Contemporary moral philosophy and much contemporary moralizing almost radiate respect for persons. Thomas Nagel is one of many who take its primacy for granted. In a review of Scanion he says:

Many others take the centrality and foundational role of such respect as a given. This is a big change from the days when moralists held that all human beings deserved a certain basic and equal disrespect.

Innocence is a notion that can prove controversial. Claims of innocence typically support not imposing burdens on the innocent when their conduct is relevantly unobjectionable. This paper examines innocence in the context of violent conflict between states or groups. Many thinkers about the morality of such violence want to establish a principle that would protect innocent civilians. Yet the common view in just war theory does not affirm the moral innocence of civilians. Similarly, the common view that soldiers have an equal right to kill does not affirm their equal moral culpability.

Talk of innocence usually Starts from the idea that a kind of moral appraisal makes sense. We assume that persons can be innocent or not by virtue largely of the choices they have made. I will accept this assumption and set aside metaphysical doubts about our capacity for freedom. There is, of course, no issue of moral innocence if in fact we cannot be morally responsible for our actions.

When a debate seems intractable, with little agreement as to how one might proceed towards a resolution, it is understandable that philosophers should consider whether something might be amiss with the debate itself. Famously in the last Century, philosophers of various stripes explored in various ways the possibility that at least certain philosophical debates are in some manner deficient in sense. Such moves are no longer so much in vogue. For one thing, the particular ways they have been made have themselves undergone much critical scrutiny, so that many philosophers now feel that there is, for example, a Quinean response to Carnap, a Gricean reply to Austin, and a diluting proliferation of Wittgenstein interpretations.

Scorned by analytic philosophers for much of the twentieth Century, the a priori has been newly befriended in recent years. This development is healthy but there is reason to be concerned about how it is unfolding. In particular, it is largely characterized by a certain historical myopia: contemporary philosophers are able to see back to Kant but not much beyond him. While it may be true that the a priori changed with Kant, this in itself provides us with a reason to go back before him. For other conceptualizations of the a priori, all but forgotten now, might help us to meet worries about it that Kant's familiar version cannot.