Moral reasoning is a form of practical reasoning wherein one attempts to give or find reasons for morally approving or disapproving actions. All reasoning involves premises that lead to a conclusion. A premise is a judgment, expressible in a statement, which contains two elements. The first is the subject, and the second is what logicians call a predicate. The predicate is what is asserted about the subject.

There are two types of reasoning—practical and theoretical—each with its own characteristics. In theoretical reasoning, one argues from two descriptive premises such as (1) “All humans are mortal” and (2) “Socrates is human” to a descriptive conclusion “Therefore, Socrates is mortal.” However, the practical syllogism, as Aristotle noted, is an argument whose conclusion recommends an action or at least ...