People on the right tend to look to religious texts for guidance as to what is right and what is wrong. And, the moralizing of the right drives people on the left crazy. But, the left is not immune from moralizing (and, really, engages in as much moralizing as those on the right, truth be told).

So, how do people on the left determine what is right and what is wrong?

Laws (the codification of many rights and wrongs) are created by majority rule (in democractic societies) but there remains the problem of "tyranny of the majority" at the expense of minority rights.

If the vast majority of people in the world, for example, hypothetically supported capital punishment, is captial punishment therefore "right"? If not, on what basis is it "wrong"? In other words, in that hypothetical, it would seem that in order to assert that capital punishment is "wrong", one must appeal to something that must necessarily trump majority or democratic rule, no? If so, what is that "something"?

I don't believe that religious texts should dictate what behavior is acceptable (right) and what behavior is not acceptable (wrong). I also have a hard time with the concept of "natural law"...who divines it, for starters?

Any thoughts?

[ 01 January 2007: Message edited by: Sven ]

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Originally posted by Stargazer:
Great question Sven. One I was just discussing last week with a good friend of mine when the conversation turned to killing and moral relativity versus moral absolutism. In the end, we could not agree on a definitive answer of what is right and what is wrong in this context. Is killing inherently wrong? Against what standards is "wrong" to be measured?

The conversation revolved around the Iraq war.

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Murder seems to be an obvious "wrong". But, I think that it is obvious only because it is, for all practical purposes, universally accepted as wrong. In other words, people pretty much agree that murder is wrong.

But, take something much more controversial: abortion rights.

Prolifers say that it is "wrong" to kill a fetus. Prochoice people argue that it is "wrong" to deny a woman's right to terminate a fetus.

Based on what standard are either of those assertions based? It seems to me that it has to be either a democratically determined standard (that is subject to change as majority opinion changes) or a non-democratically determined standard. If it's a non-democractically determined standard, how does one divine what that standard is?

Prolifers might say, "Well, it's self-evident that a fetus shouldn't be killed." Prochoicers might say, "Well, it's self-evident that a woman has a human right to control her body."

Is either postion really "self-evident"? If so, is it based on some natural law?

My tendancy is to view "right and wrong" only in democratic terms (because I don't believe in any absolute "right and wrong"...because that necessarily means some kind of divine or natural law that I don't think exists). But, what's left is a significant problem of minority rights being subject to "tyranny of the majority".

[Edited for Spelling]

[ 01 January 2007: Message edited by: Sven ]

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Originally posted by Fidel:
What do pro-lifers say about privatized health care as planned and enforced infanticide ?. And I think that once they are born, pro-lifers don't really concern themselves with human needs from that point on. The kids can end up as cannon fodder on the other side of the planet, and millions of them can show up at school doors with empty bellies, and later, filling the ranks of an army of unemployed, juvenile delinquents or worse. And good dooby pro-lifers tend to place all of the blame for these awful things squarely on the shoulders of people and scolding them for being human and bearing children in the first place. I think if they want to be pro-life, then they should be fully committed to doing the whole job right. Kids are expensive these days, and once they are with us, the costs of ignorance and want outweigh the price of social democracy.

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Fidel, I'm not arguing about the merits of either position. It's just an example to illustrate my question: From where does "right and wrong" come from? How is "right and wrong" determined?

So one problem with majoritarianism is simply that it is too easy to come up with counterexamples. But there's a worse problem. According to majoritarianism, if you find your moral views out of line with the majority, then you should change your moral views in order to fit the majority's views. According to majoritarianism, you would have absolutely no grounds on which to argue that a majority-held view about morality is wrong: since being "wrong" would be the same as "being condemned by the majority", the only way to argue that X is wrong would be to argue that X is condemned by the majority. But, surely, it should at least e coherent (if difficult) to believe that the majority is wrong about X. Otherwise, there would be no room for coherent social critique on moral issues.

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My tendancy is to view "right and wrong" only in democratic terms (because I don't believe in any absolute "right and wrong"...because that necessarily means some kind of divine or natural law that I don't think exists). But, what's left is a significant problem of minority rights being subject to "tyranny of the majority".

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Then we keep seeing the word "morals" thrown about and from our lips without really understanding exactly what morals, whose morals we are following, and why, which is still a fundamentally unanswered question. Is society full of free willed people, who are free to make choices based upon...? what exactly? We know that we have laws, and that laws are seem by may to be static, yet they are not, they are and always have been fluid. But we, as a society, shift and change those laws based upon mainly oppression and suppression of a formerly non-recognized right or wrong. So in the end, we are back full circle to what is right, what is wrong, and who decides such things. I like to think we are free-willed individuals, but we are not and cannot be to a large extent. In that sense, we are subject to a force, the majority, the elite, what have you. Under these conditions (for we do not live in a vacuum) who really decides what is right and wrong? Maybe society is a giant organism, which changes and adapts to all parts of itself. If this is a possibility, then again we have to ask, how much of an actor in this play are we? Do we direct or do we take direction?

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Originally posted by Sven:

Fidel, I'm not arguing about the merits of either position. It's just an example to illustrate my question: From where does "right and wrong" come from? How is "right and wrong" determined?

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And I understood that your example points of view are just that, examples. I wasn't looking for a response, because I realize that human righs beyond the right to life are controversial topics. I was merely suggesting that the left views the right not to live in poverty as an extension of basic human rights.

Some will say that our views of right and wrong are rooted in religious views, the ten commandments, or from Persian civilization or whatever.

Someone mentioned natural law, and I think there is some basis there for deriving rights and wrongs from that standpoint. People like John Locke created exclusive property rights on behalf of well off Britons and appealed to natural laws in doing it. His argument worked in his day to override existing common rights of the many who depended on them for subsistence because there was no human rights lawyers to represent peasantry in the matter. It was a clever argument and the exact opposite of a similar case made for common rights which pre-existed Locke's, and who is today considered one of the "gods of capitalism."

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Originally posted by Martha (but not Stewart):
My remarks have been, unfortunately, almost entirely negative.

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But, that's my dilemma, too!!

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Originally posted by Martha (but not Stewart):
What positive account can be given of the source of morality -- besides majoritarianism? Well, there's all the standard stuff of university ethics classes: utilitarianism (of varying kinds), natural law theory, divine command theory, Kantianism, etc. Most of us do not, of course, engage in moral reasoning on the basis of one of these "isms": we just use our moral intuitions, and try to sort things out with some degree of consistency and compassion, kind of hoping that others share our moral intuitions or at least share enough of our moral intuitions that we don't simply talk past one another.

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Perhaps you are looking at morality solely from the perspective of an individual? From that perspective, "right and wrong" is largely based on "moral intutition", I suppose.

But, what about "right and wrong" in a societal sense? Like the example of capital punishment touched on above. If a majority of people say capital punishment is "right", what higher moral law (above democratic process) can a person appeal to in order to label that punishment as "wrong"?

I don't know the answer to that. I keep finding myself falling back to majority rule. In the absence of majority rule, we would, necessarily, have to cede authority to a select group of people who would decide right and wrong (much like the role of clerics in a religion). And, I'm really uncomfortable with that.

I do not think, though, that right and wrong come from on high. Rather, religious thinkers adopted many ideas which were socially useful, and incorporated them into their ethics.

"Natural law" had a thousand-year history in the Catholic Church before people such as Spinoza wrote that God and nature are co-extensive.

Later, some "natural law" writers claimed that nature, not God, was the source of ethics. But observation of nature provided little evidence that tigers or other creatures of nature were particularly gentle or respectful of the rights of others. "Social Darwinism" turned out to be cruel policy.

I think the best answer of the question is that "experience as to what sustains societies" should be the source of ethics. It is known that a right to murder will lead to unhappiness, and revenge. That will lead to an unravelling of civility, security, and social potential.

Nothing can be written in stone. And additions must be made as new experiences are confronted. Today, a new ethical relationship to the earth is imperative if our children are to inherit anything.

Where once Locke could write that no limits on private property were justified because there was always plenty left over for everyone else to take from, circumstances have changed the common situation.

So, the social "experience" I mention above has to include a willingness to make changes as new problems such as global warming come into view.

Mental masterbation morality is relative to religious indoctrination.

True morality is "knowing" equality, and I mean the very highest form of equality. Not the; "I am better than you", indoctrinated mental masterbation morality

Very small children, even babies have been shown to know when another child has something it does not, or more than what it has, or when they have been treated wrongly by an adult etc, it impacts upon their lives for ever. And this can, and does, occur before speech or reading abilities have commenced. As such, signs of knowing right and wrong occur most certainly before morality can be "taught" to them by religion.

Now whether, this "knowing of equality" is a result of our body, the organism, always striving for homeostasis, or other, is up for speculation. But knowing right from wrong prior to religious indoctrination is not.

I equate equality, or lack thereof, as both the macro and micro of right or wrong.

WITHOUT GOD
Tuesday January 9, 2007 & Saturday January 13, 2007 at 10pm ET/PT on CBC Newsworld

In the early 1970s, John Lennon wrote the lyrics "Imagine there's no heaven…no hell below us…and no religion too. Imagine all the people, living life in peace." Imagine. But is it possible to be a good person if you don't believe in God? Noted author and oncologist Dr. Robert Buckman says "yes" in Without God.

For years, it was proclaimed that "God is Dead", that religious faith was in decline worldwide. And yet, in North America, over 90 per cent of the population still believes in God; and in the U.S., the traditional separation of Church and State is being challenged. Dr. Robert Buckman is part of the 10 per cent who claim no religious affiliation. Renowned for his work with cancer patients and as a writer and broadcaster, Buckman is also President of the Humanist Association of Canada. He's written several books on living and dying a secular life, all with his trademark wit and highlighting his own brushes with death.

In Without God, Buckman takes the viewer on a journey to explore the roots of spiritual belief and to challenge the need to believe in God. He meets people who are comfortable with life without religion, who believe it's possible to have moral values without faith in God. The film also examines the scientific basis for belief, including the work of Laurentian University neurologist Dr. Michael Persinger, who suggests that a predisposition to spirituality might be hard-wired right into our brains.

Buckman's views are also challenged by some religious leaders in the film. As long as people have existed, we have constructed beliefs to help us understand a world that often seems terrifying and arbitrary. Faith lends comfort in times of trouble, binds communities together, and helps us mark important passages such as birth and marriage. But after horrific events such as Sept. 11 or the Tsunami disaster, some people will still ask "Where is God?"

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What do babblers think the source of right and wrong is?

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This babbler just speaks for itself.

Seems to me that the determination if something is right or wrong builts on past experiences either your own or through those of others. That is about the simplest way I can put it.

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Originally posted by Brian White:
something is wrong when, if it was done to you, it would hurt.
So if you choose to do it to someone else, you are doing wrong.

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[ 08 January 2007: Message edited by: Southlander ]

Why else would a prairie dog, or a Canada Goose stand watch for predators while others feed if they didn't know that the same would be done for them?

This predates religion, which is only an attempt to describe this necessary function of social animals. We don't see much of this activity in tigers or bears because they aren't terribly social animals.

We don't do unto others as we would have them do unto us very often. Rather, we do unto others according to how we perceive they have done unto ourselves or others before. We tend to cooperate with people who are seen as fellow cooperators, and not cooperate with those who we see as non-cooperative.

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There is growing evidence that there is a neurological basis for morality. A recent study with rats showed that a brain area mediating pain "lit up" with activity in a rat which was simply watching another rat experience pain. This type of finding supports those world views which say we are all connected, that what happens to one individual reverberates through all. The implication is that there exists a "prime directive" hardwired into human beings and setting the stage for future moral development. This prime directive exists deep in the human brain, far beyond the reach of social conditioning, at least initially.

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Although I see your point, I also believe we need to be very cautious when we speak of anything being neurologically "hardwired" To do so creates both an inaccurate portrayal of the human nervous system and human experience and can result in some rather confused conclusions.

The brain is not some hermetically sealed central processing system, human neurology and human experience are in an interacting relationship from day one. All that we experience is reflected in a neurological correlate at the same time that our brain is influenced by what we define as external The infant brain is far from fully developed at birth and is dependent on interaction and stimulation, physical, emotional and intellectual, in order to development. In fact the infant is dependent on this interaction for it's survival.

The reason for the developmental neurology lecture? First off I think that rather than speaking of "hardwired" social or moral behaviours beliefs etc. it is more accurate to emphasize the necessity of social interaction on the survival of the human organism. If anything is physiologically "hardwired" in humans it is the need to be connected with others socially. We need others not only in our development but we continue to be dependent on others for our ongoing survival. I think what is frequently lost in the dominant discourse is that social connection is a survival need rather than in conflict with our survival. Survival is frequently framed in a manner that is short-sighted and exclusive of the needs of others and our connection to them.

I think this is relevant to morality in that right or wrong is defined in terms of our need for connection with others. If our actions are violent, brutal and harmful to others we end up severing the connection with others that we depend on. This is perhaps one of the great tragedy's of small minded self-interest there are many people in this culture who have accumulated economic and material resources but in the process of lost authentic ties and connections. The capitalist ethos of brutal and constant competition undermines the very deep and genuine need for connection.

I believe in a moral sense we often do have at least emotional awareness that when we do harm to others we are also doing harm to ourselves. I do not believe this is an awareness in an intellectualized pragmatic sense but is experienced as a deep emotional loss.

[ 08 January 2007: Message edited by: N.R.KISSED ]

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On another point I have seen an experiment on a baby monkey where it was deprived of a mother when very little, never cuddled etc and it was incapable of forming any sort of relationship. It got real sickly and stressed out. We can't separate human morality from human upbringing. Kids don't grow up in a vacuum, and if they do they're not normal.

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Originally posted by Brett Mann:
and who taught neurological psychology as part of an introductory course for years.

I would have thought you have learned to use smaller sentences (one 56, one 86) and better explainations...

When I say "hard-wired", I mean "hard-wired" - which of course is always relative, .... we are getting very close to "hard-wired" ......
History is full of examples of people having to reject popular opinion to behave morally. Morality, like the very worth of humanity, resides in the individual, not the group.

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Tommy I feel sorry for you if you don't do unto others .. at least most of the time. Don't you trust other people to be basically good?

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Of course I take it that most people are basically good, most of the time. In fact, I "do unto others" , as do most others, when a social interaction is initiated.

How else do you find fellow cooperators?

I think a lot of people on the left bristle at my view on this because it seems to deconstruct everthing down to self interest, an incorrect right wing notion. But what I think it illustrates is that in social animals like ourselves, self interest and "altruism" cannot often be disentangled. Instead of being polar opposites, they are the same. I don't know how much more lovey dovey one can get with humanity.

Where the contention lies is that as individuals we tend to over value our "tit" and undervalue our fellow's "tat". We are not good score keepers, and disputes constantly arise. That's why we try to keep people on track with the invention of religion, we try to keep score with money, and in some cases, try to put things square with criminal and civil courts and failing that, wars and vendettas.

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Originally posted by Southlander:

To behave morally is to conform to accepted principles, therefore by definition anyone rejecting popular opinion is not following the morals of the group.
If you think their behaviour is moral from today's point of view that is purely a personal opinion.
The definition of moral behavior is a group ethos, that sets the laws and what is acceptable behaviour. It is dynamic, and difficult for strangers to understand.
This is where everyone starts from as a child. To grow from there we need to begin understanding others points of view, and then merge some of it into what we started with.

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So the accepted principles of Nazi Germany included persecuting and murdering Jews. Adhering to these principles is moral, because the majority accepts them? Obviously not. Morality occurs in human beings in every culture and becomes clearer and more universal as societies advance. But truly moral behaviour often (inevitabley?) requires separating oneself from the crowd. Following group consensus unquestioningly is the opposite of moral behaviour. A real value of discussing morality, its universality, its un-taught neurological basis, is to expose and condemn the shallowness of relativistic, de-constructionist thinking. Ken Wilber has convincingly demonstrated the falseness and moral bankruptcy of relativistic moral reasoning in articles such as this.

A sample : "the calamity of our generation, that we've come to think that you're morally good if you don't make judgments. But that's exactly wrong. You're morally good if you make the right kind of judgments. And you have to learn how to make wise judgments in order to make moral decisions."

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Only a thorough re-thinking of moral philosophy and reasoning can reverse this trend and make the left a force for positive change again.

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You and I might deride Derridian Post Modernism, but in the end, we have to admit that what we call empiricism isn't often very empirical, outside of the realm of mathematics.

We opperate on provisional truths. Which is okay, it works pretty good. Better than anything else.

The "tit for tat" idea seems to fit observations pretty well. It models on a computer pretty good, too. And it predicts fairly well, and it has a feel of parsimony.

At least until new information comes along.

"you're caught up in the postmodern pluralistic misunderstanding that nothing is better or worse than anything else, it leaves you open to egocentric invasion. In other words, if nothing is higher or lower, then anything I do is right. There can be no challenge to what I'm doing. That leaves us without any traction whatsoever. That is a broken moral compass in the worst possible sense, and that's kind of what we have in this cultural creative, rampant pluralistic, rampant relativistic orientation. And it's even inherently self-contradictory, because when people apply this pluralism, which claims there are no hierarchies, they're making a hierarchical judgment—they're claiming that their judgment is better than others'. So that's the sort of rampant self-deception that is called morality in our culture."

The cure Cohen and Wilber offer for this situation is a morality based in a conscious awareness of our role in evolution. Thus..

Right and wrong are judgements from an obeserver of an action performed. The judgement is entirely based on the observer, so right and wrong will vary from observer to observer (the action remains the same, but the judgement of right or wrong can change). The source of right and wrong is exactly that... It's the observer.

How these judgements or perceptions of right and wrong form stems from a younger age when we are much more perceptive to empathy... Though I would think this happened earlier in human developement as in todays world society influences this devlelopment very heavily. Of course, todays society is heavily materialistic and we outright reject much spiritualism... So views of right and wrong tend to put material goods at the forefront (hey money, lets sue!)

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There is growing evidence that there is a neurological basis for morality. A recent study with rats showed that a brain area mediating pain "lit up" with activity in a rat which was simply watching another rat experience pain.

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There would be the empathy between rats. Humans project their emotions, whether we are aware of it or not... As children we are much more perceptive to this. When our ideas of right and wrong first form, we are much more aware of the emotions of those around us... If you pick up pain from another (or any 'bad feeling'), it will not be long before any action that causes pain to another will be considered 'wrong'.

I'm kinda curious now... Theres a few well documented cases of a 'Wild Child'... Children who grew up isolted from other humans, specifically in the years when we still have full access to our language aquisition. These wild children have no native tongue because of this... I'm curious as to how their sense of 'right and wrong' developed now. To what I remember, there was still this empathy towards life and causing pain to another would seem 'wrong' to them... But I'll have to check to confirm

[ 09 January 2007: Message edited by: Noise ]

Added:
Heh, re-read what I posted... It's almost a biologically built in golden rule... If you pick up on the distress the 'wrong' actions caused and feel that distreess yourself, you are in a way doing unto yourself with your 'wrong' actions.

[ 09 January 2007: Message edited by: Noise ]

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Originally posted by Noise:
Interesting topic... Albiet abstract.
I'm kinda curious now... Theres a few well documented cases of a 'Wild Child'... Children who grew up isolted from other humans, specifically in the years when we still have full access to our language aquisition. These wild children have no native tongue because of this... I'm curious as to how their sense of 'right and wrong' developed now. To what I remember, there was still this empathy towards life and causing pain to another would seem 'wrong' to them... But I'll have to check to confirm

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Interesting exploring wild children, however if brought up in close contact with dogs etc then children still not in a vaccuum, I believe they are they influenced by moral standards of said animal?
Interesting, can we apply this to other animals, ie the rats. Are they in turn taught their morals by their mother when growing up? Do rats growing up in different situations ( eg short of food, exposed to danger) have different morals? Is this lifelong?

[ 09 January 2007: Message edited by: Southlander ]

Wilber has a term for this - he calls it "aperspectival madness." The reason for a moral compass is to tell good from bad. This implies the existence of good and bad as moral absolutes. Wilber makes the point (or maybe it was Cohen) that there is no neutrality, no middle ground in moral questions. To say that there is no objective right and wrong is to join the side of evil, albeit unconsciously. It is precisely this morass of moral relativism which we are trying to escape.

Edited to add: In Wilber's words:

"And so absolute truth is beyond good and evil, but relative truth has good and evil. And in the relative world, you're supposed to choose good and avoid evil—Buddha was very clear on that one. In the absolute world, you transcend both of them. Now, what we've done is to confuse the two, and we think that because the absolute is beyond good and evil, therefore in the relative world, we should make no judgments at all. And that is already to capitulate to an immoral action in the relative world. You're already reinforcing immoral action when you do that."

[ 09 January 2007: Message edited by: Brett Mann ]

The same applies to any answer and regardless of morales. An answer is nothing more than an interpretation of the question by an observer. The only thing that remains constant from observer to observer is the question being asked (Question is always more important than someones answer. Especially is the answer is 42).

Good vs evil or right vs wrong are essentially the same thing... An observers judegment upon a particular question or action. Pretty much what Wilber's is saying I think... Though I'm still caught up on the existance of an absolute truth. My answer is there isn't an absolute answer... All that exists is the question asked.

A physics prof put this one infront of me... It's kidna the basis behind an engineering joke.
A) 2+2 = 3
B) 2+2 = 4
C) 2+2 = 5

Kinda obvious which ones right? Actually... Pending how I look at the question, all three are right. 1.6 + 1.6 = 3.2 apply rounding, that is 2+2 = 3. You've probably heard the joke : 2+2 = 5 is true for exceedingly large values of 2 Although kinda silly, it goes to show that the only constant is the question... My answer can vary pending how I look at and answer the question.

I'm not sure if I'm in agreeance with Wilber that there is an absolute truth. Something that exists that is inherantly good,evil,right, or wrong does not exist without the observer there to make it exist.

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Interesting exploring wild children, however if brought up in close contact with dogs etc then children still not in a vaccuum, I believe they are they influenced by moral standards of said animal?

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I agree with that as well, all life has some degree of empathy (animal life more-so)... There are cases of locked up and hidden by a parent (A deformed child being hidden by the parents is not a myth). They might have different outlooks.

Added:

A Breif History of Everything sound right Brett? Heh, I wanted to bring up some of the 'feminist will tell you' peices that he has in there and ask the feminists here if thats infact what they say

[ 09 January 2007: Message edited by: Noise ]

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To say that there is no objective right and wrong is to join the side of evil, albeit unconsciously. It is precisely this morass of moral relativism which we are trying to escape.

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It would be convenient if there were an objective right and wrong which is not socially-constructed.

If there were such an objective morality, then we could, indeed, "escape the morass of moral relativism."

Unfortunately, it is extremely difficult to DEMONSTRATE this "objective morality". In fact, it is often noticeable that my "objective morality" and your "objective morality" may differ.

When they do, outsiders may suspect that NEITHER of us really has objective morality at our disposal, but are in fact arguing individual and subjective moral positions.

That's moral relativism.

I do think that part of a source for right and wrong must come from REASON. The ability to reason is a shared capacity, one which gives at least the possibility of a relatively permanent socially-agreed understanding of what one should and shouldn't do.

The topic is complex, so here I will just ask interested people to read something about or by Jurgen Habermas or Gianni Vattimo.

habermas

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Originally posted by jeff house:
It would be convenient if there were an objective right and wrong which is not socially-constructed.

If there were such an objective morality, then we could, indeed, "escape the morass of moral relativism."

Unfortunately, it is extremely difficult to DEMONSTRATE this "objective morality". In fact, it is often noticeable that my "objective morality" and your "objective morality" may differ.

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This dilema rest on a false dichotomy of absolute abstracts, set in opposition. Just because there is no provable absolute objectivity, does not mean that morality is entirely free of its context and meaning.

Or to use a metaphor from physics, to say that the actual velocity of a sub-atomic particle, rests on the relative position of the observer, so that sub-atomic particles may be seen to have slight variances of direction, and speed, and position does not mean that the particle does not perform within a specific bandwidth (for lack of a better term) of probable velocity and position, relatable to all obersevers.

Thus we can see that most societies share a similar "velocity" of human morality regardless of whatever peculiarities may be invested in each society, for instance, prohibition against non-group sanctioned killing is more or less universal.

[ 09 January 2007: Message edited by: Cueball ]

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Just because there is no provable absolute objectivity, does not mean that morality is entirely free of its context and meaning.

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You are right. And that is what Habermas and Vattimo think, too.

But they are interested in showing what the actual basis of morality might be. And they tend to find it in "rational communication."

That standard is subtly different from the usual standard of reason, which is the favorite of the Enlightenment.

The critique of "reason" by these two points out that "reason" lends itself to top-down thinking.
In other words, the enlightened despot or the Party decide what "reason" is, and imposes that on everyone.

Habermas, a Frankfurt school semi-Marxist, thinks that this approach does not do justice to subjectivity; he wants a method which insures that everyone prepared to be rational may participate in setting societal morality.

Vattimo accepts more of the critique of reason pioneered by Nietszche. So, he talks of "weak thought", meaning an ethics which cannot be certain, only probable.

But he, too, stresses the utility of rational discussion together (ie. babble) as a method of finding agreement on moral values.

To be ethical is to treat everyone fairly. To be moral is to treat someone else better than you treat yourself. Since the devil's greatest achievement has been to convince everyone that he doesn't exist, moral relativism plays right into his hands. Not that it is necessary to believe in God and the devil to perceive that there are forces of good and evil in combat in this world, and as Dylan says, "you gotta serve somebody." When someone says that no one has the right to judge someone else, they usually really mean, "no one has the right to judge my actions or beliefs." It is this kind of relativistic thinking run amuk that Wilber is attacking. Here's a kind of judgement I think we are entitled to make, just as an example off the top of my head - no one has the right to be willfully ignorant of crimes against humanity committed by one's own government. A moral absolute, if you will. What about those who would claim a moral imperative against abortion? I would respond that this moral responsibility and perogative resides totally with the woman who is making the choice and will have to live with the consequences. While having an abortion might be an immoral act under some circumstances, the intrusion of the state into the life and body of an individual citizen represents a greater immorality.

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Originally posted by Brett Mann:
I'm going to check out those references you cite, Jeff. My provisional position is something like this: good and evil are in fact absolutes...

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You started out ok but went of the rails right there.

In fact, the closest thing there is to evil, and note I say the "closest" thing, is postulating in abstract absolutes.

In fact, the greatest evils have flowed from the actions of those who were most absolutely certain that they were the proponents of good, the evil the perpetrated, in almost inverse proportion to the good they postulated they were doing.

[ 09 January 2007: Message edited by: Cueball ]

That said, its not about being unsure, or confused but flexible.

You should really read Hegel, in regard to his notions of virtue.

[ 09 January 2007: Message edited by: Cueball ]

The personal conclusion I've come to, when I think of my idealized ethical system, is a modified moral relativism. I figured it out when I thought about the links people had drawn between moral relativism and Einstein's theory of relativity, which I consider terribly flawed.

Einstein's theory of relativity could have just as easily been named the theory of invariance. Many things (mass, time elapsed, distance interval), are relative to the velocity of a frame. However, all things are held together by an invariant, the speed of light. So if you want to have an ethical version of special relativity, which I started off as a simple thought-experiment but have since decided actually makes sense, you have to pick your invariant variable. Most moral relativistic theories I've seen didn't specify their invariants, so they're poor analogies.

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My provisional position is something like this: good and evil are in fact absolutes - givens of our situation in human life.

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There was this 'Without God' show that came on recently... And the topic about it is 'Can you still be good without God'.

And the answer is no. Can't be evil without God either. God is the judge... The rule... The ever watching eye (Kinda like the jollier version taught to kids on Christmas... Always be good or no gifts! Good being what we.. er.. santa tells you that you should be. Mind you, evil is the term for adults... Kids are only bad. Ummm, both can be naughty I guess). Evil and good is the measure of what we do when applied to Gods word. Without the ruler we're measured against, how could there be good or evil?

So I guess I'm saying I completely disagree with you on this one Brett There is no absolute good or absolute evil without god, because god is the measure that judges if it's good or evil. Makes for an efficient justice system no? Can't tell the peasants we're always watching you, might as well tell them an ever watchful eye is judging them instead.

Really wish we could get over the good vs evil bit and start being 'judged' by the rules we create.

Added:
Our morale system, somewhat like our language system, is learned when we're children. A child at a certain age is perceptive to things that we as adults simply can't do. Children learn language from hearing parents who don't always use good grammar... Yet we somehow catch onto and use grammar concepts without being explicitly taught... And better yet, rarely are we aware that we are using those grammar concepts. We learn our morales in a similar fashion... They echo from our parents and soroundings (I should rephraise this... Simply the environment. I guess the parents are a part of the environment we think is best?)
[ 09 January 2007: Message edited by: Noise ]

[ 09 January 2007: Message edited by: Noise ]

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Originally posted by Fidel:
Martha you're a barracuda.

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I never subscribed wholly with all of Stephen J. Gould's ideas outside his realm of expertise, but he did make a good point that we only have a partial understanding of the physical conditions, the evolutionary process, that gave rise to us.

So, invoking evolution to explain this or that behavior can turn into, in his words "Just so Stories".

But, one cannot deny that emotions and visceral "gut" feelings have utility in survival of the individual and the species (or, kin). So it would be foolish to not listen to them, or deny their importance.

Using pure "reason" isn't reasonable. But it is probably reasonable to believe that what we call reason can be described as a kind of manual overide ability over our instinctive behaviors.

The exact conditions that gave rise to the basic instinct of say, "tit for tat" are no longer with us. Nor are many of the conditions that gave rise to our instictive behaviors. Reason is an adaptation that accounts for changing situations.

I think the two are meant to work hand in hand as a kind of moral compass.

I think the kind of moral absolutism that some look for is not attainable. I mention "tit for tat" as an instictive behavior, but surely, there are scads of others, and surely they are all tuned differently inside each individual.

But that hardly justifies saying "everything is okay, whose to say what is right or wrong"?

In any case, I have never believed that belief in God is necessary to behave morally, and when I look around at a lot of "belief" I'm not even sure it helps.

The most important thing to understand about morality is that we and our societies didn't invent it. Moral reasoning, as I am trying to demonstrate, involves a mode of consciousness with its own accompanying neurophysiology and neuropsychopharmacology with can best be conceived of as another kind of sensory organ, a built in good and bad detector. The strength of this capacity will vary from individual to individual an it can atrophy and disappear or flourish and triumph. It is deeply integrated with reason, but a stupid person can be a moral genius and a highly intelligent person can be a moral degenerate.

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I believe in God

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I have many difficulties flat out accepting most definitions of God... Although we could go indepth on a discussion regarding omniscience (or as I prefer to call it "the persistant observer"), one of my key sticking points is it's only with the preconception that God exists that one can actually beleive that God exists. If you, or any person, had devloped void of the very idea of God... Could you beleive in God? Back to the loop question: Did God create Humans in his image, or have Humans created God in theirs?

Religion vs science has become a very well defined line for me... Though I guess my competing observer beliefs tends to highlight this more... But there are 2 ways of looking at the world around you. The religious observer will observe human nature and define what they observe to fit their beleifs within God (or whatever the beleif structure is... God's if you go with polytheistic society). From early times of Sun moves across the sky? Must be god! In our wisdom we've advanced the question musch more thoroughly I will admit. Miraculous set of morales? Must be God! Anything we currently cannot explain? Must be God! Most things we can explain? Must be God! Regardless of what is actually observed, the religious can always distort it to fit into their pre-defined belief structure. It is that act of defining what they observe by what they beleive. Science is the opposite... They observe the world and define their beleifs based on what they observe.

This is the 2 divides of science and religion... An altering beleif structure that is defined as new observations are made opposed to a rigid belief structure that attempts to explain new observations based on the beliefs. It's interesting to see the 2 people on the furthest ends of the spectrum... One dedicated to proving themselves and their beleifs as right, while the other seeks to disprove their beleifs only to redefine them with each new observation.

And this thread gives a pretty good demonstration of the polarization of this debate... We've observed something of human nature thats been devloping within us since the first mammals huddled together for warmth millions of years ago and put it to our masses for reaction. Some of us will struggle to redefine and rethink our beliefs to include this new observation... Others will redefine and rethink this observation until it matches the beliefs. I would not be quite so quick to dismiss millions of years of 'pack animal' evolution prior to us even remotely becoming human (or monkey?) as something that could only exist because God must.

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Is it possible for right and wrong to be absolutes in the human universe (for these concepts only apply to humans) without the existence of God?

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Err... using the terms right/wrong interchangeably with good/evil, this line should be clarified to good/evil. Good and evil could not exist without God, simply because God and God's word is the measure used to determine whether the action is good or evil. No God, no standard set or rules to judge whether the action was good or evil... Therefore no good or evil. The actions themselves still exist, the judgement of the action as good or evil does not.

The existance of an absolute right or wrong is something I will dispute as well. Right or wrong is a judgement upon the answer and will absolutely depend on the observer making the judgement... The only consistant is the action (or question) itself. How could there possibly be something that 'is always right' (absolute truth is Wilbers term I think), when right/wrong is a judgement upon an action?

If you want to get into the 'whys' of morality without a god, we would be getting into the ins and outs of childhood psychology... In particular the early mental developement. I made the mention to Early Language Acquisition (ELA) and the potential existance of an ELA Device (Chomsky is a leader in this field and a good place to start if you wish to read in on the debate). The potential of an early section of the devloping brain being an language devloping organ (or the ELA Device) is an interesting concept, and could suggest an early morales devlopement device within the earliest stages of our lives. An empathatic creature capaable of feeling others pain would instinctively learn what causes pain in others (therefore themselves) as well as elation, laughter, fear, and other primal emotions would be the instinctive and natural method of learning the golden rule of morales... Do not do to others would you would not like done to you.

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I could imagine an evolving universe, spontaneously appearing out of nowhere without a creator, and that universe having an evolutionary direction - the "good."

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If a spontaneously created universe appeared out of nowhere, and nobody was there to observe it... Did it ever exist? In any case, your desire for us to have a greater purpose is pretty strong, no? Now could you imagine an evolving universe, spontaneously appearing out of nowhere without a creator, and that universe having absolutely no purpose but existance itself? You're not alone... Lack of purpose and existing without reason leads to dispair.

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could be thought of a "sin" in a human being genetically programmed to be sensitive to this evolutionary direction

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Just an interesting view point to take... Go through Christianity with the view point that 'All rules // morality within Christianity was created to ensure the continuation of humanity'. Prior to christianity, human culture has a stunning capabilty to devolve and degrade at an alarming rate... Left to our own devices, we naturally fall apart into obscurity. We'd need a set of rules to surivive... A judgement upon our actions and scorn towards actions judged as wrong. God filled this void... Like a gift, the human species suddenly had a 'universal' guide determining what actions were right (good) vs wrong (evil).