This chapter explores the place of remorse in Sophie de Grouchy’s moral theory, as presented in her 1798 work, Letters on Sympathy, which was originally published with her translation of Adam Smith’s Theory of Moral Sentiments. I argue that, for Grouchy, a cultivated sense of remorse weakens our self-conceit by drawing our attention to the ways in which we harm others, even for seemingly justifiable reasons. In so doing, we are led to recognize the equal standing of others, (...) which gives rise to the “sentiment of natural equality.” This “sentiment of natural equality” places a check on our norms and institutions and allows for the potential of moral progress. While Grouchy frames the Letters as a commentary on Smith’s writings, her discussion of remorse, equality, and moral progress shows her to be a bold and original thinker, and one worth taking seriously. (shrink)

This is a semifinal draft of a forthcoming paper. Kant’s account of the pain of remorse involves a hybrid justification based on self-retribution, but constrained by forward-looking principles which say that we must channel remorse into improvement, and moderate its pain to avoid damaging our rational agency. Kant’s corpus also offers material for a revisionist but textually-grounded alternative account based on wrongdoers’ sympathy for the pain they cause. This account is based on the value of care, and has (...) forward-looking constraints much like Kant’s own account. Drawing on both Kant’s texts and recent work in empirical psychology, I argue that experiences of remorse which conform to the sympathetic account may fulfill Kant’s forward-looking goals better than those conforming to his own account. (shrink)

This paper outlines and defends a notion of tragic-remorse. This moral emotion properly accompanies those actions that involve unavoidable moral wrongdoing in general and dirty hands scenarios in particular. Tragic-remorse differs both phenomenologically and conceptually from regret, agent-regret and remorse. By recognising the existence of tragic-remorse, we are better able to account for our complex moral reality which at times makes it necessary for good persons to act in ways that although justified leave the agent with (...) a moral stain and a particular emotional response. (shrink)

A common idea about assessing meaning in life is that one draws up a list of those various positive values that one has achieved and subtracts from it one's negative deeds in life. The resulting balance is the meaningfulness of one's existence. I call this the ledger theory. Drawing on the work of Raimond Gaita and Julian Barnes's novel The Sense of an Ending, I argue for a phenomenology of remorse that gives us reason to reject the ledger theory. (...) Even those agents whose lives have been exceptionally meaningful in some respects may remain haunted by their past. Certain sorts of misdeeds – those that involve significant, irreparable damage – leave life marred in such a way that the negative remains, even in the face of all the meaningful deeds of life. (shrink)

Does remorse imply self-hatred? In this paper, I argue that self-hatred is a false response to one’s wrongdoing because it is corrupted by the vice of pride, which affects the perception of its object. To identify the detrimental operation of pride, I propose to study the process of change of heart and its impediments. I use the example of Kostelnička, from Janáček’s opera Jenůfa, to show that the impediment to remorse is active already as a source of wrongdoing (...) and self-deception. I identify three different aspects of Kostelnička’s pride: social ambition, defensive anger, and moral ambition. I show that it is pride as moral ambition that prevents the wrongdoer’s acknowledgment of her blameworthiness by causing her obsession with her blameless self-image and corrupting her self-love. In the last part of the paper, I reject Kostelnička’s initial self-hatred before her change of heart, because it is not based on an accurate judgement of her agency. Kostelnička’s true remorse is thereupon connected with her inner transformation towards humility and with a reorientation of her attention towards the victim of her wrongdoing, as testified in her plea for forgiveness. The implied moral improvement and reconstitution of her relationship to herself and others opens the way for her coming to terms with her guilt. (shrink)

This essay explores the nature of an important collective emotion, namely, collective remorse. Three accounts of collective remorse are presented and evaluated. The first involves an aggregate of group members remorseful over acts of their own associated with their group's act; the second an aggregate of persons remorseful over their group's act. The third account posits, in terms that are explained, a joint commitment of a group's members to constitute as far as is possible a single remorseful body. (...) Construed according to this account the remorse of a nation that has wronged another nation is liable to make a particularly important contribution to international peace. (shrink)

A defendant’s failure to show remorse is one of the most powerful factors in criminal sentencing, including capital sentencing. Yet there is currently no evidence that remorse can be accurately evaluated in a courtroom. Conversely there is evidence that race and other impermissible factors create hurdles to evaluating remorse. There is thus an urgent need for studies about whether and how remorse can be accurately evaluated. Moreover, there is little evidence that remorse is correlated with (...) future law-abiding behavior or other legitimate penal purposes, and, in fact, there is evidence that remorse is often conflated with shame, which is correlated with increased future criminality. More accurate information on the nature and evaluation of remorse can be used to reform the criminal justice system. (shrink)

This paper outlines and defends a notion of 'tragic-remorse'. This moral emotion properly accompanies those actions that involve unavoidable moral wrongdoing in general and dirty hands scenarios in particular. Tragic-remorse differs both phenomenologically and conceptually from regret, agent-regret and remorse. By recognising the existence of tragic-remorse, we are better able to account for our complex moral reality which at times makes it necessary for good persons to act in ways that although justified leave the agent with (...) a moral stain and a particular emotional response. (shrink)

This paper outlines and defends a notion of ‘tragic-remorse’. This moral emotion properly accompanies those actions that involve unavoidable moral wrongdoing in general and dirty hands scenarios in particular. Tragic-remorse differs both phenomenologically and conceptually from regret, agent-regret and remorse. By recognising the existence of tragic-remorse, we are better able to account for our complex moral reality which at times makes it necessary for good persons to act in ways that although justified leave the agent with (...) a moral stain and a particular emotional response. (shrink)

Familiarity with the doctrines presented in Richard Allestree’s devotional work The Whole Duty of Man (1658), which Hume reported having read as a boy, can illuminate the strategy of argument Hume employs in Treatise 2.1.6–2.1.8 to undermine views he attributes to “the vulgar systems of ethicks.” Hume’s explicit critique of the view that pride is a sin and humility a virtue in Treatise 2.1.7 relies on assumptions that are already present in Allestree’s account of pride and humility and are described (...) using similar language. Sections 6–8 of Treatise 2.1 also provide an implicit critique of Allestree’s attempts to induce a general stance of humility based on mortifying considerations about human nature and to inspire episodes of penitential humility for the sins of the day. I argue that the “limitations to this account” gathered together in 2.1.6 are placed there to set up this critique. Together, the limitations imply that defects in our personal character are sufficiently close to us, peculiar to us, discernible to others, of appropriate duration, and supported by general rules to generate the passion of humility when we reflect on them, while reflection on human nature in general and particular episodes of sin are not. (shrink)

After surveying the many practical difficulties sentencing judges must confront in determining whether the offenders who appear before them are genuinely remorseful, recent dialogical accounts of remorse-based sentence reductions are examined. These accounts depend on a morally communicative approach to legal punishment’s justification and seem to confine such communication to offenders. They contend that, in order to respect remorseful offenders, sentencing judges must reduce their sentences. Why they should do so, by how much they should do so, and whether (...) they should do so when the individuals being sentenced are recidivists, are among the questions discussed. Also examined is whether remorse should be a prominent mitigating factor in sentencing or only one among many aggravating or mitigating factors. In conclusion, it is suggested that existing sentencing practices might make more sense if we suppose judges to be looking for things other than genuine remorse in the individuals who appear before them. (shrink)

In Shame and Necessity, Bernard Williams describes the experience of guilt in terms of fear at the anger of an internalised other, who is a “victim or enforcer.” Williams says it is a merit of his account that it shows how our guilt turns us towards the victims of our wrongdoing. I argue that his account in fact misses the most important form of guilt's “concern with victims”– the experience of remorse. I consider, and reject, one way of trying (...) to supplement this lack in Williams's account of guilt. Finally, I sketch some features of remorse that suggest that remorse belongs to a very different moral picture from the one painted by Williams. (shrink)

I examine the ‘momentous’ choices that one makes early in life – about career or spouse, for example – and I ask what it means to regret such choices at the end of one’s life. I argue that such regrets are almost meaningless because of the difficulty of imaginatively accessing a much earlier self. I then contrast long-term regret to remorse, and argue that the two are qualitatively different experiences because remorse involves another person as victim.

The aim of this paper is to analyse the concept of remorse from the perspective of moral philosophy. This perspective may be less familiar than other approaches in this anthology, such as those of forensic psychiatry or law. In what ways does moral philosophy claim to be able to illuminate the nature of the concept of remorse? First, by presenting an account of this concept and its structure within a more general account of the nature of moral thought. (...) Second, by drawing on the resources of the philosophy of mind. This latter discipline may seem even more mysterious than moral philosophy. Moral philosophy is continuous with the reflections serious people have always conducted on the sources of those actions we feel bound to perform, the nature of values and obligations, and the nature of moral ideals. It differs from ordinary moral thought only in drawing on a range of canonical historical texts bearing.. (shrink)

Steven Tudor defends the mitigation of criminal sentences in cases in which offenders are genuinely remorseful for their crimes. More than this, he takes the principle that such remorse-based sentence reductions are appropriate to be a ‘well-settled legal principle’—so well settled, in fact, that ‘it is among those deep-seated commitments which can serve to test general theories as much as they are tested by them’. However, his account of why remorse should reduce punishment is strongly philosophical in character. (...) He sets to one side the many practical difficulties in implementing such reductions in the real world of criminal justice institutions so that he can focus on the question of whether a plausible account of sentencing can show that remorse should mitigate punishment. I contend that Tudor’s defense of such reductions is unpersuasive in certain respects. Yet even if it can be made more persuasive, I argue that the conditions that would have to be satisfied for remorse-based sentence reductions to be justifiably implemented are so many and various that they would likely exceed our abilities to responsibly grant them in real world legal contexts. I therefore claim that Tudor has failed to provide a defense of the ‘remorse principle’ that serves to explain or justify existing legal practices. (shrink)

This article critically examines the rationales for the well-settled principle in sentencing law that an offender’s remorse is to be treated as a mitigating factor. Four basic types of rationale are examined: remorse makes punishment redundant; offering mitigation can induce remorse; remorse should be rewarded with mitigation; and remorse should be recognised by mitigation. The first three rationales each suffer from certain weaknesses or limitations, and are argued to be not as persuasive as the fourth. (...) The article then considers, and rejects, two arguments against remorse as a mitigating factor in sentencing: that the crime, not the offender, is the focus of punishment; and that the truly remorseful offender would not ask for mitigation. The article concludes with a brief consideration of whether a lack of remorse should be an aggravating factor. (shrink)

Philosophical Investigations, Volume 45, Issue 3, Page 334-356, July 2022.

Kant’s conception of remorse has not received focused discussion in the literature. I argue that he thinks we ought to experience remorse for both retributivist and consequentialist reasons. This account casts helpful light on his ideas of conversion and the descent into the hell of self-cognition. But while he prescribes a heartbreakingly painful experience of remorse, he acknowledges that excess remorse can threaten rational agency through distraction and suicide, and this raises questions about whether actual human (...) beings ought to cultivate their consciences in such a way as to experience remorse on his model. (shrink)

This exploration of the crucially important role played by remorse in Iris Murdoch’s philosophical, theological, and political thinking identifies it as a critical concept in her moral psychology and a recurrent theme in her art. Through engagement with Simone Weil, current theories of remorse, trauma theory and Holocaust studies, it offers fresh perspectives on Murdoch’s fiction – particularly the late novels, her radio play The One Alone, and her monograph Heidegger.

When hard determinists reject the claim that people deserve particular kinds of treatment because of how they have acted, they are left with a problem about remorse. Remorse is often represented as a way we impose retribution on ourselves when we understand that we have acted badly. (This view of remorse appears in the work of Freud, and I think it fits our everyday, pretheoretical understanding of one kind of remorse.) Retribution of any kind cannot be (...) appropriate if we do not deserve bad treatment because of how we have acted. But remorse seems to be essentially bound up with understanding that we have acted badly. If this is right, it is important for hard determinists to find a non-retributive account of remorse, so that they can accommodate remorse within their theories. My goal in this paper is to provide such an account. I describe a kind of remorse which I think is a common human experience, a kind which is based on suffering in sympathy with the person one has wronged. It is similar to suffering in sympathy with one's friends when they suffer. We suffer in sympathy with friends not because we think we deserve to, but because we care about them, and their suffering gives us pain. In the wake of a wrongful act, a "virtuous wrongdoer" comes to care about the person wronged, and suffers in sympathy with him. This kind of remorse can be accommodated by hard determinists. (shrink)

This article replies to some of Richard Lippke’s criticisms of my earlier article on the issue of whether remorse should mitigate sentence. I query whether remorse-based mitigation must always wait for signs of moral reform, and re-affirm that remorse is worthy of recognition in itself and not just for the moral reform it may bring. I also argue that, where delayed mitigation is appropriate, the task of ascertaining moral reform is not as dubious, practically or in principle, (...) as Lippke maintains. I then confirm that my defence of the principle that remorse should mitigate sentence is not necessarily a defence of current practice. (shrink)

In this follow up to I Was Wrong: The Meanings of Apologies, Nick Smith expands his ambitious theories of categorical apologies to civil and criminal law. After rejecting court-ordered apologies as unjustifiable humiliation, this book explains that penitentiaries were originally designed to bring about penance - something like apology - and that this tradition has been lost in the assembly line of mass incarceration. Smith argues that the state should modernize these principles and techniques to reduce punishments for offenders who (...) demonstrate moral transformation through apologizing. Smith also explains the counterintuitive situation whereby apologies come to have considerable financial worth in civil cases because victims associate them with priceless matters of the soul. Such confusions allow powerful wrongdoers to manipulate perceptions to disastrous effect, such as when corporations or governments assert that apologies do not equate to accepting blame or require reform or redress. (shrink)

This is the first sustained study examining how the emotions of remorse and regret were manifested in Greek and Roman public life. By discussing the standard lexical denotations of remorse, Fulkerson shows how it was not normally expressed by high-status individuals, but by their inferiors, and how it often served to show defect of character.

In many jurisdictions, an offender’s remorse is considered to be a relevant factor to take into account in mitigation at sentencing. The growing philosophical interest in the use of neurointerventions in criminal justice raises an important question about such remorse-based mitigation: to what extent should technologically facilitated remorse be honoured such that it is permitted the same penal significance as standard instances of remorse? To motivate this question, we begin by sketching a tripartite account of (...) class='Hi'>remorse that distinguishes cognitive, affective and motivational elements of remorse. We then describe a number of neurointerventions that might plausibly be used to enhance abilities that are relevant to these different elements of remorse. Having described what we term the ‘moral value’ view of the justification of remorse-based mitigation, we then consider whether using neurointerventions to facilitate remorse would undermine its moral value, and thus make it inappropriate to honour such remorse in the criminal justice system. We respond to this question by claiming that the form of moral understanding that is incorporated into a genuinely remorseful response grounds remorse’s moral value. In view of this claim, we conclude by arguing that neurointerventions need not undermine remorse’s moral value on this approach, and that the remorse that such interventions might facilitate could also be authentic to the recipient of the neurointerventions that we discuss. (shrink)

This paper analyses the role of remorse and apology in international criminal trials by juxtaposing two prominent cases of convicted war criminals Biljana Plavšić and Esad Landžo. Plavšić was the first and only Bosnian Serb political leader to plead guilty before the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia. Her acknowledgement of guilt and purported remorse expressed during her ICTY proceedings was celebrated as a milestone for both the ICTY and the Balkans. However, she later retracted her (...) class='Hi'>remorse while serving her prison sentence. Landžo was a guard at the notorious Čelebići detention camp and did not acknowledge his guilt publicly during his ICTY trial. Seven years after his release from prison, Landžo personally confronted survivors and apologised to them. Through comparison of these two widely different cases, we illustrate varying roles criminal trials can play in offender’s reflection on his/her crimes and how relevance and resonance of war criminal’s remorse in and outside of the courtroom depend on how remorse is expressed and to whom. (shrink)

This article examines the historical background, proliferation, and later internationalization of public declarations of forgiveness and remorse, first made in Europe a few decades after the end World War II. The author suggests that these declarations should be understood as a political practice, and bases her claim on three premises: after 1945, politicians began apologizing not only for their own crimes but mainly for those perpetrated by the communities they represented; these declarations implied a tacit acceptance of responsibility of (...) both the group that declares its remorse and of the group that accepts and possibly forgives the former for its past crimes; apart from representing a shared collective moral responsibility, declarations of forgiveness and remorse imply the continuity of a nation. These three premises apply if declarations of forgiveness and remorse are not banal and conventional, but function as a political ritual. The au... (shrink)

Certain unwise, careless, or as we say, ‘self-destructive’ actions often bring in their train consequences unpleasant to the agent according to natural law. If an agent through folly or otherwise acts in a way which shows that he has ignored or forgotten predictable or possible consequences people will say ‘it serves him right’, meaning ‘he ought to have foreseen that’. Sometimes they will even say ‘he got what he deserved’. For these reasons such consequences can be called punishment, or a (...) kind of punishment. (shrink)

tantane me tenuit vivendi, nate, voluptas, ut pro me hostili paterer succedere dextrae, quern genui? tuane haec genitor per vulnera servor morte tua vivens? heu, nunc misero mihi demum exitium infelix, nunc alte vulnus adactum!