CONCEPT OF CONSCIENCE WITHINETHICS

Abstract

In the article, a study was conducted to establish the connections of conscience with other ethical categories and to analyze the main approaches to the interpretation of the concept of conscience within the framework of ethics. The results of the study make it possible to make sure that all the antinomies listed in the article are reflected in attempts to define conscience as a moral category. But ethics does not teach conscience, but can only explain its role. Conscience is an organ of moral intuition.

Conscience is one of the relevant topics of human life, moral reflection that allows you to feel the falsity in your behavior, understanding the malignity of an act.

The article proves that, on the one hand, conscience is an undeniably existing moral phenomenon, on the other hand, it must be rationalized, since we are talking about it within the framework of ethics. Conscience, as a synthesis of external and internal, prompts a decision only in a single situation. It is not universal. There can be no moral situations in which the decision is made by the deductive method. All responsible decisions are made relying only on one's conscience. Life is the art of interacting with your conscience.

The article draws attention to the interpretations of the substantial approach, which take the grounds of conscience to the border of individual moral consciousness and to the border of subjectivity, while in the case of the individualistic approach, conscience is perceived only as a phenomenon of autonomy.