Title Promoter Affiliations Abstract "Does feeling holier than others make one more or less moral? The effect of the belief in moral self- superiority on moral judgment, action, and sanctioning" "Vera Hoorens" "Methods, Individual and Cultural Differences, Affect and Social Behavior" "Most people believe that they possess morally good traits more, and morally bad traits less, than others (moral self-superiority). However, little is known about how this moral self-superiority plays out in terms of moral judgments, moral actions, and responses to moral actions of others. Exploring these effects may be consequential because of the influence of people’s self-views on their behavior, the fundamentally comparative nature of these self-views, and the robust and general evidence for moral self-superiority. Moreover, moral choices are ubiquitous in everyday life and almost all large-scale societal challenges have a moral component, from curbing pandemics to fighting poverty. Two competing hypotheses may be derived from the literature on moral behavior. One states that moral self-superiority discourages morally good choices, reduces appreciation for other people’s morally good choices, and enhances disapproval of their morally bad ones. The other states that moral self-superiority facilitates morally good actions and inspires generosity and leniency towards others. In this social psychological project we will pit the two perspectives against each other in a series of experiments and a longitudinal study. We will thus learn whether moral self-superiority ironically undermines people’s morality or amplifies people’s morality, an insight of great relevance in the domains of education, management, mental health, and personal growth." "Does feeling holier than others make one more or less moral? The effect of the belief in moral self-superiority on moral judgment, action, and sanctioning." "Vera Hoorens" "Methods, Individual and Cultural Differences, Affect and Social Behavior, University of Oregon" "Most people believe that they possess morally good traits more, and morally bad traits less, than others (moral self-superiority). However, little is known about how this moral self-superiority plays out in terms of moral judgments, moral actions, and responses to moral actions of others. Exploring these effects may be consequential because of the influence of people’s self-views on their behavior, the fundamentally comparative nature of these self-views, and the robust and general evidence for moral self-superiority. Moreover, moral choices are ubiquitous in everyday life and almost all large-scale societal challenges have a moral component, from curbing pandemics to fighting poverty. Two competing hypotheses may be derived from the literature on moral behavior. One states that moral self-superiority discourages morally good choices, reduces appreciation for other people’s morally good choices, and enhances disapproval of their morally bad ones. The other states that moral self-superiority facilitates morally good actions and inspires generosity and leniency towards others. In this social psychological project we will pit the two perspectives against each other in a series of experiments and a longitudinal study. We will thus learn whether moral self-superiority ironically undermines people’s morality or amplifies people’s morality, an insight of great relevance in the domains of education, management, mental health, and personal growth." "Imagination and Moral Reasoning. Creative Imagination in Moral Option Generation." "Katrien Schaubroeck" "Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Center for Ethics" "As a human faculty, imagination is often linked to the creativity of the mind, as displayed, for instance, by artists or children. This project examines its functional roles in moral reasoning. People often seem to use their imagination in situations where moral problems are at stake. Suppose that you cross the path of a refugee begging for help. You would probably try to imagine several things: the things the other has been through, what your options to help the refugee are, what the repercussions of certain actions will be, and so on. This project investigates how exactly we use our imagination to answer difficult moral questions or to solve pressing situations or dilemmas. This main aim is split up in two sub-aims. First, this research applies a novel moral-psychological approach to distinguish different modes and functions of imagination. As a very general term, 'imagination' can namely refer to different elements of moral reasoning, e.g., metaphorical understanding, empathy, narrative reflection, etc. Having analysed contemporary research results regarding the different relations between imagination and moral reasoning, I will focus on a blind spot in the current debate: the way in which imagination generates specific options for moral action. Thus the second aim is to examine this process of option generation in order to provide an answer to the question why imagination might be necessary to come up with practical solutions to moral situations and dilemmas." "First food, then morals: the impact of (new) media on the ongoing decline in commensality, and the consequences on the development and activation of moral attitudes and moral behaviour" "Charlotte De Backer" "Media, ICT and interpersonal relations in Organisations and Society (MIOS)" "Due to an increase in television consumption, family meals are in decline. This also implies a loss in daily rituals of moral socialization, which might explain why low frequencies in family meal consumption correlate with lower psychological wellbeing. This project aims to investigate the relation between commensality, morality and wellbeing, with a focus on new media, and commensality outside the family context as new research angles." "Using Moral Foundations Theory when introducing Restorative Justice Processes: Effects of moral framing on the decision to participate in victim-offender mediation" "Ivo Aertsen" "Leuven Institute of Criminology" "Previous research focused on the role of moral foundations and the retributive and restorative justice orientations on the decision to participate in Restorative Justice (RJ) processes, specifically victim-offender mediation. Building on those previous findings, this research project is focused on the analysis of the effect of morally framing the introduction of the mediation process, in the initial letter sent by the mediation services to victims and during the preparatory meeting, on the decision to participate in the preparatory meeting and on the decision to effectively participate in the mediation process, respectively. Using experimental designs and convenience samples of college students and general adults in Phase I of the project and convenience samples of real victims of crime and offenders in Phase II, the research project aims to contribute to a sound theoretical framework but also to practice oriented knowledge, given the possible applicability of the results to RJ practices." "Debt or Sin? Legal-Theological Roots of the Moral Confusion in the EU Debt Crisis" "Wouter Druwé" "Division for Roman Law and Legal History" "The FWO research project “Debt or Sin?” starts from the hypothesis that the current moral confusion regarding debt and credit started already long before the present European debt crisis, or, for that matter, the rise of classical economics in the 18th century. It assumes that the principle that debts must be repaid and promises honored was elevated by moral theologians and jurists into a fundamental principle for organizing market transactions, right at the time when modern markets and states came into existence (15th-17th centuries). The overall objective is to clarify this symbiosis of morality, law and finance in a formative albeit neglected stage in the development of European legal and economic thought. This objective will be achieved through a close analysis of a number of writings on the law of obligations by jurists and theologians between ca. 1400 and 1700, which are, of course, mostly written in Latin. Regardless of their confessional denomination, both Protestant and Catholic authors have produced a vast amount of moral and legal literature that seeks to govern the life of Christians in all its dimensions, including debtor-creditor relationships. Particularly, they have elaborated a sophisticated normative framework to regulate capitalism at the very moment of its global expansion by emphasizing the need for individuals, especially merchants and bankers, to maintain certain moral principles to save their souls while doing business. Pursuant to the methodological principle that abstract ideas should be put into a real life context, the debate on “debt” will be investigated in the works of specific authors from the 15th to the 17th centuries in light of the specific historical context in which they worked. Even though the writings on debt and contract of well-known authors such as Thomas Aquinas, Francisco de Vitoria or Leonardus Lessius constitute essential background reading material, our doctorate wil take the work of one author in particular as a starting point: the highly influential legal, moral and economic thought on debt of Conrad Summenhart (c. 1458-1502), a theologian at the University of Tübingen, whose impressive work on contract law, the 'Septipertitum opus de contractibus pro foro conscientiae atque theologico' (c. 1500) has had a profound influence on Spanish theologians of the school of Salamanca, some of whom often made reference to “Conradus.” Nevertheless, the research done on this work from a legal perspective is quite limited, meaning that it will be important to make a substantial analysis in order to correctly assess the place and importance of the work in the history of ideas. This will involve studying both the works which have influenced Summenhart (for instance, works on Contract Law of predecessors like Jean Gerson, Matthew of Kraków, Johannes Nider and others) and, conversely, some of the authors of the School of Salamanca, whom Summenhart has influenced himself. In the course of this undertaking a further geographical widening of previous research will, if possible, be achieved by investigating the work 'Contra malos divites et usurarios' by Stanislas Zaborowski, a Polish priest and jurist (1470/77-1530). He stands in a rich, yet widely unexplored, eastern European tradition of legal-theological thinking.The research activities and the analysis of the work of Konrad Summenhart and other authors will be guided by common research questions such as: 1) how can we situate the life and work of the figure in their proper intellectual and historical context; 2) what is the relationship between legal, moral and economic thought in the author’s work; 3) what are the religious roots of the author’s thought; 4) what is the author’s approach to the law of insolvency; 5) how does the author deal with new financial techniques (e.g. sale of debt, lending techniques, quantitative easing); 6) what is the author’s approach to the issues of austerity and profligacy, respectively; 7) does the author make a distinction between private and public debt, respectively; 8) what impact did the author have; 9) what is the author’s attitude towards debt relief and the Biblical idea of the Jubilee?; 10) what overall contribution did the author make to sanctionning the principle that “debts must be paid and promises kept”?" "Narrative Procedure of Moral and Political Deliberation." "Patrick Loobuyck" "University of Pardubice, Center for Ethics" "My project deals with two contested and opposite views concerning moral deliberation. According to the first one, the substance of our deliberation comes from a certain conception of the good, while the second one states that the good is secondary to the procedures of the right. Rawlsian liberal theorists defend the latter, while communitarian inspired philosophers (but not only these philosophers) defend the priority of the good. The philosophers of the first branch often portray our political deliberation as being constituted by our reasonable apparatus and our procedures of thought. That is to say; our reason and reason giving ability is the primary source of our deliberative power. The philosophers on the second branch, however, write that this procedure comes after our rationality is shaped by our embeddedness in culture, history, and society. Therefore, when we talk about political deliberation, we talk about two conflicting theories. My thesis, as it is stated in the name of the project, is dealing with the problem of political deliberation. The main goal of my thesis is to show that the conception of the good, which I take the notion of the narrative to be, can add substance to the constructivist procedure of political deliberation that we find in the contemporary political theory. Within this project, I will work on two main elements of my thesis. On the one hand I will elaborate on what contribute to our understanding of what a narrative is, taken as a substantial view. On the other hand, I will work on constructivism, as far as it can be seen as a formal principle which ""guides"" and ""transforms"" our substantial, narrative view. It is the purpose of my thesis to shed some light on the debate on political deliberation. This is seen as one of the more relevant topics in the field of the political philosophy because it deals with the starting position when talking about the morality of institutions. More specifically, I would like to tackle the priority argument (the good vs the right) and propose a view which can, in a way, reconcile the philosophers of the good and of the right. My view is based on the theory of the good, however, it encompasses the deliberative elements from the theory of the right. In the regards to my project, the good, which is taken as a basis for the political deliberation is found in the conception of the socio-historical narrative. However, for that narrative to progress, we would need a regulating factor which is found in the constructivist method which serves as a procedure of the right." "Ethics and value-reality. Aurel Kolnai's legacy: an analytic ethic based on the phenomenology of value-consciousness and moral awareness." "Stefan Rummens" "Research in Political Philosophy and Ethics Leuven (RIPPLE), Institute of Philosophy, Ethics @ KU Leuven" "ETHICS AND VALUE-REALITY. Aurel Kolnais legacy: an analytic ethic based on the phenomenology of value-consciousness and moral awareness.In 1900, Aurel Kolnai was born in a liberal Jewish family living at the centre of Budapest. He studied and wrote his dissertation in Vienna, converted to Catholicism and was mainly interested in and influenced by realist phenomenology authors such as Brentano, Husserl, Scheler and Hartmann inspired him. In addition, he read many works of Chesterton and, later, also appreciated the writings of British moral philosophers, especially intuitionists. Due to the upheaval in the first half of the twentieth century, Kolnai was forced to travel around Europe, eventually ending up in the United States in 1940. Thereafter, he held a position at the Université Laval for several years and, from 1959 onwards, he was appointed at Bedford College, University of London. The accessibility ofhis work suffered from his perfectionism, which implied he was frequently unsatisfied with his work and often unable to finish the work he started, his travelling existence, eclecticism, a density of style in his work and although there have been translations and publications of hiswork after his death in 1973 the absence of a systematic account of his ethical and political-philosophical views. The aim of this doctoral dissertation is to remedy this hiatus and to introduce Kolnai to the contemporary debate and, in particular, to do this for his moral philosophy.The introductory chapter starts with a sketch of the difficulties that research about Kolnai has to face, but the chapter is mainly about Kolnais historical-personal context and his philosophical backgrounds. The former is covered by a brief biography, the latter by a longer section in which references are made to Meinong, Brentano, Scheler, Hartmann, Moore, Prichard and Ross, as the development of Kolnais ethical thoughtwas mainly indebted to early, realist phenomenologists, value-ethicistsand British moralists of the 19th and 20th century.The second chapter is a synopsis of and commentary on Kolnais ethical views. According to Kolnai, ethics has to start from the moral already present in realityand, thus, from ordinary thinking and reflection about moral experienceand from the description of ethically relevant phenomena. Central to his observations was that value- and moral awareness are intimately linkedand that only the phenomenological method would contribute to an improved understanding of morality. While we already, pre-morally value lifeand its constituents, morality especially concerns the preservation, protection and improvement of these values and our valuable mode of being.Kolnai thus emphasized that although morality is based on primordially positive values, morality is primarily emphatically present whenever these positive values are threatened or corrupted. Kolnai named this the Thematic Primacy of Evil (vs. the Ontologic Primacy of the Good) or thematic or negative morality (in addition to positive and implicit morality).In the third chapter, which can be seen as the crux of the dissertation, I identify the presuppositions of Kolnais moral philosophy and develop a neo-Kolnaian ethic by which I want to show the relevance of Kolnais methodology and views in terms of several issues in the contemporary ethical debate. I therefore develop a neo-Kolnaian conception of ordinary morality and delineate the Kolnaian view meta-ethically. The issues that are taken up, and by which I thus illustrate the fruitfulness of this methodology and view, are moral conflicts and moral dilemmas, the objectivity and universalizability of moral judgements, moral reasons and motivation and, lastly, the peculiar status of morality and being moral. In these sections, I mainly rely on developments of Kolnais insights about the importance of value- and moral awareness to ordinary morality and our reflective understanding of morality. In order to show Kolnais influence, I make use of his contemporaries and, especially, ofthe ethical writings of Bernard Williams and David Wiggins. Both Williams and Wiggins were colleagues of Kolnai at London upon whom, although generally not very well known, Kolnai had a considerable influence in thedevelopment of their ethical thought. Finally, there is an important section explaining Kolnais anti-utopianism and its relation to his moral philosophy. In general, in contrast to the nowadays all too often all too sceptical view about ordinary morality, I argue, in the spirit of Kolnai, that ordinary morality should be, and earns to be, taken much more seriously and less sceptically. In particular, a (philosophical) phenomenology that tries to describe and learn from morality as it is, has much more to offer than is often claimed by contemporary moral philosophy, all too often disregarding phenomenology and the search for relevant descriptions of ethical phenomena." "The moral perspective as a personal perspective" "Stefan Rummens" "Research in Political Philosophy and Ethics Leuven (RIPPLE)" "The moral perspective has traditionally been understood as an impersonal perspective. Moral philosophers are often committed to the view that personal projects and attachments, for example, are morally irrelevant. In my view, however, the moral perspective is at least partly a personal perspective. (1) My first objective is to explain in what ways the moral perspective is and is not a personal perspective. This part of the project has two dimensions. The aim of the reconstructive dimension is to provide a positive account of the ways in which the moral perspective can rightly be said to be a personal perspective, inspired by a Wittgensteinian tradition in moral philosophy. The aim of the critical dimension is to evaluate, on the basis of my reconstructive analysis, three mainstream Kantian accounts by Korsgaard, Habermas and Darwall. Although they rightly recognize that the moral perspective is a personal perspective, my hypothesis is that these accounts misrepresent several personal aspects of our moral lives and practices. (2) My second objective is to trace the implications of the fact that the moral perspective is in several ways a personal perspective for three debates in contemporary moral philosophy. If the moral perspective is, in ways that I will specify, a personal perspective, then that will have consequences for (a) practices of giving moral advice, (b) the possibility of action-guiding moral theory and (c) our understanding of the problem of moralism." "Wittgenstein, Intuitionism, and the Foundations of Our Moral Reasoning" "Bart Pattyn" "Research in Political Philosophy and Ethics Leuven (RIPPLE)" "Moral disagreements are prevalent and do not appear to be easily reconcilable. This fact has led some philosophers to endorse metaethical moral relativism, the view that moral truths are relative to a group. However, it is widely acknowledged that moral relativism is problematic.My aim is to propose a metaethical framework that takes moral disagreement seriously but does not run into relativism’s major problems. In order to achieve this aim, I will take three steps. First, I will investigate, develop, and defend the concept of moral certainty, as introduced by some philosophers influenced by Wittgenstein. Second, I will integrate moral certainty into the framework of moral intuitionism, the position that we reason morally based on intuitive awareness of value. I will argue that moral intuitions should be thought of as certainties, and that this helps to solve a major problem for intuitionists about the truth of moral intuitions. Third, I will show that although not everyone shares every moral certainty, this does not make them arbitrary because non-moral facts restrict the domain of possible certainties. This will result in an original metaethical position that could be located in between realism (reality determines what is right) and relativism (what a group thinks determines what is right): reality does not determine what is right, but it restricts the domain of possible moral certainties, that is, the domain of possible starting points for reasoning towards moral truth."