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Ethic Theory Moral Prac (2015) 18:223235
DOI 10.1007/s10677-015-9574-8
Maureen Sie
Accepted: 24 February 2015 /Published online: 17 March 2015# The Author(s) 2015. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com
Abstract According to some, contemporary social psychology is aptly described as a study in moral hypocrisy. In this paper we argue that this is unfortunate when understood as establishing that we only care about appearing to act morally, not about true moral action. A philosophically more interesting interpretation of the Bmoral hypocrisy^-findings understands it to establish that we care so much about morality that it might lead to (1) self-deception about the moral nature of our motives and/or (2) misperceptions regarding what we should or should not do in everyday or experimental situations. In this paper we argue for this claim by elaborating on a fascinating series of experiments by Daniel Batson and his colleagues who have consistently contributed to the moral hypocrisy findings since the late nineties, and showing in what way they contribute to a better understanding of moral agency, rather than undermine the idea that we are moral agents.
Keywords Moral hypocrisy. Self-deception . Acting for reasons . Moral agency. Daniel Batson
1 Introduction
Moral principles such as Byou should alleviate suffering when possible^ are regularly exchanged in explaining and justifying our actions and practices. Conversations about what to think of certain actions, measures, or policies often turn on finding principles people can agree on. Also a substantial part of moral philosophy is spent on arguing about which moral principles do regulate and should regulate our lives. Hence it should be no surprise that we expect people to conform to the moral principles they articulate. We positively dislike people
M. Sie (*)
Department of Philosophy, Erasmus University, Rotterdam, The Netherlands e-mail: [email protected]
Maureen Siee-mail: [email protected]: http://maureensie.wordpress.com/
M. Sie
Department of Humanities, Leiden University, Institute of Philosophy, Leiden, The Netherlands
Moral Hypocrisy and Acting for Reasons: How Moralizing Can Invite Self-Deception
224 M. Sie
who advocate moral principles but do not act in accordance with them and condemn those who act for so-called ulterior motives. BMoral hypocrisy^ is the general label for this phenomenon.
According to some, contemporary social psychology could be described as a study of this phenomenon (Monin and Merritt...