“Prepare to vomit,” my friend said over breakfast after Mass. He opened his alumni magazine to show me a short essay by the director of one of the core curriculum program at his alma mater. When people ask me what has gone wrong with the liberal arts, now I can show them.
Every few months I very round up and loosely link together various bits and snippets which I am not inclined to expand into full length posts, either because I like them better short, or because they condense ruminations which I’ve developed at greater length somewhere else. Here we go.
I’m not sure where you get your questions, but I wanted to submit one for consideration. Here’s my question:
One of Dostoevsky’s characters famously claims that if there is no God, then everything is permitted. Dostoevsky himself believed in God, but millions of atheists have taken comfort from his character’s line. They reason that since God isn’t there to judge me, I can do what I want.
You’ve written and taught about moral prohibitions which have no exceptions. Thomas Aquinas gives as an example the prohibition of lying. Aristotle would never deny that someone has the right to lie to his enemies, but as you explain, Aquinas holds that lying is always immoral.
If legislators and judges all accepted the philosophical theory of determinism, what would be the effect on criminal sentencing? I haven’t found any clear consensus. Since the subject is heavily debated, could you tell me your view on the philosophical principles which guide or ought to guide legislators and judges?
