Publication Date

2016-08-05

Availability

Open access

Embargo Period

2016-08-08

Degree Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy (PHD)

Department

Philosophy (Arts and Sciences)

Date of Defense

2016-06-30

First Committee Member

Kenneth Goodman

Second Committee Member

Wilson Shearin

Third Committee Member

Risto Hilpinen

Fourth Committee Member

Jeff McMahan

Abstract

This dissertation is an investigation of the Socratic moral claim that being a moral wrongdoer is worse for the wrongdoer than it is for the victim. Chapter One investigates this moral claim in the context of Plato’s Gorgias and the historical Gorgias’ Encomium of Helen. Chapter Two brings the ancient conception into contemporary ethics into a typology of what the ancient concept looks like in contemporary ethics. Chapter Three prepares for an investigation of a certain moral wrongdoer, the military interrogator/ torturer and wrongdoing, by first examining a standard torture hypothetical, the Ticking Time Bomb. All three chapters work together as they revolve around my explication and characterization of the ancient and contemporary phenomenon of moral injury.

Keywords

Moral Injury; Ethics; Socrates; Gorgias; Ticking Time Bomb; Jonathan Shay; Jeff McMahan

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