Patting the wrists, rolling the eyes.

[Spanky]

Originally posted by soup sandwich
But doesn't the moral code change? And, if so, how do we account for the fact that the moral code changes? If the code is instinctive, why is the moral code of a person in 2005 (e.g., anti-slavery) different than the code of a person in 100 A.D. (slavery of one's enemies is OK)? Has our creator endowed the person of 2005 with different rights than the person of 100 A.D.

If this has been covered before in this discussion I apologize, I haven't read the full thread.

I don't think it has really changed. I think even in 100 A.D. people knew instinctively that slavery was wrong, but certain people benefited and therefor kept it going. During Roman times many philosophers suggested slavery was wrong. I think as time moves forward there is a slow progression towards changes in the law and human societies conforming more towards the code.

[Spanky]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
Translation: The world is confusing, with many inexplicable things. The only explanation is that there is a god.


I don't get it, and I certainly don't get what it proves, because it leaves nearly as much open. To wit, I've long believed that there is a god who at least go things started around the big bang. But I don't see what that tells me about anything since. There could be a heaven and a hell. Or there could not. I could take Pascal's wager, or I could not. But what you seem to be left with is "no human-developed moral code has sufficient teeth and I'm at such a loss as to why (most) humans act morally that the only explanation is god." That seems the least satisfying answer of all.

There is no questions it is weak, but do you have a better one?

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by Spanky
There is no questions it is weak, but do you have a better one?

I offered two in my initial response. Mill and Rawls.

Your problem is your comparing ideal compliance under religion with real-world compliance in any other system. Well, sorry, but it's not like the threat of hell seems to prevent half of catholics from using birth control and believing abortion should be legal. Just ask the priests themselves if there's universal adherence to their own church's morality.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by Spanky
I don't think it has really changed. I think even in 100 A.D. people knew instinctively that slavery was wrong, but certain people benefited and therefor kept it going. During Roman times many philosophers suggested slavery was wrong. I think as time moves forward there is a slow progression towards changes in the law and human societies conforming more towards the code.

I don't think there's a universal moral code, but the process you describe is consistent with the idea that there has been a long evolution of moral reasoning, with people gradually converging on agreement over fundamental principles, but continuing to disagree in various ways about specific application.

You seem to think the fact that we all think this way suggests that there is a God. Not to say there isn't a good, but maybe it reflects that we get our moral philosophy from our parents and others who raise us. Or that the human brain is hard-wired to certain moral dispositions because we all share a brain design that evolved in this way on the plains of East Africa.

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by Spanky
I don't think it has really changed. I think even in 100 A.D. people knew instinctively that slavery was wrong, but certain people benefited and therefor kept it going. During Roman times many philosophers suggested slavery was wrong. I think as time moves forward there is a slow progression towards changes in the law and human societies conforming more towards the code.

Kind of a post hoc. What about the code are they not conforming with now? Or is it an evolving code. If people knew slavery was wrong, why did it happen? Hell has gotten hotter?

[Spanky]

Originally posted by taxwonk
That's absurd. The notion of "The Good" existed long before the existence of the type of religious belief system you are talking about. The Greek gods didn't enforce a moral code, but clearly Plato sought to understand the nature of what is Good, among other topics.

They may have discussed it but they never defined it. Talking about how acidic something is is ridiculous without a ph scale. Talking about how heavy or light something does not work with out some kind of measuring system. Same as talking about how illegal something is unless there is some code of penal system - misdemeaor, A felony, B felony etc. Saying something is really immoral, just immoral or not immoral at all is ridiculous without some sort of way to measure. Since Plato did not have a code, he just assumed it was insinctual. He also assumed that every one would agree on what is good and what is not. He assumed a code.

[Spanky]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
So it seems like you're down to "faith is the least-bad source of morality."

put differently "religion is the worst form of moral codes except all those others that have been."

Yes that is pretty much it. Again, I know it is weak, but its the same defense Churchill gave Democracy and Capitalsim.

[Spanky]

Originally posted by Replaced_Texan
2. It's interesting, too, that a lot of those deviations from the general "don't hurt people, don't kill people" princple are based on other religious principles. Female circumcision, human sacrifice, suttee. Friend of mine quoted Leviticus to me in another context yesterday:



Seems that a lot of cultures get around the bigger principle by saying God told them it was ok.

I agree, but people have such a strong instinct for the moral code that religion is the best way to get people to ignore it. I think people instinctively know female circumscission is wrong, so the best way to get them to ignore their instincts is to say that they must ignore their instincts because it is God's law.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Not such a hot idea, I'm thinking.

[Replaced_Texan]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
Well, sorry, but it's not like the threat of hell seems to prevent half of catholics from using birth control and believing abortion should be legal.

74% in Texas

[Spanky]

Originally posted by Bad_Rich_Chic
2.



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.

I am not using "social Darwinian" theories. Under the basic theory of evolution, mutations either die out or are successful. The mutations that are successful are the ones that help the carrier of that mutation carry on their genetic line. The mutations that do not help the carrier survive (or carry on their genetic line - survive until they can reproduce) dies out because the carrier dies. Every step in the evolutionary process is a mutation that has helped us survive. So absense some divine influence, our moral instincts are a mutation that has carried on because that mutation has helped us survive. Just like the mutation that created our eyes, opposable thumbs, and brain.

Originally posted by Bad_Rich_Chic 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?

The problem, like I pointed out with the father killing his step childre, is if people's morality is just based on self interest mutation then the argument of what is right and wrong breaks down to what helps us survive. If people have two conflicting instincts on what is moral how do you decide who is right? In different isolated societies people will develop different moral instincts (there will be different mutations) and some will help people survive better than others. They will also differ depending on different environmental factors. So people in warm climates will have different moral instincts than people in cold climates (just like they have different weather protectoin). If all we have is the theory of evolution, our moral instincts, are just mutations and we will never be able to agree on what is the right mutation.

Originally posted by Bad_Rich_Chic 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).

We will have to agree to disagree. Without a universal instinct for good that is not universally based, I do not believe mankind could ever agree on morality. The "good" instincts developed by evolution are just mutations that help us survive. They will not only be relative from society to society, but future mutations may be better. So if certain humans are born with a mutation that tells them to kill the weak and these humans reproduce more successfully than us, and take over the world who are we to criticize their morality, because it has helped them carry on their genetic line.

Originally posted by Bad_Rich_Chic 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.

Here I also think you are wrong. If I understand that my instincts are there just to help me survive, then cheating on my taxes, if I can get away with it is fine. If I know that no one will catch me, it increases the amount of resourcesw that I have, and it will not effect the society I live in (being one in two hundred million tax payers my step will be insignificant) then I should do it. If there is a universal moral code that says you should not cheat then no matter how it benefits me I should not do it. Period. Same thing goes for stealing or any other crime.

Originally posted by Bad_Rich_Chic (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.

So you find some money on the floor in your Gym. One instinct tells you to keep it, and another one tells you to turn it into the front desk in case someone claims it. Which one do you listen to? both instincts are there to help you survive. I believe one of the instincts comes from some place besides a mutation that helps you survive.

[ltl/fb]

Originally posted by Spanky
I don't think it has really changed. I think even in 100 A.D. people knew instinctively that slavery was wrong, but certain people benefited and therefor kept it going. During Roman times many philosophers suggested slavery was wrong. I think as time moves forward there is a slow progression towards changes in the law and human societies conforming more towards the code.

There was a lot of human history even before 0 A.D. If everyone knew slavery was so wrong, and this was some kind of universal principle, why the blanket statements in Leviticus?

I think you are just deeply, deeply anti-evolution or something, that we have all given you a bunch of different reasons other than "god gave humanity an immutable set of morals" for why/how people agree on general principles, and you reject all of them.

[ltl/fb]

Originally posted by Spanky
So you find some money on the floor in your Gym. One instinct tells you to keep it, and another one tells you to turn it into the front desk in case someone claims it. Which one do you listen to? both instincts are there to help you survive. I believe one of the instincts comes from some place besides a mutation that helps you survive.

The instinct to turn it in comes from a mutation that helps society as a whole survive.

[Spanky]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
I offered two in my initial response. Mill and Rawls.

Your problem is your comparing ideal compliance under religion with real-world compliance in any other system. Well, sorry, but it's not like the threat of hell seems to prevent half of catholics from using birth control and believing abortion should be legal. Just ask the priests themselves if there's universal adherence to their own church's morality.

1) I must have missed that. Have Mills or Rawls come up with a theory on the source of the moral code that we all assume exits.

2) I think the Catholic church is having trouble because they have issued religious decrees that are in conflict with the moral code and therefor people are instinctively ignoring the church, eventhoug being Catholic, they believe they are risking burning in hell.

[Spanky]

Originally posted by ltl/fb
There was a lot of human history even before 0 A.D. If everyone knew slavery was so wrong, and this was some kind of universal principle, why the blanket statements in Leviticus?

I think you are just deeply, deeply anti-evolution or something, that we have all given you a bunch of different reasons other than "god gave humanity an immutable set of morals" for why/how people agree on general principles, and you reject all of them.

I have no problem with the theory of evolution. I just don't think it explains the existence of a universal morality code. Besides that it seems to explain everything else.