Talk:Morality

Comments

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For the line "Morals are created by and define society, philosophy, religion, or individual conscience" isn't it saying that Morals are CREATED by and DEFINE society, philosophy, religion... where i think its supposed to say "Morals are created by and defined by society, philosophy, religion, or individual conscience" Somebody can change that if I'm right. -observed by some random guy, erase this after the change has been made, or decided that no change is needed.

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I fixed the "gods know what's best for us" statement by deleting it. Am considering changing the "moral core" bit to include some mention of maturity- think this would also fix the problem directly below, rather than changing the footnote?

I have heard the footnote at the end "Moral core" called by a different name: maturity.

Example: 'the god(s) know what's best for us' is using language to disparage the view, not objective in the least.

Some parts copied and adapted from Sexual morality because already clear enough in that article.

that article is one of many subtopics in morality that need to be written about.

24, my changes are not opposing what you had said, but adding instead some other notes, that I imagine can combine with your definition. You added the element of personality of the conduct, that is effectively correct on a "subjective" level (by which I mean, the matter regarded from the side of the individual). But I can see that the "social" relevance of this concept can be perhaps of more commonly known evidence.

very true. The classic argument about morality is whether it comes from inside or outside the person. The Greek word "mores" or "custom" clearly defines it as a matter of what you get *caught* doing.  ;-) But they were a *shame*-based culture, as the sociologists call it. We are *guilt*-based and expect inner decisions rather than external pressures to catch us before we do things we shouldn't.

This more properly should regard those cultures that admit the "original sin", therefore those cultures influenced by the Byble (or by other eventual religions containing similar beliefs). But, even in this case, the sense of guilt only regards the relationships with religion and can influence morality only when it is a religious morality: I can see no evident effect of the sense of guilt (and I live in one of those topic areas, as you can imagine) in a common concept of morality as the abstinence from theft, which should be valuable also in Gauguin's far islands.

Not being enforced by law, morality is always volountarily accepted by the individual, but it has to be proposed before. Admitting it is a personal acceptance of what even the same individual can impose himself, the point is whether a definition of morality necessarily regards the rules to apply in the relationships with others-from-yourself, widely intended, or we can admit it in an alone individual's self-sufficient determination.

there's more on this in some of the essays at meta

I can mainly read there a distinction from ethics focused on the derivative authority or etymology. This does not help on a definition. I evidently agree with those definitions by which morality is instrumentally what a common individual has at his disposal as a help for his decisions and as a parameter for evaluating other individuals' conduct.

Of course the personal aspect is very important and as you can see, nothing was deleted, I just added some points that perhaps you might develop :-) --Gianfranco

hard to know where. Some of what is written about morals is effectively about ethics, or etiquette, and I'd like to make that distinction clear. But Morality is contentious so I'd like to see this settle down first.

Well, as above, IMHO morality is often a pragmatical effect or evolution or application of ethics, which produce theoretical schemes. But not always a morality is backed by a complex phylosophical process, and basically it does not need it to exist: just to say one, religion is not (or not always) phylosophy, but it's evident there is a religious morality. And however a morality can be expressed even in the eventual ignorance of ethics: less instructed classes do have a morality, perhaps a spontaneous one. Etiquette regards the methods of relating with other individuals, not general goals, I'd say. --Gianfranco

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I've added a paragraph about evolutionary psychology, and another slightly rambling and speculative one following on from it, about octopuses. I think the octopus idea is highly relevant, but if the general opinion is that it is too diffuse, and not suitable for an encyclopaedia, then I have no problem with that second paragraph being condensed or removed. :-) GrahamN

the octopus example includes this phrase: "our revulsion for infanticide." The problem is, the example is comparing two species of animals, humans and octupuses. But the statement, "our revulsion for infanticide," is not true of all humans, it is likely culture-specific.

this fact does not invalidate the octopus example (not that I am so enamored of it), but it does reframe the issue. For certainly, our intelligence is closely connected with our being cultural animals, and creating different cultures. Thus, were one to suppose that octupuses had human-like intelligence, one might suppose that there would be different octopus cultures as well. And that would indeed play into discussions of morality.

That said, I am uncomfortable with comparing octopus intelligence and human intelligence -- as I would be comparing ant intelligence and human intelligence. Species survive because they are adapted to their niche. It is very difficult to compare adaptations then, because the niches are different. Surely human intelligence evolved as an adaptation to our niche. Since octopuses and ants evolved in other niches, it makes more sense to say that they have different kinds of intelligences. Slrubenstein

[Sorry about the curly apostrophes. I hadn't noticed that my word processor was doing that.]

I've never heard of a human culture that tolerated infanticide. However, I'm no anthropologist, and I may well be wrong, so I will remove the word. However, there is surely a core set of moral codes that are not culture-specific. I would be very surprised if there were any human cultures in which incest or rape were considered respectable.

In Ancient Egypt, pharoahs regularly used to marry their sisters. In Pakistan it is not infrequent for gang-rapes to be condoned or even encouraged to regain a community's honour. It may be illegal, but it is certainly acceptable to that part of the culture. "Honour killings" are another example where murder is considered to be acceptable. According to current wisdom, genocide was considered acceptable to the Nazis. You'd be surprised what has been considered to be morally justified by various cultures over the ages. AngryStan 03:33, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

Regarding to the above statement, the Spartans regulary practiced infantacide. As far as incest goes(and this, admittedly is dealt with in the appropriate article), it has long been my belief that this taboo has much to do with biological necessity.

Responding the above statement regarding Spartans 'practicing' infanticide. There is a fine line between that practice performed on one's own people, and those considered 'enemies'. Morality does not play a large part on this action to 'enemies'. Given an example, if a society condones infanticide (modern China, though not explicitly) due to varying degrees of necessity (arguably not biological), 'societal' morality can be considered; while the other society that commits infanticide through conquest (the Mongols) to prevent those conquered from reproducing as 'war' morality. I do not argue one is righteous to the next, but the conquest infanticide fits well into the kill/murder aspect of war. I hope we don't begin arguing semantics.

As to your point that human intelligence evolved as an adaptation to our niche, that is precisely the idea I was trying to explore. It seems probable to me that our morality has evolved along with our intelligence, to be very specifically suited to our biological make-up and to the kind of social animal that we have evolved to be. A hypothetical animal of equal intelligence but very different physiology and habits would surely have evolved a very different moral code. This notion might suggest that our concept of right and wrong are not universal absolutes, but are particular to the human species.

I take it that you think my idea does have some relevance in this article, so I will try to re-work the octopus paragraph to make its purpose clearer, and, if I can, to make it a little more concise, and to make its tone more neutral. GrahamN 19 July '02

I've just edited the octopus paragraph a bit, but I'm not happy with it. It is now even longer! I'd value any suggestions how it could be cut down. Maybe it would be a good idea to drop my super-octopus altogether and to stick with general terms? I'm quite fond of her, but I can see it might be for the best. :-( GrahamN 19 July '02

I have no strong objection to octopuses. I guess my larger point was this: IF you want to make claims about the intelligence of non-humans, THEN I believe octopuses, ants, pigeons, spiders, flatworms and human beings are all equally intelligent -- just intelligent in radically different and perhaps incomensurable ways.

As for culture and morality, there are many societies in which certain forms of infanticide is mandated. Whether you would consider this moral or not is another matter -- on other pages there have been recent debates over morality and cultural relativism; some people believe in a universal morality which leads them to condemn certain societies as immoral. My point is simply that there are some societies in which infanticide, at least under specific conditions, is considered not only permissible but necessary. The same is true by the way for rape. In some societies, the gang-rape of women is a socially legitimate punishment for certain crimes. Of course, we define rape as a crime, so perhaps in those societies we shouldn't call the practice rape -- call it what you will, it is the violent violation of a woman by several men.

Look at it this way: it may be true that all societies think of murder as wrong (I hesitate to say this only because it is an empirical question). Certainly, in U.S. society, people think that murder is wrong. Nevertheless, we have the death-penalty. People who support the death-penalty either do not think it is murder, or they think that it is murder that is somehow justifiable. And when the U.S. goes to war and bombs other people, many believe that is entirely justifiable.

So, is there a universal morality? What do you mean moral principles that all people SHOULD believe in, or moral principles that all people do in fact believe in? Some philosophers think there is a basis for making claims about the first kind of morality. But my sense is, if you mean the second kind (an empirical issue), there either is none, or it is so abstract (e.g. killing is wrong except when it isn't) as to be practically meaningless. Slrubenstein

I don't agree with everything you say, because since all humans have a common evolutionary ancestry, there is likely to be some common moral core, hard as it may be to define. However, your arguments are sufficiently convincing for me to delete Olivia the octopus from this article. I will miss her. I will think about her sometimes on lonely nights at home, and I hope you will too.  :-( GrahamN

I promise I will think of Olivia often. As for morality -- do not get me wrong; I would bet that in every society on earth people would agree that

killing = bad

I am just pointing out that in most societies not only do people violate this more, they also construe it so that various forms of killing are considered either justifiable or even good. And it is this fact that makes me dubious about universal mores. Perhaps the one thing we have in common, thanks to our evolution, is such plasticity in behavior, thought, and feeling -- far more plastic than even the sweetest of octupi -- that our overwhelms such quests as the attempt to define a single universal morality. Just a thought. Slrubenstein

I moved the moral back to a separate page, as it represents a separate (abit related) concept. All its changes were preserved. --Yurik 15:44, 20 Mar 2005 (UTC)

On the origin of morality

"While some philosophers, psychologists and evolutionary biologists hold that morality is a thin crust hiding egoism, amorality, and anti-social tendencies, others see morality as equally a product of evolutionary forces and as evidence for continuity with other group-living organisms."

Translation: "Some see morality as an excuse to practice evil and others see morality as a product of evolution."

Those are NOT the only two opinions about where morality comes from. A lot of people believe God has established laws for people to obey and a good encyclopedia should at least mention that. The "thin crust" may be a freudian slip for the thinly veiled weaseling of presenting two POVs to exclude the third.--The burning bush 22:07, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

which god? how many gods need to be included to satisfy a mystical sources category? Zombie81 05:27, 25 May 2007 (UTC)

There needs to be a good deal more in this article regarding the position by believers that religion is necessary to the existence of morality -- the notion that everyone would, by nature, behave in an "immoral" way if it weren't for prescriptive religion, that people aren't capable of ethical behavior with belief in God. There are loud arguments on both sides, naturally. . . . --Michael K. Smith (talk) 15:57, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

Philosophers (please see history)

I removed the portion "(although they [philosophers] often use both words [i.e. morals and ethics] interchangably)...yes, they did...but do we need the ambivalence? Reinsert if we do. --VKokielov 02:36, 25 Apr 2005 (UTC)

i HAD to get rid of a h (at the end of one of the headings with =='s on either side) it looked like this ==heading==h.

I have removed the main article, as it was considered nonsense, and no-one disagreed. Please do not attempt to recreate it, it will be considered vandalism. Thanks--131.111.8.96 14:02, 7 October 2005 (UTC)

Add a section about Nietzsche's view of morality. He offers a good arguement on the issue of morality in some of his works.

Proposed Merge from Moral Code

I put in a merge tag, because I think Moral Code would fit better as a subtopic here. --Michael 22:48, 31 October 2005 (UTC)

I'd second this, and suggest also including Public Morality 81.86.104.187 08:58, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

MERGED. I'm no mergist, but seriously this needed to be merged. We need less articles on Wikipedia that are more comprehensive... If someone thinks this was a mistake they are free to revert, but there's been no comments to the contrary in three months, that sounded like a call of action to me. - JustinWick 08:02, 31 January 2006 (UTC)

I was looking around for "public morals" and found "public morality" instead. Whatever you may decide on "public morality" as it stands, I need to find a place for a batch of material on the law relating to "public morals". If I put it into "public morality", this will potentially pre-empt the decision on the proposed merge, so I give you a few days to make a decision. David91 17:21, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

Proposed minor revision

Here is a minor suggested revised wording for Rational Morality:

ORIGINAL: Whereas "derived" morality may depend on religion or collective thought, rational morality is the idea of morality as innate or self-evident, based on reason. Thus morality is necessarily one of self-interest ...

REVISED: Whereas "derived" morality may depend on religion or collective thought, rational morality is the idea of morality as innate or self-evident, based on reason. Thus, rational morality is necessarily one of self-interest ...

Thank You, --EScribe 05:46, 11 November 2005 (UTC)

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Why did the following entry disappear within the last few days from the article? =

Rational Morality

Whereas "derived" morality may depend on religion or collective thought, rational morality is the idea of morality as innate or self-evident, based on reason. Thus rational morality is necessarily one of self-interest and looks at man's nature and the reason he needs values, then defines the virtues, known as a moral code, that must be practiced to reach those values. Morality is "rationally accepted" and chosen. Rational morality asserts that all other "views" of morality are subjective and require some sort of sacrifice, either to the supernatural (i.e., God) or the social collective, whereas proper morality is self-evident and in the interest of the individual's happiness. Thus rational morality is synonymous with individual rights.

Thankz 66.61.36.55 00:39, 26 January 2006 (UTC)

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Odd use of evolutionary critique

This passage makes a weird claim.

The evolutionary critique points to the radical ways which morality differs across times and cultures among human beings. Very few activities are always morally wrong across all human societies. For example, some groups still practice forms of infanticide, incest, and paederastry, activities that would be condemned harshly in most Western societies. It has been argued that morality is simply whatever norms are present within a given society at a given time.

It sounds like the POV being pushed is that there is no common standard of morality across different cultures. What is odd about this passage is that it is not looking for moral standards across most cultures; it is claiming that for something to be universal morality it has to be always condemned by all cultures . That's kind of an impossible standard. Most cultures think it's always wrong to slaughter large numbers of your tribal 'in-group', but the Mubutushuku tribe of the Momobotosoku region of Africa kills off 90% of their tribe annually, so I guess mass murder is just another subjective Western standard of morality. Let's see an authoritive (anthropology?) source for these "some people" who think morality is "simply whatever norms are present" Seriously. I weant to see a source for these some poeple. MPS 14:59, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

Ummm... For something to be a "universal" morality, it would have to be condemned by all cultures, by definition. The only one I've been able to think of is some variant of "keep your commitments."

Septegram 15:11, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

I also want to see some citation for your remark that "the Mubutushuku tribe of the Momobotosoku region of Africa kills off 90% of their tribe annually." First of all, that would result in a non-viable population in a matter of a few years--kill off 90% of the much larger planetary population at that rate, and in ten years you don't have a viable breeding population. Second, the only Google references I've found link here. Frankly, I don't believe you.

Septegram 15:18, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

I, too, would appreciate a citation for this remark. I don't see how such a society could survive more than a decade or two.

As a second point, I would like to point out that for something to be "universally wrong," it is not necessarily required that it be condemned by all cultures.

In fact, almost the reverse is true. To say that "for something to be 'universally wrong' it must be condemned by all cultures" is equivalent to saying "morality is determined by cultural acceptance", i.e. to support a morally relativist position, and to deny a morally universalist position. If something is 'universally' or 'fundamentally' wrong then it is wrong *regardless of* cultural acceptance or condemnation. If the existence of universal morality were to be accepted, it would be conceivable that something could be universally wrong if *no* cultures condemn it. As a trite example, if we accept for the sake of argument that "hacking into computer systems to cause damage is universally wrong" we can reflect that not one single person or culture in 1837 thought this.

If we do not equate "universally wrong" with "absolutely wrong", then a "universally wrong" act is just an act which is "relatively wrong for all cultures at a given point in time", and the qualifier "universal" has no sensible or useful meaning other than to reflect upon similarities between different cultures at a given point in time.

The fact that some individuals or culture do not accept particular moral codes is no evidence at all as to the existence or non-existence of "universal morality" - it could well be that there is just a minority or majority of "immoral people". This is indeed the problem with any concept of universal morality, it is (in my opinion) impossible to determine what such a code would actually be, therefore the concept is a singularly useless one regardless of whatever "truth" it might have. AngryStan 21:08, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

First, how are we defining "culture" anyway? Mightn't someone be able to make an argument that culture is a purely individual thing, and therefore a total consensus -- among every single person on the planet -- is required before anything can be called "universally wrong"? The fact that some people or some groups of people commit acts which are seen to be wrong and condemned by others is not necessarily evidence of the non-existence of a universal morality. It simply demonstrates that some people, for some reason, are choosing not to follow it in practice. Arguing this line is essentially saying that our criteria for moral judgments ought to follow after moral actions and not vice versa -- that is, "good" actions are whatever we choose to do and "bad" actions are whatever we choose not to do. Rather self-defeating, is it not? --Todeswalzer|Talk 02:05, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

Morality is not merely the sum of its parts, that is, its laws. It is any code at all which seeks to prevent someone from living in such a way as to act on every impulse he experiences. Laws against murder exist because people have been driven to murder. Laws against rape exist because people have been compelled to rape. etc.. Whether such activities are deemed immoral or not by a given society depends on whether they are problematic or not (murder is not problematic if the victim is being sacrificed to a god, rape is not problematic if said society's men are not threatened by women and do not care about their feelings, infanticide is not problematic if the baby is deformed and nobody cares about it, etc.) Evolution would actually render morality an obsolete and useless concept, as any intelligent evolutionist would be able to reason that any pang of conscience he feels at the thought of killing, stealing from, raping, or otherwise violating another human being is nothing but a meaningless electrical signal in his brain, to be dismissed as such. There would be no reason for him not to act on every impulse he feels except for fear of punishment, which is the only type of morality that would make sense to an evolutionist who is actually capable of deep thought. If there were no supreme law-giver (God), satisfying impulses would be the only sensible reason to continue living, any other reason would have to be an invention and could not apply to all of humanity. This problem is solved when the general public is either intellectually complacent (never questioning their priests in white lab coats or bothering to analyze the logic behind their own feelings) or if they truly believe that there is a supreme law-giver with the power to make their feelings viable as well as give instruction on how to find satisfaction in resisting certain impulses and being kind to others without benefitting oneself. Most societies today, particularly in overdeveloped nations, opt for the first solution.

Distinction between ethics and morality

I believe that there is a clear distinction between what is moral and what is ethical; the two may sometimes clash.

The Catholic Encyclopedia says this:

"Where morality is divorced from religion, reason will, it is true, enable a man to recognize to a large extent the ideal to which his nature points. But much will be wanting. He will disregard some of his most essential duties. He will, further, be destitute of the strong motives for obedience to the law afforded by the sense of obligation to God and the knowledge of the tremendous sanction attached to its neglect."

And also -

". . . Buddhism, explicitly taught the entire independence of the moral code from any belief in God. To these arguments we reply . . . that human reason proclaims the essential dependence of morality on religious belief."

One can, by example, precieve that the act of fornication is one of immorality since most religions hold it to be a sin yet logically, legally (in most countries), and biologically - thus ethically - it would be permissible because it carries no "tremendous sanction" against it.

There are many other examples of actions which are considered immoral but are not unethical and vise versa, e.g. slavery.

Perhaps the article should make that distinction clearer. GeeOh (talk) 09:03, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

Your quotations demonstrate the RCC viewpoint on Morality which could be added to this article's Morality#Religion as a source of moral authority or Morality#Religiosity and morality subsections. As for Ethics vs Morality, definitions other than the ones already cites are always good, in my opinion, as long as they are properly referenced. --Cubbi (talk) 15:16, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

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Should Anglo Saxons be allowed to muddle themselves up? Is this an ethical question or a moral question? Please see the German language entry for a useful distinction between ethics and morality.

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I agree.

This is ethics not morality:

Morality can also be seen as the collection of beliefs as to what constitutes a good life. Since throughout most of human history, religions have provided both visions and regulations for an ideal life

Obviously written by someone not objective enough. Emphasis on the religions part.

Regards, dcer

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I believe Aristotle would make a distinction between morality and ethics. Morality concerns guidelines for living a 'good' life. What will make one happy in the long run. It has no 'direct' concern with how one treats others. For example; reading, learning, brushing one's teeth, embracing the idea of delayed gratification are all behaviors that improve one's life but do not involve other people.

Ethics is the subject of acceptable behavior and interaction with other people and the world.

Paul

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Minor issue

Perhaps it would be more grammatically correct to change the title of the first section of the article (Evolution of Morality) to Development of Morality. A very small issue, but the term evolution should be limited to biology. Dilbert 00:06, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

I think we should be more specific when using the term "development" -- do we mean the progressive expression of moral traits over the course of human development from infant to child to adult or do we mean its evolutionary bases? I agree they're separate, but they shed light on each other and if we're going to have a section devoted to the ontogeny of morality, we should also have one devoted to its evolutionary history. --Prionesse 16:12, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

Minor quip; please take the word "goodness" out. There is no definition in the meaning of the statement "wholesome goodness". It is vague, subjective, and carries an unreasonable biased expectation of optimistic results. Maybe it is just me, but goodness is not a word. It conveys the apex of political correctness, of Orwellian(sp?) "new-speak", by being a word that cannot be defined other then; It means what ever the -lister- wants it to mean; with the -speaker- letting self-deception happen. Please take it out. 76.170.118.217 (talk) 10:50, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

Is prostitution Immoral?

I want a clear answer on this one.

144.132.1.37 11:10, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

I'd say "No," as long as all parties have given their informed consent. Others would say otherwise. Are you seriously looking for an absolute answer, applicable universally?

Septegram 15:09, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

There is no clear answer. Is it right to contribute to the suffering of the downtrodden? Is it right to contribute to the possible spread of disease? What effect do your actions have? To what extent are you personally responsible for things that are out of or only slightly in your control?

Those conditions can all exist in a marriage or any other human relationship that does not involve direct payment for sex. --Michael K. Smith (talk) 16:00, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

On the other hand, if we constructed a robot prostitute that had no feelings and was incapable of spreading disease or participating in any of the social ills associated with prostetution, would it be wrong to engage in the act? Of course not.

Sexual conduct in and of itself is a cultural and/or religious value judgement, not a question of morality. We only begin to discuss morality when we begin to discuss the ramifications of the act. These are seperate questions.

Yes, it is. Definately so. Provided you have 'morals' to begin with...

Yoda921 11:14, 31 December 2006 (UTC)Yoda

wow yoda, good job not backing up your opinion there with anything... why is it immoral?? assuming all sex is protected, and the prostitute is not beaten up or shit like that or exploited its completely moral... she wants money, some guy wants sex, they exchange, both agree to the arrangement... :O shit a brick! nothing immoral happened!

Described that way, it sounds positively Reaganite free-market! :-) --Michael K. Smith (talk) 16:00, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

This entire discussion, while valid, is misplaced. It has little to do with the article. You might want to take this to a sexuality- or philosophy-related web forum, or at the very least move it to an article that deals with prostitution and its implications. SpectrumDT (talk) 20:56, 3 January 2009 (UTC)

Reader Comment

At present this article reads like a survey rather than a clarification; or, to contrast it in another way, a summary of the academic views on Morality as opposed to the everyday view.

Perhaps a better way of presenting it would be to begin with the everyday understanding of morality. I'd suggest that (as a discussion point, not as a fixed idea) that Morality in the common Western understanding, has religious underpinnings: it implies (or has come to be understood as) what is 'universally supposed to be', or is declared by God or the gods. This, as opposed to what is legal, or has been declared by humans to be right or wrong; or what is "socially acceptable": defined by society to be correct or incorrect.

I agree with these last two sentences. I think regardless of all the philosophical discussions, when people talk about "morality" they mean it absolutely. We see this in common attempts to teach children "the difference between right and wrong", as if such a difference is fixed and obvious. This weird idea does indeed, I believe, come largely from religion.

I do not think, however, that other considerations should be excluded from the discussion of morality, as you appear to suggest below. Many investigations into morality arise as an attempt to describe how morals particular morals are formed (we may assume that they do not "come from God"), or to devise acceptable systems that may be used if a society accepts that some code of morality is necessary, which we may assume to be most of the time. I do not think it is improper to consider such things under the heading of "morality", since regardless of the origins, they deal with morality as it is practised. AngryStan 21:48, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

Philosophers and academics have tried to explore all these ideas, attempting to find a solid universal basis as well as boundaries for moral concepts. In doing so they have muddied the water, taking all of these into the general mix of "morality", indeed, groping into areas such as ethics, etiquette, and further afield into ideas about the good life.

Philosophers may have entered such areas in their discussions but it is confusing and perhaps even wrong to suggest that all of these ideas are really in the field of morality. The laws of physics play a role in biology but we would not suggest that biology is some sub-study of physics.

Put another way, the "common understanding" of a distinction between legality and morality is not necessarily a correct view and the academic view incorrect. But, for practical purposes--which is what an encyclopedia serves--it provides a clearer and more useful view...with academic views as an interesting but subordinate discussion....IMHO.--207.81.127.107 17:22, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

Small deletion

Paragraph "In any society, actual behavior patterns diverge.." deleted as not relevant to morals as construct/in definition. Whilst I like the first sentence I couldn't leave it standalone. The remainder, in my opinion, is of the class "this [subjectively classed] group of people (pundits) definitely do [semi-subjectively classed] action (pose politically)", which strikes me as unnecessary/POV. mr happyhour 18:10 04 AUG 06

Morality or Moral Relativism?

It seems as though most of the posters here are conflating or confusing morality with moral or cultural relativism.

Seems like an old discussion, but I'll respond anyway. To save time, upshot is that I think you are the one who is confused here.

Morality is the branch of philosophy that deals with that which is always right and wrong. This means that which is always right and wrong and has some level of universal acceptance even if not always adhered too. Murder was considered wrong even in Nazi Germany.

Incorrect. Stanford Encylopedia of Philosophy defines morality as as term that "can be used either (1) descriptively to refer to a code of conduct put forward by a society or, (a) some other group, such as a religion, or (b) accepted by an individual for her own behavior or (2) normatively to refer to a code of conduct that, given specified conditions, would be put forward by all rational persons". The idea that "morality is the branch of philosophy that deals with that which is always right and wrong" is simply incorrect, by any accepted standard.

The notion that morals change according to culture is simply a fallacy.

"Philosophy 101", as you mention below, should make it clear that the two main sides in the morality debate deal with absolutism (which you are describing) and relativism (which you are calling a fallacy), so it is hardly a "fallacy". Rather, it is a position you personally do not agree with.

Consider the following argument.

Back during the slave days, owning slaves was commonly accepted. Therefore, there was nothing immoral about owning slaves.

This is simple reduction to absurdity - so much for cultural norms. Those with background in logic should also spot the circular argument.

The argument is not circular. As per the definition (1) from the SEOP given to you above, if we define morality as the "code of conduct put forward by a society", then if something is commonly accepted, it is considered to be moral, or at least, not immoral. Therefore it is a syllogism of the form: 1. By definition, what is/was commonly accepted is/was not immoral. 2. Owning slaves was commonly accepted. 3. Therefore, owning slaves was not immoral. Classic example, nothing circular about it.

You can argue with the definition if you like, but you cannot reasonable argue the logic that flows from this definition. At least, nobody with "background in logic" would reasonably try to do so.

It is also wrong to conflate sexuality with morality.

Again, according to your personal definition. According to definition (1)(a) above, it may not be.

Unless we are talking about a violent act such as rape, morality as it refers to consensual sex between adults is a misnomer. Although it is common to use the term “morality” with regard to sex, it is simply a miss-use of the term. I have little doubt that this point is difficult to understand

because it's incorrect.

due to the wide acceptance of this error. Also, there can be numerous debates about the moral consequences of some sexual practices but these things must all be debated on there individual merit. Promiscuity in and of itself has nothing to do with morality.

Again, according to your personal definition.

It is also wrong to suggest that people acting in violation of a given religion are immoral and it is wrong to suggest that any actions sanctioned by religion are necessarily moral.

According to definition (1)(a) above, it isn't.

Consider the practice of “honor killing” in which a woman must be killed by her male relatives if she is perceived (regardless of fact) as committing a sexual indiscretion that brings shame on the family. The use of religion to justify the murder does not constitute a change in morality it only means that an attempt is made to justify the murder based on circular reasoning. i.e. It’s right because my book says so.

Which, as already explained, can be a basis for morality. It's not circular reasoning at all, you just don't agree with that particular basis. You are attempting to decry something you personally find distasteful on the incorrect grounds that it is "illogical".

A very different notion is one of “thou shall not murder.” This is not only a religious statement but a logically defendable one as well.

The existence of god is "logically defendable (sic)", just not defensible very well. Likewise for your statement, which is only logically defensible according to the truths which you accept as being self-evident.

Note that the commandment does not read “thou shall not kill.” That would be a very different and ethically problematic statement.

The bottom line is that morality is correctly defined separately from theology which is a different branch of philosophy.

Again, "correctly defined" if we accept your definition, which almost all philosophers do not. So this is not "the bottom line" at all.

Likewise, the term “morality” must not be improperly used with regard to sexual conduct.

Morality is the branch of philosophy that deals with that which is always right and wrong. This is the definition.

Incorrect, see a proper definition given to you above.

Really, this is all philosophy 101. Unless you have never taken it or have been de-educated by an imposter, this should all be quite basic.

In that case, I'd suggest taking a course a little more advanced than 101 for this level of discussion. AngryStan 20:52, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

Toems

Near the beginning of Morality#Morality in judicial systems, what does this mean? "it is not difficult toems" Art LaPella 17:18, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

Moral Logic

Some forms of morality can be deduced from the following statement, "Related subjects do not combine for the same reason that unrelated subjects do not separate." (I call it the Base Rule.) From this statement the incest taboo can be derived. Family members are, of course, related. Also, there is homosexuality which occurs from related genders and is widely considered to be immoral. Another example is cannibalism which is caused from related species. In each of these instances, related subjects are being combined when they were already combined in the first place. Without this logical statement morality is abstract. JHuber 07:47, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

No comment other than to say this is a pretty weird and seemingly nonsensical idea which I frankly cannot make head nor tail out of. AngryStan 21:50, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

Morality needen't be abstract: subjective morality is what most people mean when they talk about morality... the kind that people in funny clothes who use old books allegedly imbued with supernatural significance tend to go on about; objective morality is where you define morality and its component parts in terms of logic and reason and in context. As living organisms we are defined by the chemical self-replicating system that our genetic programming is determined by; in this context we can define "good" as all behaviours that perpetuate the system we call life, and "bad" as all those that are in conflict with the system: malfunctions, if you will.

This is defining morality in terms of adaptivity and maladaptivity at a fundamental level. Inclusive fitness as a mechanism for a more complex moral system comes about when we form groups: Groupism or Group-forming being a subsidiary genetic programming (or instinct) in support of the primary genetic programming of survival. We can then, in this context, define immorality in terms of damage to the Group: to inclusive fitness. (I call this the "This is my idea, I thought of it first, aren't I clever" Rule.)

The problem with supposedly abstract topics like this, is that they are not abstract at all; they just seem to attract abstract people who seem drawn to opportunity to define an objective concept in subjective terms.

You may well be able to argue successfully that incest, cannibalism, homosexuality are immoral, but you have to first establish whether you're using an objective or subjective system of morality.

Whether things are related or not is down to the rules of your morality; but if you're aiming for a logical morality (as opposed to "moral logic"), you have to be a bit more sophisticated than just using a blanket semantic formula like that.

You've got a very selective related-biology idea there, which doesn't stand up when you test it: related species like dogs and wolves? related people like second cousins?

Shut up.

It takes one to know one 14:27, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

Proposal about genetic altruism

Social primates - especially chimpanzee show altruism in a sense that "I will scratch your back if you scratch mine". It speculates about an altruistic gene that is needed in a social population.

If for example anarchy will develop in a country because of poverty, then both poor and rich individuals get a increased risk in being injured. That outcome is bad for all parties. Hence it is in everybodies interest to have a good social security.

If we look in the human population. We as population set up rules together that is benificiant for the population. Some individuals break against our common rules even that there lives are not at risk, Why?

Just some thoughts

--Msitua 09:37, 2 December 2006 (UTC)

You should note that wikipedia is not for original research or ideas. Is there a published source (e.g. in a journal) for what you describe? Notinasnaid 10:06, 2 December 2006 (UTC)

There are actually a number of thinkers espousing the view that morality is at least partly the product of our evolutionary development. I can think of at least three different authors which have recently written books devoted partly or entirely to this idea: Michael Shermer (in The Science of Good and Evil), Marc Hauser (in Moral Minds) and Richard Dawkins (in The Selfish Gene and The God Delusion). This article might be very much improved if their work could be incorporated here. --Todeswalzer|Talk 03:14, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

It is already there a bit in the development of morality section. Imagine coudl be better covered, or worse EverSince 00:42, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

p.s. there is an Ethics and evolutionary psychology page which had quite strange content but I've recently rejigged so it could start to serve as an expansion of a section on this page. EverSince 11:33, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

Moral Core

DELETE!

Don't like this term.

Sounds American.

Not sourced.

That whole section sounds like a patronising and subjective lecture bundling together ideas of preference, such as "Maturity". ("Moral core" sounds like a constant; "maturity" a variable). It takes one to know one 14:34, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

This section strikes me as surprisingly involved. Perhaps it would be better if it were less biased. 155.212.104.246 C. Ignatius

Sounds American? What kind of exception is that? Is there some wiki policy against being an American? Why should we have to put up with your POV against America?

Why does this article have so much material on evolution and sociology -topics which have nothing to do with morality?

If this article were going to actually be on morality we should remove all the sociology and evolution nonsense and keep the moral core section. There's no wiki policy protecting rants against morality. --The burning bush 20:49, 4 May 2007 (UTC)

"Remove all the sociology and evolution nonsense..."

I judge that by your verbatim you lend yourself to the reason why sounding a American is to be frowned upon.

Make your point. Don't just remark that something is nonsense. --79.64.19.54 (talk) 00:52, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

Revert in the section about Religion and morality

ThAtSo, you just reverted my reorganization of the section on "Religion and morality" alleging that it introduced POV. But, were exactly is the POV? Is there anything in the reverted version not justified by the references? That edit required a lot of work, since the modifications involved careful evaluation of what each source had to say. Meanwhile, the version of the text you seem to favor discuss one of the studies in much more detail than the others, and leaves at least one study without any mention, even though it is referenced (that is, the version you reverted to has problems with undue weight). I'd say your reversion introduced POV. --Leinad ∴ -diz aí. 04:45, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

When you made the changes that I was forced to revert, you said that you were just 'reorganizing the "religion and morality" section to improve the flow and to show more precisely the findings of each study', but now you're saying that your version is more neutral. Looks like you were less than candid the first time around, which is unfortunate and certainly undermines your credibility. At this point, since you've revealed that your goal is to adjust perceived neutrality issues, it's up to you to justify this adjustment. If you want to argue that another relevant study should be added, I won't complain, but I'm a lot more skeptical of your attempt to rearrange all the sentences to tell a misleading story. ThAtSo 00:32, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

My summary was and still is perfectly adequate. I carefully read all the referenced studies I could access with the goal of showing more precisely their findings, and I think I succeeded in doing so. If a more accurate description of the sources seems to have changed the balance of the text, it can only mean that the old version you reverted to is POV. This is why I said above: "I'd say your reversion introduced POV".

Even though you don't seem to believe in my good intentions, I am very interested in having a good NPOV text in the section. I already gave some reasons why I think my version is superior. Now, I'd like to ask again what exactly you feel is POV about my version. The concrete reasons why you believe my edits tell a misleading story. More precisely, I'd like you to show me were my text misrepresents the sources provided. (According to what I know about WP policy, what the sources say is the prime criteria to access bias.) I am providing a copy of the text reverted bellow so you can point were the potential bias is. --Leinad ∴ -diz aí. 17:01, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

---

Religion and morality

In the scientific literature, the degree of religiosity is generally found to be associated with higher ethical attitudes. Modern research in criminology also acknowledges an inverse relationship between religion and crime, with many studies establishing this beneficial connection (though some claim it is a modest one). Indeed, a meta-analysis of 60 studies on religion and crime concluded, “religious behaviors and beliefs exert a moderate deterrent effect on individuals’ criminal behavior”. Apart from this general trend, one study found that nations in which the population show strong belief in the devil and in hell have higher rates of homicide than countries with either more secular populations, or with populations that believe in God and heaven but not in its malevolent counterparts. Research also seem to show positive links in the relationship between religiosity and moral behavior on topics other than crime. There are, for example, surveys suggesting a positive connection between faith and altruism, and data suggesting that growth in the importance of religion in adolescents' lives is consistently related to better family relations. Although a recent paper argues for a positive correlation between the degree of public religiosity of a country and certain measures of dysfunction, the methodology of the study has been criticized and an analysis published later contends that a number of problems disavow any findings or conclusions to be taken from the research.

---

It's been half a month since my last post here... May I assume that there is no further objections to the text above? I intend to reintroduce it in the article. --Leinad ∴ -diz aí. 18:19, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

Quite the contrary, it's been weeks and nobody's shown the slightest bit of support for your version, which is sure to be reverted if you try to stick it in the article. ThAtSo 02:36, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

You should at least point what is wrong with the version above. You are the only one complaining about it. It's weird that you seem to be ready to start a revert war over the edit, but doesn't even care to objectively evaluate the text (even though I asked you to do so many times). --Leinad ∴ -diz aí. 16:38, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

As I explained already, your entire effort is flawed from the start because you're just adding bias to overcome perceived bias. ThAtSo 16:48, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

Voice Issue?

In the introductory paragraph, whoever wrote it uses the word "I", and not in quotes. I'm not sure if there are any rules about this but I wanted to ask if this possibly presented a voice issue --encyclopedia's probably shouldn't be in first person-- before I fixed it. Henry Corvel 23:50, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

Morality (ethics) vs. Moralism

Is there any significant reason why the term "morality" differs substantially from the term "ethics"? Aren't they both just 2 different words for normative values, that is, ways to determine what's right/good from what's wrong/bad? If so, I propose that the article for "morality" be merged with the one for "ethics", and that "moralism" and/or "moralist" have their own articles, since these 2 terms (moralist & moralism) denote more of the arbitrary, petty, and oppressive qualities associated with taboo-enforcers and other force initiators than the term "morality" itself does, which I think most people just equate with "knowing right from wrong", which is more properly (and neutrally) covered by "ethics". Shanoman 17:26, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

The philosophical; distinction between the morality and ethics is usualyy that morality is a reflection of people's actual thoughts about ethics, and ethics is the study of what peope shou8ld think about ethics. These are important differences. Moralism is different again. Those who accept common sense morality often frown on moralism. It is a rather unpleasant attitude, and I suspect (violating NPOV!) that most ethicists would feel like punching anyone who accused them of being moralistic! Anarchia 01:10, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Latin etymology

The word in the opening sentence ought to be mos, mores. Jorgath (talk) 20:13, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Great article with lots of information to be included

The New York Times has a great article on scientific investigations into morality that I think could be incorporated into the article [1]. Remember (talk) 16:42, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

Morality is a learning process

Public Morality is education.

If we teach more people about virtues and it's positive meaning, it will contribute to public morality. Morality is goodness, in ordered to understand goodness better must we study virtues.

Sincerly, Phalanx Pursos —Preceding comment was added at 00:04, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

This page is diabolical

So I changed it towards the better.

With all the morality that I have studied in my life, was I totally dissapointed about the misinformation which has been posted on this page. You people explain everything about morality except the fact what it really is, accept the fact that you know nothing about it. Public morality died 1500 years ago, most flawed statements prove this time and time again.

Phalanx Pursos 06:47, 25 August 2008 (UTC)

possible logical flaw

"The subjectiveness of morality is shown by the observation that actions or beliefs which by themselves do not cause any harm may be by some considered immoral"

it is true that one may observe that some others consider an action or belief immoral while at the same time observing that that action or belief causes no harm. Why does this imply subjectivity? It may be that your observations of harm has nothing to do with whatever objective measuring stick is used but the moralists.

If however, you mean to imply that the act of causing harm itself is a measure of subjectiveness, then morality is objective by your standards - it is whether or not you cause harm to others.

This renders this statement logically flawed, contradictory, naive, and combined with the politically charged gay marriage example, brings to question the matter of the writers bias. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.229.71.216 (talk) 16:48, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

Moral Realism in the introduction

This sentence in the introduction: "Moral realism would hold that there are true moral statements which report objective moral facts, whereas moral anti-realism would hold that morality is derived from any one of the norms prevalent in society (cultural relativism); the edicts of a god (divine command theory); is merely an expression of the speakers' sentiments (emotivism); an implied imperative (prescriptive); falsely presupposes that there are objective moral facts (error theory). "

Is pretty unclear. The best I can break it down is:

"moral anti-realism would hold that morality is derived from any one of the norms prevalent in society (cultural relativism) (Other stuff). And Moral anti-realism falsely presupposes that there are objective moral facts (error theory). "

Seems like "falsely presupposes" violates some kind of fair and neutral rule.

Am I just reading this sentence wrong? Is it trying to say that anti-realism holds that morality is derived from a false presuppositions that there are objective moral facts? If that's the case, it seems like that is redundant with the examples already listed.

Should the sentence read: "moral anti-realism would hold that morality falsely presupposes that there are objective moral facts (error theory) and is derived from any one of the norms prevalent in society (cultural relativism); the edicts of a god (divine command theory); is merely an expression of the speakers' sentiments (emotivism); or is an implied imperative (prescriptive);"??

I'd change it if I knew what the sentence was actually trying to say. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Ecnassianer (talk • contribs) 23:01, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

Did the pedestrian die?

This section is pretty suspcious: the article it points to seems nothing more than a bunch of ludicrous cultural stereotypes (e.g. it asserts that the French subject turned traitor very quickly, needing only to be plied with cigarettes). The discussion page of that article raises these concerns but I can see none here, can someone who knows anything at all about the book verify that it exists, is relevant to what is being asserted here, and that the whole thing isn't just a joke? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.27.182.72 (talk) 10:36, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

notes on categorization

I place the category "Concepts in Religious Metaphysics" and "Pseudo-Information Science," because the religious metaphysics doesn't utilize a developed methodology, hence the theories are not real (meaning it is implausible to occur or even perform a computerized simulation). Note that Philosophy isn't psuedoscience because they have an established method that is well develop through phenomenology / contemporary philosophy (aka philosophical method based on intuition, gut feeling, perspective, insight...etc psychological phenomenon (but regardless in partial some phenomenon are provable through neuroscience).

So please present some firm mediums such as books and research rather than blatantly presenting controversial topics (e.g. creationism vs evolution).

If you are interested in Religious Studies, I suggest trying to present a possible clear studies on how the religious concepts maybe evolved in different religion to present a clearer picture of Notion. Thanks for your time in reading this --75.154.186.99 (talk) 01:45, 24 December 2009 (UTC)