Carol Gilligan's Quote Analysis

A Philosopher and a Psychologist

“The decisions used to be so much easier, the course of action so much clearer. There was obviously the right thing to do. When did the right decision become so clouded? How did it become so blurred, and why for that matter? What should I do, and how do I want to play this”? (Jeff Davis: The Thinking Man’s Quote) I think we all have had that question dance through our mind at times when we had to make a decision that may impact our lives. I wished I had a dime for the countless times I asked for guidance and prayed and hoped I made the correct moral decisions. I think Carol Gilligan a renowned Psychologist and feminist Philosopher had asked that question once or twice herself. I even would venture to say that the

I believe that is what prompted Carol Gilligan to drove in to the studies that set her apart from so many others in her field of study. In her ventures as a psychologist she set out to disprove the theories that Lawrence Kolberg tried to establish with his justice theory. Was she just in her decisions when she set out to prove her justice and care perspective? If Plato was alive and he asked Gilligan the same question he asked his fellow philosophers in “The Republic” “Is it better to be just or unjust” What would her response be to his question? Would she agree with Thrasymachus and his statement where he stated “the just suffer while the unjust prosper”. I wonder if Plato would be on the side of the feminist philosopher, or would he disagree with her studies. In this paper I will discuss the studies of Carol Gilligan, and how she proved that women make moral decisions based on care perspective. She also established that men tend to make moral decisions based on the justice perspective. I will also discuss how Socrates and Thrasymachus engage in a conversation where they try to