Morality
I’ve been thinking about morality.
For someone who once based his ethics upon a religious imperative, morality presents unique challenges. How do you judge right and wrong when you don’t have a big beard in the sky dispensing irrefutable declaratives? Is there really anyone with the authority to state that what I do is wrong or right? Don’t worry, SafeT isn’t contemplating murder Dostoevsky style, he’s the same nice guy you’ve come to know and love. Perverse and perverted, yes, but no danger to himself or others.
I believe that most people wander through life doing things that they think are right or wrong based on rules of behavior and emotional predilections with little thought as to the root truth of what is right or wrong about the choices they make. Others might think that, perhaps, laws and society are dictating right and wrong. But fear of retribution is rarely the true moral motivation we operate under. How many times were you thinking about the relevant statutes when deciding on a course of action? What of actions you take that aren’t governed by law, such as monogamy and truthfulness?
I’m not covering any new ground here, although it is somewhat new for me specifically. I graduated from high school with a 1.9 GPA and have only a handful of community college credits to my name. I find that my wetware is relatively capable, but applying it has always been a challenge for me. So the internet becomes my classroom to a certain extent. I found this article from the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy to be interesting. I also became fascinated with the implications of this Taco Bell Nutritional Guide.
From the Stanford article I reacquainted myself with the organ transplant moral quandry, from Taco Bell I learned that a bean burrito, if ordered “fresco style”, is really not bad for you at all by fast food standards. First, the organ transplant.
Lets start with the following implausible situation. There is a group of five people in peril beneath a large, suspended weight. When the weight falls, as it surely will, they will die. There is a single person who is standing under another suspended weight, but this person is not in any danger. You are in possession of a button which will cause the first weight to be rendered harmless while releasing the second weight, killing the single person. What do you do?
- Press the button, saving five people while killing the one.
- Do nothing, allowing the five people to die while leaving the single person unharmed.
- Join the five people under their weight and lead them all in a spirited round of singing “We Shall Overcome” in order to lift their spirits just before they–and you–die a horrible crushing death.
It is very tempting to press the button, eh? Go ahead, its hypothetical anyway. Whatever button you currently have your hand on is not likely to hold the power of life or death. If you’re lucky, the button you are going to press will result in an audible beep. I like beeping.
So lets change the situation a bit, and introduce you to the organ transplant scenario. There are five people who have recently been attacked by a maniac. Each has a different damaged organ without which he or she will die within a few hours. Heart, lungs, liver, etc.
You are a gifted organ transplant surgeon who is faced with the sad task of overseeing their inevitable death due to a chronic shortage of organs. A man walks into the emergency room with a vicious hangnail, but he is otherwise healthy. As the amazing surgeon you are, you know that harvesting the requisite organs from this man will result in his death, but will certainly save all of the injured patients. Do you…
- Kill the mostly-healthy man, harvest his organs and save the victims.
- Fix the man’s hangnail and let the victims die.
- Read the hangnail patient a collection of Emily Dickensen and T.S. Eliot poems while listening to the Cure’s Disintegration continuously until the man offers you his organs of his own free will.
- He may even offer to kill himself with a sharpened soup spoon. This would be considered a bonus point.
This second scenario is actually the same as the first in that we are faced with the choice of murdering someone to save five others. No matter how many people are saved as a result of murder, it is still murder and wrong… by most people’s accounts.
But while all of this is interesting, and that Stanford article goes into more depth and explores many approaches to address the question of morality, I’m still left with a disturbing murkiness as far as what is and what isn’t good. Why would either possible outcome be good… or bad? No matter what rule I or the various referenced thinkers cited by the Stanford article come up with to justify my decision, is it not merely a rationalization of a choice I’ve already made? I think that’s enough out of me for now, I’ll talk more on it later. I welcome your comments, suggestions and questions.
Ah yes I remember morality was once a national trait
I’m of the don’t do anything school. The other day my daughter found a box of matches. I could tell by the look in her eyes that she knew that she wasn’t allowed to play with them, but I let her do it anyway. She didn’t light them (she has yet to get the coordination or physical strength to do it) She just tipped them out of the box and put them back in. She was playing with matches though not lighting them…I dunno…
SafeT, dude, that one person under the rock. She’s like totally hot. Hot AND keen. Hot, keen, and wearing surprisingly little! I think the choice is obvious. You must give those 5 poor souls the show of a lifetime.
Everyone will be happy!
Just to lower the tone to a slightly earnest one for a moment… I actually think most people (apart from the psychopaths amongst us) have a pretty good internal moral radar. As in, we know whether something is a good or bad thing to do, it’s just a matter of choosing to ignore that little voice that tells us that or listening to it. You can call that voice “God” or “conscience” or “Bill”… either way, it does the same thing.
Moral quandaries are different though… I say throw in some Sylvia Plath among the Emily Dickensen and you’ll be sorted!
Oh…I’m quite familiar with Dickensen…wrote a freakin 8 page paper about her last year.
Morality…tuff subject. To tuff for a cartoon hippopotamus. 1.9 GPA? I didn’t even graduate from highschool! Well sorta. Got my GED, exchanged it for a Diploma and went to College. What does this have to do with morality? Lets just say…I do my best.
hobbs:Yes? Which nation?
Jagd:If you wake up in a flaming bed, then you have only yourself to blame.
Rich: I don’t know as I can get to her. I think she can’t get out until after the others are dead. Otherwise, wouldn’t they all just walk away from the whole mess?
Shoopska:Yes, but the voice says things to people differently depending on what country and time they come from. My father-in-law’s voice seems to tell him that women should know their place. The voice talking in the ears of some countries tells them to cover their women. The internal voice is about as accurate as your temperature sense. You might know if it is hot or cold, but not how hot or how cold. You might not even know that much!
B-Hip:I was merely saying I don’t have formal philosophy training. I’m sure the questions that bug me have been explored much more thoroughly by others, and that my conclusions are old hat amongst those who wear the hats for a living.
This is why we have Religion & the Police so people like you that flounder in philosophical dilemmas know which way to go.
I on the other hand listen to bloggers to tell me what is moral.
I don’t think anything in this scenario is real SafeT. I think I was trying to say that there are alternative solutions to a dilemma depending on how you look at it. But I may have just enjoyed being stupid.
PS. There’s a new vid if you follow the link on my site.
l>t: Religion can’t help me, and the police can only enforce morality as far as it has been legislated. There are no laws against lying, cheating on your spouse, being a selfish ass, etc. Bloggers! Whoo! Y’know, that should be entered in as a possible authority. Wait, I’ve seen some pretty bad blogs out there…
Rich:I’ll go look at the vid! I’ll go make out with the chick under the suspended weight!
You’re perverse and perverted as well? WOW… That’s cool!! Although I don’t feel quite as special anymore.
Ah, now Safet when you say “the voice says things to people differently depending on what country and time they come from” I think we’re getting into the questions of what is morality, as opposed to ethics, or cultural assumptions or learned behaviour or societal norms…
But I wasn’t talking bout morality in terms of things an evangelical would call “immoral”. Hell no!
I meant that something that makes the average person feel guilty when they lie or cheat or somehow f*** over another human being. The kind of voice you’d want your kids to hear… the one that tells them to treat other people well and makes their conscience suffer when they don’t. That’s the kind of moral radar I’m talkin bout.
Phew, getting a bit serious there. Better make a joke…
What did the Buddhist say to the hot dog man?
“Make me one with everything.”
(hee hee)
Hi Safet, I read this the other day but was too confused to write anything. I’m thinking purely in black and white terms now, but I think (maybe) my approach would be to save the one person and let the five die, and likewise, save the healthy guy with the hangnail to let the others die.
I’m making this decision based purely on the idea that the people in the other situations are going to die anyway – it’s practically inevitable. My moral compass says it’s not right to harm an innocent person like that. Yeah, i know, the others are innocent too, but they were stupid enough to stand under a huge deadly boulder, so maybe it’s just natural selection at work.
Is this wrong? Probably. And where’s the line? If there were a million people under the boulder, and I had to kill one to save them, I’d kill the one. So does this mean I have a certain threshold value for human life?
My head hurts now.
To quote my mother “Morals, morals where did you get those from? You didn’t have those when you lived with me!”
As for the hang nail problem if all the dieing people need different organs surely you could harvest one of them to donate to the others?
Personally I try to get away with as much as I can without being noticed.
From the morally flexible individual in the corner.
PJ:AND pretentious!
Shoopska:Ethics and morals are pretty close. What is ethical is different from one culture to another as well. Bribery, for instance. As is the very varying ideas of what constitutes justifiable violence. In the USA it is generally considered unjustified to punch someone because of a verbal insult. But some people disagree. Some times disagree. The value of honor and the importance of defending it varies. And the permissability of ‘white’ lies, etc. Your inner voice may not match my inner voice, and the trick here is to understand that doesn’t necessarily mean I am wrong. Or am I?
As for the Buddha joke, that’s been one of my favorites for a long time.
Kav: Your first instincts match that of most people. “Do no harm” takes precedence over “allow no harm”. Congratulations! Your sacrifice to save a million people indicates that this philosophy has a boundary somewhere. Sorry your head hurts.
Meekon5! Golly, its been awhile! So…. try to negotiate an organ swap? creative!
The morality principles are living in latency into each of us. It depends on us to make them alive and to choose the right path. All we have to do is to have faith. Knowledge is not morality and morality does not need to much knowledge.
If there is a honor into knowledge, there is no dishonor into not knowing everything. The ignorance is only a white page, were we suppose to write down the truth.
I think this should be a good beginning for everybody.
It all depends on whether you’re a consequentialist or a deontologist. Now fuck off.
Mircea:
“The morality principles are living in latency into each of us. It depends on us to make them alive and to choose the right path. All we have to do is to have faith. Knowledge is not morality and morality does not need to much knowledge.”
But that doesn’t explain why morality differs so greatly from place to place and time to time. Just saying “have faith” seems like a cop-out to me. Its the equivalent of shrugging your shoulders and saying, “it is what it is.”
Acting in a way that might be considered “moral” doesn’t require thought, but then again neither does having a bowel movement or eating. But by studying it you can possibly learn more about what makes it work, and then take that information and apply it toward making things better.
El B:You don’t fucking say! But my teeth are fine, so I must be the other one, right?
Try to see only the basics starting from the meaning of the Decalogue. This is available allover the place and in all religions. Of course, you do not have to practice religion in order to follow the principles. The differences regarding morality in place and time are only environmental, influenced by family, good or bad leaders, society and self conscience. When I said “faith”, I did not say it in the religious sense or way, but to faith in the morality itself.
“Acting” the morality is leading to double personality, decadence, society collapse or, sometimes, to war. Morality cannot be imposed, only embraced.
Anyway, this is just an opinion…
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