Addressing moral problems through practical reasoning

  • Authors:
  • Katie Atkinson;Trevor Bench-Capon

  • Affiliations:
  • Department of Computer Science, University of Liverpool, Liverpool, UK;Department of Computer Science, University of Liverpool, Liverpool, UK

  • Venue:
  • DEON'06 Proceedings of the 8th international conference on Deontic Logic and Artificial Normative Systems
  • Year:
  • 2006

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Abstract

In this paper, following the work of Hare, we consider moral reasoning not as the application of moral norms and principles, but as reasoning about what ought to be done in a particular situation, with moral norms perhaps emerging from this reasoning. We model this situated reasoning drawing on our previous work on argumentation schemes, here set in the context of Action-Based Alternating Transition Systems. We distinguish what prudentially ought to be done from what morally ought to be done, consider what legislation might be appropriate and characterise the differences between morally correct, morally praiseworthy and morally excusable actions.