By Greg Borzo, UChicago News An excerpt: That the new study of virtues has come to embrace a systematic, organized body of knowledge was evident at the third annual conference of the New Science of Virtues project at the University of Chicago, March 14-16, 2012. “The rigorous scientific method can be...

From Science Daily An excerpt: A study by University of Iowa neuroscientist and neuro-marketing expert William Hedgcock confirms previous studies that show self-control is a finite commodity that is depleted by use. Once the pool has dried up, we're less likely to keep our cool the next time we're...

By Luci Scott, AZ Central News Imagine you're riding in a car with a friend who is speeding and the car hits a pedestrian. You're the only witness, and the friend's lawyer asks you to testify that your friend was not at fault. Do you help your friend or tell the truth? This is one of many...

By Ashley Welch, Scientific American Anyone who has ever devoured a triple-chocolate brownie after an intense workout knows how tempting it can be to indulge after behaving virtuously. A new study suggests, however, that we often apply this thought process to inappropriate scenarios, giving ourselves...

From New Scientist WHY do we sometimes wrestle with moral dilemmas? A twist on a classic psychology experiment suggests that our minds have two parallel moral systems, and they don't always agree. In the trolley experiment, participants are told that a runaway tram trolley could kill five people...

By Tiffanny O'Callaghan, in The New Scientist Disgust can be a bewildering emotion. In her new book, That's Disgusting, research psychologist Rachel Herz points out that our tendency to react by pulling away is based on a combination of self-preservation and learned behaviour. When we are grossed...

By Bill Schmitt, ND Newswire Reading for Life, an innovative literature-based mentoring program that provides an alternative to prosecution for low-risk juvenile offenders, was recently awarded county funding to sustain its operation in St. Joseph County, Ind. With the unanimous approval of the county...

By Jonathan Haidt, Reason Magazine From a rational perspective, joining a protest rally is like voting—a complete waste of time. The odds that your voice or your protest sign will make a difference are no better than the odds that your vote will change an election. And yet, people do join protests and...

By Cordelia Fine, the Wall Street Journal 'If there were an Olympics of desiring," the philosopher William B. Irvine once observed, "we would all make the team." Desire animates us: What, quite literally, would we do without it? Yet all too often—for about four hours a day, according...

By Linda Grant, Wall Street Journal An excerpt: Life and Fate , by Vassily Grossman (1959) An old Russian woman, seeing a captured German soldier, raises a brick to throw at him, but at the last moment she instead hands him a piece of bread. The woman has no idea why she does this and in the years to...

By Liisa Myyrya, Soile Juujaumlrvi and Kaija Pesso The aim of this study was to clarify the relationships between empathy variables, personal values and moral reasoning. The impact of empathic concern, perspective taking and personal values measured by the Portrait Value Questionnaire on moral schemas...

by Cynthia L. S. Pury and Autumn D. Hensel When asked to describe a courageous action they have taken personally, people overwhelmingly describe an action with a successful outcome (Pury, Kowalski, & Spearman, 2007). Study 1 replicated these findings in observations of other people. Fifty participants...

The article discusses the highlights of the Twenty-Seventh Annual National Federalist Society Student Symposium held at the University of Michigan Law School in Ann Arbor in 2009. Among the topics tackled were judicial review, local values and pluralism. It affirms a basic assumption of federalism that...

What are virtue and vice, and how do they relate to other moral properties such as goodness and rightness? Thomas Hurka defends a distinctive perfectionist view according to which the virtues are higher-level intrinsic goods, ones that involve morally appropriate attitudes to other, independent goods...

Abstract: Article presents aspects of law-related education and character education, both recent educational reform movements to promote positive values in youth. Discusses ways that the two reform efforts are in conflict with each other, and suggests how they can be combined to facilitate positive character...

At the center of this work is a passionate concern with the relationship between political rhetoric and political action. For Elshtain, politics is a sphere of concrete responsibility. Political speech should, therefore, approach the richness of actual lives and commitments rather than present impossible...