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Confabulation, rationalisation and morality

Jefferson, Anneli ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1870-1361 2020. Confabulation, rationalisation and morality. Topoi 39 (1) , pp. 219-227. 10.1007/s11245-018-9608-7

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Abstract

In everyday confabulation and rationalisation of behaviour, agents provide sincerely believed explanations of behaviour which are ill-grounded and normally inaccurate. In this paper, I look at the commonalities and differences between confabulations and rationalisations and investigate their moral costs and benefits. Following Summers and Velleman, I argue that both can be beneficial because they constrain future behaviour through self-consistency motivations. However, I then show that the same features that make confabulations and rationalisations beneficial in some cases can also make them morally costly, when behaviour is explained and justified through the endorsement of bad moral principles. I show that these effects are most likely to occur where the central element of confabulation, self-explanation, and the central element of rationalisation, self-justification, coincide.

Item Type: Article
Date Type: Publication
Status: Published
Schools: English, Communication and Philosophy
Publisher: Springer Verlag (Germany)
ISSN: 0167-7411
Date of First Compliant Deposit: 1 November 2019
Last Modified: 06 May 2023 00:22
URI: https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/126101

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