This in-depth resource covers the AQA A-Level Philosophy topic of Moral Responsibility, exploring the key philosophical debates surrounding free will, determinism, and moral accountability. It is designed for both students and teachers, providing clear explanations, structured content, and exam-focused material to support high-level understanding and assessment preparation. Topics Covered Free Will and Moral Responsibility • What it means to act freely • The conditions required for moral responsibility • The relationship between freedom, choice, and blame • The difference between voluntary and involuntary actions Determinism • The claim that all events are causally determined • Hard determinism and the denial of moral responsibility • Key arguments supporting determinism (scientific, psychological, theological) • Implications for praise, blame, punishment, and moral accountability Libertarianism • The belief that humans possess genuine free will • Agent causation and the idea that individuals can initiate actions • Challenges to libertarianism, including randomness and lack of control • Key philosophers and thought experiments supporting libertarian freedom Compatibilism • The view that free will and determinism are compatible • Freedom as the ability to act according to one’s desires without external constraint • Soft determinism and moral responsibility • Strengths and weaknesses of compatibilist theories Moral Responsibility and Punishment • The relationship between free will and moral accountability • Justifications for punishment: retributive vs consequentialist approaches • Whether punishment is fair in a determined world • The role of moral responsibility in praise, blame, and justice Essay questions.

An in-depth exploration of conscience in ethics, covering Aquinas, Butler, Freud and Freud, and debates about moral authority and moral decision-making. This resource provides a comprehensive and exam-focused exploration of the topic of conscience, as set out in the OCR A-Level Religious Studies (Ethics) specification. It is designed to support both teaching and independent study, offering clear explanations of key theories, scholars, and evaluative debates surrounding moral decision-making. Topics Covered The Nature and Role of Conscience What is meant by conscience in moral philosophy Whether conscience is an innate moral faculty or socially developed The role of conscience in moral decision-making Aquinas and Conscience Aquinas’ understanding of synderesis and conscientia The relationship between reason, natural law, and conscience Conscience as the application of moral knowledge to particular situations Strengths and criticisms of Aquinas’ account Sigmund Freud and the Development of Conscience The psychoanalytic account of conscience The role of the superego, id and ego in moral development psychosexual development Guilt, repression, and the influence of society and upbringing Strengths and weaknesses of Freud’s approach Conscience, Moral Authority and Moral Disagreement Is conscience a reliable guide to moral truth? Can conscience justify moral disagreement or immoral actions? The problem of mistaken conscience Whether conscience should always be followed Comparison between Aquinas and Freud Past essay question outlines