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We can have just laws and unjust laws.

So our law and morality entirely separate domains.

If not, what's the link between them?

Scott Hirschowitz is professor of both law and philosophy at the University of Michigan.

Scott Hirschowitz, welcome to Philosophy Bites.

Thanks, it's great to be here.

The topic we're going to focus on is law and morality.

Now obviously they're not the same thing, but what's the difference?

So there's a long tradition of thinking just what you said, of thinking that law is one thing

and morality is another.

And ultimately what I want to do is push back on that picture.

I want to try and persuade people that our legal practices are actually part of our moral

lives and are intended to change our moral relationships.

So I think of our legal practices as a kind of moral practice in the same way that promising

is a kind of moral practice.

When I promise you say that I'll come by here at two in the afternoon to record a podcast,

changing our moral relationship, giving you a right that you didn't have before, creating

a responsibility for me.

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