Regret

Philosopher Paddy McQueen provides a detailed examination of the nature of regret and its role in decision-making. Contrary to influential philosophical accounts of regret, he argues that we should only regret choices we make that were not justified at the time, based on the information that was available to us. Consequently, he suggests that many of us should have fewer regrets than we do, and we should worry less than we do about whether we might come to regret a decision. In making this case, he engages with important areas of philosophical debate, such as reasons, time and justification, the temporal self, values and valuing, responsibility, the causal framing of events, and self-forgiveness. The result is a complex, novel account of when we should regret the things that we do. In addition, McQueen explores how experiences of regret are shaped by social discourses, especially those about gender and parenthood. He examines how regret has become politicized in debates about abortion and trans identities and reveals ways in which regret is used to regulate people's reproductive choices. Through this cultural politics of regret, he challenges assumptions about gender identities and the expectations of regret that are attached to certain people's decisions. In so doing, he shows how confronting these assumptions and expectations can help to promote people's autonomy and well-being. Weaving these threads together, McQueen highlights the personal and political significance of regret. Cover Regret Copyright Contents Acknowledgements Introduction: The Personal and Political Significance of Regret 1. Making Sense of Regret 1.1. Introduction 1.2. How to Develop an Account of Regret 1.3. What Regret Is (and What It Is Not) 1.4. The Psychology of Regret 1.5. Are There “Types” of Regret? 1.6. The Rational and Intelligible Limits of Regret 2. On the “Fittingness” of Regret 2.1. Introduction 2.2. The Moralistic Fallacy 2.3. The “Shape” and “Size” of Regret 2.4. Is It Always Unreasonable to Regret? 3. Reasons, Mistakes, and Justified Decisions 3.1. Introduction 3.2. Practical Identity and Decision-​Justification 3.3. “Epistemically Available” Reasons 3.4. Perspective-​Dependent and Perspective-​Independent Reasons 3.5. Retrospective Justification 3.6. Reasons and Time 3.7. Self-​Transformations 3.8. Akrasia and Regret 4. Regret, Agency, and Responsibility 4.1. Introduction 4.2. Regret and the Scope of Responsibility 4.3. Against Williams’s “Agent-​Regret” 4.4. Description, Intention, and the Framing of Responsibility 4.5. Accidents, Apologies, and Interpersonal Relations 5. Regret, Valuing, and Virtue 5.1. Introduction 5.2. Regret, Attachment, and Affirmation 5.3. Assessing Wallace’s Account 5.4. Regret and Unrealised Values 5.5. Conflicts of Value and Tragic Choices 5.6. Coda: Aristotle and Stoicism 6. The Social Structuring of Regret 6.1. Introduction 6.2. The Cultural Politics of Emotion 6.3. The Social Contours of Regret 6.4. Pronatalism and Regret 6.5. Regretting Motherhood 7. Voluntary Sterilization and Regret 7.1. Introduction 7.2. Refused Sterilization Requests 7.3. Autonomy and Medical Paternalism 7.4. Sterilization, Well-​Being, and Informed Consent 7.5. Permanency, Commitment, and Choice 7.6. Credibility, Identity, and Epistemic Injustice 8. Abortion and Regret 8.1. Introduction 8.2. The Politicization of Abortion Regret 8.3. The Rise to Prominence of Abortion Regret 8.4. Ripple Effects 8.5. The Normative Force of Abortion Regret 9. Trans Regret 9.1. Introduction 9.2. A Note on Terminology 9.3. The Purported “Problem” of Trans Regret 9.4. Personally Transformative Treatment 9.5. Trans Regret and the Authentic Self 10. Living with and without Regret 10.1. Introduction 10.2. Refusing to Regret 10.3. The Waxing or Waning of Regret 10.4. Self-​Forgiveness and Regret 10.5. Looking to the Future 10.6. Regulating Regret Bibliography Index