THEY KNOW NOT WHAT THEY DO: A PRELIMINARY ACCOUNT OF THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN FALSE CONSCIOUSNESS AND MORAL BLAME

Abstract

This thesis is a preliminary attempt at clarifying how the concept of false consciousness challenges our conceptions of moral blame. In it, I argue that our practices of blaming in cases of acts under false consciousness cannot be accounted for by attributability blame, forcing us to turn to other kinds of blame. Most recent attempts to justify our practices of blaming agents in marginal cases largely rely on attributing their actions, or attitudes, to them through reasons-responsiveness or real-self accounts of responsibility. But, I argue that, to make sense of the false beliefs in the reasons for actions of an agent suffering false consciousness (who have such beliefs in virtue of being in a social group), we need to shift our focus away from individual cognition to social cognition. This means that blame cannot be properly attributed to individual agents, as beliefs of false consciousness are irreducibly social.