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469 BCE
Socrates 469-399 BC
He believed that virtue could be known, though he himself did not profess to know it. He also thought that anyone who knows what virtue is will necessarily act virtuously. Those who act badly, therefore, do so only because they are ignorant of, or mistaken about, the real nature of virtue. -
1225
Thomas Aquinas 1225-1274
Aquinas believes that we should always follow our conscience, even when it is wrong or causes great harm. Since we have no way of knowing whether our consciences are wrong, they are the best guide we have as to what is the moral thing to do. -
René Descartes 1596-1650
As Descartes defines it, virtue depends upon the employment of reason. Though it is conceivable that one might have a “firm and constant will” to do something without having examined whether it is the right thing to do, one cannot have a firm and constant will to do what is judged to be the best, unless one is capable of judging what the best is. -
Immanuel Kant 1724-1804
Kant’s Categorical Imperative is to act according to the maxim that you would wish all other rational people to follow, as if it were a universal law. This means that we should never treat a person as a means to an end. Persons are always ends in themselves. We must never use or exploit anyone for whatever purpose. -
John Rawls 1921-2002
His theory of justice as fairness describes a society of free citizens holding equal basic rights and cooperating within an egalitarian economic system. This means that a person’s position at birth does not determine a higher or lower position for them in the future since all people are fundamentally equal. And that all social goods are to be distributed equally, unless an unequal distribution would be to everyone’s advantage.