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Nicolas Cornell, University of Pennsylvania

Friday, April 25, 2014 - 3:00pm

This paper argues that the character of a wrong is not determined only by the right that was violated. Many philosophers, such as Weinrib, Ripstein, and Darwall, maintain that rights and wrongs are necessarily tied to one another, reciprocal perspectives on the same moral connection between agents. This paper presents an argument for thinking that wrongs are not connected to rights in this straightforward way. The argument proceeds through an investigation of remedies. Remedies offer us a window into the nature of wrongs because they constitute what we consider the appropriate repair for the wrong. This paper argues that, in several respects, remedies do not correspond simply with the nature of the right that was violated. For any given rights violation, other factors will figure in determining the appropriate remedy. In other words, wrongs‹as viewed through the lens of what it would take to compensate for them‹involve elements beyond rights.

Paper Title

Wrongs, Rights, and Remedial Ambiguity