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Author Topic:   Morality! Thorn in Darwin's side or not?
Cedre
Member (Idle past 1490 days)
Posts: 350
From: Russia
Joined: 01-30-2009


Message 121 of 438 (505219)
04-09-2009 4:44 AM
Reply to: Message 116 by Perdition
04-08-2009 12:02 PM


Re: Human life and worth
I'm going to deal with Perdition's posts first, it has not yet been cleared in my mind though whose post I'll deal with next, but bear with me as I will try to reply to everyone in due time. (Breath)
I accept the lawmaker as all of us, not some mystical being in the sky who only thinks his special tribe is worth anything,
If that is what you believe then I’m okay with it, but your manner of expression puts me under the impression that you think I’m trying to bully you into believing in my God which I’m not by the way, in fact my religion prohibits it; however since this is a debate I believe that I’m allowed to defy and challenge your believes and not expect for you to get emotional on me and start employing ad hominem tactics rather than dealing directly with the points as I make them in my arguments.
Why do you think they should be? All life is special, and precious, and just as fleeting and tenuous as human life is. One could argue that we're special because of our unique ability to understand, and our ability to control large swathes of the planet through agriculture and construction.
I was going to put myself forward with this paragraph but then I noticed that you had already done it for me below and so I didn't in the end.
But that just makes us stewards of life, and again, makes us no less worthy of preservation than any other life form.
To one person a scuffed up, torn dirty teddy bear is the most precious thing oin the world,
So to this same person I guess human life isn’t priority number one, since it considers a torn dirty teddy bear as the most precious thing in the world.
Worth is not an inherent attribute of anything, worth is given to something on an individual basis.
This Indeed is in line with the point that I tried to make in my last posts, namely that worth is not in born, or it is not even a birth right to be worthy, it is rather affected by the individuals surrounds. That is if the individual happens to find him/herself in a place where his/her life is not valued due to his/her skin color, his/her life will become worthless even though he/she believes it may have some worth the majority agree that he/she is utterly worthless. Please grasp what I mean by this, as Perdition as averred above worth is not an inherent attribute of anything therefore human life is not of necessity worthy or even valuable. You may disagree with me by saying that it is worthy but then again this is your opinion that human life is worthy since it has no worth to start with other than that worth one decides or feels like to give it.
So here is my initial argument; worth is determined on an individual basis like Perdition has described it above, since it is determined like this human’s do not have intrinsic or inherent worth and therefore someone can decide that humans are worthless and therefore is not morally obligated to either safe life or to respect it for that matter. Now logically point out where I go wrong in my reasoning regarding this?
The usual reason we have for granting more worth on one thing over another is rarity, and one could argue that an individual is the rarest thing of all and is thus worth the most.
This is a usual reason for granting worth but the worth given in this way usually goes up and down like a seesaw. We see this in precious metals and stones, their worth ebb and flow and are not stable or absolute their worth is rather determined by current need. The worth of currency would serve as another good example of this; one day it is the leading currency but then on the next day it brings up the rear.
Nevertheless it is merely your opinion that rarities should be considered as possessing greater value than common things, in truth you saying that rarities are valuable boils down to a moral statement, thus in keeping with your moral statement, human life should be valued since apparently humanity is a rarity and all rarities are valuable, so it would be immoral to treat humans like valueless trash since they are valuable. Note however that this isn’t true or applicable for the next guy, and the next guy, and the next guy after him, they all have their determined moralities that arise out of their emotions and personal likes and dislikes, to them rarity doesn’t mean anything.
If you still maintain that all rare things should be regarded as being valuable in the face of other existing moralities and viewpoints then you are attempting to create a transcended and absolute morality or opinion. And this contradicts your position that morality is subjective, because what you are trying to do is impose your opinion that all things rare are valuable on other people who obviously have their own opinions and moral codes or standards, and in so doing you have created a morality that oversteps all others, in other words an absolute morality has been established, that can’t ever be overturned.
But if moralities are subjective you have no right to impose your morality since all moralities are correct and none is wrong, because to say that one morality is right and another is wrong is to establish an absolute morality which cannot be because moralities are subjective. You can’t have a subjective morality that is also absolute; it like saying that a circle is round and not round also, or that the moon is not made from cheese but is made from cheese also; these scenarios contravene the law of non-contradiction and therefore cannot be.
Thus my point is as long as moralities are subjective there can be no universal absolute morality since this would automatically mean that moralities are not subjective but are objective or absolute.
I don't need anyone else to tell me my life has worth, that's something I give it myself, and because I can empathise with others, I grant them the same worth as I grant myself.
Thus you have no right to tell others that all rare things should be considered as being valuable, since this is what you have determined for yourself. Other people are equally capable of determining for themselves what is and is not valuable thank you.
You're exactly right, that's why people were able to do those things, and the people who did them considered what they did to be morally right. We have a different definition of morally right, and by default, I think my morality is better than theirs,
Who or what gives you the right to make the above assessment, that is that your morality is better than theirs, moralities are subjective none is wrong but all are correct , for them their moralities are better than your I guess if that is the case.
So the question comes down to how you define a "person" not how you define morality.
But you use your morality to define the worth of a person; if you think it is wrong to hurt others than you will give them the appropriate worth that would keep them from being hurt. On the other hand if you view that hurting others is of necessity not a bad thing then others won’t have much worth in your eyes.
People have no inherent meaning or purpose in life. That's the way it is and railing against it won't make it any less true. The only meaning we have in life is what meaning we give it, so make sure to give yourself a good reason to live, a good meaning for your life, and then strive to reach your purpose.
You may not have inherent meaning or purpose in life but I believe that I do have inherent meaning and purpose which God gas bestowed on me even before I was born. And that purpose it to be happy in this life and the life hereafter.
Moralities do not negate each other. If I like apples but loathe oranges and my friend like oranges but loathes apples, do those two conflicting views negate each other? No, they just don't apply beyond the person making the subjective observation.
The above is not a good analogy, try something like this. If I say it is wrong to crush an orange, and my friend begs to differ, and seeing that we have determined this two ideas subjectively it will not be wrong to crush an orange or not to crush an orange, both are correct, thus if I don’t crush the orange I’m correct and if my friend crushes the orange he is still correct. This is the same thing that happens when moralities are subjective, it isn’t wrong to crush a human being and it isn’t also wrong to not crush a human being; this is so because neither morality oversteps the other thus neither one is more correct or more wrong than the other.
Edited by Cedre, : No reason given.
Edited by Cedre, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 116 by Perdition, posted 04-08-2009 12:02 PM Perdition has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 122 by Perdition, posted 04-09-2009 8:44 AM Cedre has not replied

  
Perdition
Member (Idle past 3238 days)
Posts: 1593
From: Wisconsin
Joined: 05-15-2003


Message 122 of 438 (505237)
04-09-2009 8:44 AM
Reply to: Message 121 by Cedre
04-09-2009 4:44 AM


Re: Human life and worth
If that is what you believe then I’m okay with it, but your manner of expression puts me under the impression that you think I’m trying to bully you into believing in my God which I’m not by the way, in fact my religion prohibits it; however since this is a debate I believe that I’m allowed to defy and challenge your believes and not expect for you to get emotional on me and start employing ad hominem tactics rather than dealing directly with the points as I make them in my arguments.
HI Cedre, I wasn't trying to get emotional, and no where did I employ and ad hominem attack, I never called you anything. I was merely pointing out that I find God's "morality" objectionable and would not consider his proclamations to be moral, so even if I did believe in him, I wouldn't think he was a great god.
So to this same person I guess human life isn’t priority number one, since it considers a torn dirty teddy bear as the most precious thing in the world.
I thought it would be pretty obvious that this person was a child. Perhaps I should be more explicit in the future? My point, one that you failed to see throughout your post, is that worth is determined on an individual basis. Nothing, and I mean NOTHING, has an inherent worth that we can all agree on.
So here is my initial argument; worth is determined on an individual basis like Perdition has described it above, since it is determined like this human’s do not have intrinsic or inherent worth and therefore someone can decide that humans are worthless and therefore is not morally obligated to either safe life or to respect it for that matter. Now logically point out where I go wrong in my reasoning regarding this?
People can decide that, and there are people in the news every day who do. But, just because everyone can determine their own morality does not mean everyone else has to tolerate their morality. That's where society comes in. A society is made up of a whole host of moralities, indeed, one for every person in that society. This group determines norms of behavior and decides on things that it will overlook and things that will not be tolerated on a societal level. In our society, indeed in most societies, we have decided that taking another person's life without just cause (and just cause varies from society to society) is wrong. If your morality contradicts that norm, you will be expelled from that society in one way or another.
If you still maintain that all rare things should be regarded as being valuable in the face of other existing moralities and viewpoints then you are attempting to create a transcended and absolute morality or opinion
No where did I say that all rare things should be regarded as valuable. I merely said that this was a common way of determining rarity. It's not the way it SHOULD be, it's just the way it often is. I'm not even saying that this is true in all cases. Often, disagreements over value stem from disagreements over rarity. A child sees her teddy bear as incredibly rare, it is hers after all. Someone else sees it as just another bear in a sea of such dolls.
Thus my point is as long as moralities are subjective there can be no universal absolute morality since this would automatically mean that moralities are not subjective but are objective or absolute.
That's pretty much been everyone's point. You're the one who seems to think there should be an absolute morality. I have no problem with there not being one.
Who or what gives you the right to make the above assessment, that is that your morality is better than theirs, moralities are subjective none is wrong but all are correct , for them their moralities are better than your I guess if that is the case.
Everyone thinks their morality is better than everyone else's. If you thought someone else's morality is better, wouldn't you change yours to be comparable to theirs? For example, if I think Bob next door has a better grasp on the value or worth of things and can better determine what is the "good" thing to do, wouldn't I try to match his views rather than just going along with my "flawed" morality? I'm not going to say that you should change your morality to mine, I'm just saying that my morality is better in my opinion because it is mine.
But you use your morality to define the worth of a person; if you think it is wrong to hurt others than you will give them the appropriate worth that would keep them from being hurt. On the other hand if you view that hurting others is of necessity not a bad thing then others won’t have much worth in your eyes.
That's very true, but people who feel others do not have worth are called sociopaths, and if they are noticed, they are removed from society. It happens all the time, whether by sending them to jail, killing them through capital punishment, or institutionalizing them.
You may not have inherent meaning or purpose in life but I believe that I do have inherent meaning and purpose which God gas bestowed on me even before I was born. And that purpose it to be happy in this life and the life hereafter.
That's what you believe, I believe that is a purpose you have given yourself, but have misidentified the source. I really don't care if you convince yourself your purpose comes from yourself or some outside source. Your morality is a bit vague, though, so I hope what you find what makes you happy is not something that would conflict with the society you live in.
The above is not a good analogy, try something like this. If I say it is wrong to crush an orange, and my friend begs to differ, and seeing that we have determined this two ideas subjectively it will not be wrong to crush an orange or not to crush an orange, both are correct, thus if I don’t crush the orange I’m correct and if my friend crushes the orange he is still correct. This is the same thing that happens when moralities are subjective, it isn’t wrong to crush a human being and it isn’t also wrong to not crush a human being; this is so because neither morality oversteps the other thus neither one is more correct or more wrong than the other
You keep seeming to miss the point that people are also living in a society which, if you will, naturally selects the moralities that will better serve that society. Crushing oranges doesn't have much of an impact on the society, in most cases. Now, if you were on an ancient naval vessel and there were only a few oranges left, crushing one might lead to someone on the crew getting scurvy. In that case, the society on the ship may very well determine that crushing oranges is a very bad thing. Your friend would then see the effect of a moral thought being in conflict with a strong moral choice in the society.
There is no absolute morality. If we find sentient life on another planet, the odds of them holding the same things valuable as we do would be very low. One could postulate that they will have some form of respect for their type of life, however broad or limited their definition of "their type of life" is because without that decision, they probably would not have survived very long as a sentient species. But, just because there is no absolute, that doesn't mean we can't, as a society, determine what fits in or not.
You often jump straight to the worst in humans. Very few people would want to kill others in a general way, and those that do often come in conflict with their society, or find another one. I'm very proud of our armed services, but I know one person for sure who joined the military because he wanted to have the ability to kill other people. He found a society where it would be possible for him to follow his moral compass.
TO give this an evolutionary theme, each morality is like a genetic mutation. It makes everyone different, but the morals that work best in the society are picked for, the ones that do not are selected against by having that person removed from society.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 121 by Cedre, posted 04-09-2009 4:44 AM Cedre has not replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 125 by ICANT, posted 04-11-2009 2:47 AM Perdition has replied

  
Peter
Member (Idle past 1479 days)
Posts: 2161
From: Cambridgeshire, UK.
Joined: 02-05-2002


Message 123 of 438 (505341)
04-10-2009 12:11 PM
Reply to: Message 1 by Cedre
03-28-2009 8:28 AM


I think there is a bit of a disconnect in here (and I admit I haven't read ALL the thread so forgive me if I trundle out something that's already been dealt with -- been away from the site for a while and probably should catch up better ).
The disconnect hinges on a couple of points in the originating post.
The originating post talks about people acting selflessly with no though to any future benefit to themselves. This is somehow then turned into an evolutionary problem along the lines of 'But how could such behaviour have evolved if it provides no benefit?'
The disconnect is that evolution has very little to do with individuals and everything to do with populations.
It is likely (with such a physically weak species as homo sapiens) that a population (or community) which has some selfless individuals in it would fare better than a population filled with self-serving individuals.
This would tend to select in favour of populations that include individuals with 'self-less' traits.
I didn't think that was hard to figure out. Strength in numbers only gives a benefit if the numbers co-operate with one another.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 1 by Cedre, posted 03-28-2009 8:28 AM Cedre has not replied

  
ICANT
Member
Posts: 6769
From: SSC
Joined: 03-12-2007
Member Rating: 1.5


Message 124 of 438 (505396)
04-11-2009 2:30 AM
Reply to: Message 119 by SammyJean
04-08-2009 5:57 PM


Re: Human life and worth
Hi Sammy Jean,
Sammy Jean writes:
I said we humans need to use our innate ability to empathize.
In one of your earlier posts you mentioned this was hardwired in us.
My question is, how, where, and why did this innate ability get hardwired into us?
God Bless,

"John 5:39 (KJS) Search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me."

This message is a reply to:
 Message 119 by SammyJean, posted 04-08-2009 5:57 PM SammyJean has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 128 by SammyJean, posted 04-11-2009 1:08 PM ICANT has not replied
 Message 129 by Modulous, posted 04-13-2009 3:27 AM ICANT has not replied

  
ICANT
Member
Posts: 6769
From: SSC
Joined: 03-12-2007
Member Rating: 1.5


Message 125 of 438 (505397)
04-11-2009 2:47 AM
Reply to: Message 122 by Perdition
04-09-2009 8:44 AM


Re: Human life and worth
Hi Perdition,
Perdition writes:
I was merely pointing out that I find God's "morality" objectionable and would not consider his proclamations to be moral, so even if I did believe in him, I wouldn't think he was a great god.
What is so objectionale about God's morality?
There is much that is objectionale about the morality of religion.
The God I serve gave me two rules to live by.
1. Love God with everything you are.
2. Love your neighbor as much as you love yourself.
Now you and everybody else here can dispense with number one.
But if everyone in the world would keep number two.
Our jails would be empty.
There would be no homeless.
There would be no hunger.
There would be no pain inflicted by one human being on another.
Now please explain how us making decisions as to what is moral or what is not moral is better than that.
God Bless,

"John 5:39 (KJS) Search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me."

This message is a reply to:
 Message 122 by Perdition, posted 04-09-2009 8:44 AM Perdition has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 126 by DevilsAdvocate, posted 04-11-2009 7:52 AM ICANT has not replied
 Message 130 by Straggler, posted 04-13-2009 9:28 AM ICANT has not replied
 Message 131 by Perdition, posted 04-13-2009 3:43 PM ICANT has not replied

  
DevilsAdvocate
Member (Idle past 3101 days)
Posts: 1548
Joined: 06-05-2008


Message 126 of 438 (505405)
04-11-2009 7:52 AM
Reply to: Message 125 by ICANT
04-11-2009 2:47 AM


Re: Human life and worth
2. Love your neighbor as much as you love yourself.
Now you and everybody else here can dispense with number one.
But if everyone in the world would keep number two.
Our jails would be empty.
There would be no homeless.
There would be no hunger.
There would be no pain inflicted by one human being on another.
ICANT,
Good to hear from you again.
The problem with the above is that even modern day Christians would not agree with the system of morality established by your "God" as described in the Bible, both NT and OT i.e. God condoning slavery, corprol punishment by stoning, the refusal to defend oneself or provide collective defense against bullies (as portrayed by the life of Jesus and his apostles, which clearly contradicts the capricious actions by God in the OT), etc. For example why does God say in the OT not to kill (or loosley intepreted by modern Christians "murder") and then not only condones but commands the wholesale, ethnicidal annihalation of men, women, children and livestock of whole Canaanite villages and socities not once but over and over throughout early Jewish history?
There are glaring inconsistencies even between modern Christians on what "love your neighbor as yourself" and "love God with all your sole" actually mean and how it should be applied in todays modern world. Would you not agree? Do we still condone slavery? Do we condone punishment in the form of stoning people, including children? Is an iron rod a sufficient form of chastisement for children to keep them in line? Are practices such as ethnicide acceptable to meet an acceptable end goal?
The end problem is this: How do you define "love your neighbor"? Why is it that the large majority of fundamentalist Christians find it acceptable to go off to war to let's say Iraq and take up arms against an defiant dictatorial regime which have cost many American as well as Iraqi lives (including innocent men, women and children)? How does this jive with your view of "love your neighbor as much as yourself?" Are not the Iraqi people your neighbors? If Christian fundamentalists love them so much why are they so willing to do them harm? Do you not see the glaring inconsistencies and gaps in understanding as a result from such cliche and purposfully vague phrases as "love your neighbor as yourself" and "love God with all your heart"?
Edited by DevilsAdvocate, : Correct spelling & grammer

For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.
Dr. Carl Sagan

This message is a reply to:
 Message 125 by ICANT, posted 04-11-2009 2:47 AM ICANT has not replied

  
Admin
Director
Posts: 12998
From: EvC Forum
Joined: 06-14-2002
Member Rating: 2.3


Message 127 of 438 (505406)
04-11-2009 8:01 AM


Let's Get Back On Topic
I had a short dialog with Cedre before I promoted the thread that touched indirectly on the issue of whether the best term for what he wanted to talk about was morality or altruism. In the end it turned out that he wasn't really interested in talking about the evolutionary origins of morality. He wanted to communicate the message that morality derives from God.
But this thread is in one of the science forums. There's an entire category of forums dedicated to religious topics, please take non-scientific discussions related to religion or God there. Thanks.
--Percy

--Percy
EvC Forum Director

  
SammyJean
Member (Idle past 4073 days)
Posts: 87
From: Fremont, CA, USA
Joined: 03-28-2009


Message 128 of 438 (505432)
04-11-2009 1:08 PM
Reply to: Message 124 by ICANT
04-11-2009 2:30 AM


Re: Human life and worth
Hi ICANT,
I believe this innate ability to empathize is the product of the evolution of the mirror neuron system in the brain.
Mirror neurons are brain cells that fire both when performing an action, and when the brain is observing that same action being performed by someone else. Because of the mirroring properties of these neurons, they have been of intense interest to scientists looking for the neurological roots of things like imitation, empathy, language acquisition and morality.
These brain cells were first discovered accidentally by scientist studying motor neurons in the macaque monkey in 1997. So they are a recent find and much research is still being done and will continue to be done. Their discovery and implication in human brain evolution has been considered one of the most important findings of neuroscience in the last decade.
An excellent 14 min video from Nova explaining these neurons can be found here:
Mirror Neurons | NOVA | PBS
Edited by SammyJean, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 124 by ICANT, posted 04-11-2009 2:30 AM ICANT has not replied

  
Modulous
Member
Posts: 7801
From: Manchester, UK
Joined: 05-01-2005


Message 129 of 438 (505513)
04-13-2009 3:27 AM
Reply to: Message 124 by ICANT
04-11-2009 2:30 AM


My question is, how, where, and why did this innate ability get hardwired into us?
The how is more interesting than the where. The where is planet earth. The why and the how are pretty much the same question.
There are essentially two kinds of behaviour in animals: innate and learned. There is not necessarily a big disconnect between the two.
In simple terms there are two possible strategies for any given interaction with others: be nice or be nasty.
If any given animal is a little nicer to others, it might not do as well, but its children - should it have any - would also be nicer to others. If that family spends at least some of its life in proximity to one another, that family will be nicer to each other than other families.
This may, in certain circumstances, prove to be advantageous. If this is the case, then there will be a tendency for the members of the nice family to reproduce with greater probability than the members of the nastier families and we'd expect the proportion of nicer members to increase in the population.
It is almost certainly the case that being totally nice will not be advantageous. So we'd expect to see animals that are sometimes nice to one another, and sometimes nasty.
Naturally we cannot know what happened exactly - but we can show that it is feasible that it can happen appealing only to observable natural mechanisms.
1. Love God with everything you are.
2. Love your neighbor as much as you love yourself.
Now you and everybody else here can dispense with number one.
But if everyone in the world would keep number two.
Our jails would be empty.
There would be no homeless.
There would be no hunger.
Number two boils down to 'Be nice'. Hardly an instructive moral code. Do I beat my children (tough love)?, do I kill innocent commuters (better they died in glory than fall to sin)? And so on.
And there would be hunger. No matter how nice we are to each other, being nice doesn't magic food into the world. Famines happen no matter how nice we are to one another.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 124 by ICANT, posted 04-11-2009 2:30 AM ICANT has not replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 132 by Cedre, posted 04-14-2009 6:54 AM Modulous has replied

  
Straggler
Member
Posts: 10333
From: London England
Joined: 09-30-2006


Message 130 of 438 (505543)
04-13-2009 9:28 AM
Reply to: Message 125 by ICANT
04-11-2009 2:47 AM


Re: Human life and worth
ICANT writes:
The God I serve gave me two rules to live by.
1. Love God with everything you are.
2. Love your neighbor as much as you love yourself.
Now you and everybody else here can dispense with number one.
But if everyone in the world would keep number two.
Our jails would be empty.
OK.
There would be no homeless.
There would be no hunger.
Food, wealth and other resources would certainly be more equitably distributed around the world.
In fact what you are suggesting sounds somewhat like an idealised form of global socialism................
There would be no pain inflicted by one human being on another.
Except possibly by those who enjoy the experience of inflicting pain on one another......
Would you consider these people immoral?
Now please explain how us making decisions as to what is moral or what is not moral is better than that.
The notion that "Treat others as you would be treated" as a starting basis for a system of rational and reasoned social morality requires divine and supernatural revelation is ridiculous.
If nothing else it needs to be appreciated that this notion predates Christian thinking and that whatever the ultimate origins of man's moral nature we innately have this capacity for the concept of morality regardless of any particular religious doctrine.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 125 by ICANT, posted 04-11-2009 2:47 AM ICANT has not replied

  
Perdition
Member (Idle past 3238 days)
Posts: 1593
From: Wisconsin
Joined: 05-15-2003


Message 131 of 438 (505573)
04-13-2009 3:43 PM
Reply to: Message 125 by ICANT
04-11-2009 2:47 AM


Re: Human life and worth
Many people have covered examples of where god acts in a way I find morally reprehensible. The first and biggest one, to my mind, comes from the first couple of pages.
Blaming children for the actions of the father is a terrible thing to do. Why should the children be harmed because their father made a bad choice? How is this "lov[ing] your neighbor as you would love yourself?"

This message is a reply to:
 Message 125 by ICANT, posted 04-11-2009 2:47 AM ICANT has not replied

  
Cedre
Member (Idle past 1490 days)
Posts: 350
From: Russia
Joined: 01-30-2009


Message 132 of 438 (505612)
04-14-2009 6:54 AM
Reply to: Message 129 by Modulous
04-13-2009 3:27 AM


Re: Modulous
My question is, how, where, and why did this innate ability get hardwired into us?
The how is more interesting than the where. The where is planet earth. The why and the how are pretty much the same question.
The how is indeed a more interesting question and is one that is still without a plausible answer, the where is a question relating to where in the organism morality got hardwired, and the why is still a question in question.
There are essentially two kinds of behaviour in animals: innate and learned. There is not necessarily a big disconnect between the two.
I would ask you to provide some evidence for this statement. Since humans are also animals to a certain degree then according to what you’re saying recoiling a finger from a hot stove would be comparable to going to somebody to apologize. I’m missing the connection.
If any given animal is a little nicer to others, it might not do as well, but its children - should it have any - would also be nicer to others.
I will happily disagree with the second part of your statement, I would have loved to disagree with the first part as well but sadly I don’t get what you’re trying convey with it. I'm disagreeing because I know of a lot of brats who have parents that are complete opposites of them in character and in behavior, their parents are sweet people, nice and caring and loving, yet they are total loser brats, holy terrors who are only good for causing trouble. Now don’t accuse me of judging here, it’s just the plain truth and occasionally I have also been a total loser brat. The point is not many children are chips off the old block, some turn out good others turn out bad. I guess we humans are just rebellious creatures by nature we are very poor at following trends we even disobey biological trends.
If that family spends at least some of its life in proximity to one another, that family will be nicer to each other than other families.
This seems to be true for humans including other social animals, but I will doubt that it is out of being moral in other social animals. Animals will tend to be kind to closer relatives because they will get something out of it in the end, but I will continue to doubt that it was because of love. Animals display biological altruism, which is when an animal’s behavior benefits other organisms; at a cost to itself according to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy it is not synonymous with human morality.
This may, in certain circumstances, prove to be advantageous. If this is the case, then there will be a tendency for the members of the nice family to reproduce with greater probability than the members of the nastier families and we'd expect the proportion of nicer members to increase in the population.
I can’t figure out whether you are addressing animals or humans in this quote but I will take it that you are addressing humans, since animals do not choose their mating partners based on goodness of heart but on physical appearance or dominance or other traits safe goodness of heart. But humans do not also always choose spouses that are good people, some women even choose to stick with their abusive partners, and young teenage girls will often go for the bad boys as opposed to the goody goody two-shoes of the neighborhood or the class.
It is almost certainly the case that being totally nice will not be advantageous.
This statement needs some kind of backing.
Naturally we cannot know what happened exactly
And yet you hold almost religiously to natural explanations even when they refuse to provide answers, and won’t let a divine foot in the door, perhaps that is the only explanation, to claim it’s not is to claim all knowledge.
but we can show that it is feasible that it can happen appealing only to observable natural mechanisms.
I give you the permission to show that it is feasible.
Number two boils down to 'Be nice'. Hardly an instructive moral code.
Why not?
And there would be hunger. No matter how nice we are to each other, being nice doesn't magic food into the world. Famines happen no matter how nice we are to one another.
I disagree. There is adequate food supply in the world to feed the entire human population, what does lead to hunger is not a lack of food but more accurately the imbalance in distribution of wealth, namely money, money is the root of the problem not the solution. Therefore if everyone would just share a bit of their meals with someone else hunger will be eradicated for the most part. Just test this out if you don’t believe me find a few hungry people on the streets in your area and feed them and you will find that they no longer will be hungry, suppose if everyone in the world did the same, would hunger not be a thing of the past, I think it would.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 129 by Modulous, posted 04-13-2009 3:27 AM Modulous has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 135 by Modulous, posted 04-14-2009 1:23 PM Cedre has not replied

  
Cedre
Member (Idle past 1490 days)
Posts: 350
From: Russia
Joined: 01-30-2009


Message 133 of 438 (505625)
04-14-2009 9:11 AM


Salvaging the true meaning of morality
Stinginess resulting from a concern for your own welfare
and a disregard of others

The above is the definition of selfishness
The quality of unselfish concern for the welfare of others
And the above is the definition of altruism, a facet of morality. No one will disagree that it is better to be selfless than to be selfish, in fact our morality urges selfless behavior as opposed to selfish behavior. So morality is about being selfless not about being selfish. Our moral rules are against selfishness, and strongly encourage selflessness. So to reason that an individual ought to be unselfish because it is better for the group, which is better for the species, which is better for him/her, because if the species dies out, then he/she will not survive? But looking at what is better for him/her, boils down to selfishness. And rules of morality are against selfishness. In the words of morality gets reduced to this ludicrous statement: I morally ought to be unselfish so that I can be more thoroughly selfish. That is silly.
So since selfishness cannot be moral and naturalistic thinking has reduced it to selfishness, thus naturalistic thinking has failed at explaining true morality which cannot be marked by selfishness.
My only question is, how can morality be selfish when it is against selfishness? This doesn’t make any sense and if morality were a person I would identify him/her as a hypocrite.

Replies to this message:
 Message 134 by SammyJean, posted 04-14-2009 12:40 PM Cedre has not replied
 Message 136 by Blue Jay, posted 04-14-2009 6:25 PM Cedre has replied

  
SammyJean
Member (Idle past 4073 days)
Posts: 87
From: Fremont, CA, USA
Joined: 03-28-2009


Message 134 of 438 (505642)
04-14-2009 12:40 PM
Reply to: Message 133 by Cedre
04-14-2009 9:11 AM


Re: Salvaging the true meaning of morality
Cedre writes:
So to reason that an individual ought to be unselfish because it is better for the group, which is better for the species, which is better for him/her, because if the species dies out, then he/she will not survive? But looking at what is better for him/her, boils down to selfishness. And rules of morality are against selfishness. In the words of morality gets reduced to this ludicrous statement: I morally ought to be unselfish so that I can be more thoroughly selfish. That is silly.
As an individual it may appear better to be selfish but we don't live as individuals. Do we? We live in groups and without the group it would be harder for the individual to survive. Right? So, the individuals survival = the group's survival and the group's survival = the survival of the individuals with-in the group. Selfishness is not in the best interest of the group, so selfishness is not in the best interest of the individual either. Is it?
It's not really that hard to understand!

"Few are those who see with their own eyes and feel with their own hearts." -Albert Einstein

This message is a reply to:
 Message 133 by Cedre, posted 04-14-2009 9:11 AM Cedre has not replied

  
Modulous
Member
Posts: 7801
From: Manchester, UK
Joined: 05-01-2005


Message 135 of 438 (505644)
04-14-2009 1:23 PM
Reply to: Message 132 by Cedre
04-14-2009 6:54 AM


Clarifications
the where is a question relating to where in the organism morality got hardwired
Usually the brain - though knowing nature there are probably some interesting exceptions.
There are essentially two kinds of behaviour in animals: innate and learned. There is not necessarily a big disconnect between the two.
I would ask you to provide some evidence for this statement.
Sure thing. Human children who spend years in the company of language using adults learn language. This is almost universal. Cats that spend years in company of the same adults pick up very little human language.
The tendency to pick up and use languages is an innate behavioural trait. Picking up specifically 20th Century English with a Birmingham accent is a learned behavioural trait.
It seems to me that there isn't a large disconnect between the innate behaviour of language acquisition and the learned behaviour of a specific language.
Indeed, anthropology has studied a variety of human universals which includes a large range of pursuits - some of them require some learning but the drive to do in them seems innate.
There are also studies out there in neuroscience that shows that although the brain changes through learning - the more related we are to one another the more similar certain structures are that control certain behaviours. Identical twins, even those that have been separated since birth and share very different upbringing can still have very similar brain structures.
There are a number of studies regarding these twins, with some interesting observations such as hobbies, mannerisms, opinions, dress sense etc overlapping quite significantly even when the backgrounds of the two were quite markedly different.
Does that suffice?
If any given animal is a little nicer to others, it might not do as well, but its children - should it have any - would also be nicer to others.
I will happily disagree with the second part of your statement, I would have loved to disagree with the first part as well but sadly I don’t get what you’re trying convey with it.
If an animal shares some food that it has found with those around it, then that animal will get to eat less. This might lead to it being weaker or slower or what have you. Thus it might not do as well. Should it have children, and if that impulse to share food with others was heritable, then those children will tend to also share food with others.
If that family spends at least some of its life in proximity to one another, that family will be nicer to each other than other families.
This seems to be true for humans including other social animals, but I will doubt that it is out of being moral in other social animals.
My statement you quoted is tied to the previous point. Now we have a parent and some children that share food when they find it. That might mean that the family as a whole tends to do rather well if they live in proximity with one another as they will tend to help each other out. So while the parent might have gone hungry, now the family may get hungry less often than others. So the gene that has led to this sharing behaviour could increase in frequency in the genepool.
The 'motivation' factor I covered in an entirely separate post about chocolate that was addressed directly to you, so I won't repeat that here.
Animals display biological altruism, which is when an animal’s behavior benefits other organisms; at a cost to itself according to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy it is not synonymous with human morality.
I was addressing a specific question about how an ability to empathize might become hard-wired into us. I gave a brief account of how a strategy of being nice might be able to evolve in nature. Empathy is the skill of working out what the other person is feeling so that we can 'be nice'. So once we have the drive to be nice, there is the possibility of evolving complex ways of specialising in nice behaviour.
I can’t figure out whether you are addressing animals or humans in this quote but I will take it that you are addressing humans, since animals do not choose their mating partners based on goodness of heart but on physical appearance or dominance or other traits safe goodness of heart.
I was talking about non specific animals - I was generalising. You have a very narrow view of animal mating choice. But I wasn't talking about mating choice, so your point seems irrelevant anyway.
It is almost certainly the case that being totally nice will not be advantageous.
This statement needs some kind of backing.
If an animal gives up all of its found food during a period of famine, it will starve to death. This is not advantageous. It seems to me that essentially giving everything for the benefit of others, ie., 'being totally nice', will result in disaster for the individual doing it.
It might work out for the genes to produce the occasional perfect altruist, but a passing glimpse at the literature on Game Theory should prove it is not a stable strategy for all organisms to be perfectly altruistic all the time.
Naturally we cannot know what happened exactly
And yet you hold almost religiously to natural explanations even when they refuse to provide answers, and won’t let a divine foot in the door, perhaps that is the only explanation, to claim it’s not is to claim all knowledge.
I don't hold onto natural explanations in any fashion that can be described as 'religious'. It seems to me that there only exist natural explanations. When the supernatural crops up, I fail to see any actual explanations. Like any good detective, I'm not going to postulate that a Djinn committed a murder when I can see a rough picture of how a human being might have done it even if I don't know the details moment by moment.
Still - if you think that postulaing lfar helps us explain missing children cases better than child abusers and runaways, then you have a lot of explaining to do.
I give you the permission to show that it is feasible.
I already gave a brief outline which you critically misunderstood. Hopefully my clarifications will help there. Do you find anything infeasible about my generic overview?
Number two boils down to 'Be nice'. Hardly an instructive moral code.
Why not?
Because it doesn't tell us anything about how to determine what is nice and what is not. Is killing one innocent man to save five innocent men from dying 'nice'? Is spanking a child 'nice'? Is going to war 'nice'? When is going to war 'nice'? And so on. It answers none of the moral questions that vex human society.
I disagree. There is adequate food supply in the world to feed the entire human population, what does lead to hunger is not a lack of food but more accurately the imbalance in distribution of wealth, namely money, money is the root of the problem not the solution.
A highly temporal view. It hasn't always been the case that humanity has over produced food, and it is quite possible that it won't always be the case. If/when human population levels outstrip our abilities to produce and distribute food (can the earth feed 60 trillion people?) then no matter how nice we are people will go hungry.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 132 by Cedre, posted 04-14-2009 6:54 AM Cedre has not replied

  
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