[lit-ideas] Re: Zidane, the reasons why
- From: Paul Stone <pas@xxxxxxxx>
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Tue, 11 Jul 2006 09:25:38 -0400
At 09:17 AM 7/11/2006, you wrote:
Walter Okshevsky wrote:
"If one commits moral wrong, and then explanantions are provided for why
one did so, could it be that the explanantions are sufficient to
exhonerate the agent from moral blame?"
Isn't this a round about way of asking whether a wrong can be a means to
a good? Which would be a different question than whether an action's
moral worth is to be decided by its end.
It seems to me that the answer to both is no.
I think some times, something appears to be a moral wrong without all the
evidence present. An 'excuse' is sometimes an explanation and while it
doesn't exonerate a moral wrong, it could change a previously thought moral
wrong into a morally acceptable action.
Of course, in this case -- zidane's -- there were two moral wrongs of which
we only saw one. The fact that Mazzehsomething said something about
Zidane's ma doesn't excuse Z's action, but it certainaly DOES explain it.
However, Walter was talking about a more general philosophical inquiry and
I'm sure we can think of many instances that if one was only looking at
half the evidence, she might deem something a moral wrong; but upon
learning the whole story, she would change her mind.
p
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