We ALL Have a Universal Moral Code In Us

[jerryR34]

 

Same response as Luftwaffle: it doesn't has the be a matter of survival now (on small scale). It was because our forfathers survived with this instince or 'moral rule', they multiplied and spreaded that instinct. It was once a matter of survival, that we still have in us. And of course, this exemple will not make the difference of the survival of mankind. But if everyone would think like that, we would not survive. 

So on large scale it is a matter of survival.

 

Maybe it is because your english isn't your mother tongue, but that response makes absolutely no sense, ...

Shiloh, it really boils down to your lack of understanding of evolution and natural selection.  This article sums it up nicely...

 

 

"We are so used to empathy that we take it for granted, yet it is essential to human society as we know it. Our morality depends on it: How could anyone be expected to follow the golden rule without the capacity to mentally trade places with a fellow human being? It is logical to assume that this capacity came first, giving rise to the golden rule itself. The act of perspective-taking is summed up by one of the most enduring definitions of empathy that we have, formulated by Adam Smith as 'changing places in fancy with the sufferer.'

 

Even Smith, the father of economics, best known for emphasizing self-interest as the lifeblood of human economy, understood that the concepts of self-interest and empathy don’t conflict. Empathy makes us reach out to others, first just emotionally, but later in life also by understanding their situation.

This capacity likely evolved because it served our ancestors’ survival in two ways. First, like every mammal, we need to be sensitive to the needs of our offspring. Second, our species depends on cooperation, which means that we do better if we are surrounded by healthy, capable group mates. Taking care of them is just a matter of enlightened self-interest."

 

http://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/the_evolution_of_empathy

Edited June 19, 2014 by jerryR34

[jerryR34]

More from the article I linked above.  Very informative:

 

"Animal empathy

It is hard to imagine that empathy—a characteristic so basic to the human species that it emerges early in life, and is accompanied by strong physiological reactions—came into existence only when our lineage split off from that of the apes. It must be far older than that. Examples of empathy in other animals would suggest a long evolutionary history to this capacity in humans.

Evolution rarely throws anything out. Instead, structures are transformed, modified, co-opted for other functions, or tweaked in another direction. The frontal fins of fish became the front limbs of land animals, which over time turned into hoofs, paws, wings, and hands. Occasionally, a structure loses all function and becomes superfluous, but this is a gradual process, and traits rarely disappear altogether. Thus, we find tiny vestiges of leg bones under the skin of whales and remnants of a pelvis in snakes.

Over the last several decades, we’ve seen increasing evidence of empathy in other species. One piece of evidence came unintentionally out of a study on human development. Carolyn Zahn-Waxler, a research psychologist at the National Institute of Mental Health, visited people’s homes to find out how young children respond to family members’ emotions. She instructed people to pretend to sob, cry, or choke, and found that some household pets seemed as worried as the children were by the feigned distress of the family members. The pets hovered nearby and put their heads in their owners’ laps.

But perhaps the most compelling evidence for the strength of animal empathy came from a group of psychiatrists led by Jules Masserman at Northwestern University. The researchers reported in 1964 in the American Journal of Psychiatry that rhesus monkeys refused to pull a chain that delivered food to themselves if doing so gave a shock to a companion. One monkey stopped pulling the chain for 12 days after witnessing another monkey receive a shock. Those primates were literally starving themselves to avoid shocking another animal.

The anthropoid apes, our closest relatives, are even more remarkable. In 1925, Robert Yerkes reported how his bonobo, Prince Chim, was so extraordinarily concerned and protective toward his sickly chimpanzee companion, Panzee, that the scientific establishment might not accept his claims: “If I were to tell of his altruistic and obviously sympathetic behavior towards Panzee, I should be suspected of idealizing an ape.”

Nadia Ladygina-Kohts, a primatological pioneer, noticed similar empathic tendencies in her young chimpanzee, Joni, whom she raised at the beginning of the last century, in Moscow. Kohts, who analyzed Joni’s behavior in the minutest detail, discovered that the only way to get him off the roof of her house after an escape—much more effective than any reward or threat of punishment—was by arousing sympathy:

If I pretend to be crying, close my eyes and weep, Joni immediately stops his plays or any other activities, quickly runs over to me, all excited and shagged, from the most remote places in the house, such as the roof or the ceiling of his cage, from where I could not drive him down despite my persistent calls and entreaties. He hastily runs around me, as if looking for the offender; looking at my face, he tenderly takes my chin in his palm, lightly touches my face with his finger, as though trying to understand what is happening, and turns around, clenching his toes into firm fists.

These observations suggest that apart from emotional connectedness, apes have an appreciation of the other’s situation and show a degree of perspective-taking. One striking report in this regard concerns a bonobo female named Kuni, who found a wounded bird in her enclosure at Twycross Zoo, in England. Kuni picked up the bird, and when her keeper urged her to let it go, she climbed to the highest point of the highest tree, carefully unfolded the bird’s wings and spread them wide open, one wing in each hand, before throwing it as hard as she could toward the barrier of the enclosure. When the bird fell short, Kuni climbed down and guarded it until the end of the day, when it flew to safety. Obviously, what Kuni did would have been inappropriate toward a member of her own species. Having seen birds in flight many times, she seemed to have a notion of what would be good for a bird, thus giving us an anthropoid illustration of Smith’s “changing places in fancy.”

This is not to say that all we have are anecdotes. Systematic studies have been conducted on so-called “consolation” behavior. Consolation is defined as friendly or reassuring behavior by a bystander toward a victim of aggression. For example, chimpanzee A attacks chimpanzee B, after which bystander C comes over and embraces or grooms B. Based on hundreds of such observations, we know that consolation occurs regularly and exceeds baseline levels of contact. In other words, it is a demonstrable tendency that probably reflects empathy, since the objective of the consoler seems to be to alleviate the distress of the other. In fact, the usual effect of this kind of behavior is that it stops screaming, yelping, and other signs of distress."

 

http://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/the_evolution_of_empathy

[LuftWaffle]

 

 

You say it well. Killing other is not immoral for the universe. Only for us humans. If i kill an other human, do you really think my cat or dog will mind? He'll just sit there. And the planet will not stop spinning of i steal someone's money. Only humans care.

And why do you think the court will make the right decision? Here in Belgium, the court decided it's legal in some circumstances to do euthanasia on children. 

The court acts different in all the different countries. In some arabic countries it's justice of someone gets decapitated for stealing. Court's decision...

 

And have you ever asked yourself the question why you are eating the flesh of a pig, and not of a human? Why is it less immoral to kill a pig to eat than a human? 

 

And if the court system was right, then why do some serious criminals get free because of some faults in the procedure?

 

Besides, how do i violate the 'universal moral law' (if it exists) when i drive 140km/h on the highway? (speed limit is 120km/h) i can get a serious punishment for that. 

Or in Michigan a woman isn’t allowed to cut her own hair without her husband’s permission. When she does, she commits a crime. Seems legit...

 

Hi Schouwenaars,

 

Since you claim that there is no such thing as right or wrong in any real sense of the word, which is better:

To accept the truth and live as if there are no real right or wrong actions, or

To live a lie and pretend that there are real right or wrong actions?

 

I don't remember you answering this question.

 

I've also asked you: If it's possible to rape a woman in such a way that it doesn't affect the survival of mankind, would it be wrong?

You've been asserting that every moral rule has a survival element, but surely if that is the case this question should be easy to answer.

 

That question depends on each person. choose the one you will be the most happy with. And it doesn't mean that if actions might be not 'bad' from origin, that you should do them.

 

Raping is hurting other people. And hurting your own people is not very helpfull. Survival is also based on trust on each other. And i don't think you build a relation of trust if you rape that person.

For nowadays of course it doesn't really have a big infuence on the survival of the whole human rase. But not hurting people is an instinct that comes from the far away generation who survived because they had the same instinct. Because they were able to multiply, we still have the same instinct. Of course there are always people who don't have that instinct. But that's because everyone is different.

 

 

"That question depends on each person. choose the one you will be the most happy with."

....and which one are you most happy with? Living a rational life and embracing what you espouse and living it out, or living a moral life by pretending that your actions are actually right or wrong?

 

What about those you interact with? Would you prefer them to treat you as if there isn't really any right or wrong? That the only difference between eating pork or eating you is a vestigial evolutionary legacy that no longer applies? Or would you prefer that they consider their actions toward you as having real moral significance?

 

In terms of rape: you're still not answering my question. Suppose it were possible to rape someone in such a way that it has no effect on human survival, would it be wrong?

You've sidestepped this question by simply assuming things about rape which aren't necessarily true. Let me give you an example: I read once about a dentist who used to rape his female patients while they were under anaesthesia in his dental practise. Apparently he had done this many times and was never caught because the women didn't know they were raped.

He didn't hurt anybody and didn't break any trust either. The victims simply didn't know that they were victims.

 

Is this wrong? Why? How did it affect the survival of mankind?

[jerryR34]

More from:  http://greatergood.b...tion_of_empathy

 

 

 

 

"A bottom-up view of empathy

The above examples help explain why to the biologist, a Russian doll is such a satisfying plaything, especially if it has a historical dimension. I own a doll of Russian President Vladimir Putin, within whom we discover Yeltsin, Gorbachev, Brezhnev, Kruschev, Stalin, and Lenin, in that order. Finding a little Lenin and Stalin within Putin will hardly surprise most political analysts. The same is true for biological traits: The old always remains present in the new.

This is relevant to the debate about the origins of empathy, especially because of the tendency in some disciplines, such as psychology, to put human capacities on a pedestal. They essentially adopt a top-down approach that emphasizes the uniqueness of human language, consciousness, and cognition. But instead of trying to place empathy in the upper regions of human cognition, it is probably best to start out examining the simplest possible processes, some perhaps even at the cellular level. In fact, recent neuroscience research suggests that very basic processes do underlie empathy. Researchers at the University of Parma, in Italy, were the first to report that monkeys have special brain cells that become active not only if the monkey grasps an object with its hand but also if it merely watches another do the same. Since these cells are activated as much by doing as by seeing someone else do, they are known as mirror neurons, or “monkey see, monkey do” neurons.

It seems that developmentally and evolutionarily, advanced forms of empathy are preceded by and grow out of more elementary ones. Biologists prefer such bottom-up accounts. They always assume continuity between past and present, child and adult, human and animal, even between humans and the most primitive mammals.

So, how and why would this trait have evolved in humans and other species? Empathy probably evolved in the context of the parental care that characterizes all mammals. Signaling their state through smiling and crying, human infants urge their caregiver to take action. This also applies to other primates. The survival value of these interactions is evident from the case of a deaf female chimpanzee I have known named Krom, who gave birth to a succession of infants and had intense positive interest in them. But because she was deaf, she wouldn’t even notice her babies’ calls of distress if she sat down on them. Krom’s case illustrates that without the proper mechanism for understanding and responding to a child’s needs, a species will not survive.

During the 180 million years of mammalian evolution, females who responded to their offspring’s needs out-reproduced those who were cold and distant. Having descended from a long line of mothers who nursed, fed, cleaned, carried, comforted, and defended their young, we should not be surprised by gender differences in human empathy, such as those proposed to explain the disproportionate rate of boys affected by autism, which is marked by a lack of social communication skills.

Empathy also plays a role in cooperation. One needs to pay close attention to the activities and goals of others to cooperate effectively. A lioness needs to notice quickly when other lionesses go into hunting mode, so that she can join them and contribute to the pride’s success. A male chimpanzee needs to pay attention to his buddy’s rivalries and skirmishes with others so that he can help out whenever needed, thus ensuring the political success of their partnership. Effective cooperation requires being exquisitely in tune with the emotional states and goals of others.

Within a bottom-up framework, the focus is not so much on the highest levels of empathy, but rather on its simplest forms, and how these combine with increased cognition to produce more complex forms of empathy. How did this transformation take place? The evolution of empathy runs from shared emotions and intentions between individuals to a greater self/other distinction—that is, an “unblurring” of the lines between individuals. As a result, one’s own experience is distinguished from that of another person, even though at the same time we are vicariously affected by the other’s. This process culminates in a cognitive appraisal of the other’s behavior and situation: We adopt the other’s perspective.

As in a Russian doll, however, the outer layers always contain an inner core. Instead of evolution having replaced simpler forms of empathy with more advanced ones, the latter are merely elaborations on the former and remain dependent on them. This also means that empathy comes naturally to us. It is not something we only learn later in life, or that is culturally constructed. At heart, it is a hard-wired response that we fine-tune and elaborate upon in the course of our lives, until it reaches a level at which it becomes such a complex response that it is hard to recognize its origin in simpler responses, such as body mimicry and emotional contagion"

[enoob57]

ah ha... the spirit of the evil one saying through humanism I'm it and there can be no other...

Imagine the surprise of finding themselves before The very One they deny- but then to late!

Love, Steven

[LuftWaffle]

Hi jerryR34,

 

I've read through the article that you posted regarding the evolution of empathy. I'm not entirely sure what you're hoping to achieve by posting it though. The topic we're discussing in this thread is the nature of morality, or to use a technical term: moral ontology.

 

A good theory on the origin of morality would have to account for the ontological nature of morality. What you're doing is you're assuming that morality is non-real (i.e. subjective) and offering an explanation of how such a morality could have come about. But that merely begs the question: assuming what needs to be proven.
My position is that morality isn't subjective and I've offered reasons for showing that a subjective morality doesn't match up to the morality that human beings experience.

 

Suppose we ask a question regarding the nature of the automobile and I go and offer a history lesson on the development of the bicycle. Besides not actually addressing the issue on the table I've actually offered an explanation of something other than what needs to be explained. As such if you're trying to explain what a car is by explaining where bicycles come from, you've actually failed to explain what a car is, not so?

Likewise, offering an evolutionary story about how morality could have come about doesn't address the question on the table, and even as an explanation it fails to explain what needs to be explained, because the morality that the explanation ends up with is completely different from the morality it hopes to explain.

 

Here's why I say that:

 

The type of morality that you end up with given the explanation in the article is to put it plainly, completely arbitrary, for instance the article states, "Biology holds us “on a leash,” in the felicitous words of biologist Edward Wilson, and will let us stray only so far from who we are. We can design our life any way we want, but whether we will thrive depends on how well that life fits human predispositions."

What this says is that biology restricts us to who we are. Our thriving depends on how our actions fit human predispositions.

How void and meaningless is that statement? "Be what you are!" Really?

Suppose we are a violent bunch of bigots, predisposed to barbarism and hatred?

Well then evolution it seems restricts us to being violent bigots predisposed to precisely those very things, right?

It seems then however we are, that's what we should be. So if you're nasty, that's what you should be. If you're nice, that's what you should be. But that's can't be right, can it?

 

We're left wondering how one can get from a genetically determined behavior to a right or wrong belief about behavior. The article doesn't actually offer anything in this regard, but instead simply smuggles objective morality in when it urges us to "achieve universal human rights".

 

This smuggling in of morality is also perfectly illustrated when the author states, "Empathy is fragile, though. Among our close animal relatives, it is switched on by events within their community, such as a youngster in distress, but it is just as easily switched off with regards to outsiders or members of other species, such as prey. The way a chimpanzee bashes in the skull of a live monkey by hitting it against a tree trunk is no advertisement for ape empathy. Bonobos are less brutal, but in their case, too, empathy needs to pass through several filters before it will be expressed. Often, the filters prevent expressions of empathy because no ape can afford feeling pity for all living things all the time. This applies equally to humans. Our evolutionary background makes it hard to identify with outsiders. We’ve evolved to hate our enemies, to ignore people we barely know, and to distrust anybody who doesn’t look like us. Even if we are largely cooperative within our communities, we become almost a different animal in our treatment of strangers."

 

So if hating our enemies is just as much a part of "who we are" as "loving our neighbour" then why prefer the latter over the former? The same goes for xenophobia, racism etc. These, according to the article are part of our evolutionary heritage too. On one hand we're urged to embrace our evolutionary heritage when it comes to the nice things that apes do, but what does the author base his rejection of the bad things that apes do on? It can't be evolution because he believes that both the nice and the bad things evolved and that these evolved because they're beneficial. So, what does he base it on?

 

It seems the answer is that if something feels good, then it's moral.

"Our best hope for transcending tribal differences is based on the moral emotions, because emotions defy ideology."
"Emotions trump rules."

 

I don't suppose it's necessary for me to point out that making a moral rule which says that we should not let moral rules guide us, but rather let our moral emotions guide us, is glaringly self-defeating.

But worse than that, if the author is consistent he ends up with a "morality" that is completely arbitrary and absurd. Instead of applying reason we're better off trusting our feelings. "X is wrong" becomes "I don't like how X feels".

But this still hasn't actually answered why he chooses some animal traits to be virtues and some to be vices. If emotions are supposed to be our giude, why does his example highlight some emotions like "caring" but not other emotions such as rage or hatred?

 

The article states, "What we need, therefore, is a vision of human nature that encompasses all of our tendencies: the good, the bad, and the ugly."
That's all good and well if you assume that you can distinguish between good, bad and ugly in the first place, and therein lies the rub. According to the article there is no good or bad, just things people do which they've inherited from primate ancestors.

 

Now we can apply some common sense. Does the morality that the article explains match up to how we experience morality in our everyday lives. If we read about an act of terror where the perpetrator showed no remorse and doesn't seem to feel anything for his victims, are we going to be consistent and declare that since there are no feelings of wrong doing the perpetrator hasn't done anything wrong? Or if the majority of society has strong feelings that being gay is repulsive, should we let those feelings guide our understanding of morality?

 

If you're hesitant to answer yes to any of the above, then perhaps it is because morality is something different from what the article attempted to explain.

[jerryR34]

Hi jerryR34,

 

I've read through the article that you posted regarding the evolution of empathy. I'm not entirely sure what you're hoping to achieve by posting it though. The topic we're discussing in this thread is the nature of morality, or to use a technical term: moral ontology.

 

A good theory on the origin of morality would have to account for the ontological nature of morality. What you're doing is you're assuming that morality is non-real (i.e. subjective) and offering an explanation of how such a morality could have come about. But that merely begs the question: assuming what needs to be proven.

My position is that morality isn't subjective and I've offered reasons for showing that a subjective morality doesn't match up to the morality that human beings experience.

 

Suppose we ask a question regarding the nature of the automobile and I go and offer a history lesson on the development of the bicycle. Besides not actually addressing the issue on the table I've actually offered an explanation of something other than what needs to be explained. As such if you're trying to explain what a car is by explaining where bicycles come from, you've actually failed to explain what a car is, not so?

Likewise, offering an evolutionary story about how morality could have come about doesn't address the question on the table, and even as an explanation it fails to explain what needs to be explained, because the morality that the explanation ends up with is completely different from the morality it hopes to explain.

 

Here's why I say that:

 

The type of morality that you end up with given the explanation in the article is to put it plainly, completely arbitrary, for instance the article states, "Biology holds us “on a leash,” in the felicitous words of biologist Edward Wilson, and will let us stray only so far from who we are. We can design our life any way we want, but whether we will thrive depends on how well that life fits human predispositions."

What this says is that biology restricts us to who we are. Our thriving depends on how our actions fit human predispositions.

How void and meaningless is that statement? "Be what you are!" Really?

Suppose we are a violent bunch of bigots, predisposed to barbarism and hatred?

Well then evolution it seems restricts us to being violent bigots predisposed to precisely those very things, right?

It seems then however we are, that's what we should be. So if you're nasty, that's what you should be. If you're nice, that's what you should be. But that's can't be right, can it?

 

We're left wondering how one can get from a genetically determined behavior to a right or wrong belief about behavior. The article doesn't actually offer anything in this regard, but instead simply smuggles objective morality in when it urges us to "achieve universal human rights".

 

This smuggling in of morality is also perfectly illustrated when the author states, "Empathy is fragile, though. Among our close animal relatives, it is switched on by events within their community, such as a youngster in distress, but it is just as easily switched off with regards to outsiders or members of other species, such as prey. The way a chimpanzee bashes in the skull of a live monkey by hitting it against a tree trunk is no advertisement for ape empathy. Bonobos are less brutal, but in their case, too, empathy needs to pass through several filters before it will be expressed. Often, the filters prevent expressions of empathy because no ape can afford feeling pity for all living things all the time. This applies equally to humans. Our evolutionary background makes it hard to identify with outsiders. We’ve evolved to hate our enemies, to ignore people we barely know, and to distrust anybody who doesn’t look like us. Even if we are largely cooperative within our communities, we become almost a different animal in our treatment of strangers."

 

So if hating our enemies is just as much a part of "who we are" as "loving our neighbour" then why prefer the latter over the former? The same goes for xenophobia, racism etc. These, according to the article are part of our evolutionary heritage too. On one hand we're urged to embrace our evolutionary heritage when it comes to the nice things that apes do, but what does the author base his rejection of the bad things that apes do on? It can't be evolution because he believes that both the nice and the bad things evolved and that these evolved because they're beneficial. So, what does he base it on?

 

It seems the answer is that if something feels good, then it's moral.

"Our best hope for transcending tribal differences is based on the moral emotions, because emotions defy ideology."

"Emotions trump rules."

 

I don't suppose it's necessary for me to point out that making a moral rule which says that we should not let moral rules guide us, but rather let our moral emotions guide us, is glaringly self-defeating.

But worse than that, if the author is consistent he ends up with a "morality" that is completely arbitrary and absurd. Instead of applying reason we're better off trusting our feelings. "X is wrong" becomes "I don't like how X feels".

But this still hasn't actually answered why he chooses some animal traits to be virtues and some to be vices. If emotions are supposed to be our giude, why does his example highlight some emotions like "caring" but not other emotions such as rage or hatred?

 

The article states, "What we need, therefore, is a vision of human nature that encompasses all of our tendencies: the good, the bad, and the ugly."

That's all good and well if you assume that you can distinguish between good, bad and ugly in the first place, and therein lies the rub. According to the article there is no good or bad, just things people do which they've inherited from primate ancestors.

 

Now we can apply some common sense. Does the morality that the article explains match up to how we experience morality in our everyday lives. If we read about an act of terror where the perpetrator showed no remorse and doesn't seem to feel anything for his victims, are we going to be consistent and declare that since there are no feelings of wrong doing the perpetrator hasn't done anything wrong? Or if the majority of society has strong feelings that being gay is repulsive, should we let those feelings guide our understanding of morality?

 

If you're hesitant to answer yes to any of the above, then perhaps it is because morality is something different from what the article attempted to explain.

There was talk in the thread about how morality evolved.  The article I posted addressed that topic.

[jerryR34]

ah ha... the spirit of the evil one saying through humanism I'm it and there can be no other...

Imagine the surprise of finding themselves before The very One they deny- but then to late!

Love, Steven

No worries for me, when I stand before the Lord, he will say, "Well done, good and faithful servant!".

[enoob57]

ah ha... the spirit of the evil one saying through humanism I'm it and there can be no other...

Imagine the surprise of finding themselves before The very One they deny- but then to late!

Love, Steven

No worries for me, when I stand before the Lord, he will say, "Well done, good and faithful servant!".

As the comment was directed to the site that was sited ... to suggest morality to have a beginning

(as to evolve) is to say God does not exist ->for as He has no beginning and He is the creator of all things

and as morality is not a thing but a character trait thus morality cannot be as they suggest!

Another point is it is not what we will say will be but what He says will be-> for we, in ourselves, have no

authority to command what is and is not to be! Love, Steven

Edited June 26, 2014 by enoob57

[Schouwenaars]

 

 

 to suggest morality to have a beginning

(as to evolve) is to say God does not exist for He has no beginning 

Why would that be?

I believe morality has a beginning but i don't say God does not exist.