Synopsis of Research in Shanghai (September 15 - December 12)
John (Zhicheng) Fan is planning to finish another chapter of his dissertation on blame and forgiveness. On blame, Fan is interested in "writing someone off" as a response to wrongdoing. Fan argues that it is different from the kind of angry blame familiar in ethics, and that there are distinctive moral norms that apply to this response. Fan’s next chapter will focus on what it means to give someone another chance. Fan contrasts this form of reparative response to the kind of forgiveness more familiar from the Christian tradition, usually associated with the metaphor "wiping the slate clean." Importantly, to give another chance does not require wiping the slate clean, or overcoming anger or resentment toward the wrongdoer and the past wrong. Fan argues that apologies sometimes are not sufficient for forgiveness in the clean slate sense, even though they can be sufficient for giving the wrongdoer another chance. And while we are not always obligated to give wrongdoers another chance, we may have an imperfect duty to do so (in Kant's sense). This is because to refuse to give people second chances as a general policy is to see them as defined by their past wrongs. But this is incompatible with seeing them as agents who can learn from their mistakes and reform. Fan’s intuition is that forgiveness, in the clean slate sense, can be quite risky, and it may be dangerous to treat forgiveness as a virtue, as is usually done in Western culture. There are many good reasons why we shouldn't wipe the slate clean. But Fan wants to argue that society can and should encourage second chances, and that it is distinct from clean-slate forgiveness. If Fan has time, he plans to also work on the political and legal implications of this line of argument, especially how we should think about agential freedom and certain forms of punishment (such as the death penalty and life without parole).