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Guilt is the fact, state, or verdict (by a court or other tribunal), of an offence, crime, violation, or wrong committed, especially against moral or penal law. Guilt is also a cognitive or an emotional experience that occurs when a person realizes or believes - whether justified or not - that he or she has violated a moral standard and is responsible for that violation.^[1] It is closely related to the concept of remorse. For the trade organisation, see Federation Against Copyright Theft. ... In law, a verdict indicates the judgment of a case before a court of law. ... A trial at the Old Bailey in London as drawn by Thomas Rowlandson and Augustus Pugin for Ackermanns Microcosm of London (1808-11). ... A tribunal is a generic term for any body acting judicially, whether or not it is called a tribunal in its title. ... In law, an offense is a violation of the penal law. ... The word violation, when used alone, has several possible meanings in the English language. ... A wrong or being wrong is a concept in law, ethics, and science. ... Morality (from the Latin manner, character, proper behavior) has three principal meanings. ... For other uses, see Law (disambiguation). ... Cognitive The scientific study of how people obtain, retrieve, store and manipulate information. ... For other uses, see Emotion (disambiguation). ... Look up understanding in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... For other uses, see Believe. ... Morality (from the Latin manner, character, proper behavior) has three principal meanings. ... People feel remorse when reflecting on their actions that they believe are wrong. ...

Definitions of guilt

In psychology and ordinary language, guilt is an affective state in which one experiences conflict at having done something that one believes one should not have done (or conversely, having not done something one believes one should have done). It gives rise to a feeling that does not go away easily, driven by conscience. Sigmund Freud described this as the result of a struggle between the ego and the superego parental imprinting. Guilt and its causes, merits, and demerits are common themes in psychology and psychiatry. It is often associated with depression. The philosopher Martin Buber underlined the difference between the Freudian notion of guilt, based on internal conflicts, and existential guilt, based on actual harm done to others.^[2] François Chifflart (1825-1901), The Conscience (after Victor Hugo) Conscience is an ability or faculty or sense that leads to feelings of remorse when we do things that go against our moral values, or which informs our moral judgment before performing such an action. ... Sigmund Freud (IPA: ), born Sigismund Schlomo Freud (May 6, 1856 – September 23, 1939), was an Austrian neurologist and psychiatrist who founded the psychoanalytic school of psychology. ... The ego, superego, and id are the tripartite divisions of the psyche in psychoanalytic theory compartmentalizing the sphere of mental activity into three energetic components: the ego being the organized conscious mediator between the internal person and the external identity. ... Martin Buber (8 February 1878 – 13 June 1965) was an Austrian-Israeli-Jewish philosopher, translator, and educator, whose work centered on theistic ideals of religious consciousness, interpersonal relations, and community. ... Sigmund Freud (IPA: ), born Sigismund Schlomo Freud (May 6, 1856 – September 23, 1939), was an Austrian neurologist and psychiatrist who founded the psychoanalytic school of psychology. ...

Causes of guilt

Some thinkers have theorized that guilt is used as a tool of social control. Since guilty people feel they are undeserving, they are less likely to assert their rights and prerogatives. Thus, those in power seek to cultivate a sense of guilt among the populace, in order to make them more tractable. This is especially so within multicultural and multiracial societies where the governments of the day, need a denationalized population, so there is no collective, national cohesiveness as guilt is used in large urban areas to fragment and control the populace.^{[citation needed]} Social control refers to social mechanisms that regulate individual and group behavior, in terms of greater sanctions and rewards. ...

Some evolutionary psychologists theorize that guilt and shame helped maintain beneficial relationships, such as reciprocal altruism.^[3] If a person feels guilty when he harms another or even fails to reciprocate kindness, he is more likely not to harm others or become too selfish; in this way, he reduces the chances of retaliation by members of his tribe and thereby increases his survival prospects, and those of the tribe or group. As with any other emotion, guilt can be manipulated to control or influence others. In evolutionary biology, reciprocal altruism is a form of altruism in which one organism provides a benefit to another in the expectation of future reciprocation. ...

Another common notion is that guilt is assigned by social processes such as a jury trial, i.e. that it is a strictly legal concept. Thus the ruling of a jury that O.J. Simpson or Julius Rosenberg was "guilty" or "not guilty" is taken as an actual judgement by the whole society that they must act as if they were so. By corollary, the ruling that such a person is "not guilty" may not be so taken, due to the asymmetry in the assumption that one is assumed innocent until proven guilty and prefers to take the risk of freeing a guilty party over convicting innocents. It has been suggested that this article or section be merged with Jury. ... Orenthal James Simpson (born July 9, 1947), commonly known as O. J. Simpson and also just by his initials O.J. and his nickname The Juice, is a retired American football player who achieved stardom at the collegiate and professional levels. ... The Rosenbergs Ethel Greenglass Rosenberg (1915-1953) and Julius Rosenberg (1918-1953) were American Communists who captured and maintained world attention after being tried, convicted, and executed for spying for the Soviet Union. ... Presumption of innocence is a legal right that the accused in criminal trials has in many modern nations. ... For the Parker Brothers board game, see Risk (game) For other uses, see Risk (disambiguation). ...

Still others -- often, but not always, theists of one type or another -- believe that the origin of guilt comes from violating universal principles of right and wrong. In most instances, people who believe this also acknowledge that, even though there is proper guilt from doing 'wrong' instead of doing 'right,' people endure all sorts of guilty feelings that don't stem from violating universal moral principles.

Collective guilt

It has been suggested that this section be split into a new article. (Discuss)

See also: Collective responsibility (doctrine)

Collective guilt, or guilt by association, is the controversial collectivist idea that a group of humans can bear guilt above and beyond the guilt of particular members, and hence an individual holds responsibility for what other members of his group have done, even if he himself hasn't done this. Advanced systems of criminal law accept the principle that guilt shall only be personal. This attitude is not usually shared by other systems of law. Assumption of collective responsibility is common for feud. Such systems tend to judge the guilt of persons by their associations, classifications or organizations, which often gives rise to racial, ethnic, social and religious prejudices.^[4] Collective guilt is regarded by some as impossible because it seems to presuppose that collections of humans can have traits, such as intentions and knowledge, that strictly speaking are claimed to be truly possessed only by individuals.^{[citation needed]} The principle of collective guilt is totally denounced in libertarian social thinking. However, there are those who consider such judgements on collective guilt to be overly reductionistic and accept the existence of collective guilt, collective responsibility, etc.^{[citation needed]} Sometimes the idea of collective guilt can be a form of association fallacy. Humans seem to have a natural tendency to attribute collective guilt, usually with tragic results. History is filled with examples of a wronged man who tried to avenge himself, not on the person who has wronged him, but on other members of the wrong-doer's family, or ethnic group, or religion, or nation, or tribe, or army. Likewise collective punishment is often practiced in different settings, including schools (punishing a whole class for the actions of a single unknown pupil) and, more transcendentally, in situation of war, economic sanctions, etc, presupposing the existence of collective guilt. Image File history File links No higher resolution available. ... For the British Parliamentary discipline, see Collective responsibility Collective Responsibilty is a concept, or doctrine, according to which people are to be held responsible for other peoples actions by tolerating, ignoring, or harboring them, without actively collaborating in these actions. ... Collectivism, in general, is a term used to describe a theoretical or practical emphasis on the group, as opposed to (and seen by many of its opponents to be at the expense of) the individual. ... The term criminal law, sometimes called penal law, refers to any of various bodies of rules in different jurisdictions whose common characteristic is the potential for unique and often severe impositions as punishment for failure to comply. ... In criminal law, guilt is entirely externally defined by the state, or more generally a “court of law. ... This article does not cite any references or sources. ... Wikipedia does not yet have an article with this exact name. ... This article is about the political philosophy based on private property rights. ... Descartes held that non-human animals could be reductively explained as automata — De homines 1622. ... An association fallacy is an inductive formal fallacy of the type hasty generalization or red herring which asserts that qualities of one thing are inherently qualities of another, merely by an irrelevant association. ...

It has been suggested by Werner Cohn that the accusation that others apply "guilt by association" is itself a fallacy, for two reasons: 1) the term "guilt" is ambiguous. Sometimes it applies to criminal guilt, which requires a very high standard of proof ("proof beyond a reasonable doubt"). But more often, "guilt" refers to various shortcomings that require lesser standards. 2) "association" is also ambiguous. Sometimes "association" may be totally innocent, such as the association of fellow travelers on a train. But other kinds of association, for instance criminal conspiracy, are not at all innocent.

The idea of collective guilt became popular in Western World since the 1960s, as many historical injustices, including e.g. slavery in the United States, has been perceived by intelligentsia as faults of the society requiring retribution on behalf of those who had nothing to do with them (see e.g. Reparations for slavery and White guilt).^[5][6][7][8] The 1960s decade refers to the years from the beginning of 1960 to the end of 1969. ... Slave sale in Easton, Maryland The history of slavery in the United States (1619-1865) began soon after English colonists first settled Virginia and lasted until the passage of the Thirteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. ... The notion of an intellectual elite as a distinguished social stratum can be traced far back in history. ... Reparations for slavery is a movement in the United States, which suggests that the government apologize to slave descendants for their hardships, and bestow on them reparations, whether it be in the form of money, land, or other goods. ... White guilt refers to a concept of individual or collective guilt felt by some white people for the racist treatment of people of color by whites both historically and presently. ...

Terrorism is commonly rationalized by its practitioners on ideas of collective guilt and responsibility.^[9] Many nations have laws holding corporations, but not the individual decision-makers within them, responsible for certain kinds of acts. For example, in the United States corporations can be fined for violating pollution laws, but the individuals who actually ordered and directed the polluting activity may not themselves be regarded as having broken any laws, since they act as corporate officers on behalf of the shareholders. This is generally known as the "corporate veil". Terrorist redirects here. ... The corporate law concept piercing (Lifting) the corporate veil describes a legal decision where an officer, director, or shareholder of a corporation is held liable for the debts of the corporation despite the general principle that those persons are immune from suits in contract or tort that otherwise would only...

Cultural views of guilt

Traditional Japanese society and Ancient Greek society are sometimes said to be "shame-based" rather than "guilt-based" in that the social consequences of "getting caught" are seen as more important than the individual feelings or experiences of the agent. This may lead to more of a focus on etiquette than ethics as understood in Western civilization. This has led some in Western civilizations to question why the word ethos was adapted from Ancient Greek with such vast differences in cultural norms. The culture of Japan has evolved greatly over the years, from the countrys original Jomon culture to its contemporary hybrid culture, which combines influences from Asia, Europe and North America. ... The term ancient Greece refers to the periods of Greek history in Classical Antiquity, lasting ca. ... For other uses, see Shame (disambiguation). ... It has been suggested that Office etiquette be merged into this article or section. ... For other uses, see Ethics (disambiguation). ... Ethos (ἦθος) (plurals: ethe, ethea) is a Greek word originally meaning the place of living that can be translated into English in different ways. ... Beginning of Homers Odyssey The Ancient Greek language is the historical stage of the Greek language[1] as it existed during the Archaic (9th–6th centuries BC) and Classical (5th–4th centuries BC) periods in Ancient Greece. ...

Christianity and Islam inherit most notions of guilt from Judaism, Persian and Roman ideas, mostly as interpreted through Augustine who adapted Plato's ideas to Christianity. The Latin word for guilt is culpa, a word sometimes seen in law literature, e.g. in mea culpa meaning "my fault (guilt)". Topics in Christianity Movements · Denominations Ecumenism · Relation to other religions Preaching · Prayer Music · Liturgy · Calendar Symbols · Art · Criticism Christianity Portal This box:      Christianity is a monotheistic[1] religion centered on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth as presented in the New Testament. ... For people named Islam, see Islam (name). ... This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ... Persia is the historical and alternative name for the state of Iran in the European languages. ... Ancient Rome was a civilization that grew from a small agricultural community founded on the Italian Peninsula circa the 9th century BC to a massive empire straddling the Mediterranean Sea. ... Augustinus redirects here. ... For other uses, see Plato (disambiguation). ... For other uses, see Latins and Latin (disambiguation). ...

Guilt in literature

Guilt was a main theme in John Steinbeck's East of Eden, Fyodor Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment, Tennessee Williams' A Streetcar Named Desire, William Shakespeare's play Macbeth, Edgar Allan Poe's "The Tell-Tale Heart," and many other works of literature. It was a major theme in many works by Nathaniel Hawthorne and is a nearly universal concern of novelists, who explore inner life and secrets. For other members of the family, see Steinbeck (disambiguation). ... For other uses, see East of Eden (disambiguation). ... Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky (Russian: , Russian pronunciation: , sometimes transliterated Dostoyevsky, Dostoievsky, Dostojevskij or Dostoevski  ) (November 11 [O.S. October 30] 1821 – February 9 [O.S. January 28] 1881) was a Russian novelist and writer of fiction whose works, including Crime and Punishment and The Brothers Karamazov, have had a profound and... For other uses, see Crime and Punishment (disambiguation). ... A Streetcar Named Desire is a 1947 play written by American playwright Tennessee Williams for which he was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 1948. ... Wikipedia does not yet have an article with this exact name. ... This article is about Shakespeares play. ... Edgar Allan Poe (January 19, 1809 – October 7, 1849) was an American poet, short story writer, playwright, editor, literary critic, essayist and one of the leaders of the American Romantic Movement. ... The Tell-Tale Heart is a short story by Edgar Allan Poe written in 1843. ... Nathaniel Hawthorne (born Nathaniel Hathorne; July 4, 1804 – May 19, 1864) was a 19th century American novelist and short story writer. ... This article is about life in general. ... Secrecy is the condition of hiding information from others. ...

Dealing with guilt

Guilt can sometimes be remedied by punishment (a common action and advised or required in many legal and moral codes), by forgiveness (as in transformative justice), or by sincere remorse (as with confession in Catholicism or restorative justice). Guilt can also be remedied through cognition, the understanding that the source of the guilty feelings was illogical or irrelevant. Law does not usually accept the agent's self-punishment, but some ancient codes did so: in Athens the accused was permitted to propose his or her own remedy, which might in fact be a reward, while the accuser proposed another, and the jury chose between. This forced the accused to effectively bet on his support in the community - as Socrates did when he proposed "room and board in the town hall" as his fate. He lost, and drank hemlock, a poison, as advised by his accuser. Look up Punishment in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... A legal code is a moral code enforced by the law of a state. ... For other uses, see Forgiveness (disambiguation). ... Transformative justice is a general philosophical strategy for responding to conflicts. ... People feel remorse when reflecting on their actions that they believe are wrong. ... This article is about the practice of confession in the Modern confessional in the Church of the Holy Name, Dunedin, New Zealand. ... As a Christian ecclesiastical term, Catholic—from the Greek adjective , meaning general or universal[1]—is described in the Oxford English Dictionary as follows: ~Church, (originally) whole body of Christians; ~, belonging to or in accord with (a) this, (b) the church before separation into Greek or Eastern and Latin or... Restorative justice is commonly known as a theory of criminal justice that focuses on crime as an act against another individual or community rather than the state. ... This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ... This article is about the capital of Greece. ... In the common law legal system, an indictment is a formal charge of having committed a serious criminal offense. ... A bounty is often offered by a group as an incentive for the accomplishment of a task by someone usually not associated with the group. ... The word Accuser can mean:- Accuser (fictional Star Wars spaceship) Someone who accuses Category: ... An empty jury box in an American courtroom For jury meaning makeshift, see jury rig. ... This page is about the Classical Greek philosopher. ... Species Conium chaerophylloides (Thunb. ... For other uses, see Poison (disambiguation). ...

Lack of guilt

Psychopaths typically lack a sense of guilt or remorse for any harm they may have caused others, instead rationalizing the behavior, blaming someone else, or denying it altogether.^[10] This is seen by psychologists as part of a lack of moral reasoning in comparison with the majority of humans, an inability to evaluate situations in a moral framework and an inability to develop emotional bonds with other people.^[11] This article is about psychological theories of psychopathy. ...

References

1. ^ "Guilt." Encyclopedia of Psychology. 2nd ed. Ed. Bonnie R. Strickland. Gale Group, Inc., 2001. eNotes.com. 2006. 31 Dec, 2007
2. ^ Buber, M. (1957). Guilt and guilt feelings. Psychiatry. May; 20(2): 114-29.
3. ^ "Shame and Psychopathology" By Stefano Pallanti, MD, and Leonardo Quercioli, MD
4. ^ Wright, Quincy (1949). International Law and Guilt by Association. The American Journal of International Law 43.4, 746-755.
5. ^ Thomas Sowell (2007). Aftermath of the 1960s?.
6. ^ Posner, Eric A. & Adrian Vermeule (2003). Reparations for Slavery and Other Historical Injustices. Columbia Law Review 103.3, 689-748.
7. ^ Wenger, Kaimipono D. (2004). Causation and Attenuation in the Slavery Reparations Debate
8. ^ Lilly, J. Robert & Richard A. Ball (1982). A Critical Analysis of the Changing Concept of Criminal Responsibility. Criminology 20 (2), 169–184.
9. ^ Devine, Philip E. & Robert J. Rafalko (1982). On Terror. Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 463, International Terrorism (Sep., 1982), pp. 39-53.
10. ^ Millon, Theodore; Davis, Roger D. "Chapter 11: The Five-Factor Model of Personality, pp. 173-177. Psychopathy: Antisocial, Criminal, and Violent Behavior.
11. ^ Hare, R. D., & Neumann, C. N. (2006). The PCL-R Assessment of Psychopathy: Development, Structural Properties, and New Directions. In C. Patrick (Ed.), Handbook of Psychopathy (pp. 58-88). New York: Guilford.

The Columbia Law Review is a law review edited and published entirely by students at Columbia Law School. ...

See also

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to:

Guilt

• Catholic guilt
• Good faith
• Helpfulness
• Shame
• Conscience
• Survivor guilt
• Fear
• Learnt or innate
• Freud
• Nietzsche's critique of the "bad conscience"

Image File history File links This is a lossless scalable vector image. ... Wikiquote is one of a family of wiki-based projects run by the Wikimedia Foundation, running on MediaWiki software. ... Catholic guilt- is the idea that feelings of remorse, self-doubt, or personal conflict are created when an individual who is raised as a Catholic, engages in or having fantasies about acts that the Catholics consider sinful. ... Bona fide redirects here. ... In social psychology, the everyday concept of helpfulness is technically defined as (1) the property of providing useful assistance, and (2) friendliness evidenced by a kindly and helpful disposition [syn: kindliness]. For many years, social psychologists have been searching for answers to these questions: Why, and when, will people help... For other uses, see Shame (disambiguation). ... François Chifflart (1825-1901), The Conscience (after Victor Hugo) Conscience is an ability or faculty or sense that leads to feelings of remorse when we do things that go against our moral values, or which informs our moral judgment before performing such an action. ... Survivor guilt, otherwise known as survivor syndrome, is the mental condition that results from the appraisal that a person has done wrong by surviving traumatic events such as combat, natural disasters, or even surviving a lay-off in a work place. ... For other uses, see Fear (disambiguation). ... Sigmund Freud His famous couch Sigmund Freud (May 6, 1856 - September 23, 1939) was an Austrian neurologist and the founder of the psychoanalytic school of psychology, a movement that popularized the theory that unconscious motives control much behavior. ... Friedrich Nietzsche, 1882 Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche (October 15, 1844 - August 25, 1900) was a highly influential German philosopher. ...

Further reading

• Guilt in Think On These Things. Retrieved on 2006-02-16. by Gary Gilley
• The Innocent Bear the Guilt for the Guilty Ones. Retrieved on 2007-05-10. by Gerd Altendorff translation by Jochen Reiss
• Branscombe, Nyla R.; Bertjan Doosje (2004). Collective Guilt: International Perspectives. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0521520835.