience is the operating of the SE: giving moral commands fear of judgment from others. • People feel guilt and fear when they are disobedient to the rules leads people to want to obey the rules of society to avoid guilt. and punishing us with guilt. of society. This is because they don’t want to be shunned by 3. Post-conventional: Utilitarian understanding that good for society is Ego: the rational self, helping us to process the desires of the id. The collective conscience: society for disobeying rules. more important than good for individuals. This leads to the Id: the unconscious and instinctive part of personality, containing beliefs agreed on by those in the same society. Acts are bad • Rather than people focusing on moral issues, people feel guilt development of an individual conscience that makes consistent choices the Eros (sexual desire) and Thanatos (aggression). because society disapproves of them. when they have broken a rule. for the good of everyone. This is Kantian in nature as choices become The role of upbringing: • The conscience becomes the internalised voice of society, which universalizable. Not many people get here. Conscience is an expression of the rules that we learnt in early How the conscience is evolutionary: disapproves of our actions. Application to the Heinz Dilemma: (should a man steal medicine for his childhood – we were “trained” as children to understand what is allows society to grow stronger, it is a survival mechanism Humanistic Conscience: dying wife from a corrupt pharmacist?) right and wrong – therefore the conscience is developed by our developed by people sharing the same moral values. • The humanistic conscience has awareness of what makes life 1. Pre-conventional - Heniz should not steal the drug because he relationships with other people and does not exist as a moral flourish and what destroys it. personally could be punished, e.g put in prison. authority without those people. • The humanistic conscience leads humans to civil disobedience 2. Conventional – whilst society thinks this is wrong, which means it The function of guilt: Therefore, the conscience develops to allow society to survive, and when necessary – humans therefore resit societies norms when could be wrong to steal, he may be justified in saving his wife as we The conscience cannot be seen as the voice of God, but feelings of having a good conscience allows us to fall in line with society’s they are morally wrong. Examples come from those who understand this is good and he has a good motivation. guilt and shame can be caused in us through religious laws, expectations of us. We are controlled by our fear of judgement and resisted the Nazi regime and more recently have resisted that 3. Post-conventional – we cannot universalize the act of stealing and particularly if we had a religious upbringing. exclusion, so we follow our conscience, this is particularly true in implementation of nuclear weapons. we have to uphold society's rules, so he should not take the drug. The conscience, as the “Inner Parent” is simply our internalised religious social groups. • Rejecting the authoritarian conscience and embracing the views that have come from our upbringing, experienced as feelings humanistic conscience allows us to reach our full potential as of guilt and shame. people.. Aquinas: Conscience as a faculty of reasons. Butler’s reflective Principle. Fletcher’s Agapeic Principle: Christianity – conscience as the “voice of God”: Synderesis Rule: Conscience as a natural property: Act in a way that produces the most loving consequence in every Augustine: Act in a way that does good and avoids evil Like Aquinas, he agrees that the conscience is our God-given ability situation. • The conscience is a part of God’s creation of humans. to reason that should always be followed. He presumes that all Conscience as a verb, not a noun: • The conscience is innate – meaning that it is put into the minds Relationship to Natural Moral Law: human beings have a sense of right and wrong. Everyone has a Conscience is not something we have, it is a process that we use, it (or souls!) of humans by God. Conscience is our God-give ability to reason, so it is how we work out conscience and ought to obey it. is more accurate to say that we are “consciencing” because it is an • He literally sees the conscience as the “voice of God”. the primary and secondary precepts, and allows us to formulate 2 principles that govern human behaviour: active and dynamic process. deontological rules. 1. Self-love - This is a desire for happiness for the self. It is "who can St Paul: reflect upon themselves and their own interest or happiness, so as How conscience relates to the Rule of Love: • Romans 2:15: The conscience is “a witness to the requirements of Relationship with Divine Law: to have that interest an object to their minds" We are using this process of weighing up the consequences of our the law.” The laws that we understand through reason are supported through 2. Benevolence - This is the desire or hope for happiness in other actions and considering, in a teleological way, how we can limit • God judges those who are “pure of heart” – showing that there is divine law, meaning that the Bible and Catholic tradition work as a people. human suffering and act in the way that Jesus did (showing some internal part of us that God will consider when giving out useful guide to help us confirm our reasoning is right. Conscience as an intuitive moral judge: unconditional love).