This chapter considers how the law might be reformed so as to better capture circumstances in which an agent’s capacity for autonomous decision-making is being undermined by a disorder or impairment which affects the values or beliefs that the agent applies to the information. It will begin by exploring the merits of including an ‘appreciation’ criterion in the test for capacity, before going on to consider whether more other, more explicit, criteria would be preferable. It will conclude that the challenges inherent in devising a workable legal test lean in favour of the law adopting a more blunt approach which focuses on the origins of the values or beliefs that the agent applies to the information in their decision-making. A new limb of the MCA is therefore proposed, which asks whether the person is unable to make a decision because the values or beliefs by which they evaluate the relevant information have been caused by or altered as a consequence of the person suffering from a disorder, illness, or impairment. Various potential challenges to such a provision will be explored and responded too.

The theme of recognition is one of the most intensively discussed topics in the humanities and social sciences in the last decades. This chapter discusses its relevance for moral education. We begin with two examples illustrating lack of recognition in the school class, one concerning cultural difference and the other economic and social inequality. Secondly, we introduce the idea of recognition, its importance for individual and social life and some basic ways to think about its various forms. Thirdly, we discuss some specificities of school education that are necessary to bear in mind when applying the concept of recognition in this context. Finally, we tie these conceptual and theoretical considerations back to the two examples and show how a recognition-theoretical perspective can helpfully illuminate them. The conclusion summarizes our most important findings.

This chapter explores a specialized use of the word "free" in Shakespeare's works. It does not deny that Shakespeare often uses term in political and legal senses. What it shows is that Shakespeare also often uses the term to denote a quality of mind or soul, and that this quality can be thought of as a virtue when it is acted upon. The quality is shown to be related to generosity -- or partly constituted by it -- but also to include an element of other-directedness and the possession of what might be called an unarmed ego. The chapter argues that while the term occurs in this sense throughout the Shakespearean corpus, the term is most clearly defined and focused on in one of the great comedies, Twelfth Night. The play is shown to be built around the concept. The chapter then turns to how the term -- that is, the quality -- functions in tragedy. It is shown, in Hamlet, and especially in Othello, to function explicitly as a liability to the protagonist. But this is not seen as undermining its status as a virtue, merely as defining one of the differences between a comic and a tragic world.

This chapter focuses on the emotional virtue of gratitude in society and education. First, it explores major understandings of gratitude prevalent in philosophy and psychology that elaborate what gratitude is, and why it is called for. The practices encouraged for cultivating feelings of gratitude by psychologists and educators will also be discussed. Then the chapter will turn to critical views of gratitude that question its moral value, its psychological utility, and its place in education. While teaching feelings of gratitude in the classroom may not necessarily be harmful, there are risks and challenges that should not be overlooked by educators interested in the moral and social development of their students.