Mourning and Perspective

Bad events justify mourning. Bad events, being bad, are mourn-worthy. This seems like an accurate statement, but it must be refined. Do we mean that every bad event justifies everyone mourning forever? If not, why not? It cannot be because the proper response is not, for some people, to mourn, supposing that the mourn-worthiness is inherent in the event. Of course, we might give an account on which the mourn-worthiness of events is relative to the agent. In that case, what makes an event mourn-worthy to some but not others?

Now, there are likely some events which are mourn-worthy only for some and not for others. I would like to set those aside for now, however, and consider only those events which are mourn-worthy for anyone who hears of them. Even in such cases, the degree may vary. I want to suggest that, where the badness to the agents is the same but the mourn-worthiness differs, this is a result of how worthy those events are of consideration by the agents.

On this account, we have more reason to consider bad events the more they affect our lives and the lives of those close to us. Two equally mourn-worthy events, or the same mourn-worthy event at two different times, may rightfully elicit different degrees of mournfulness from us on account of our differing practical relations to them. The events continue to provide reasons for us to mourn, but we cease to be in a situation where those reasons warrant as much consideration.

Depending on one's conception of reasons, this may amount to the events giving less reason. That is, if a reason just is something which should be given consideration in practical reasoning, then the fact that one has reason, all things considered, not to give weight to a fact in practical reasoning entails that the fact is not a reason for one, and similarly if one merely has some reason not to give weight to a reason, then the reason is less weighty of a reason. If this is one's account of reasons, then it should be no surprise that reasons come and go over time.

If, on the other hand, we presuppose that reasons are eternal in the way that other ideal entities are supposed to be (e.g., numbers, the predicate "being red," etc.,), then the reason goes along with the event, and is just as much a reason whether or not we have reason to take it into (or exclude it from) consideration. Translated into a less Platonist idiom, this might becomes the view that an event provides a reason for action phi provided only that, were one to consider it and only it, then one would rightly reach the practical conclusion *phi*. Combinations of events will provide different reasons from their isolated parts, and might not provide a reason derivable from their parts. This conflicts with our ordinary language of "weighing reasons" which seems to suggest that distinct reasons can be placed alongside each other. Yet it is not an uncommon claim that it is only in a context that reasons exist and have force. That the light turned green is only a reason to go because of its situation in a set of laws, and it seems to provide no reason to go if the road is blocked ahead of me. Again, the reason appears to evaporate in certain contexts.

So we seem to be forced to claim that reasons are ephemeral things. Nevertheless, mourn-worthy events remain mourn-worthy. That is, they remain such that the proper reaction to them, when faced with them, is to mourn over them to an extent corresponding to their degree of mournfulness and how directly one is faced with them. The reason to mourn provided by a mourn-worthy event may evaporate, but this is not because the event ceases to be mourn-worthy, but because we lack reason to consider it. The mourn-worthy event only provided reason to mourn at all because it occurred in a context where it made it fitting for someone to mourn. If we were given fresh reason to consider the event, as on the anniversary of the event, then the reason to mourn would revive because the event retains whatever features made it a mourn-worthy event.