ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the exploration of remorse, the time outlining a basic conception of remorse from a philosophical perspective. Philosophers typically 'analyse concepts'. The analysis of a concept is concerned with analysing how we think using that concept, and this usually goes hand in hand with an analysis of the language of that concept. Where a concept or term being analysed refers to some aspect of human experience, it is common for conceptual analysis to describe the common features of that lived experience. Conceptual analysis also tends to focus on 'central cases' or 'paradigm examples' of the thing analysed and thus can tend to produce somewhat ideal or model conceptions of the thing in question. The chapter seeks to situate remorse within the family of what we call 'retractive emotions' such as regret, guilt, shame, compunction, contrition, and repentance. Emotions have intentionality, and it has both mental and physical aspects.
