cicerone imposter wrote:Coolwhip: A child would be severely socially handicapped if it grew up without it's parents. It needs to follow an example. A dog, however, does not have an innate conscience, and would not develop one no matter how hard you tried.
Wrong! A dog has been known to save a baby/tolder from danger or its owner from an burning house.
Are you serious? That just proves that dogs are smart enough to realize that they get food if they protect humans.
(Or maybe a dog was a bad example, take a cat than. Replace the word "dog" with "cat")
joefromchicago wrote: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.
That's an illogical conclusion. There are lots of innate features of humans that appear with variations across cultures. Our bodies, minds, emotions, collective memories, and morality are affected by cultural and environmental factors.
Quote:And no one yet has discovered a "morality gene" in humans.
Noone has discovered a love gene, or a happiness gene, or jealousy gene either, yet these seem to be innate human traits that span all cultures.
Quote:That is not to say, however, that morality cannot be objective.
That is another can of worms.
Coolwhip wrote:Well, the "happy" gene is also yet to be discovered. Lack of knowledge proves nothing.
What I am talking about is the ability to acquire a sense of moral and/or conscience. Moral is an innate behavior.
The
ability to acquire a sense of morality isn't the same thing as morality, any more than the ability to ride a bicycle is the same thing as riding a bicycle. Just because we may all have an innate ability to act morally doesn't mean that we are innately moral.
Coolwhip wrote:My point being that moral can be innate and still present itself with great variation from culture to culture.
What exactly would it mean for someone to have "innate morality?" Does that mean that everyone has the same morality, or does that mean that everyone has the same
capacity for morality?
IFeelFree wrote:That's an illogical conclusion. There are lots of innate features of humans that appear with variations across cultures. Our bodies, minds, emotions, collective memories, and morality are affected by cultural and environmental factors.
If some human trait varies across cultures, then that's pretty solid evidence that the trait is culturally determined and not innate. The most we can say is that humans have the innate
capacity to act morally, just as humans have the innate capacity for language. Languages vary across cultures just as ethical practices do. But the capacity for language isn't the same thing as language, and the capacity to act morally isn't the same thing as morality. Humans are no more imbued with morality than they are imbued with language.
joefromchicago wrote:IFeelFree wrote:That's an illogical conclusion. There are lots of innate features of humans that appear with variations across cultures. Our bodies, minds, emotions, collective memories, and morality are affected by cultural and environmental factors.
If some innate human trait varies across cultures, then that's pretty solid evidence that the trait is culturally determined. The most we can say is that humans have the innate
capacity to act morally, just as humans have the innate capacity for language. Languages vary across cultures just as ethical practices do. But the capacity for language isn't the same thing as language, and the capacity to act morally isn't the same thing as morality. Humans are no more imbued with morality than they are imbued with language.
What about nurturing behavior?
neologist wrote:What about nurturing behavior?
Is it innate? I don't know. I imagine that there are some aspects of it that are culturally determined. But I'm not an anthropologist, so I'll just stick with talking about morality for the time being.
joefromchicago wrote:neologist wrote:What about nurturing behavior?
Is it innate? I don't know. I imagine that there are some aspects of it that are culturally determined. But I'm not an anthropologist, so I'll just stick with talking about morality for the time being.
Would it ever be immoral for a mother to ignore the needs of her infant while she tends to her personal desires?
joefromchicago wrote:neologist wrote:Would it ever be immoral for a mother to ignore the needs of her infant while she tends to her personal desires?
Ever? I'm sure it would.
Then is the nurturing behavior a matter of conscience or not?
You probably know why I am asking this. But I really do consider all answers. Or, nearly all.
joefromchicago wrote:IFeelFree wrote:That's an illogical conclusion. There are lots of innate features of humans that appear with variations across cultures. Our bodies, minds, emotions, collective memories, and morality are affected by cultural and environmental factors.
If some human trait varies across cultures, then that's pretty solid evidence that the trait is culturally determined and not innate. The most we can say is that humans have the innate
capacity to act morally, just as humans have the innate capacity for language. Languages vary across cultures just as ethical practices do. But the capacity for language isn't the same thing as language, and the capacity to act morally isn't the same thing as morality. Humans are no more imbued with morality than they are imbued with language.
I see your distinction between morality and the capacity for morality, but I'm still not sure I completely agree. It appears as if there are certain moral values that are common to all human cultures, and so are innate -- responsibility, respect, honesty, selflessness, sacrifice, etc. -- even though codes of behavior vary culturally. Also, there is the notion of a conscience, or the impulse toward the morally that right appears to be innate, even though specific moral actions vary culturally. I suppose that is what you mean as "the capacity for morality". Perhaps we're saying the same thing in different ways?
IFF, Not true; that's the reason why some humans practiced cannibalism. The Donner Party also practiced cannibalism.
neologist wrote:joefromchicago wrote:neologist wrote:Would it ever be immoral for a mother to ignore the needs of her infant while she tends to her personal desires?
Ever? I'm sure it would.
Then is the nurturing behavior a matter of conscience or not?
A matter of conscience? I don't know what you mean by that. If you mean that the mother's failure to nurture her infant might, in some circumstances, be immoral, I'd agree. If you mean, on the other hand, that the mother's failure to nurture her infant demonstrates that nurturing is
innately moral, I'd have to disagree (actually, I'd have to wonder why you even asked, since the
failure to nurture would seem to demonstrate that it is
not innately moral).
neologist wrote:You probably know why I am asking this.
Nope. I have no idea.
Neo holds that morality is an innate human characteristic--this discussion is headed in the same direction as the Genesis discussion in the other thread.
IFeelFree wrote:I see your distinction between morality and the capacity for morality, but I'm still not sure I completely agree. It appears as if there are certain moral values that are common to all human cultures, and so are innate -- responsibility, respect, honesty, selflessness, sacrifice, etc. -- even though codes of behavior vary culturally.
Those common moral values are not really all that common. For instance, one culture might show respect for its elders by worshipping them after they die, while another migh show respect for its elders by eating them after they die. The fact that we call both acts "respect" has more to do with the way we think in terms of analogies than with the innateness of "respect."
IFeelFree wrote:Also, there is the notion of a conscience, or the impulse toward the morally that right appears to be innate, even though specific moral actions vary culturally. I suppose that is what you mean as "the capacity for morality". Perhaps we're saying the same thing in different ways?
The "impulse to do right" is a pretty barren concept if no one is actually acting on that impulse. And if the actions that are impelled by various consciences differ across cultures, then I'm not sure how we can say that those consciences have the same
idea of what is right or wrong.
Some societies have turned their elderly out in the winter to die, and therefore to assure the food supply for the younger, healthier members of the band. "Selflessness" is not necessarily at all evident across cultures, and in many cultures, such a notion would be laughed to scorn. In pre-modern Japanese society, talking about "selflessness" would have gotten you a blank stare. Everything that people did had a selfish end, and this was considered laudable. The "ronin" of the Bushi class whose clan leadership had been exterminated might become a bandit, and take his chances, because his own survival, followed by that of his immediate dependent family were paramount. He would seek to serve another Daimyo, if he survived the rigors of brigandage, because of the benefits which would accrue. If his Daimyo, or even an agent of the Diamyo, a Hatamoto, ordered him to commit seppuku, he would do so, because to obey assured the survival of his immediate dependent family. That was not an act of selflessness, however, it was simply pragmatism--had he refused to commit seppuku, he'd have been executed out of hand. It would only be by an excruciating stretching and twisting of definitions, and an inappropriate application of the cultural values of the Christian West that anyone would be able to allege that pre-modern Japanese society valued selflessness.
If you completely deny any inherent ability to have a conscience, than you fail to explain how it first came to be.
Coolwhip wrote:If you completely deny any inherent ability to have a conscience, than you fail to explain how it first came to be.
Psychoanalytic theory would suggest that the superego is unformed at birth and develops with the growth of the ego by incorporating the ethical precepts of the parents or parent figures.
