rationaldeath
Member
- Dec 10, 2021
- 84
For those of you that are not religious, do you believe morality is objective? I've come to lean towards it being subjective. So I think the core of most people's moral beliefs is "I ought to avoid causing others suffering", and this belief is associated with a negative emotional response to actions that cause other people suffering. The naturalistic explanation for this negative emotional response would be a combination of genetics (evolving to function effectively as part of a tribe) and environment (society reinforces beliefs which are conducive to it's existence). So virtually all of us experience these bad feelings at the thought of hurting people, but does that alone justify the belief that we "ought" not hurt people? Does using the word "ought" by itself even have any meaning without objective morals?
I would answer no to both of those questions. To me "bad" just means "I don't want that to happen", and the reason I don't want certain things to happen is because I believe either consciously or subconsciously that they will cause me to suffer. I experience suffering when other people experience suffering, so I don't want it to happen. But it is also possible for a person to feel nothing, or even happiness while inflicting immense suffering on others. So as bad as it sounds there doesn't seem to be any objective moral authority we could call upon to tell someone like Ted Bundy he should stop murdering people.
Going off topic a bit, but why do we even want to avoid suffering in the first place? I would answer because it is a mechanism developed through evolution to facilitate our survival. It's hard coded into our brains. I would even argue that everything we are is just the interaction of our genetic programming and environment. We are physics in motion, deterministic (at least beyond the subatomic level) like everything else in our universe. Belief in our deterministic nature has actually helped me become a lot more empathetic towards myself and others since without free will you ultimately can't blame anyone for their actions, just as you can't blame hurricanes for forming or viruses for spreading.
Now I'm not certain of these beliefs and I'm always looking for other perspectives, so I would love to hear your ideas and any opposing viewpoints you all might have.
I would answer no to both of those questions. To me "bad" just means "I don't want that to happen", and the reason I don't want certain things to happen is because I believe either consciously or subconsciously that they will cause me to suffer. I experience suffering when other people experience suffering, so I don't want it to happen. But it is also possible for a person to feel nothing, or even happiness while inflicting immense suffering on others. So as bad as it sounds there doesn't seem to be any objective moral authority we could call upon to tell someone like Ted Bundy he should stop murdering people.
Going off topic a bit, but why do we even want to avoid suffering in the first place? I would answer because it is a mechanism developed through evolution to facilitate our survival. It's hard coded into our brains. I would even argue that everything we are is just the interaction of our genetic programming and environment. We are physics in motion, deterministic (at least beyond the subatomic level) like everything else in our universe. Belief in our deterministic nature has actually helped me become a lot more empathetic towards myself and others since without free will you ultimately can't blame anyone for their actions, just as you can't blame hurricanes for forming or viruses for spreading.
Now I'm not certain of these beliefs and I'm always looking for other perspectives, so I would love to hear your ideas and any opposing viewpoints you all might have.