What are ethics and morality based on?

Discussion in 'Ethics, Morality, & Justice' started by Mr. Hamtastic, Apr 24, 2009.

  1. Mr. Hamtastic whackawhackado! Registered Senior Member

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    Let me begin with stating what it appears to me to based upon.

    There are regional religions, these religions are the basis for all things "moral", or at least morality can be traced to them.

    Ethics-the idea of this is right or this is wrong-seems to be even more cultural. I would not want my children to marry at 13. I feel it is wrong. I know that this is considered ethical in other parts of the world.

    I guess I would like to know what measuring stick to go by for "good" or "bad". Does such a measuring stick exist which can apply to anyone, anywhere, anytime?

    One final thing: If ethics and morality are concepts that are relative(what's good for me may be evil to you and that's the way it is and we should coexist) then are they of any real value in life? Shouldn't we abandon these concepts completely, or declare one best and destroy the others? Aren't these concepts more trouble than they are worth?
     
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  3. Aerika Registered Senior Member

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    Humans are responsible for the worse atrocities committed by the animal kingdom. But we are able to feel guilt and compassion so society is driven to make rules and laws governing our behavior.

    Some people have gone as far as to invent gods and religions that validate their beliefs. It's not a bad dream by any means, having a god watching over me insuring I'm treated according to my beliefs or there will be hell to pay in the afterlife. And/but since we cannot agree on some issues, we've created several gods and religions.

    Our views on morality have evolved and in many cases religion has fought our evolution every step of the way. Such as slavery, equal rights for blacks, women's suffrage, and currently gays are fighting for their equal rights.

    Morality and ethics comes from our emotions and a desire to bring order and fairness to our community. Though regionally speaking, we have evolved differently.
    That's why in some cases we are diametrically opposed to one another on certain issues.
     
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  5. John99 Banned Banned

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    Its really up to the indicviduals brain.

    If someone is a flasher then he must figure it is ok. at least at some point he has to.
     
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  7. Mr. Hamtastic whackawhackado! Registered Senior Member

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    I agree. Have we not evolved enough to look at things without the glass of "emotion"?

    Fairness, on the other hand, seems to be one of the most amorphous concepts out there. Can fairness be defined in some static way which would make it possible for things to be "fair" to all parties involved?
     
  8. John99 Banned Banned

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    much of this is dependent on the society you live in and the length of time certain moral perspectives have been in practice. we really can establish a moral compass across the board and universally or we can have individual hamlets with widely varying conceptions.
     
  9. Aerika Registered Senior Member

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    I think emotion still plays a role in our sense of right and wrong. But in many cases we have evolved past that.

    Since our morality has evolved and is in the process of evolving, its difficult to envision a world or society where we have absolute morality or fairness. Or at least in my lifetime since regions of the world have evolved differently.
     
  10. Mr. Hamtastic whackawhackado! Registered Senior Member

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    IF emotion decides right and wrong, then the man sho derives great happiness from raping and torturing small children will see his actions as right. How do we justify any suggestion that our belief that his actions are not right?

    Now let us make it a bit more extreme. Community A believes that children should be involved in ritual torture and sex from a young age. Community B believes that children should be protected from torture or sex until they reach an age of adulthood. Community A thinks that their experiences as children will allow them to enjoy life more, without fear of pain, without sexual compunctions. Community B thinks that children should have experiences in life that they show interest in, and that some experiences require maturity.

    Which one is "right"? Why?
     
  11. Roman Banned Banned

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    Which ever one makes you feel better. Duh.

    Your argument is basically:
    If all morals are emotive, then consider A
    A makes you feel bad.
    Therefore A is morally wrong.

    You in fact offer a great defense of emotivism.
     
  12. Oli Heute der Enteteich... Registered Senior Member

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    No, there's a biological basis.
    (I have a prior appointment and have to log out now, but this should be a start).
    http://serendip.brynmawr.edu/bb/neuro/neuro01/web3/Solano.html
     
  13. Mr. Hamtastic whackawhackado! Registered Senior Member

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    If emotivism is what I am suggesting, then let's consider the members of these two communities. The people in A are morally right because emotively they FEEL right. The people in B are also morally right because they FEEL right. Thus, we are faced with a choice of accepting relativism(what's good for one may not be good for another, and the both should accept this), or choosing another method.

    Do you have one, Roman?
     
  14. Mr. Hamtastic whackawhackado! Registered Senior Member

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    Oli-While an interesting theory, I suggest a problem with it. IF morality is an evolved biological trait, THEN why are so many opposing ideas considered "moral".

    IE-The Japanese suicide bombers in WW2 were doing a"moral, honorable" act. They didn't even have virgins waiting in paradise, being mostly shintoists. Even atheists in the US would agree that committing suicide to kill others, even in times of war, is not moral or honorable. These views seem diametrically opposed, and if biological, suggests that there may not be SPECIFIC moral traits, but perhaps an intuitive sense which may not be bound up in anything.

    I suggest that the authors of that paper have overapplied an observation, just as Darwin did when he suggested that humans would evolve into earless beings after seeing a friend who lost an ear living well. The fact that brain injury leads to many an immoral act does not mean that morality is biological. What it means is that any injury or illness in your brain will alter your perceptions, your rationalism, and even your interpretation of what your senses tell you.

    Kind of like saying that because some computers have been seen to have viruses, that these viruses are caused by the manufacturer.
     
  15. sniffy Banned Banned

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    There is a part of the brain that is responsible for that which humans have come to label 'morality'. You could say it is a trigger mechanism which helps certain animals 'do the right thing' which is the right thing because it makes them feel good (ergo the need for emotion) which in turn encourages them to do more 'moral' things which makes them feel even better (or superior) about themselves. The added value is in the fact that 'doing the right thing' might also make another individual feel better, or live longer or...... 'fall in love' or want to recriprocate one day.

    Amazing survival tool, eh?
     
  16. Mr. Hamtastic whackawhackado! Registered Senior Member

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    Ok. But doesn't that biological tool fire in response to some really simple stimuli, at least biologically? Consider an infant. Why does an infant smile? Why do they cry? Why do they cry until they see us, then stop and smile and coo when we pick them up? Why not all the time? Why does this generally not occur until after a couple of months of life?

    For it to be biological, an infant should be fully functional in regards to this.

    Also, if it is the "feel good" sensation which produces morality, and it is biological, why does it fire differently for different individuals in the same family, much less in different cultures?

    All of this leads me to believe that morality is a learned trait. Maybe backed up by something biological but mostly a learned trait. It is that learned basis I want to know the true basis for.

    Or did our ultimate grandparents fall out of the trees and decide that society and owning goods and helping the helpless were good things and genocide, torture, and theft were bad things and we have been learning such ever since?

    Another point: What happens when that biological tool gets turned off? By illness, injury, or defect, it doesn't matter. Does morality cease to exist for that person?
     
  17. Roman Banned Banned

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    Another method? Are you kidding? Emotivism is pretty much the only meta-ethical theory worth having. Notions of right and wrong arise simply as expressions of what we like and don't like. The science also backs me up on this- if you watch people's brains while you ask why actively killing one person to save five, all their emotion gates flare up, followed by logic circuits as they try and work backwards. If you watch a brain when you ask about passively killing one person to save five, their emotion gates don't go off, just their cerebral cortex processing 5-1 = 4 is ok.

    Emotivism doesn't explain anything beyond the proximal of why we feel the way we do, of course. I think evo psych has some pretty worthwhile things to say in the morality department- why we feel the way we do about stuff.
     
  18. Mr. Hamtastic whackawhackado! Registered Senior Member

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    Is emotivism the best way to go then? Doesn't that lead straight down the path to relativism, where everything is ok in someone's eyes?
     
  19. Roman Banned Banned

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    Really. REALLY. REALLY.
    Try again.

    It really doesn't. Different cultural mores are largely variations on the same generic pattern. There's also the case of who you get to apply morality to. If a cultural decides infants don't get to be in the "in-group", they'll put unwanted children in jars or throw them off cliffs. If Jews happen to fall into a social out-group, it will be ok to gas them and take their money.

    As social animals, in constant competition with each other, we need ways to compartmentalize our actions and behaviors so that others won't catch on and we can keep from hurting our own groups while ruthlessly slaughtering other groups for our own benefit. If we can make up reasons why it is ok to kill and steal from our enemies, who are more or less identical to us, we will have a great advantage over the hippies down the road who can't bring themselves to jihad.

    Where we frame morality is certainly learned, but in most studies of children, ideas of fairness and right and wrong come about very early.

    No, no, no!
    We only say those things are bad things, in certain contexts. Genocide, torture, and theft are all ok, given the right social circumstances. For instance, many of the conservatives on this board advocate all three, but it is ok for them, because all Muslims are Evil. Madanthonywayne, a pretty reasonable, Jesus loving freak, wants to torture terrorist suspects and invade Iran because it would make him sleep better at night. How fucked up is that?

    Well, not very. Our emotions allow us to hold contradictory beliefs. Humans are bundles of inconsistency because it allows us to operate to our maximum benefit. That's why moral questions tend to be "hard". Rational inspection tells us one thing, while our guts tell us another.

    Sort of. Think of morality as a way for an individual to gauge social risk. The more guilty you'd feel about doing something, the more risk associated with doing it. Stealing a candy bar? Not that guilty. Raping and murdering someone? Pretty guilty.

    Without a sense of right and wrong, you'd get someone who misbehaved all the time. They wouldn't be able to feel that their desire to butcher and eat you was wrong, they may know it intellectually, but without that emotional block, you end up with pathologies like psychopathy.
     
  20. sniffy Banned Banned

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    When considering emotivism one should also take into account reason. The one tempers the other and vice versa does it not?
     
  21. Roman Banned Banned

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    IMO, yes.

    But that's just it, everything is ok in someone's eyes. But good luck trying to get away with raping somebody's kids.
     
  22. Mr. Hamtastic whackawhackado! Registered Senior Member

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    It's all about going to the right community, isn't it? If I wanted to rape someone's kids, it would be a good idea to go somewhere where it's allowed. I understand there are some curious rules about such things in some southeast asian and pacific island nations.

    If it is ok to rape children there(can't see sex w/kids as consensual), then why do we have people crying foul? What the hell are "human rights" based on? What right does anyone have to say about what another person or people do, morally?

    For example, what right do we in the US have to say that the treatment of women in some islamic nations is immoral? If none, why do we say anything, then?
     
  23. sniffy Banned Banned

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    It could be because certain people have said that when they are treated a certain way it makes them feel bad and as there are times when we can relate to feeling bad at the hands of others we can, therefore, empathise with those who are feeling bad because someone has treated them badly. Not rocket science.
     

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