Morality; conscious/unconscious behavior

[sunspot]

Morality is a system of value judgements that attempts to define natural human behavior and distinguish this data set from unnatural human behavior. Humans are capable of both kinds of behavior. Without morality, the unnatural and natural become relative, with unnatural having the advantage, requiring less reason and will, and the ease of unconscious compulsion.

 

For example, it is easier to steal than work for a living. It is easier to lie, at times, than to always tell the truth. It is easier to cheat than play by the rules. It is easier to divorce than work through difficult times. It is easier to overeat than eat heathful. It is easier to to drink too much than moderate to a couple of beers a day. It is easier to base self worth on money than on character. It is easier to run with the herd than to stand alone., etc..

 

If we put morality in historical perspective, modern civilization is very recent, maybe 6000-7000years. Before that humans or prehumans (before civilization), were small groups where everyone knew everyone like one big family. With civilization the family mentality is partially lost and one becomes more anonomous or one's cultural family now is only a part of the whole. The unnatural of today, was at one time, progressive in the sense of how one goes about living in this strange and unnatural cultural environment. But to make culture one big happy family, morality came to be. It was an attempt to define the new rules of modern natural human behavior that could best allow one big extended cultural family. Unnatural behavior is a throwback to being anonomous, where one's actions can not be seen as having any impact on others. Christ changed the requirements of morality, because it was limited to one large group, due to tindering by man. For example, prohibitions divide the cultural family. All that was required was love God and love your neighbor. It gave back some of the freedom to experiment with the constraint of weighing ones actions in the context of the big picture. Moderation is the key and the data so created hopefully allows one to see the same natural data set as everyone else.

[dkv]

Morality is a system of value judgements that attempts to define natural human behavior and distinguish this data set from unnatural human behavior. Humans are capable of both kinds of behavior. Without morality, the unnatural and natural become relative, with unnatural having the advantage, requiring less reason and will, and the ease of unconscious compulsion.

REP: I do not think so. Morality is the social obligation invented to achieve higher level of togetherness. They are hard coded in to nature but are invented to keep the chances of survival maximum.

Most of them are based on instinct.

[pecker66]

Yep, I think you're much closer DKV. Nice and succinct, too.

[J'Dona]

Morality is a system of value judgements that attempts to define natural human behavior and distinguish this data set from unnatural human behavior. Humans are capable of both kinds of behavior. Without morality, the unnatural and natural become relative, with unnatural having the advantage, requiring less reason and will, and the ease of unconscious compulsion.

Are you certain that "unnatural" human behaviour even exists, at least in the sense you have described? Cannibalism, paedophilia, and slavery are generally considered (in modern civilisations) to be inhuman and immoral things—and yet all of these have existed and were often normal parts of society throughout human history. Can you rightly declare them to be unnatural because they are classified as immoral (and hence unnatural, by your definition of morality) by a morality which did not appear until long after all three were commonplace?

 

I am sure you agree that most people have different senses of morality: this is demonstrably true. In that case, natural and unnatural behaviour would be relative regardless of the morality of the observer, since this is relative as well.

Edit: Just noticed that you've discussed some of those examples in other threads, but I hadn't seen them. If you respond to them I'll leave it to be done here rather than draw unreliable inferences myself.

[sunspot]

The one thing useful about morality is that it creates a matrix by which immorality is possible, for some, without the disruption of culture. Picture if we all decided to embrance immorality; screw morality. The thieves, perverts, murderors, rapists, child molesters, etc., would have much more competition, and there would no long been any easy sheep to shear. The result would be anarchy.

 

A spiritual person differs from an immoral person by what is called a moral conscience. What that means is that if the moral person had an opportunity to get away with something, nobody is looking, they won't get caught, and culture says it is good, there is still a moral restraint against acting because God is watching. A good citizen aetheist is not worried about divine judgement, but can still have a conscience with respect to social laws. They do good by cultural law independant of whether culture is moral or immoral.The moderately good citizen aetheist does not have any conscience, but makes judgements based on whether they will get caught or not. The bad citizen aetheist will take advantage of any situation where they will not get caught, and will manipulate risky situations so they can get away with even more than that.

[UNCLEBEN]

Morality, sure to get the debate going as it basiclly controls all of our views and behaviour and as usuall allthough we all aspire to be moral in our lives in all situations, we are human and allowed small mistakes if only to make ourselfs feel better. Thats the way I see it I mean on certain subjects of perverted sexual behaviour when it effects others regardless of age there can be no exception and its interesting that this subject was bought up by another member in that it seems that is the holy grail of our morality.Anyway reading the sunspot posting on moral concience made me think of my own concience but i dont see how spiritualness comes in to it, what is a spiritual person can someone tell me?

[Edtharan]

There is no absolute morals or ethics. These are entilerly the construct of humans.

 

But why did we invent such things?

 

Morals and ethics lay down some ground rules about how we wish to be treated by others. As a communal set of rules these become the basis for a stable group (society). It is this reson that we invented morals and ethics, so we could exist in large social groups.

 

Ethics and morals are nothing more than an agreed upon set or rules and guidelines that if we, and others, follow them, then we can live together in large groups and be treated the way we wish to be treated.

[lrokwild]

Morals are nothing more than a set of rules created by society in order to ensure the survival of humans. These rules continue to change as our culture changes. What is moral and what isn’t will ultimately depend on the type of culture we were brought up in.

 

I don’t think it is so much a set of systematic rules that "attempt to define" natural human behavior. I think it is much more like a set of lenses that we are given at birth. These lenses are constantly grinded and re-grinded throughout our early childhood and adulthood. The way the lenses are grinded and shaped depend on the culture. Each culture has their different methods of shaping these lenses that we use to see the world with. One set of lenses will seem to fit for one particular culture and then make us completely blind to another. The problem is, the lenses will always be flawed in some way, but we cannot do without them.

 

This analogy was originally used to explain human perspectives and how our perspectives will always influence what we see and believe. I think morality greatly depends on what we believe and see as well as how we where raised.

 

There will never be a proper definition for morality, or a set of rules in stone. They constantly change and vary.

 

Back to my initial statement. "Morality is a set of rules created by society in order to insure the survival of humans". If you think about it, this is all morals really are. The things that are universally dubbed immoral among almost every culture are usually things that would create ciaos, anarchy, harm and ultimately lower our life expectancy rate, one way or another. Its part of evolution, humans are a very magnificent organism. We are truly the top of the food chain. The past major evolutionary changes have occurred with our brains. Id say we have even lost some physical attributes while gaining mental ones. Look at a chimp or gorilla... they are much stronger and faster and more agile then humans...for the most part, but they have nowhere near the mental capacity that we do. Where am I going with this? ... Throughout evolution our brains have become smarter, and we instead rely on our brains to survive more so than our bodies. We have found extremely intelligent and efficient ways of surviving. One of those ways is by creating social groups and eventually rules of morality.

 

Sunspot talked about unconscious processes being involved. Since I am a Freudian I believe in (for the most part) Freud’s structural model of the mind. The 'ID' the 'Super Ego' and the 'Ego' or 'I'. Freud said that the 'ID' is the part of us that is primal... its our primal, unconscious motives and drives. He believed it was sex and aggression (many, including myself believe its more than that, but they still are very major motives.) These drives are often unmoral, sick, and socially unacceptable.... I mean we are talking about drives that make us want to have sex with everyone we can and beat up any competitors that stand in the way of our sex or food. This isn't very cool now is it? He continued to say that the 'Super Ego' is our moral side. This part develops early on in child hood and is essentially our way of bringing external authority inside our heads and making our parents beliefs our own. So many argue that morals primarily come from our parents.

 

These 2 parts of the mind constantly get into conflicts... its literally ciaos in our subconscious and our 'Ego' comes up with what is called Compromised Formations and those formations become our conscious thoughts and actions.

 

I believe that during the falic stage nearly all of our morals develop...... during the Falic stage kids really start to want identification and we take in our parents believes and make them our own. This isnt to say that as we grow older, many of our morals wont change... but for the most part, this is where the base of them begin.

 

In conclusion, I'd say morals are a set of believes created by society, passed down generation after generation and constently manipulated and changed by evolution.

 

P.S. Morality is 100% a conscious process. Nearly everything that goes against morality is unconscious. You can begin to see how psychopathology develops. - It is the things we are conflicted about that get repressed into the subconscious. The things we are conflicted about are almost always something that goes against moral beliefs or social ethics. You could even say the reason we have so many people with pathological disorders is because we have created so many morals and social rules....then again.... without them we would have mass death and destruction... and we would no longer be intelligent, cognitive beings...but animals... like every other.

 

You could even say it’s the ability to create these morals that is one of the key evolutionary developments of homosapeans.

 

Survival of the fittest - Those cultures that where able to be at peace with one each other and work collectively as a team rather than kill each other would survive longer, pass traits down and so on and so forth.

 

P.P.S. Ideas of morals and morality can also develop through the experience of conditioning. Essentially when you were a kid and you did something wrong or "immoral" you got smacked or yelled at, eventually you stopped doing these things partly in fear of pain, but fear of dissapointment from your parents. We have also been conditioned by society to follow rules. So i guess you could argue that acting morally correct or socially acceptable could become a unconscious process...if repeated enough times.

[Idolator]

He continued to say that the 'Super Ego' is our moral side. This part develops early on in child hood and is essentially our way of bringing external authority inside our heads and making our parents beliefs our own. So many argue that morals primarily come from our parents.

 

how can this be constructed at a later stage? if this stage of development is skipped for whatever reason, what methods are most effective at inducing it in later life?

[lrokwild]

how can this be constructed at a later stage? if this stage of development is skipped for whatever reason, what methods are most effective at inducing it in later life?

 

Well, a cognitive behavioralists or social behavioralists approach would argue that our moral beliefs are constructed by interaction with humans, and modeling. So essentially a person we look up to later on in life, be it our parents still or someone else, would be our model, and their beliefs would greatly influence our own.

 

A classic behavioralist would argue that we learn morality through means of classical and operant conditioning. In essence, we learn what we can get away with and what we cant, by means of trial and error. If we do this, we get rewarded, if we do that, we get punished.

 

The stage i mentioned could not be skipped, unless a child was raised un till they were 2 years old and then stuck in the wild....and even then...they would look to wild animals for morality..... anyone that’s around us, taking care of us, be it our parents, a scientist, a friend, who ever, that person will project their beliefs on to us, and we will take them as our own. This is because at that early age, we have no other choice really... we are learning machines.

 

I believe morality develops by social interaction, by evolution of culture, by conditioning, and by early interaction with our parents. Its a mixture of different psychological theories that best explains morality.

[Idolator]

Well' date=' a cognitive behavioralists or social behavioralists approach would argue that our moral beliefs are constructed by interaction with humans, and modeling. So essentially a person we look up to later on in life, be it our parents still or someone else, would be our model, and their beliefs would greatly influence our own.

[/quote']

 

like brainwashing? a cult?

 

A classic behavioralist would argue that we learn morality through means of classical and operant conditioning. In essence' date=' we learn what we can get away with and what we cant, by means of trial and error. If we do this, we get rewarded, if we do that, we get punished.

[/quote']

 

this is not true. you either obey rules or see them as arbitrary. avoiding punishment doesnt mean you accept the justice of being punished.

 

The stage i mentioned could not be skipped' date=' unless a child was raised un till they were 2 years old and then stuck in the wild....and even then...they would look to wild animals for morality..... anyone that’s around us, taking care of us, be it our parents, a scientist, a friend, who ever, that person will project their beliefs on to us, and we will take them as our own. This is because at that early age, we have no other choice really... we are learning machines.

[/quote']

 

nonetheless, if it were skipped, or if the child failed to learn it for whatever reason, do you believe it could be undertaken at a later date? what techniques would you imagine would help in such a situation?

 

I believe morality develops by social interaction' date=' by evolution of culture, by conditioning, and by early interaction with our parents. Its a mixture of different psychological theories that best explains morality.[/quote']

 

is the earliness important? can it be learnt later, even if only partially?

[sunspot]

There is a way to put morality in perspective. If we look at sexual desire the natural end result are babies. Sex, at its most fundamental level is there to produce offspring. Associated with sexuality is pleasure. This is not the end, but a carrot on the string that leads to the offspring end. In some schools of psychology, the pleasure intermediate is considered the center of the behavioral universe, even though it is more of a periphreal aspect of natural instinct.

 

The same can be said about hunger. The natural goal of hunger is provide fuel and raw materials for the body. Associated with hunger is also pleasure to help lead us toward the natural end. With the pleasure principle, one would assume that the pleasure of eating was the end. This would mean that eating anything, or too much of anything, if it led to pleasure would be considered a valid human behavior. This is in direct contraction to the final end of eating being the proper health of the body.

 

Most of the so-called immoral human behavior, that is often considered, by psycholgist, a natural part of the randomness of humans, is often centered on a periphreal and not a real center. The example of eating is in agreement between science and religion. Religion calls gluttony a sin. Over eating is also considered, by science, to be bad for the body because it can lead to obesity. Neither consider the end goal of eating pleasure, but rather the end is the health of the body. A nice thick juicy steak each night will bring more periphreal pleasure than rabbit food (salad), yet the salad is often a much better but choice for the hunger instinct. That is sort of how morality is suppose to work. It is based on various centers and not on their periphreal.

 

If we go back to sex, it is often considered moral to constrain sex to marriage. If the end goal of sex is a baby, the marriage provides the male/female team for favorable development. If periphreal pleasure is the center, then free sex will bring all kinds of pleasure. But many babies will still result, creating a far more difficult circumstance for the baby. The perimeter is not the optimum center and morality tries to maintain center.

[lrokwild]

like brainwashing? a cult?

 

Perhaps' date=' but also the media, government, friends, and everyday people that you interact with. We have the ability to learn by imitation, if we view something someone else does as "ok" or morally acceptable, we are likely to do it ourselves. There have been countless studies done on this, if you want I can explain some.

 

 

this is not true. you either obey rules or see them as arbitrary. avoiding punishment doesnt mean you accept the justice of being punished.

 

Um...what I said is true, what your arguing about is something different. I never once claimed that we would accept the justice of being punished. I simply said that from a behavioralist POV we learn morality by certain contingencies in the environment. We emit a behavior, we either get rewarded, punished, or nothing happens. Humans naturally like to be rewarded, so when society reinforces "Moral" behavior and punishes "wrong" behavior we are likely to emit the behavior that gets us something desirable.

 

nonetheless' date=' if it were skipped, or if the child failed to learn it for whatever reason, do you believe it could be undertaken at a later date? what techniques would you imagine would help in such a situation?

[/quote']

 

I already mentioned some of them in my post.

 

1. Classical and operant conditioning.

2. Modeling or "social engineering"

3. Early childhood influences.

 

is the earliness important? can it be learnt later' date=' even if only partially?[/quote']

 

Yes the earliness is important. Our personalities are shaped fundamentally by our very first experiences. Psychoanalytical psychologists believe that the way we first deal with experiences good or bad will eventually get repressed into the subconscious and then affect our behaviors later on in life.

 

P.S.

 

Are you looking for specific teaching techniques that could be applied to teaching delinquent kids morals? Perhaps you should be more specific about what kind of information you’re probing for.

[Idolator]

There is a way to put morality in perspective. [...'] The perimeter is not the optimum center and morality tries to maintain center.

 

so do you think morality is instinctive? if so, is a capacity for morality present which is then developed, as with language?

[Idolator]

Perhaps, but also the media, government, friends, and everyday people that you interact with. We have the ability to learn by imitation, if we view something someone else does as "ok" or morally acceptable, we are likely to do it ourselves. There have been countless studies done on this, if you want I can explain some.

 

yes, please. also, what relationship do you think morality has to compassion and emotion?

[lrokwild]

Morality, compassion and other emotions all fit into the same type of cognitive constructs.

 

Is morality instinctive?

 

I would say for the most part, No. We learn morality; we are not born with it. Just think of a child, the "terrible twos" for example, that child has serious moral issues. A 2 year old, cries, whines, yells, insults, talks dirty, plays with things they shouldn’t, does things they are told not to, sneaks around, and pretty much doesn’t give a rats ass about what anyone thinks. Many schools of psychology have said that we have evolved from animals. Our brains carry the same primal parts that every mammal does. What we have done evolutionarily is "built" new parts of the brain that give us new ability to control our animal instincts. We always have those animal instincts, we just have the ability to simulate and sublimate those animal urges into new emotions and feelings.

 

On the other hand, we do come genetically ready to form relationships with humans. We depend on our mothers to survive for the first few years of our life. So in that way, we have some morality in a sense that we don't kill our mothers when we are young.

 

I think it is important for you to really understand that the idea of morality is learned. What is moral in one culture greatly differs from another. The only instinctive morals we could have "hardwired" into our brains are ones that tell us we shouldn’t kill each other. This has been hardwired into our subconscious through evolution to prevent us from killing each other. Even with this being said, one could argue that this is not true, think about all the people that DO murder others.... they obviously had some environmental influence that gave them the idea that it would be ok to kill someone. Often people think its ok to kill someone if they don’t get caught. So then this brings you back to classical and operant conditioning. As you can see, morality is really an opinion of the masses.

 

Now as for the example of the experiments I mentioned.

 

A group of young children, about 3-4 years old and then another group of 5-7 yrs old where split up individually and placed into a room with a big stuffed bear called BOBO and an adult. The child was to watch the adult play with BOBO and then the adult would leave the room and the child would be asked to play with BOBO.

 

Now in one group the adult ignored BOBO. In the second the adult beat up BOBO and was very violent with him. Finally with the third group the adult played very nice and loving with BOBO.

 

This test showed a HUGE correlation between how the adult played with BOBO and how the child played with BOBO. So if people around you do not always fight, swear, yell, ext, you are likely not to do the same. This is why you see people growing up in the ghetto very aggressive, angry, and violent people. Its because that’s what is around in their environment.

 

We as humans adapt to our environments. So depending on what goes on around us will determine how we behave.

[Idolator]

Morality, compassion and other emotions all fit into the same type of cognitive constructs.

 

so compassion is also arbitrary? and emotions? how would someone learn them later in life?

 

So if people around you do not always fight, swear, yell, ext, you are likely not to do the same. This is why you see people growing up in the ghetto very aggressive, angry, and violent people. Its because that’s what is around in their environment.

 

but what if a persons enviroment is normal, thier family are typical caring middle-class types, and yet somehow the person still fails to learn morality? how can such a person develope this skill later in life?

[Zingaro]

how can this be constructed at a later stage? if this stage of development is skipped for whatever reason, what methods are most effective at inducing it in later life?

 

Getting married and having children. It's been noted that men who have behaved seriously thuggish in their youth can become strongly moralistic with their children as they don't want them to go through the suffering and consequences that they did.

 

I'm currently reading a book "A Life Inside" by a former convict that argues that the system (bad as it is) does in fact help reform many people and enables them to understand the rewards of a moral life.

 

Social conditioning clearly powers people's perception of morality, but I think much is inbuilt. The ability to empathise with others is a psychological trait that makes people want to stop others being abused. This can be observed in the animal kingdom. We also feel guilt which drives us to be moral. Freud holds that people lacking in moral intelligence have misses out on an essential developmental phase in their childhood.

[Idolator]

Social conditioning clearly powers people's perception of morality, but I think much is inbuilt. The ability to empathise with others is a psychological trait that makes people want to stop others being abused. This can be observed in the animal kingdom. We also feel guilt which drives us to be moral. Freud holds that people lacking in moral intelligence have misses out on an essential developmental phase in their childhood.

 

do you have any links discussing the empathy of animals?

 

do you believe guilt is related to compassion and empathy? is it inborn, or can it be learnt?

[Komatos]

In response to most opinions on this thread:

 

I find modern concepts of "Morality" to be subjective to opinions and arbitrary. It is rather a predjudice system in which people join a bandwagon to say such behavior is "wrong" and some is "right".

 

The fact is nothing is right or wrong, and most of morality (and modern world "laws" which are based on morality) revolves around political ideals and opinions that the "majority" agree with.

 

It is a form of oppression for those that simply do not share the beliefs or a conscience or "morals", in a society where majority opinion rules, the minority will always be opressed. (No, not talking about races here, talking about ALL societies, even "nazi germany").

 

Morality being a way to prevent over-eating?

I disagree, I think that is simply instinct. We instinctively eat because our stomachs tell us we are hungry and it creates a feeling of empty dulled pain inside our chest that encourages us to put food into our mouths.

 

Some people over-eat as a means of making up for the time in which they "wont be eating" later on in the day or week. It is a planned out process, not a moral one.

 

The myth that some people simply over eat because they are fat lardasses that lack the morality to control themself, well, that is a myth. Studies show that people that overeat or are overfat (the correct term, overweight isn't really correct) are usually overfat because their body has digestive dysfunctions.

 

The concept of Gluttony is society's creaton, and it is an insult to those who are fat out of genetical construction, not lack of self control. Including gluttony in the "Christian" set of morals only goes to make people who are fat feel bad about themself and be disliked by the general population around them. The end result is, morals hurt this person more than they help him.

 

This is just one example of a situation in which "Morality of Society" is actually insulting, judgemental, and harmful to someone who is just being themself.

 

There is a way to put morality in perspective. If we look at sexual desire the natural end result are babies. Sex, at its most fundamental level is there to produce offspring. Associated with sexuality is pleasure. This is not the end, but a carrot on the string that leads to the offspring end. In some schools of psychology, the pleasure intermediate is considered the center of the behavioral universe, even though it is more of a periphreal aspect of natural instinct.

This is more or less, a diferent form of instinct. Morality is a diferent thing altogether.

 

Sexual-Drive and Sexual-Pleasure compell humans to enjoy and crave sex when in the presence of a potential geneticly acceptible partner (people are usually attracted to those of a suitable healthy body than those who are sick, fat, and careless).

 

Being a "Player" or one who hops from partner to partner is not immoral because it allows the possibility of getting multiple victims pregnant, it is Immoral because to allow for such behavior you usually have to lie, cheat, and charm your way to get females to spread their legs for you.

 

So then we can say

Morality is not the same type of instinct as sexual drive or hunger. It also is not necessarily always "good" to have morals, some morals have more in common with racisms of the world than they do in simple Right and Wrong.

 

Morality should be limited to what harms another human being is wrong and what doesnt is acceptable. Morality should not contain political, religious, or arbitrary opinions and behaviors, because containing such makes the question of weather or not it is moral subjective to ones opinion. Although, among most populations morality always does contain such bullshit.

 

Not conforming with Societies morality does not make you a bad person, it makes you a diferent person.

 

Morality:

1. The quality of being in accord with standards of right or good conduct.

2. A system of ideas of right and wrong conduct: religious morality; Christian morality.

3. Virtuous conduct.

Definition one translates into peoples expectations and bandwagon standards for eachother to follow. Can be arbitrary or can be simply a concept of "Not harming others = Moral, Harming them = Immoral". Arbitrary morals are worthless, baseless, meaningless, and usually politically subjective or religious.

 

Definition two implies such standards could be derived from a "Religious Collective" rather than simply the society in which you live (if it is a mixed culture). Such as christian morals being diferent than muslim morals in American Society.

 

Definition three implies "Morality" could be a term simply applied to conforming to standards, believing in them, and abiding by them.

 

Problems of Morality

The problem with the belief of "Morals" being correct is it is almost a form of belief in self-superiority. It is similar to being a Snob. Someone who believes their morals are correct and someone who lacks morals (or simply has less of them, or diferent ones) lacks understanding.

 

Why are people typically moral? Why do they tend to convince themself that what they did in situations was "right"?

Simple. When a normal person with morals "breaks" a moral, they feel guilty.

 

Lets look at a few definitions:

Guilty - Suffering from or prompted by a sense of guilt: a guilty conscience.

Guilt -The fact of being responsible for the commission of an offense, Guilty conduct; sin.

Suffering - To feel pain or distress; sustain loss, injury, harm, or punishment.

Hurt - To cause mental or emotional suffering to; distress.

 

Someone is kept in line by their morals simply to avoid Guilt and bandwagon dislike from people in their society. Guilt is clearly not a good feeling and it seems to stick around until someone confesses to, makes up for, or undoes their "sin" against their own Morality. However, if they broke a moral in which they were not enslaved to, they would feel no such feeling.

 

If you do not kill someone simply becuase you fear punishment, you are held back by the law, not by morality.

If you do not kill someone simply because you fear guilt, you are held back by morality and even if the law and society permitted such an act you probably would be a slave to your emotions.

 

Can Morality Be Learned later on in life if it does not exist at the present?

Maybe... But not without a sense of compassion and empathy for another human being. Morality is a link in a fence of a network of wiring in which Compassion, Empathy, Emotion, and Guilt are all tied into one.

[Zingaro]

do you have any links discussing the empathy of animals?

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empathy

"Some students of animal behavior claim that empathy is not restricted to humans as the definition implies. Examples include dolphins saving humans from drowning or from shark attacks, and a multitude of behaviors observed in primates, both in captivity and in the wild. See, for instance, the popular book The Ape and the Sushi Master by Frans de Waal."

"The possibility that empathy resides in parts of the brain so ancient that we share them with rats should give pause to anyone comparing politicians with those poor, underestimated creatures." Frans de Waal

 

http://www.empathogens.com/empathy/animal.html

"Empathy may not be uniquely human quality:

The ability to empathise is often considered uniquely human, the result of complex reasoning and abstract thought. But it might in fact be an incredibly simple brain process * meaning that there is no reason why monkeys and other animals cannot empathise too.

 

http://www.percepp.demon.co.uk/lovempat.htm

"Empathy is evolutionarily prior to love. Animals display empathy and manifest it in social groupings and behavior."

[Zingaro]

do you believe guilt is related to compassion and empathy? is it inborn, or can it be learnt?

 

The capacity to feel guilt is clearly inborn and is related to compassion and empathy. How much guilt a person is capable of feeling though, has to do with their sensibilities which would mainly be socially conditioned.

[Komatos]

Sorry but there is a problem with your belief in the word "Empathy", empathy is considered to just be an "Understanding of" and not a "Caring for".

 

Empathy - Identification with and understanding of another's situation, feelings, and motives.

 

What you are refering to is Compassion.

 

Compassion - Deep awareness of the suffering of another coupled with the wish to relieve it.

 

Too often the terms are confused and used incorrectly. In reality, Sociopaths and Psychopaths have empathy for all around them, without it, they would not be such successful liars and manipulaters. What they lack is compassion, guilt, emotion, and morality.

[lrokwild]

U can learn morality later on in life by way of imitation or modeling... like I already said... that’s how it is done.. there is no if and or but!

 

How else do you think you learn? If we established that morality is a learned behavior and very little of it is genetic, then how else would someone learn to be moral unless they watched some one else act morally correct or was taught by someone else?

 

Because we all have natural inherited instincts to survive in our environment, and in order to survive we have to manipulate people and form relationships with people, could explain that morality is more than just a cultural lesson learned by modeling. You could say that some things we call morality are things that we do subconsciously, in order to survive and prosper in our environments.

[Zingaro]

Sorry but there is a problem with your belief in the word "Empathy"' date=' empathy is considered to just be an "Understanding of" and not a "Caring for".

 

What you are refering to is Compassion.

 

Too often the terms are confused and used incorrectly. In reality, Sociopaths and Psychopaths have empathy for all around them, without it, they would not be such successful liars and manipulaters. What they lack is compassion, guilt, emotion, and morality.[/quote']

 

If I'd meant Compassion then I would have used that word. Sociopaths & Psychopaths couldn't possibly empathise with their victims as they lack the emotional maturity. They can't empathise with another's suffering because they are filled with self-loathing themselves or are empty emotionally. That's why they get a buzz torturing small animals. The philosophy you are arguing for is that adopted by communists in Mexico and Nazi's in Germany. I believe that the evidence is clear, from 2,500 years of thought on the matter, Morality is an inbuilt instinct which can be advanced or damaged by environmental upbringing. I believe in Darwin's Evolutionary principle and I also believe in psychological evolution. The brain is born with a host of systems ready-to-go, they need to be developed in the environment.

 

Naturally many political philosophies incorporate the people's perception of morality whether it is Christian, Secular, or Moslem. It is only totalitarian states that reject conventional morality; the leaders becoming rich and powerful and the people impoverished mentally and physically.