Conscience : Hilosophical and Religious Significance

Conscience occupied a central place in philosophical and religious theorising about ethics from the time of the Stoics until the early decades of the twentieth century. Aquinas, Butler, Cudworth, Reid, Price, Newman and Ewing - to mention but a few - wrote at length about the rational powers by the exercise of which we come to know moral truth. Lack of philosophical interest in conscience in recent times has been due to a number of factors: the influence of radical empiricist metaphysics, scepticism about the possibility of moral knowledge, and a preoccupation with analysis of the language of morality. Yet at the start of the 21st century, the background conditions have significantly changed.A fresh philosophical examination of the significance of conscience is now due, and this book develops a philosophically defensible account defending the integrity of conscience against the scepticism which characterised late 20th century philosophy. Moral epistemology now occupies a prominent place in theoretical ethics, moral realism is now the dominant position in meta-ethics, and defences of neo-intuitionism by philosophers such as Jonathan Dancy and Robert Audi have transformed the general philosophical perception of ethical intuitionism. Conscience also occupies a central place in religious thought since it was widely believed to provide an important source of our knowledge of God and since its development and refinement are recognised as preconditions of genuine spiritual growth. This book undertakes an exploration of conscience which draws on current developments in the fields of ethics and epistemology, in a way which is also sympathetic to a number of religious perspectives - particularly the role of conscience in a naturalised account of our knowledge of God, and in the structure of a virtuous life.Bunting, Harry is the author of 'Conscience : Hilosophical and Religious Significance', published 2006 under ISBN 9780754630883 and ISBN 0754630889.