Center for Advanced Studies (CAS) Research Focus Moral Behavior (LMU) - HD Center for Advanced Studies (CAS)

Adam Smith has claimed that imagination is necessary for empathy, in the sense that we identify with the person we are empathising with. But such imagination could take other forms, like simulating the other person's feelings. In her talk, Rae Langton explains (1) how empathy involves first personal imagining, and (2) what empathy might teach us about the first personal. She argues that empathic imagining is a de se attitude that involves an imaginative self-ascription of the other person's properties. | Rae Langton ist Professorin für Philosophie an der Universität Cambridge

Monika Betzler ist Professorin für Praktische Philosophie und Ethik an der LMU München.

Spätestens seit Aristoteles gehören Fragen des Charakters und der Moral zu den Grundlagen der Ethik. Die Psychologie, und hier vor allem die Entwicklungspsychologie, interessiert sich für die emotionale, moralische und soziale Entwicklung bei Kindern und untersucht die Entstehung von Altruismus, Empathie und prosozialem Verhalten. Und auch in der Volkswirtschaftslehre spielt die Motivation von Entscheidungen traditionell eine große Rolle, deren Durchdringung es erlaubt, das Menschenbild hinter ökonomischen Modellen besser zu verstehen. Für die Rechtswissenschaft sind moralphilosophische Fragen insofern von Bedeutung, als sie die Grundlage für die Bindungs- und Geltungskraft von Gesetzen bilden. In diesem Schwerpunkt adressieren neben der Philosophie Wissenschaftler aus so unterschiedlichen Disziplinen wie der Psychologie, Ökonomie, Politikwissenschaft und der Rechtswissenschaft moralphilosophische Fragen. | David Laibson ist Robert I. Goldman Professor of Economics an der Harvard University.

Walter Mischel is Robert Johnston Niven Professor of Humane Letters in Psychology at the University of Columbia.
[The CAS research focus "Moral Behavior" presents four lectures on willpower.] Representatives of the fields of philosophy, psychology and economics discuss the question of how strength and weakness of will affect decision-making processes, as well as the role of self-control.

[The CAS research focus "Moral Behavior" presents four lectures on willpower.] Representatives of the fields of philosophy, psychology and economics discuss the question of how strength and weakness of will affect decision-making processes, as well as the role of self-control.

Initially an outgrowth of the desire to keep newborns and infants alive, the American child-rearing advice industry grew to become a means to influence American children of all ages. During the twentieth century, advice moved from issues of physical survival to psychological well-being, and from normal development to cognitive success. As doctors, psychologists and other professionals penetrated into the lives of middle class parents and their children, they contributed to the growing self-consciousness and accompanying anxiety of mothers regarding their responsibilities. In this context, Dr. Benjamin Spock emerged as the towering figure in post-World War II America parenting advice.