People rely on their emotions to tell them about the world. Emotions are about something, they feel like something, they influence how we interact with others, and they can be evaluated for appropriateness. What roles do emotions play in a theory of moral motivation? According to sentimentalists, emotions play a fundamental role in moral judgement. In this paper, I will argue how the emotional deficits of psychopaths provide support for sentimentalism.
The best way to distinguish emotions from other psychological states, such as beliefs and desires, is in terms of their functions (text 10). An emotion is a response to external or internal events of major significance, and they are about things we care about or things that matter to us (text 71). Pride targets positive things about ourselves, shame has to do with negative things about ourselves, and fear is a response to perceived danger. (TEXT 71). One function of emotions is that they feel like something, (TEXT 71) Anger is felt as a pounding heartbeat, fast breathing, tense muscles, and feeling hot and sweaty. In fact, evidence shows that basic emotions feel much the same and have the same physiological signs for people across different cultures. (TEXT 71) Another function of emotions is that they can motivate us to action (TEXT 71). Anger gives us some information about the world, which is often particularly morally significant (TEXT p. 75) because anger seems to be about or directed at moral transgressions (TEXT p. 74). This can also be said about other emotions such as guilt, empathy or sympathy, moral approval, admiration, pride, shame, resentment, gratitude, etc. (Text 75). Judgments that have moral content, i.e. moral judgements, have a special relationship to action that other kinds of judgements do not have (text 75).
Moral norms generally concern the welfare and rights of individuals, and conventional norms relate to the regulation and coordination of actions. The difference between such norms comes out most clearly in judgments concerning violations. Moral transgressions are judged to be more serious, less permissible, and less subject to authority than social norms. The moral-conventional distinction tracks the status of moral and social or conventional norms. (MORAL UNREASON p?)
Emotions seem to be related to moral judgements in an important way (TEXT 75) as we tend to be motivated by our moral judgements. However, this tendency can be discouraged by the circumstances or overridden by other motivations. (text 76). Still, we tend to be motivated by moral judgments, whereas judgements made by our reasoning faculty are not essentially motivating, which leads some people to conclude that judgements must be made from our emotions, rather than from our reason (text 76). This conclusion is endorsed by moral judgement internalists, who state that emotions are the basis for moral judgement. One theory of moral judgement internalism, which believes that morality is somehow grounded in moral sentiments or emotions, is referred to as sentimentalism (TEXT 79).
Sentimentalism makes moral judgements motivating because our emotions motivate us (TEXT 79). Further, when our moral judgements change, our motivations tend to change with them. (TEXT 75). If moral judgements are expressions of sentiments or emotions, then it follows that in making a moral judgement we have some motive or other. The claim that moral judgements are essentially motivating is known as moral judgement internalism. It is worth noting that the motivation elicited by a moral judgment does not have to be an overriding motivation for action (Internalism, Emotions, and the Psychopathy Challenge pg. 329). Our moral motivations can be outweighed by non-moral considerations, such as self-centred interests, and some versions of internalism allow this. But if someone has no motivation at all to act upon what they claim to be morally right, this gives us a good reason to suspect that they may not hold a genuine moral judgment (Internalism, Emotions, and the Psychopathy Challenge pg. 329).
Other people deny sentimentalism, and more broadly deny moral judgement internalism, who are known as moral judgement externalists (TEXT 79). Some base their denial on the sentimentalist claim that moral judgements are essentially motivating (TEXT 79). However, as previously noted, a moral judgment does not have to be an overriding motivation for action, on some accounts of sentimentalism. Others claim that the fact that emotions influence moral judgements does not establish that moral judgements are emotional responses, nor that emotions are even an essential part of moral judgement ( TEXT p. 78). Moral rationalism is the idea that morality is based on reason or rationality (How Psychopaths Threaten Moral Rationalism: Is It Irrational To Be Immoral p. 285) rather than emotions or sentiments. Moral judgement externalists have claimed that sentimentalists would have a stronger argument if there were empirical evidence that we cannot make moral judgments without emotions (TEXT 78).
Some have thought that psychopaths provide empirical evidence that we can’t make moral judgements without emotions, because psychopaths do not experience emotions like sympathy or compassion and they act immorally (TEXT 78). According to the International Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems, the criteria for antisocial personality disorder includes callous unconcern for the feelings of others and lack of the capacity for empathy, disregard for social norms, rules, and obligations, incapacity to experience guilt, and proneness to blame others or to offer rationalizations for their behaviour (Psychopathy and the DSM-IV Criteria for Antisocial Personality Disorder, pg ??). [Psychopaths] are ideal candidates for testing the empirical plausibility of moral theories. Many think the source of their immorality is their emotional deficits. ( Moral Unreason: The Case of Psychopathy.237) Emotionally, they are significantly impaired, incapable of feeling guilt or remorse, their fear and pain responses are abnormal, and their other emotions are shallow compared to the normal population. They are manipulative, egocentric, and impulsive ( Moral Unreason: The Case of Psychopathy p ?) Central to this emotional landscape is a complete lack of empathy. (Moral unreason p. ?) Importantly, psychopaths appear remarkably rational, especially when compared to other populations with behavioural and emotional problems, This provides substantial support for sentimentalism as an empirical theory, (Moral unreason p. ?) When studying the capacity for moral judgement, psychologists explore the psychopath's basic capacity to distinguish moral violations (e.g., hitting another person) from conventional violations (e.g., playing with your food) (How Psychopaths Threaten Moral Rationalism: Is It Irrational To Be Immoral p. 293). Children as young as 4 years of age (Smetana and Braeges, 1990), including children with Downs Syndrome, draw a distinction between moral and conventional norms.12 Since the former have a rather undeveloped reason and the latter low IQ, this rather speaks against the idea that moral understanding is the result of rational processes. (MORAL UNREASON p?)
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When compared to non-psychopathic individuals, even children can distinguish the cases of moral violations from the conventional violations on a number of dimensions (How Psychopaths Threaten Moral Rationalism: Is It Irrational To Be Immoral p.293-294). Psychologists have tested psychopaths and non-psychopathic control criminals on their capacity to distinguish moral and conventional violations (How Psychopaths Threaten Moral Rationalism: Is It Irrational To Be Immoral p. 294) and found that control criminals, like normal adults and children, made a significant moral/conventional distinction on permissibility, seriousness, and authority contingence Psychopaths, on the other hand, didn’t make a significant distinction on any of these dimensions (How Psychopaths Threaten Moral Rationalism: Is It Irrational To Be Immoral p. 294-295). In support of the claim that psychopaths lack empathy, it was found that psychopaths were much less likely than the control criminals to justify rules with reference to the victim’s welfare, and instead typically gave conventional-type justifications for all transgressions (How Psychopaths Threaten Moral Rationalism: Is It Irrational To Be Immoral p. 295).
Perspective-taking abilities, general rational abilities, intellectual arrogance, and affect-based accounts of the psychopath’s deficit in moral judgement (How Psychopaths Threaten Moral Rationalism: Is It Irrational To Be Immoral p. 295)
An argument against the claim that psychopaths’ limited emotional capacity shows favour for sentimentalism over rationalism, is that psychopaths also have a limited capacity to make rational judgements (MORAL UNREASON p?). Since it is clear that psychopaths have emotional deficits of the sort relevant to the sentimentalist view of morality, the question is whether their deficits in their practical reason account for their lack of morality, which would show support for rationalism. For a rationalist, a rational agent’s will is guided by moral considerations insofar as it is guided by rational considerations, (MORAL UNREASON p?) as no one can be morally worthy if we are deficient in practical reason because we won’t be performing the right actions for the right reasons. (MORAL UNREASON p?).
Psychopaths have deficits in their practical reasoning that significantly impairs their decision-making abilities, which has been shown through experimental and anecdotal evidence. For example, psychopaths will frequently act in their own worst interest, exhibit cognitive-perceptual shortcomings in the recognition of certain emotions in others, have attention deficits, are intransigent to certain forms of conditioning, and a grossly inflated view of their abilities, intelligence, entitlements and worth (MORAL UNREASON p?) In fact, grandiosity and egocentricity are part of the diagnostic criteria for the disorder (CITE THAT ONE SOURCE). The most curious thing is that this default idea of their excellence and intelligence is impervious to counter-evidence that most others would consider fairly conclusive, e.g. persistent failure to get any significant education or pursue a career, constant brushes with the law, and so on.
Nevertheless, the sort of perseverance found in psychopaths with regard to their own self-image is out of the ordinary and does seem to reflect a failure of rational belief formation and maintenance.11 (MORAL UNREASON p?). Rationalists conclude that psychopaths' limited capacity to make rational judgements directly impacts their moral competence and thus sentimentalism does not sufficiently explain moral judgements.
A rebuttal to this sentimentalist claim is that psychopaths do in fact have the capacity to make rational judgements. If psychopaths have normal reasoning skills and they are simply insensitive to moral considerations, it is evidence that you can be rational without being moral. (MORAL UNREASON p.?) Although the reasoning skills of psychopathic individuals appear exclusively egocentric, they do appear intact. There are reasons to think that a narrow attention span is responsible for many of the difficulties in decision-making experienced by psychopaths (MORAL UNREASON p?). Their decision-making is vulnerable to breakdown, but if the goal is exciting, the means few and obvious, and there are relatively few distractions, a psychopath’s reasoning abilities to be relatively good. (MORAL UNREASON p?) . In fact, psychopaths are well-known for their successful manipulation of people, including parole boards and psychiatrists, which does require making complicated decisions about how to act, what to say, and when to say it. Psychopaths do exhibit understanding of right and wrong (MORAL UNREASON p?), however, they fail to regard moral norms as a separate from conventional norms, which are generally regarded as being more serious, less permissible, and wrongness less dependent upon authority (MORAL UNREASON). Further, they appear unmotivated by their understanding that they are not supposed to perform certain actions. (MORAL UNREASON p?) Reference to the welfare of others is very rare or entirely absent when justifying their actions. The moral universe of the psychopath seems characterized by rules set by some authority where harm to others or concern for them is not at all salient. This leads to the conclusion that the ability to make a rational judgement is not what is required to make moral judgements. One may also argue that the psychopath is only motivated by rational judgement, with emotions or sentiments having no influence. For example, if a psychopath wants something they will simply take it, with no regard for how that action may hurt someone else. Consequently, the emotional deficit is seen by many to form the root of the moral one (MORAL UNREASON p?).
There has also been studies done with patients who have suffered damage to their prefrontal cortex. The most prominent effects of these types of damages are flat affect, an inability to act appropriately socially, and difficulties making good decisions (MORAL UNREASON). Since they perform within the norm at standard IQ tests, it has been suggested that their bad decision-making skills are due to their emotional impairments. These types of patients have been compared to psychopaths, as people who sustain injury to areas of the prefrontal cortex early in life present behaviorally and emotionally almost identical to psychopaths. Both suffer from emotional impairments and impaired practical reasons. These impairments are not as pronounced in people who sustain their injuries later in life. It could be hypothesized that the prior learning of emotions and sentiments is what allows them to continue to make rational moral decisions, although there is no evidence to support this theory as of yet. Regardless, we then seem to be back to where we started, with the case of psychopathy supporting sentimentalism over rationalism (MORAL UNREASON p?).
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