Morality

[Freethinker]

Freethinker, do you believe that there are absolute rights and wrongs, or are they subjective?

No. :-)

[Freethinker]

Oh ya, one other thing I did want to cover. There is little doubt that we are born with genetically hardwired moral tenets. And further that these are added to and modified by our environment after birth. Nature and Nurture as they say.

[pgrmdave]

That makes sense - morality based on what is best for the majority, although there are times when we cannot forget the individuals.

[pgrmdave]

I'm interested in reading sources of hardwired morality, do you know of any online sources, or can you give me books to reference?

[Freethinker]

That makes sense - morality based on what is best for the majority, although there are times when we cannot forget the individuals.

I never said based on what was best for the "majority". I said for "Society" or "Humanity". (if I did use "majority", my bad!)

[motherengine]

Oh ya, one other thing I did want to cover. There is little doubt that we are born with genetically hardwired moral tenets. And further that these are added to and modified by our environment after birth. Nature and Nurture as they say.

 

what moral tenets are we hard wired with? babies dislike pain and like pleasure. if a child grows up around murder and rape the child may not find these actions wrong at all. how many moral problems did the vikings have to deal with when sacking a village? maybe nature gives us personally and nurture gives us specific morals.

[Freethinker]

I'm interested in reading sources of hardwired morality, do you know of any online sources, or can you give me books to reference?

I would suggest "The Science of Morality" Joseph L. Daleiden.

:-)

[lindagarrette]

By the way, I have been doing more writing since joining Hypography than I have done in years. I LOVE to write, because it forces me to examine my thoughts and subject them to internal and external criticism. So, in short, this is all your fault!

;)

Me too, only many of the topics are not clear enough for me to write about until I do some research, so I hit the books and surf the web a lot.;)

[Aquagem]

I'm interested in reading sources of hardwired morality, do you know of any online sources, or can you give me books to reference?

 

Me too. I haven't seen anything to date that suggests any "moral tenets", meaning specific moral behaviors, are hard-wired. I compare morality to language, which seems to be a good parallel because a) we have large brain areas devoted to it, ;) it's a collective property, c) it relies upon learning for its specifics (tenets), and d) it seems increasingly clear that we share the basic machinery with other primates and probably many other species. Maybe the sticking point is semantic, involving the definition of "tenet".

[Aquagem]

Me too, only many of the topics are not clear enough for me to write about until I do some research, so I hit the books and surf the web a lot.;)

 

Reading, searching, revising, posting, editing, reposting, rethinking, rewriting -- What's a mother to do?? This takes a lot more time than I really have, but it's invigorating! I just worry about all these avalanche-like posts turning people off. They're great for my thoughts, but I don't want to be tiresome or TOO LOUD!

 

;)

[pgrmdave]

I never said based on what was best for the "majority". I said for "Society" or "Humanity". (if I did use "majority", my bad!)

 

I'm sorry, you didn't use the word majority, that was my interpretation. I assumed that you meant that, I couldn't think of any other way to interpret it. Who else would decide what was good for society and humanity but the majority, or is there a definite good and bad?

[Tormod]

By the way, I have been doing more writing since joining Hypography than I have done in years. I LOVE to write, because it forces me to examine my thoughts and subject them to internal and external criticism. So, in short, this is all your fault!;)

 

Any chance you could publish some of your stuff here at Hypography?

[geko]

Ok i know this was brought up at the start of this thread but i havent been able to let it rest.

 

Are you sure that you havent got the ratio's back to front? Im pretty sure (or rather im under the impression), that it's agreed that there is less murder per individual 'these days' than there was in eg. tribal/hunter gatherer times. The reason i say this is that the 'noble savage' idea is regarded as a myth im sure. There never was a noble savage, it was just savage.

 

Does anybody have any evidence one way or the other?

 

I actually cant seem to find anything now (grr ;) ). I keep on finding only written information about prehistoric societies killing each other at a rate that makes the world wars pale in comparison, the condition of certain human bones indicating scalping, arrowheads londged in them, ax wounds, human muscle protein in human excrement. Specialized weapons such as maces and tomahawks. Loads of this written material though but i dont seem to be able to find any charts or whatever (but i KNOW ;) that ive seen some before that showed the percentage of murder ratios v number of population over the last 10,000 years i think it was). But hey i cant find anything :(

 

ps. there's also lots of info around that points to violence in humans not being a sickness or learned behaviour but actually part of our make up.

[Freethinker]

I'm sorry, you didn't use the word majority, that was my interpretation. I assumed that you meant that, I couldn't think of any other way to interpret it. Who else would decide what was good for society and humanity but the majority, or is there a definite good and bad?

Majority rules is MOB rule. All it takes is one more than 50%.

 

Can a majority develop a set of moral tenets? Sure they can. I was not saying they couldn't.

 

But what I was talking about was NOT how any number of the different types/ approaches to/ of morality there may be. I was discussing the existence of an objective "most benefitial to the human race and it's survival" approach.

 

At any one time a "majority" of people might decide that a particular approach represents the "most moral" approach to something. That does not assure that it is. Anymore than when the "majority" of people thought the world was flat made that the most correct option.

[Freethinker]

ps. there's also lots of info around that points to violence in humans not being a sickness or learned behaviour but actually part of our make up.

Ah but who is to determine what is and what is not "violence"? Again subjective.

 

e.g. the Sodom & Gomorrah myth. In it god slaughters two entire communities. Every man woman child and "unborn baby" in a most painful and destructive manner. I would easily lable it as an act of violence. But how many Christians would acknowledge their god being violent?

 

Are we animals? Are we born with certain hardwired predisposition to certain actions that we share with much of the animal, esp mamilian world? Yes and Yes.

 

But to label any specific one's as "violent" is a subjective and personal situational evaluation.

 

How violent is it to slice someone's flesh open and suck their blood out? What if it was because of a snake bite?

[motherengine]

if someone slices open another's flesh and sucks the blood out they are commiting a violent act regardless why it is happening. one solid definition for violence is 'a turbulent state resulting in injuries and destruction'. in the case of someone trying to suck poison out of a wound the injury and destruction of flesh is in an attempt to save a life. violence can be used to help as well as to hurt but it is still violence. there has been much violence done in the name of morality and though one may find such acts offensive there is no absolute right or wrong about it. to paraphrase shakespeare 'nothing is either good nor bad but thinking makes it seem so'. even if it could be proven that humans are hard wired with morality a denial of intelligent design leaves open any wandering interpretation concerning such things. no god, no right or wrong outside of our heads. if you believe something is right for you than it is, for you. you cannot supplant my belief with your own though. if the same thing that is right for you is wrong for me than both can exist at the same time but one can only dominate the other by physical force or manipulation with no help from an indifferent universe.

[pgrmdave]

Majority rules is MOB rule. All it takes is one more than 50%.

 

Can a majority develop a set of moral tenets? Sure they can. I was not saying they couldn't.

 

But what I was talking about was NOT how any number of the different types/ approaches to/ of morality there may be. I was discussing the existence of an objective "most benefitial to the human race and it's survival" approach.

 

At any one time a "majority" of people might decide that a particular approach represents the "most moral" approach to something. That does not assure that it is. Anymore than when the "majority" of people thought the world was flat made that the most correct option.

 

Hmmm....This is a very interesting post. We can both agree that morality can be seen as the course of action which would be

most benefitial to the human race and it's survival

But we cannot agree on how to decide such. You claim that there is an objective definition, I claim that it must be subjective. Well, I ask you this - Who decides what is most benefitial to the human race and it's survival? And are we looking to benefit everybody, or as many people as we can, immediately or over the long term? If it is your opinion, doesn't that make it...subjective?