Quote:
Originally posted by taxwonk
The thing that separates humans from the lower species is our ability to rationalize and empathize. Your insistence that man is left with nothing but instinct without the existence of God is faulty for the simple reason that it leaves out this essential feature of what makes us human.
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Quote:
spanky
Under Darwins theory people develop morals to help them survive.
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First things first - stop saying this is Darwin's theory (no one's done it in a few pages, but still). Darwin made some passing comments about complex social behaviors possibly having some heritable aspect, but Darwin did not promote the "social Darwinist" theories you're refering to.
Second - if (pretty much) all people are genetically predisposed to have an instinct driving them to feed starving children, why is that universal instinct not the basis for a "universal" moral code? Because it may be irrational? Just because self interest may find expression in several ways (evolutionary/instinctual and rational), why would the evolutionary (universal) aspect not be a sound basis for a universal code of morality? Justifying one's irrational impulse to do good with "faith" is no more convincing an argument that basing it on "thousands of years of evolutionary pressures producing this instinct in individuals with a higher rate of survival." In fact, it is much less so. Evolution strikes me as a much better (and much less culturally relative) basis for any universal code than God and religion (which, as is perfectly obvious, does not produce "universal" codes of morality but instead conflicting relative ones).
The rational free-rider problem is applicable to all moral codes, not just ones that consider themselves to be based on evolved instincts for self-interest. It undermines divine morality as much as evolutionary behaviorism, and in nearly the same way. (After all, it is the divine mover who gave us rationality, which, if we exercise it, tells us that it is in our interests to ignore God's moral codes.) And, while it may seem superficially rational to eschew moral behavior to free-ride, besides the cute Kantian and Rawlsian cites offered (which may be summarized as "acquiescing to serve a broader interest in lieu of my immediate self interest is in fact in my longer-term self interest" or "the shoe may be on the other foot some day"), it is entirely rational to debate whether it is in fact rational to assume one's own rational analysis of what behaviors will be individually beneficial is superior to instinctive behaviors with millenia of proven success.
