PHI 1101 Chapter Notes - Chapter 12: Categorical Imperative, A Priori And A Posteriori, Empirical Evidence

• School: University of Ottawa
• Department: Philosophy
• Course: PHI 1101
• Professor: Mark Brown

Document Summary

Moral philosophy: a branch of philosophy that asks basic questions about the good life, about what is better and worse, about whether there is any objective right and wrong. Specifically, it attempts to determine what actions are right and what are wrong. One is consequential in nature and the other deontological. Deontological ethics holds the view that results or consequences of actions are morally irrelevant. Instead, deontological theories pertain to duty or obligation. A deontological ethics is typically contrasted with consequential moral theories. Consequentialism: the position that people"s actions are right or wrong because of their consequences (their results): introduction. Utilitarianism is a highly influential moral theory that came to prominence in britain in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries: jeremy bentham (1748-1832) and utilitarianism. Typically, jeremy bentham, a legal commentator and radical political reformer, is cited as being the founder of the moral theory known as utilitarianism.