#7 - A certain moral system holds that performing good

[kelseylee2295]

Hi powerscore,

I would like a little more clarification for #7, "A certain moral system holds that performing good actions is praiseworthy only..." I chose A because the other four answers didn't fit correctly. And conceptually, it makes sense. But is there a formulaic reason for why A is correct? The "after years" is throwing me off. If it said something like "every good habit requires overcoming powerful temptation" that would make more sense to me. But I am not sure that would help either... since H OPT wouldn't add much. I hope that makes sense!

Thanks!

[Jeremy Press]

Hi kelsey,

Given the conditional statement in the first sentence, we can definitely try to break things down a little more formulaically here.

The first sentence says good actions are praiseworthy only when doing them involves overcoming a powerful temptation. If you wanted to diagram that, it'd be something like: Praiseworthy Overcome Powerful Temptation.

The second sentence says that there are sometimes praiseworthy actions (which means, under the moral system, they must be actions for which a powerful temptation has been overcome) that are done out of habit. If you want to use a formal logic diagram for this, it'd be: Praiseworthy Out of Habit.

Weird (tension): habit doesn't seem to mean a powerful temptation was overcome. So, I need an answer that, allows for at least some habitual actions to be ones in which a powerful temptation was overcome. The key here is that the answer doesn't need to tell me that all habitual actions are praiseworthy. And that's because the sentence only says that habitual actions are "sometimes" praiseworthy.

Connecting the two sentences diagrammatically we could get something like this:
Out of Habit Praiseworthy Overcome Powerful Temptation.

So, resolving involves showing: Out of Habit Overcome Powerful Temptation.

Answer choice A is the one that makes that connection: it allows that there are often circumstances in which habitual actions come after years of resisting temptation. That means there are some habitual actions for which a temptation was overcome. That's all I need to get me to some habitual actions being praiseworthy.

I hope this helps!

[kelseylee2295]

That's really helpful, thank you!!

[lounalola]

I was between A and E for this one, can someone explain why E is incorrect?

[Adam Tyson]

Answer E contributes nothing to resolve the paradox, lounalola, because it doesn't tell us how the moral system in question could possibly hold both of these things at once. How can they say a good action is only praiseworthy if it involves resisting temptation, and yet also say that it's sometimes praiseworthy when done out of habit? Aren't those two very different things? It's not a question of what people commonly do. It's a question of what the moral system says about what they do. It appears that the moral system contradicts itself, and answer E does nothing to unravel that apparent contradiction. Only answer A does that, by telling us that habit can sometimes be the result of resisting temptation.