Conscience or superego?

I believe we are swayed considerably by environmental facters, but, at least in my case, my core sense of morality was always the same, as far back as I recall. I may have strayed, temporarily, but always came back within the boundary.

Any ideas about the origin of the 'core sense of morality'?

[Any ideas about the origin of the 'core sense of morality'?

IFF, That's the reason so many soldiers come back with posttraumatic stress disorder, a mental illness that strikes more than a third of the soldiers exposed to war.

What are the evolutionary advantages to the conscience? It's a fundamental ingredient in civilized society. Without any conscience we would only fend for ourselves and not worry about the group as a whole.

Sociopaths lack empathy (as well as some other crucial traits), but they can manage fine in our modern society. Some even shoot straight to the top, with many other people being sacrificed along the way. But if no one had any empathy or any for of conscience, our entire society would fall apart.

One might say the conscience is part of the ego, the survival instinct. Without our group we would not survive.

I am, of course, oversimplifying a lot.

Morality can't be innate. If it were, there would presumably be no variations in ethical beliefs across cultures, whereas we know for a fact that there are significant differences. And no one yet has discovered a "morality gene" in humans.

That is not to say, however, that morality cannot be objective.

Innate behaviour



Innate Behavior refers to the actions of an animal, or human, that aren't quite described in genes, but they are expressed without prior experience through watching another individual. They are the responses, to a stimulus, that are quickly figured out through an attempt. Since nerves and pathways in the brain are connected through certain regions, then a response which stimulates the area of the original stimulus (desire) through another body region or organ, will be remembered. The Innate behavior is the use of these connected areas to solve the stimulus response problem. Taste or smell can stimulate hunger. These areas are connected in that eating, causing tasting, together solve the hunger issue. Since just smelling a food causes more hunger, the next closest cause of hunger is probably the pathway to the fix.