Do we really need morals?

[Dante]

Ahh, I can feel the flames licking at this thread already...

We all have morals. This is an undeniable fact (unless you want to get philosophical about existance, please don't). Some of us have different morals from others, but we all have morals nonetheless.

But do we really need them? They cloud our judgement, making us more llikely to choose paths that are less likely to benifit ourselves, or the species as a whole. Our morals govern our lives. These unwritten rules forced upon us by society that dictate that (For example) it is wrong to hurt people, wrong to hurt yourself. Wrong to engage in terrorism, murder, arson, rape, pillaging and killing. Wrong to randomly slash small children with swords or impale a pregnant woman because she's in your way. These are 'wrong' because are morals tell us so.

"And?" You ask, "So what? They're right." Why? You are looking at it froma moral point of view. Look at it impartially, and you see that these actions, or the desire to perform these actions, spawn from a similar source as our morals and sense of ethics. Emotion.

Our morals tell us that it is wrong to hurt because we would feel guilty. And if we wouldn't feel guilty then we shouldn't do these actions because it would hurt to have them done to us.

But our emotions are (permit the melodrama) hotter, older, raw. They tell us to act violently to get what we want. Kill, hurt, and destroy to gain what we do not have.

Then they disagree with themselves and tell us that this is wrong by throwing ethics at us. Ethics. Pah! What a pathetic word.

We are individuals, humans, why should our 'fellow man' dictate to us what we should or should not do? Force us to feel morals and ethics that they force upon us from birth?

Unless we decide on them ourselves, our morals are not our own. So why should we obey them when they so intrusively make up our minds for us? Well?

[DukeLeto]

I'd love to stay and chat, but you're in my way. *BLAM*

Anyways...

Morals are usually based on whatever hogwash people's religion tells them. Hence why a lot of poeple are opposed to:

abortion

Stem Cells

GM food

cloning

space travel

nuclear power

modern medicine

etc...

or to sum it up, progress.

Whereas some ethics are fine, for instance not shooting people at random or barbequeing baby condors, other, more questionable and varying morals do tend to get in the way of human progress, and may ultimately destroy, or greatly set back, the human race.

What really gets me, though, is when peopl say I am immoral because I am an Athiest. Trust me, if I was as immoral as these people say, said people would be dead right now.

Anyways, I have to go. I have a condor on the hibachi.

[Navaros]

Dust Scout,

since you are immoral and wish to justify that in your own mind, you try to "normalize" your immorality by claiming that morality is not needed

no point in you asking the question since you'll always be 100% convinced that you don't.

you are going to think you don't need morals until you're dead. then, at the moment when you are no longer in this life and in the next... then you will realize: "i sure *did* need morals! shame it's too late for that now."

[Egeides]

I believe morals are based on what is right. Now, what is right? Here, I'd answer that my vision of "right" is pretty much Plato's esthetics... The platonician trinity: good, right, beauty.

So there is only one thing that is right, and it is up to each of us to try to see what that is. Someone can't be at the same time false AND true, but it can be perceived as false to someone and true to another. Well from there on, the point is to try to find this True, this Beauty and this Good. So there is a moral, and it's a moral that should be followed because we should follow the Truth (which will also be Good and Beautiful: what is true is more beautiful than what is not).

Now two questions come: How can the Truth be more beautiful if, truely, people are murdered, being sad does exist and so on? and Why couldn't we decide to follow what's false?

1-

The fact that something is true has more beauty than the fact that it is false. Simply. Now what this beauty says may not be very nice, may be provocative or ask everyone to adapt to reality... Personally, I kinda solve this problem by saying that truely the essence of things is perfect. Evil is the absence of Good, therefore is a non-existence... But it is not easy for a human attached to feelings, events, senses, and so on, to see this, to perceive this.*

2-

Why couldn't we simply decide to take a false path? Well first of all I believe it is not to our advantage. I don't believe into illusions. If you want to live on dope, up to you but my belief is that you will live falsely to your own nature that is a part of this Truth, thus unadapted. Perhaps illusions based on reality can be useful to some, simply to pass over a hard moment so that ultimately it'll be easier to reach this universal concept of Truth/Good/Beauty...

A third question could have been "If a universal reality wouldn't have been happy (like it is to some), would illusion be a good thing in such circumstances?"

I'm not even totally sure on such a point, but it's not that essential to answer to it since to me it's fiction :P

And I have no time to answer this anyway (nor to polish this text), since I already took about 25-30 minutes to write and had an hour to dinner ;D

*Of course, you see that this part is compatible with my theists beliefs, but I don't think I would have any trouble to show this independently to theism. At the beginning, I had these ideas totally indepedently from theology anyway, based on logic and esthetics.

[nampigai]

depends on what kinda world you wish to live in....

[Acriku]

All morals are subjective. Now with that in mind, morals are needed to establish a stable society. It helps society to have productive and honest morals. Basically for the good of all, not yourself.

[nemafakei]

That's borderline on flaming, Nav, and you know it.

"What really gets me, though, is when peopl say I am immoral because I am an Athiest"

I know the feeling...

Morals provide us with the basic assumptions needed to apply logic and bring us order. The idea that humanity's prosperity is a goal is a sort of moral, and indeed an assumption from which we can base logic. Using this tells us not to do destructive things, so that humanity will do well. Hence, we do not murder. Usually.

From an evolutionary (more memetic (cultural) than genetic) point of view, morals came aboutbecause groups encouraging them survived. I'll not go into the probable explanatory details.

[SurlyPIG]

LOL Duke that was pretty damn funny. :D

I think that our sense of what's right and what's wrong can be derived from one thing: empathy (what did you think I was going to say? The Bible?). That is, the knowledge that what we do to others and what fate brings upon them could happen to us. We then act based on what we think we would want to happen if we were in their position.

[Acriku]

We evolved into having empathy, and it certainly helped us survive.

[Birdfolly]

We could have used some of that empathy in the AA thread. Oops did I say that out loud? ;)

[TMA_1]

if you cant place any objectivity on morality, then you have chaos. order comes from objective and rational thinking. Too much liberal thought can indeed cloud the mind. Your argument makes sense dust scout, and if I didnt have a religion, I would most likely agree. The fact remains though that if you cannot place an opinion on morality, then you will have complete difference with all others. if all other people place their own moral standards differently, then not only would people not agree with eachother, but there would we wars and hostile actions against one another. You miss the point when you say morals cloud the mind. Morals dont cloud the mind, judgement does. Judgement is not a moral, it can be totally right judgement and totally wrong judgement.

[SurlyPIG]

On the contrary, empathy and logic was entirely what I based my conclusions about AA off of.

[Phage]

Do we really need good food? Do we really need sex? Do we really need comfort? Do we really need family and love? Do we really need philosophy and NASA? Are freedom and peace necessary?

We can survive if we lived in a dictatorship that made all the above illegal, soon even sex via artificial wombs and cloning. That doesn't mean this is preffered. I personally and the vast majority prefer morality.

Nobody would be okay with a girl being raped. Nobody I know. Hence we make the act punishable.

This I believe stems from our evolutionary history. In the past societies which had morals survived. And those which did not didn't.

Also people that had morals were selected by the group, by other people. People that constantly hurt and backstabbed others were "voted off the island" so to speak, because when such things were matters of life and death, as they were back then, you didn't want an immoral bastard running around your tribe.

Morals I believe are an exegenetic part of who we are. Just like whether we are gay or straight, we prefer certain moral norms in our society. And I'm not saying this makes morals unimportant, or made up. They are real hardwired parts of who we are that will not likely not change for the rest of our lives.

They are as important as our values for family, love, freedom and partnership.

The specific morality may vary, just as our tastes in food and mates varies. Just as other values may vary. But the fact that most of humanity will adhere to some time of morality remains constant.

And I don't think morals will vary radically for three reasons: 1) COnsequences for certain acts are the same. 2) We as humans live in very similiar manners, we all have parents, we all eat, we all sleep, we all feel pain. 3) Our evolutionary societies were organized in similiar manners, with similiar goals leading to similiar biological dispositions.

Hence morality may vary, but it may also remain very constant and uniform.

[TMA_1]

every single cultulre starts out with similar, if not the same moral standards as eachother. This sounds like a huge generalization. Still though I can take all of the holiest texts and laws of each culture, and cite them as almost exactly the same. there is no getting around it. From ancient south america to feudel japan. The basics concern the abhorance of killing for no lawful reason, to not speak against a fellow kin, to obay the customs of the culture, do not act in deviant sexual practices (only cult offshoots practiced this kind of thing in various cultures, even in israel), Follow the will of the authority set over you, be charitable. So many more are included. Take the Tao Te Ching, the Bible, the Koran, the bhagavad gita, blah blah blah. if you guys actually take the time to read these texts, you see complete similarity. This is why cultures have specifically chosen to keep morality objective. It is also a sign of how closely linked cultures really are, even if they have been seperated by thousands of years.

[Acriku]

Morality is not objective. But, it can become more objective when it becomes a law, a written moral so-to-speak. In societies in early South America, cannibalism, sacrifices, etc, were morally ok. They weren't "founded" under the same morals we have today. Morality is a creation of man, and is able to be changed by man. Morality FUBU, for us by us.

[TMA_1]

not every south american culture practiced human sacrifice and cannablism. Make sure you understand that. Also there were places all over the world where there is human sacrifice. Thta doesnt mean the culture condones it. even if they did, it has to do with the spiritual, and in every case around the world, that is treated with a whole different matter altogether

[Acriku]

Since you didn't address my point, I guess you concede.

[TMA_1]

I did address your point, and your point is an assumption by the way. Most of your posts are and that is why I find them flawed and attack them. I dont like crusaders.

[Acriku]

Good for you, now what part of your post actually addresses my point? That, of course, is that morality is not objective and can be seen as such in societies that do not have the same morality as ours.

[TMA_1]

ahh but is that morality you are talking about? or the formalities of cultures? Just because something isnt immoral to one group, doesnt mean its not immoral. Societies change in each culture, but you will find core values that never do change. you havent retorted against that.

[Acriku]

Just because something isnt immoral to one group, doesnt mean its not immoral.

Of course, because morality is subjective! If it was objective, and there were clear universal rights and wrongs, then they would be followed by every nation and society. You might say that it is universal, but societies don't have to follow it, but then universal morality is useless and serves no purpose. Now, you haven't proven that there is universal morality, so I'll leave it at that.

Societies change in each culture, but you will find core values that never do change. you havent retorted against that.

Core values, you say? The core values of the United States are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, for the people. This is what the founding fathers wanted the citizens to have. Where do you see these core values that this country is founded upon in Iraq under Hussein's rule?

So what are the core values that you claim to be never changing in any culture in the history of this world?

And might I add that core values are a little bit different than morality.

[TMA_1]

life, liberty and the right to own land is very old man, vary old indeed. You didnt think john locke was the first to come up with these ideas did you? he took them from other cultures. and the founding fathers did as well. THey got their ideas from democratic societies in ancient northern europe, ancient india, greece, the confederated tribes of northeastern america. So many places.

[Acriku]

Oh I get it, so the values of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness are objective only in democratic societies. Well la-dee-dah for you, you just proved my point.

You forget about the slaves of ancient greece, india, and europe; where this country was founded with the values for everybody. Slavery was outlawed and found unconstitutional, because the values were for everybody.

[Edric O]

We have developed morals and we need morals because we humans are social animals. Our nature is to live in groups, and to care for each other in order to ensure the survival of the group as a whole.

Any human being has both an individualistic drive and a social drive. Both of them must be satisfied in order for a human to be happy. How happy would you be if you had everything you needed to survive as an individual, but you had no other human beings to talk to or interact with in any way? The fact is that loneliness can and will drive you mad.

Moral values and rules exist in order to satisfy our need for social harmony, friendship and love. As social animals, these are things that we CANNOT live without.

Many of the ills of modern society are caused by the fact that capitalism creates a psychological imbalance by blowing the individualist drive completely out of proportion, and trying to pretend that the social one doesn't exist. Obsessive individualism makes people feel empty, devoid of purpose, insignificant.

Have you ever wondered why ALL the ideas that motivate huge numbers of people are based on a collectivist foundation? From the great world religions to nationalism to communism - the most powerful motivating factor to human beings is BROTHERHOOD.

For God, for king, for country, for race, for the working class, for mankind - for US!

[Dante]

In which case, as social creatures, why can we question these morals? And why do some people obey completely different ones?

I'm not questioning the principle of working together, just why we have an inherant desire not to do things.