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    Carmelics

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    LoyalLoyalJusticeJustice
    Made withinDC&Austin
    Home/Original/inverse
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    Inverse View

    It is not the case that Human beings are naturally endowed with a heart sensitive to the suffering of others, which is the beginning of the virtue of benevolence (ren).

    ?Set your confidence on the premises below to see your aggregate.

    Reasons For

    2 perspectives
    Reason for 1 of 2
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    • 1.Xunzi argues that human nature is originally bad (性惡), and benevolent conduct arises only through ritual propriety and deliberate effort, not innate feeling.
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    • 2.The well-child intuition reveals a momentary affective response, not a stable disposition, and momentary responses do not constitute evidence of natural virtue.
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    • 3.If benevolence required only cultivation of an innate seed, Mencius could not explain the pervasive moral failure and cruelty observable across human history.
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    Reason for 2 of 2
    ?
    • 1.Hume's distinction between natural sympathy and moral virtue shows that compassion is a passion subject to partiality, distance, and habituation, not a reliable foundation for universal benevolence.
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    • 2.Moral sentimentalism of this kind conflates the genesis of a feeling with its normative authority, committing a genetic fallacy about the source of moral obligation.
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    Reasons Against

    1 perspective
    Reason against
    ?
    • 1.No person is devoid of a heart sensitive to the suffering of others.
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    • 2.If a man were suddenly to see a young child about to fall into a well, he would certainly be moved to compassion.
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    • 3.This compassion arises not from self-interest (gaining favor with parents, winning praise, or disliking the child's cry) but from natural feeling.
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