casuist
1
9.9
- noun
- /ˈkæʒuɪst/
- Formal
:
casuista
- The casuist cleverly navigated the complex ethical dilemmas posed during the debate.
Examples
-
As a casuist, Strong would favor casuistry; utilitarians would endorse utilitarianism.
Academic text (2016) -
This new science is incalculably rich in casuist detail...
Blog text (2) -
The legalist or casuist sees the need for nice discriminations.
Academic text (2004) -
After he lost, I attacked Casuist for jumping on his grave, and I argued that likely no Republican would have won this year, which I still believe is likely true.
Blog text (28) -
It is beyond the scope of this paper to address the concerns of casuists, virtue ethicists, narrativists, and pragmatists regarding deduction (but see my forthcoming book).
Academic text (2016) -
As a casuist, she carefully analyzed the moral implications of each decision.
-
In his writings, the casuist provided detailed reasoning to address challenging moral questions.
Synonyms
1
9.9
A person who uses clever but misleading arguments to persuade others
A person who focuses on tiny details and makes things more complicated
Surface Forms
Morphology
casuist = casuistry (opaque) = casu + ist
The agentive suffix '-ist' transparently indicates a practitioner, but the base 'casuistry' is a specialised and uncommon term, so the overall construction is only partially accessible to learners.
Etymology
Casuist comes from the Latin root casus, meaning 'case' or 'event', and is like the English word 'case'. A helpful way to remember it is that a casuist looks at moral 'cases' and finds clever, sometimes tricky, answers.