Natural Law - Thomas Aquinas — Transcript

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1. 0:00[Music]
2. 0:07hello and welcome to philosophy vibe the
3. 0:09channel will be discuss and debate
4. 0:11different philosophical ideas today were
5. 0:13going to be looking at some religious
6. 0:15ethics and focusing on the theory of
7. 0:17natural law right natural law was
8. 0:20advocated by since almost Aquinas the
9. 0:23central idea behind natural law is that
10. 0:25human beings have an innate power to
11. 0:28understand good and evil God has written
12. 0:31moral law into nature and he has created
13. 0:34all humans with the ability to know what
14. 0:36morality is and to recognize what is
15. 0:39good and what is evil ok so why does
16. 0:42Aquinas advocate than that true law
17. 0:44theory good question
18. 0:45well Aquinas got most of the grounding
19. 0:48for natural law through the works of
20. 0:50Aristotle Aristotle believed that
21. 0:52everything in nature was constantly
22. 0:54changing and moving and this movement
23. 0:57was all towards its specific purpose or
24. 0:59delos as Aristotle referred to it
25. 1:02yes Aquinas agreed with this he agreed
26. 1:06that God created the world in this
27. 1:08goal-driven manner where everything was
28. 1:10following strict natural laws to fulfill
29. 1:12its specific purpose ok
30. 1:15Aquinas said this was the same for
31. 1:17humans human beings are themselves
32. 1:19moving to their Della's he refers to
33. 1:21Aristotle's concept of eudaimonia you
34. 1:24could say it's like a heaven or a state
35. 1:26of bliss true and pure happiness
36. 1:28so Aquinas believed eudaimonia was only
37. 1:32achieved in the afterlife but it did not
38. 1:35stop humans pursuing this and moving
39. 1:37towards it and we move towards
40. 1:40eudaimonia by pursuing what is good and
41. 1:43avoiding what is evil if we as humans
42. 1:46always strive to pursue glu than avoid
43. 1:48evil we get closer and closer to our
44. 1:51purpose and to reaching eudaimonia well
45. 1:54there's a bit of a problem here
46. 1:56Aquinas says we reach eudaimonia by
47. 1:58pursuing good that's how exactly do we
48. 2:00know what is good Aquinas argued that
49. 2:03this is through human reason human
50. 2:06beings have the unique capability to
51. 2:08reason to be self-aware to think and
52. 2:11understand their surroundings and
53. 2:13their lives this reason unlocks for us
54. 2:16our moral knowledge and we will be able
55. 2:18to recognize good and we will know how
56. 2:21we should live and we will know how we
57. 2:23should act right I see now Aquinas went
58. 2:26further he argued that when we use our
59. 2:29reason we noticed basic goods that all
60. 2:31reasonable humans pursue the main
61. 2:34purposes of life were near enough all
62. 2:36humans want and what all humans are
63. 2:38drawn towards he distinguished five
64. 2:41basic goods that he referred to as
65. 2:43primary precepts the primary precepts
66. 2:46include life so the preservation and
67. 2:49promotion of life reproduction so the
68. 2:52continuation of the human race education
69. 2:55this is more so education of one's
70. 2:58offspring so they will know how to
71. 3:00continue the human race live better
72. 3:02lives and even protect you when you get
73. 3:04old worshipping God Aquinas saw how we
74. 3:07innately seek God we try to understand
75. 3:10and make sense of our lives as a whole
76. 3:12and finally law and order this promotes
77. 3:16justice and allows us to live in a
78. 3:18functional well maintained society where
79. 3:21humors can grow develop and be safe I
80. 3:23see so these are the primary precepts
81. 3:27the basic goods Aquinas then goes on to
82. 3:30say that natural law continues from the
83. 3:33primary precepts into the secondary
84. 3:35precepts once our reason our knowledge
85. 3:38is the primary precepts we use our
86. 3:40reason to further derive our rules laws
87. 3:43and behavior in accordance with the
88. 3:45basic goods so the specific laws or
89. 3:48behavioral codes are the secondary
90. 3:50precepts I'm not sure understand okay
91. 3:53let me explain we'll take the first
92. 3:55primary precept of life the promotion of
93. 3:58life our reason has acknowledged that
94. 4:00this is a basic good to follow we then
95. 4:03think about murder as murder is taking
96. 4:05the life
97. 4:06it goes against the primary precept of
98. 4:08promoting and preserving life and so it
99. 4:11goes against the natural law
100. 4:12so murder is something we shouldn't do
101. 4:14murder is wrong this would be a
102. 4:17secondary precept I see or if we take
103. 4:20school school is a place where children
104. 4:22go to learn and become educated
105. 4:24educating you're offs
106. 4:26is a primary precept school is something
107. 4:28that follows the primary precepts and
108. 4:30therefore follows the natural law school
109. 4:33is therefore good this is another
110. 4:35secondary precepts yes yes I understand
111. 4:38so this is the fundamental theory of
112. 4:40natural law morality is an absolute
113. 4:43god-given natural law that all humans
114. 4:46have the innate ability to discover by
115. 4:48using our reason this does seem like an
116. 4:51interesting theory on human ethics
117. 4:52however a lot of problems can be raised
118. 4:55like what well if the morality is a
119. 4:59natural law that God has written into
120. 5:01nature and all humans have the innate
121. 5:03ability to reason and discover these
122. 5:05laws then why do people violate the
123. 5:08natural law throughout all of human
124. 5:10history all the time humans have
125. 5:13violated the natural law murder theft
126. 5:16and other horrible crimes why if all
127. 5:19humans possess an innate ability to
128. 5:21understand morality is there so much
129. 5:24immorality that is a good argument
130. 5:26firstly we need to understand the
131. 5:29natural law for ethics is not like any
132. 5:31other natural law
133. 5:32I can't violate the law of gravity for
134. 5:35example however for moral law we need to
135. 5:38remember that God is balancing this with
136. 5:41free will so it is necessary that I am
137. 5:44physically able to violate moral natural
138. 5:46law yes okay but why would anyone want
139. 5:49to this can be down to human emotion we
140. 5:52are at the end of the day emotional
141. 5:54beings we do not live by just reason
142. 5:56alone and so sometimes our emotions can
143. 5:59get the better of us it can cloud our
144. 6:01reason and lead us to do wrong things
145. 6:04and violate the natural law when we
146. 6:07break a basic good our reason is being
147. 6:10overpowered by emotion and we do things
148. 6:12we know deep down we shouldn't but
149. 6:15that's exactly it
150. 6:16our reason has been pushed deep down ok
151. 6:19well here is another issue I have you
152. 6:22would agree that natural law is an
153. 6:23absolutist theory as morality has been
154. 6:26written into nature
155. 6:27it must be absolute yes correct what is
156. 6:30good and what is evil is absolute it is
157. 6:33not dependent on an outcome but God has
158. 6:35created this as law an action is within
159. 6:38itself either
160. 6:39that's all wrong so how would natural
161. 6:42law deal with moral dilemmas we're
162. 6:45violating a natural law would actually
163. 6:47bring about more good what do you mean
164. 6:49consider someone who must commit a
165. 6:51morally bad action in order to fulfill a
166. 6:54morally good action let's imagine we
167. 6:57were in a hospital and there has been a
168. 6:58power car
169. 6:59the backup generator does not have a lot
170. 7:01of power in the emergency room we have
171. 7:04three people who need urgent care or
172. 7:06they will die in the room next door we
173. 7:09have a man in a coma on a life-support
174. 7:11machine with no signs of recovery as the
175. 7:14back-up generator is weak the only way
176. 7:16we can save the three people in the
177. 7:18emergency room is to unplug the
178. 7:20life-support machine and use the power
179. 7:22so what are the choices if we do not
180. 7:26unplug the life-support machine we let
181. 7:28three people die if we do unplug the
182. 7:30life-support machine we are actively
183. 7:32killing someone and so violating the
184. 7:35natural law of life I see well Aquinas
185. 7:38had a response to this he refers to the
186. 7:41doctrine of double effect when we are
187. 7:44faced with dilemmas like this we need to
188. 7:45look at the situation and ask was the
189. 7:48action one wanted to do good and was
190. 7:50evil intended in the action so with
191. 7:53regards to the hospital example we want
192. 7:55to save for three people is this good
193. 7:57yes I would say it is this is still
194. 8:00preserving and protecting life so when
195. 8:03we unplug the life-support machine did
196. 8:05we intend evil not really our intention
197. 8:08was to save the three people which is
198. 8:10good we did not intend to kill the man
199. 8:12in the column back this is not what we
200. 8:14set out to do it was just an unfortunate
201. 8:16situation but the intention was always
202. 8:20good so what we've done was morally good
203. 8:23you just had a bad side effect so this
204. 8:25means it is permissible under moral law
205. 8:28this seems problematic how can this be
206. 8:31an absolutist theory
207. 8:32how come morality be absolute if natural
208. 8:35law can be violated when we deem it
209. 8:37necessary we're talking about situations
210. 8:39in which the intended action is good the
211. 8:42unintended side effects are violating
212. 8:45the natural laws however as agents we're
213. 8:48not intending to violate the natural
214. 8:50laws but rather promote them this is
215. 8:52just casuistry
216. 8:53you can bend in shape and violate the
217. 8:55natural law depending on what we think
218. 8:57will generate the most good this feels
219. 9:00more like a consequentialist theory
220. 9:02rather than an absolutist one I see
221. 9:05and finally what good is the natural law
222. 9:08theory if you do not believe in God you
223. 9:10can argue that God has created natural
224. 9:13laws for humans and that our moral laws
225. 9:15are created within nature but if we
226. 9:18reject the whole concept of God and deny
227. 9:21he exists and where does that leave
228. 9:23natural law as the whole theory relies
229. 9:26on God this theory can only appeal to
230. 9:29religious people no one else really has
231. 9:31a reason to adopt this good point well
232. 9:34that's all the time we have for now
233. 9:35thank you for watching we hope you
234. 9:36enjoyed the vibe and what are your
235. 9:38thoughts on natural law do you think
236. 9:40it's a good theory to explain human
237. 9:42morality lets us know in the comments
238. 9:44below don't forget to Like share and
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240. 9:48to seeing you all soon
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