Asymmetries

Abstract

Abstract This chapter lays out ten seeming asymmetries between the ordinary conception of blame and the ordinary conception of praise. These asymmetries include differences in the “demands” made by each, the “desert” status of each, whether there are emotions typically involved, whether it can be purely attitudinal or must be expressed, whether morality is implicated, what excusing conditions for each obtain, whether they target quality of will, whether some moral justification is needed for their deployment, whether a certain sort of standing is needed to issue them, and whether they are dangerous to those blamed or praised. Once the asymmetries are laid out, a few ways of addressing them are surveyed, a revisionary one from philosophy, and an endorsing one from psychology. Both approaches are found wanting, and this motivates a third option, to be detailed in the remainder of Part One.