Do we need a universal standard of morality?

[Mutian]

I myself have been perplexed by this question for a long time. I appreciate Kant's deontological way of thinking, meanwhile agree in part with John Stuart Mill's utilitarian way of calculating ends. Do we really need a universal moral law?

I am here to beseech your insights.

[nameless]

There is no possibility of any such thing as a universal morality (unless in your own private universe).
I have no morality, generally, must I accept your notions of morality?
Besides, religion says that morality is a sin! Gonna get everyone to relinquish their cherished beliefs? Unlikely.
If you wish to push your own notions of morality onto others you will meet resistance. Ultimately, if you pursue such a vain path, death. History stands as evidence.
Everyone is unique.

[parker pyne]

I honestly think we already do, regulated by intersubjectivity. Fuzzily, without getting into the specifics, it seems like First and Second world nations already agree that harm is wrong and should be avoided. The Third world may still be struggling with survival and harm may be a necessity.

But to understand why I think this, I must expand a bit. For those who have time to kill:





My propositions:

1. Morality is a form of judgment.
2. There are two sources of morality: internal and external.
3. Internal morality arises from instincts, conscience, pain, and empathy.
4. External morality is given by doctrines, either religious, legal, or authoratively imposed. External morality is based on collective internal moralities.
5. Internal morality gives direction; external morality gives restriction.

1. Morality only exists in the abstract realm.
2. Abstractions must originate from a physical reality in order to make sense. Conceptual existence is founded upon physical existence.*
3. Through experience humans have discovered that two factors trigger emotional pain: harm and injustice.
4. Just like emotions, instincts are simply universal intuitions. Therefore, morality is a universal intuition.
5. Universal meaning "regardless of culture" - then the general proposition "harm and injustice is bad" has transformed from an a posteriori truth to an a priori truth.
6. Consider this declaration: "murder is wrong". Since the word "murder" does not necessarily contain the quality of "wrongness", then we can say that this declaration is synthetical.
7. Kant declared synthetical apriori truths to be principals: principals necessarily exist.
8. a posteriori morality are situational factors which have the ability to compromise one's instincts. ie, the harmful use of lab rats in the search for a cure for a disease. This occurs when the ends seemingly justify the means.

1. Empathy, or the ability to feel another's pain, is the prime mechanism for the extension of morality into the social realm. Because we understand that harm is bad for us, then via empathy, we understand that harm is bad for other people.
2. Physical pain naturally presupposes emotional pain; this is an evolutionary advantage. However, if physical pain is present without emotional pain, then that means the harm is consensual.
3. Consent negates immorality.
4. Examples of consensual harm include euthanasia and sadomasochism.

1. Okay back to this: Morality is a form of judgment.
2. A judgment is the act of one person imposing their instincts on another person.
3. A judgment of right or wrong be done in two ways: by judging a person's intentions, or by judging the consequences their actions have caused (intentionality vs consequentialism).
4. Intentions are important when judging right or wrong. If a dog kicks over a candle and burns a house down, it is absurd to call the dog immoral.
5. Consequences determine the morality of a situation. eg. I accidentally skin my friend alive. Accidentally. No malice aforethought. I had no intention to, but it happened anyway. However, even though I am not an immoral person, the consequences were immoral, therefore the situation was immoral.
6. But, considering intentions are useful in terms of trial and punishment. Person A and Person B both commit a horrendous act - person A had no malice aforethought, therefore s/he recieves a lighter jail sentence.
7. It's the same in cases of self-defence. Self-defense is a legitimate defence in court and may acquit you from incarceration.

1. Jonathon Haidt first proposed the five facets of morality: Care/harm, fairness, loyalty, authority, purity. To read more on each, clickity click.
2. I see care/harm and fairness as the crux of all morality, while loyalty and authority are only moral in a "gulit by association" type relationship. i.e. being unloyal or disobeying authority may lead to harm or unfairness.
3. Purity deals with the aversion of contaminants. There is a biological advantage to avoiding unpure objects. Unpure objects are things which have the ability to cause harm (this again shows that harm/care is the crux of morality. All the other facets refer back to it).
4. We've talked about unpure objects, but what about unpure thoughts? These also have a guilt-by-association relationship. They also have the ability to incite actions which may cause harm.
5. Disgust with sex originated in the ease in which disease may spread through sexual intimacy. But sex in itself is not inherently immoral. Think of this: If one dog has rabies, public fear may arise and people might start to avoid dogs. However, dogs in themselves are not inherently bad.

CONCERNING THINGS BEYOND THE MORAL REALM

1. Amoral actions are those that do not directly pertain to moral judgments.
2. Examples include, but not restricted to: washing the dishes, feeding the dog, crossing the road.
3. These are amoral because the subject possesses neither malicious nor benevolent intent, and their actions do not produce a "right" or "wrong" consequence.
4. Sociopaths lack judgment, because they lack a conscience and empathy (both being the primary sources of morality). Their intentions fall into the amoral realm. Sociopaths are amoral people. However, they themselves are necessarily attached to the moral realm, because their actions may have harmful effects and are not immune from moral judgment.

* However, they might branch off to become purely a priori, meaning they do not relate to tangible reality in any way (an example of this would be maths).

[Joe]

Imp not sure if this makes any sense, but, shouldn’t that be a automatic yes, since we communicate with each other? And since EVERYONE has a moral code, whatever that may be, then it would seem natural that we adapt to each others morals, through individual interactions. But then again, shouldn’t "need" and "Universal standard" be a huge conflict for comparison in a society of individual perception? At least when strung together?

[Mutian]

Wow, I am surprised by this semi-essay~ Your notion about the first, second and third world morality is very interesting and right in part.

If I understood right, were you talking about the transformation from the internal sanction to the external one? More specifically, at the outset, morality is oriented by individual intuitions to which we call the internal sanction; as civilization moves on, the role of empathy augments which transforms the sort of intuition to those external laws (religion, constitution... etc). This is also the reason why you claimed that external morality is based on collective moralities. Am I right so far? Please correct if it not be so.

I agree with most of your ideas if I have understood right. What I could not agree is that, I think, even those third countries reach the first-country-standard economically can't and shouldn't they share the same moral law, for what is accepted or welcomed in the U.S. might not be upheld in China such as freedom of choice in marriage, given that the real conception of freedom of choice has been warped and degenerated into irresponsibility in the U.S.. I will give you an example for the sake of clarity.

In my political science class, we had a discussion regarding the topic of teenage mother in the U.S. which has become a prevalent phenomenon. I totally criticize such a behavior of irresponsibility and immaturity, meanwhile most of my American classmates believe that teenage mothers are the hallmark of their freedom of choice to which they are highly proud of. To the contrary, in China, we see teenage mother as something that should never happen, for a pregnant girl would bring insult, extra burden, and bad reputation upon herself (since she is too casual about sexual intercourse without having enough knowledge of contraception.) and her family. Most importantly, she is too casual about and irresponsible for her fidelity and purity which should have been cared about with full attention and seriousness. So, do you think it would be appropriate for Chinese people to apply the same attitude adopted by my American classmates in China?

Laws are like organs on a person's face, Brad Peter's eyes might be attractive, but it does not follow that Peter's eyes will continue to be attrative on Tiger Woods' face. A beautiful woman is charming because the eyes, nose, ears of her are suitable for her, and only for her; not because her nose is Jessica Alba's, her eyes are Queen Diana's. We all know the aphorism that, "one man's meal is another man's poison." Thus, my conclusion is that, moral laws of different cultures can, to a great extent, resemble each other without being totally the same or being universalized, for such universalization may backfire.

I am looking forward to hearing your judgments.

---------- Post added at 08:51 AM ---------- Previous post was at 08:31 AM ----------

---------- Post added at 08:57 AM ---------- Previous post was at 08:31 AM ----------

Originally Posted by Joe

Imp not sure if this makes any sense, but, shouldn’t that be a automatic yes, since we communicate with each other? And since EVERYONE has a moral code, whatever that may be, then it would seem natural that we adapt to each others morals, through individual interactions. But then again, shouldn’t "need" and "Universal standard" be a huge conflict for comparison in a society of individual perception? At least when strung together?

Hi friend,

I highly appreciate your aspiration for a cosmopolitan world. And I am not qualified for judging your lofty aspiration. But, my question is whether such adaption of different habits and customs is absolutely justified, for it is the fact that what I deem as moral and right might be wrong and immoral for you. Therefore, blind adaptions of such controversial ideologies will backfire the good will of making a cosmopolitan world.

[mister kitten]

I don't think we need a universal standard of morality. Morals come from one's own judgement. Hmm, but not all people can judge sanely. Let me take back my proposal. This is a very good question, I'll have to think on it more.

[richrf]

Hi,

The way I view it is that morality is a set of standards and expectations that a given community agrees to in order to try reduce the amount of aggravation and grief a person might encounter within the community - e.g. no killing of each other allowed, no cheating on your spouse, etc.

Now, these standards and expectations vary from community to community depending upon what the community's objectives. For example, different religious groups may have different morals because their circumstances are different.

Most of the moral standards are instantiate by law or religious doctrine. Often they are enforced via coercion (e.g. police) or fear (e.g. if you don't do this, you want go to heaven, you will be banished, etc.).

It is unlikely, given the various circumstances of different communities you can ever achieve a universal morality (suffice to say it is no where in sight).

Rich

[kennethamy]

Originally Posted by richrf

Hi,

The way I view it is that morality is a set of standards and expectations that a given community agrees to in order to try reduce the amount of aggravation and grief a person might encounter within the community - e.g. no killing of each other allowed, no cheating on your spouse, etc.

Now, these standards and expectations vary from community to community depending upon what the community's objectives. For example, different religious groups may have different morals because their circumstances are different.

Most of the moral standards are instantiate by law or religious doctrine. Often they are enforced via coercion (e.g. police) or fear (e.g. if you don't do this, you want go to heaven, you will be banished, etc.).

It is unlikely, given the various circumstances of different communities you can ever achieve a universal morality (suffice to say it is no where in sight).

Rich

Most societies seem to believe that killing the innocent without good reason is wrong.

[richrf]

Originally Posted by kennethamy

Most societies seem to believe that killing the innocent without good reason is wrong.

Yes. What is a good reason however is markedly different from society to society. This can be confirmed by checking out the laws in different countries and societies. They also change over time.

Rich

[kennethamy]

Originally Posted by richrf

Yes. What is a good reason however is markedly different from society to society. This can be confirmed by checking out the laws in different countries and societies. They also change over time.

Rich

But why should that matter? It is still true that killing the innocent is presumptively wrong in all societies. That seems to be a universal precept.