Maniacal suicide. βThis is due to hallucinations or delirious conceptions. The patient kills himself to escape from an imaginary danger or disgrace, or to obey a mysterious order from on high, etc.
Emile DurkheimRead
An act cannot be defined by the end sought by the actor, for an identical system of behaviour may be adjustable to too many different ends without altering its nature.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The morality of an action cannot solely be judged by its intended outcome, as the same behavior can lead to varied results.
Emile Durkheim's quote emphasizes that actions should not be evaluated based on the goals one wishes to achieve, as the same behavior can be interpreted in different ways depending on the context. This insight prompts a deeper examination of behaviors beyond mere outcomes, suggesting that the nature of the action itself carries significant moral weight that should be considered independently of the aims attached to it.
Themes
ActionMoralityBehaviorOutcomeEthics
In practice
Example use cases
In a discussion on ethical decision-making in business, one might refer to this quote to underline the complexity of moral actions.
More from Emile Durkheim
All quotes βMan cannot become attached to higher aims and submit to a rule if he sees nothing above him to which he belongs. To free him from all social pressure is to abandon him to himself and demoralize him.
Emile DurkheimRead
If religion has given birth to all that is essential in society, it is because the idea of society is the soul of religion.
Emile DurkheimRead
A person is not merely a single subject distinguished from all the others. It is especially a being to which is attributed a relative autonomy in relation to the environment with which it is most immediately in contact.
Emile DurkheimRead
The roles of art, morality, religion, political faith, science itself are not to repair organic exhaustion nor to provide sound functioning of the organs. All this supraphysical life is built and expanded not because of the demands of the cosmic environment but because of the demands of the social environment.
Emile DurkheimRead
A society whose members are united by the fact that they think in the same way in regard to the sacred world and its relations with the profane world, and by the fact that they translate these common ideas into common practices, is what is called a Church. In all history, we do not find a single religion without a Church.
Emile DurkheimRead
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