Is Morality Natural?

[m42]

Our emotions do, however, have a great impact on our actions. How we judge what is right or wrong may well be different from what we chose to do in a situation. For example, we may all agree that it is morally permissible to kill one person in order to save the lives of many. When it comes to actually taking someone's life, however, most of us would turn limp.

Another example of the role that emotions have on our actions comes from recent studies of psychopaths. Take the villains portrayed by Heath Ledger and Javier Bardem, respectively, in "The Dark Knight" and "No Country for Old Men." Do such psychopathic killers know right from wrong? New, preliminary studies suggest that clinically diagnosed psychopaths do recognize right from wrong, as evidenced by their responses to moral dilemmas. What is different is their behavior. While all of us can become angry and have violent thoughts, our emotions typically restrain our violent tendencies. In contrast, psychopaths are free of such emotional restraints. They act violently even though they know it is wrong because they are without remorse, guilt or shame.

http://www.newsweek.com/id/158760/page/2

[jabo]

what, well, not only psychos do those sort of stuffs, there are also people who does things that are wrong to many, such as killing, but they cannot be treated with a pill or a sessions with a shrink. take example the people in my country, the rebels that is. They think that they are fighting for the country and their fellow country men but they all end up getting the very same people they fight for killed or injured or loosing their homes and families. I even wonder if they still know what they are fighting for for staying so long in the mountains and in the forest.

[firetown]

Tough to say. Much of what we allow ourselves to do depends on our upbringing. Society is also full of "white lies". People cut corners, people make excuses for doing things they shouldn't and such. But still consider themselves being within the norm of morality. Personally, I look at what people when they do not know they are being watched.
Like when I managed a convenience store once and "set traps" while watching on camera to see which employee will steal given the opportunity.
I remember that around 80 percent of them would take something if they think they can get away with it.
So really, those were good people all in all, but it tought me that everyone has a different perspective on what is moral and what isn't.

[kerrin]

New, preliminary studies suggest that clinically diagnosed psychopaths do recognize right from wrong, as evidenced by their responses to moral dilemmas. What is different is their behavior.
Would this not depend on the "moral dilemma" they were faced with? Psychopaths are typically very rational people. They are often logical to the extreme and able to push emotional restraint aside because of their rational conclusions.

This is why I think...
They act violently even though they know it is wrong because they are without remorse, guilt or shame.
They are without remorse, guilt or shame because their "rational" thought supersedes their emotions. Remorse, guilt, or shame comes after one does something one believes or thinks is wrong. Everyone uses rational arguments to suppress emotions at some point. What is the mantra we learned on the playground about bullies and name calling? "Sticks and stones may break my bones but names will never hurt me." It's a rational argument to suppress an emotional response.

Thus I disagree with:
While all of us can become angry and have violent thoughts, our emotions typically restrain our violent tendencies.
Our emotions can often lead to violent tendencies if their is not some rational thought to restrain us.

[John A Roark]

Convoluted, Kerrin, but followable...and ultimately correct--I think.

I, too, believe that reason must trump emotion every time, since our emotions are shaped by the premises we make. Did we employ our reason adequately in forming those premises? Hmmm...then our emotions will reflect those premises, yes? Thus, our emotions can be a reliable guide to the reason we employ in making those decisions. "Make up your mind first (reason), then confirm it with your heart (emotion)," a wise man once tol' me.

If we are true to our human nature and use our reason correctly, then will we not realize that living a proper life, according to what a human IS, demands a set of principles to guide that life, a definition of right and wrong in dealing with others and the objects around us?

Is that not what morality is, and therefore is it not perfectly, inescapably, reasonably natural?

(Afterthought: that crap spouted by the chumps at Newsweek is typically what I'd expect from such a bunch of muddle-headed mistaking-their-wish-for-reality fantasizers.)

[kerrin]

Convoluted, Kerrin, but followable...and ultimately correct--I think.
Nice summation of my life and thought... convoluted but followable.

Your's was a more eloquent way to write what I was thinking.

I agree 'premises' or 'schemes,' as the modern psychologist would call them, are made first by our reasoned perceptions of the world around us.

If we are true to our human nature and use our reason correctly, then will we not realize that living a proper life, according to what a human IS, demands a set of principles to guide that life, a definition of right and wrong in dealing with others and the objects around us?
Indeed.

Is that not what morality is, and therefore is it not perfectly, inescapably, reasonably natural?
Yes, yes. Well said. Next time I enter a similar discussion I will copy/paste John Roark. ;)

[Devilyn]

I don't believe in any innate morality. Animals don't seem to have any remorse over the killing of other animals for food. We have a survival instinct which would surely conflict with a moral code. We also have a selfish gene which makes us put ourselves before others and we also have a sadistic streak. I think these traits are contrary to any in-built morality.
It seems to me that in the past any kind of morality could get you killed. I believe it is a learned belief.

[Tom Palven]

I think that a case can be made for a certain amount of innate human ethics in the "normal" or "average" person, ie. people who were not brutalized as children; born with parts of their brains missing, as in some individuals who display symptoms of autism or sociopathy; or those who were taught brutality in the Marine Corps or the streets of the 'hood. For example, "normal" people often feel queasy and sick at the sight of severe huiman injury and human blood, except for doctors and nurses who become inured to these sights. And on the other hand, we are hard-wired to recognize and feel protective of children, apparently recognizing youngsters by their proportionately larger head sizes; and not only do we find human infants cute, but also puppies, baby elephants, and so on.

Normal animals of other species also exhibit ethical behaviors. Normal wolves will not harm cubs within their own packs, for example. If, however, a female mink or weasel is threatened in her den she will often eat her young before trying to escape, as mink farmers know. This is perfectly ethical behavior in weasels, helping allow the female to regain some strength and live to proceate another day.

[Devilyn]

Being protective of our own children is possibly because we are protecting our linage. That's not an innate moral but the human desire to procreate and continue the species. I see no morality in this. The same for other animals.

[Tom Palven]

Do you think that we can equate what is normal behavior with what is ethical behavior? For example, a female Black Widow spider will sometimes eat the male after mating, thus helping her egg production and the survival of the species. This is apparently not murder, but normal, ethical, behavior in spiders. In Russia in the 1980's corruption was so rampant that it was normal behavior to bribe any person in a position of power. If you were in a line for a ballet, for example, it would be normal to bribe an official to get you to the front of the line, and no one complained. This was the way things were done, and I guess it was considered ethical. I'm not sure how this view of corruption being at times acceptable and ethical jibes with my view that reciprocity, The Golden Rule, is the cornerstone of ethics and that coercion is at all times logically unethical.

[Devilyn]

Do you think that we can equate what is normal behavior with what is ethical behavior? For example, a female Black Widow spider will sometimes eat the male after mating, thus helping her egg production and the survival of the species. This is apparently not murder, but normal, ethical, behavior in spiders. In Russia in the 1980's corruption was so rampant that it was normal behavior to bribe any person in a position of power. If you were in a line for a ballet, for example, it would be normal to bribe an official to get you to the front of the line, and no one complained. This was the way things were done, and I guess it was considered ethical. I'm not sure how this view of corruption being at times acceptable and ethical jibes with my view that reciprocity, The Golden Rule, is the cornerstone of ethics and that coercion is at all times logically unethical.

In your examples I don't see any coercion? I don't see where the Golden Rule was transgressed either?

[Tom Palven]

Thanks for replying. It just seems strange that under certain circumstances rampant corruption can be ethical. I guess that the unethical part was mainly upstream where people were prevented by force from engaging in private agriculture and business, and enjoying the fruits of their labor. Things got so bad there that chunks of masonry would fall off new buildings because there was so little cement in the concrete, and and medicine made late in a given month might not have any active ingredients in it. They did date everything, though, and people even checked the dates on boxes of candy to try to get some with all the ingredients in the recipe.

[Devilyn]

Ok, got your reply, I've not registered yet but have posted a couple in there. See how you get on. I can't see how to delete a post on this forum?