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Duty and Interest—(I)

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 February 2009

W. D. Lamont
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Extract

1. Aim and Scope of this Paper.—In this paper I shall try to show that “duty” derives its significance from its relation to “interest,” and that the former concept cannot be understood when taken apart from its relation to the latter. Such a doctrine is, I am aware, rejected by some contemporary philosophers; and I shall, I trust, make it sufficiently clear in the sequel why I am unable to accept their view.

I am not, however, concerned primarily with criticism of other theories. This paper represents an attempt to interpret a particular province of “the common moral consciousness” and to elicit the principles there implied. I begin by accepting the view that, like natural science, ethics has its data, and that it is the business of ethics to interpret these data which are the contents of the “moral consciousness.” In Section A I discuss various methods which may be used for the discovery of the relevant data, and suggest that initial enquiries can most fruitfully be pursued in the field of law and custom. In Section B I undertake an analysis of the principles of the law relating to promise-keeping. As a result of what is there found, it becomes necessary, in Section C, to discuss the nature of rights and their relation to interests, and, in Section D, the nature of duties and their relation to rights.

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Articles
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Philosophy , Volume 16 , Issue 64 , October 1941, pp. 339 - 355
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Institute of Philosophy 1941

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References

page 339 note 1 This is the work referred to in my article on “Justice” in Philosophy, vol. xvi, No. 61, p. 8, note 1Google Scholar.

page 340 note 1 Fundamental Principles of the Metaphysics of Morals, Abbott, 's trans., p. 20Google Scholar.

page 340 note 2 Prolegomena to Ethics, par. 311.

page 341 note 1 The Right and the Good, p. 21, noteGoogle Scholar.

page 341 note 2 P. 41.

page 343 note 1 Interesting examples may be found in Sharpe, F. C.'s Ethics, pp. 122 f. 158 ff., and especially in chap, xii on “The Influence of Authority upon Moral Judgments.”Google Scholar.

page 343 note 2 See Piaget, M. Jean's The Moral Judgment of the Child, ForewordGoogle Scholar.

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page 345 note 1 Jurisprudence, 8th edit., pp. 39–41Google Scholar.

page 345 note 2 See Bryce, , Studies in History and Jurisprudence (vol. i, p. 118)Google Scholar for some interesting comments on the judicial machinery of India; Salmond, chaps, ii, iii, and iv; and Allen, C. K., Law in the Making, 1st edit., chaps, iii, iv, and vGoogle Scholar.

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page 349 note 2 Op. cit., p. 33.

page 349 note 3 See Ross, p. 19.

page 350 note 1 Gloag and Henderson, p. 36. Thus a “will,” revocable at pleasure by the testator, is legally regarded as a statement of present intention, and not as an assertion of settled disposition.

page 350 note 2 Op. cit., p. 27.

page 351 note 2 Gloag and Henderson, p. 78.

page 351 note 1 Op. cit., chap. vi.

page 351 note 2 Op. cit., chap. viii.

page 352 note 1 Gloag and Henderson, p. 69.

page 352 note 2 Op. cit., chap. ix.

page 353 note 1 Gloag and Henderson, p. 57. See also Gibb, 's Select Scots Cases (1933 edition), pp. 31, 33, 35, and 114–15Google Scholar.

page 353 note 2 Gloag and Henderson, pp. 74–5, and Gibb, p. 15.

page 353 note 3 Gloag and Henderson, p. 448.

page 353 note 4 Op. cit., chap. ix.

page 353 note 5 Op. cit., p. 42.

page 353 note 6 Op. cit., chap. v.

page 353 note 7 Gibb, pp. 35–6.

page 354 note 1 Gloag and Henderson, p. 102.

page 354 note 2 Op. cit., p. 102.

page 355 note 1 E.g., Salmond, para. 37.