Ethics Chapter 7 – Flashcards

For Locke, every person has a distinct right to punish those who transgress the natural law.

The natural state of human liberty is a state of license according to Locke.

One philosopher who does not agree that there is such a thing as human nature is

According to Rorty, there is no common human nature to use as a moral reference point.

One problem for natural rights theory is that not everyone agrees on what human nature requires.

Moral laws are descriptive generalizations of facts.

Existentialists like Sartre believe that essence precedes existence.

Moral requirements cannot be grounded in human nature according to natural rights theory.

"Laws of nature" is another way of referring to natural law theory.

According to Thomas Aquinas, humans are naturally inclined to be good based on reason.

The Declaration of Independence draws on the theory of

For Thomas Aquinas, all laws created by humans are derived from natural law.

The idea that the basic moral law can be known by human reason, and that we know what it requires by looking to human nature, are two of the tenets of natural law theory.

Locke argued all humans should be treated equally because we all have the same basic nature.