Hypothetical Arguments: Do You Need To Torture Children

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Register to read the introduction… This could be seen in the following: If you want to torture children, you should seek psychiatric help. You want to torture children. Therefore, you should seek psychiatric help. While this seems perfectly valid, suppose we replace the first premise with a hypothetical imperative: If you want to torture children, you should volunteer as a babysitter. You want to torture children. Therefore, you should volunteer as a babysitter. Thus, when we affirm the first premise as a hypothetical imperative, we mean it in a sense that does not validate such an

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