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Are morals universal?
Are my morals your morals? Should I force my morals on you?

Are morals universal?

Lord Henry
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Posted 10/24/09 - 05:13 PM: Subject: Are morals universal?	#1
Are my morals your morals? Should I force my morals on you? I personally am a vegetarian, and i get lots of shit about it. I defend my position and ideals when people ask, but I don't yell at people for eating meat. My personal opinion is that morals are relative, that I can feel that something is morally wrong, but that it only applies to me. The exception to this is when it infringes on someone else's rights. If your ideas of "right" include killing another person or taking away their ability to choose what is right, then I believe that I have the right to assert my rights, in that situation. When it is ambiguous as to what is "right" and what is "wrong", then the majority is allowed to assert their view on what is right.

180 Proof
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0 of 1 people found this post helpful Posted 10/24/09 - 06:18 PM:	#2
Lord Henry wrote: Are my morals your morals? That depends. To the extent we share interests and mutually recognize one another as moral agents, how could 'our morals' be mutually exclusive, or incommensurate? Should I force my morals on you? Isn't coercing me to do what I am responsible for doing myself immoral? Wouldn't force imply that you do not recognize my moral agency, which is likely to precipitate a reciprocal disregard for your moral agency?
The question isn't "Which explanations do I believe?" but rather "Which explanations do I least disbelieve?" Absence of evidence THAT MUST BE THERE (i.e. implied by any claim, concept, or (its) predicates, that affects changes in/to the world) entails evidence of absence. [What cannot be done?[What cannot be hoped?[What cannot be known?]]]

swstephe
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Posted 10/24/09 - 06:50 PM:	#3
First, every individual's values are based on their subjective experience of the world around them. So morality is necessarily relative to each individual. Many values can only be obtained through cooperation -- declaring "don't kill people" as a way of avoiding getting killed, so societies form to project morals, (values), on each other, but sometimes also to justify behavior. Your values lead to vegetarianism as a relative moral decision. People who are not vegetarians will often feel naturally compelled to resist your moral decision because having a different moral value is a threat to their own justification and assumption that most people have the same set of values. How they deal or tolerate different moral values is a function of the society you are living in. Some societies are very rigid, some are quite relaxed, but not necessarily "liberal". Personally, I've found that communities with many foreign enclaves are more tolerant of differences than "melting pot" societies, because the threat of overlapping and adopting each other's values is stronger -- so don't expect what you consider to be a "liberal" or "tolerant" society to be the ones that are normally portrayed as more "free". But that is a subject for another time. You may be more free in Japan, where there are strict social rules, than you are in the Netherlands, where social rules are relaxed, if you are a foreigner or able to find a niche which shares your values. But that is another subject. You mention "have the right". There is no intrinsic authority that determines what rights you have. Again, the authority is presented as part of the society by implicit consensus. You don't have a right to anything, except what society has granted and you consent by being a member of that society. While nobody consents to have their eating habits criticized, there is usually a social organizing principle that deviations from society, (from your assigned category), is more subject to criticism. You can see this when people who criticize will often jump into "slippery slope" arguments about how the spread of a novel moral value might endanger some aspect of society and that you should return the accepted social values for the good of society, (and ultimately yourself). However, it is a fallacy in that the consequences are usually a fantasy.
Ethics is the measuring of morality. Morality is the measuring of good. Good is the measuring of benefit. Benefit is the measure of values.

swamy
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Posted 10/24/09 - 08:09 PM:	#4
Morality is largely universal. the percetance of small and it is due cultural aspects. Also in a capitalist economy certain aspects raises questions on moral issues. Right or Wrong are the rules laid down by the human society over generations and they are followed. Edited by swamy on 10/24/09 - 08:18 PM

James S Saint
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1 of 1 people found this post helpful Posted 10/24/09 - 09:19 PM:	#5
It depends enirely on how you define "moral". Social morals affect other people so they have the right and responsibility to defend themselves against your immoral behavior. I dissagree largely with how that is done, but I cannot argue with the fact that it must be done in one fashion or another. Personal morals are another issue. Very seldom does anyone force personal moral values upon others. The complaint about it is very much a strawman issue. People preaching that you should not do this or that is not "forcing" you to do anything.

jawats
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Posted 10/25/09 - 05:34 AM:	#6
I have some difficulties with the morality as relativistic idea. The statement "every individual's values are based on their subjective experience of the world around them....[therefore] morality is necessarily relative to each individual." This appears to be an objective statement of value concerning morality. How is it every moral statement be relative, yet have "morality...necessarily" relative?

Lord Henry
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Posted 10/25/09 - 05:41 AM:	#7
If morals are universal, then who gets to decide what the morals are? If we are born with an instinctive moral code written into our genetic code, then why do different cultures have different laws and/or moral paradigms? Also, what about the insane? Why do they have a different idea of right and wrong than most people do?

jsidelko
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1 of 1 people found this post helpful Posted 10/25/09 - 09:55 AM:	#8
Morals may not be universal, but the consequences are. Suicide may be a moral option but death is a universal outcome. Like it or not, we are always forced to weigh our subjective morals against their inevitable results. Actually, there should be at least one moral mandate: know the consequences.
thanatos

Odin
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Posted 10/25/09 - 10:19 AM:	#9
Lord Henry wrote: If morals are universal, then who gets to decide what the morals are? If we are born with an instinctive moral code written into our genetic code, then why do different cultures have different laws and/or moral paradigms? Also, what about the insane? Why do they have a different idea of right and wrong than most people do? I think the point is that if morals are universal, no human being can subjectively 'decide' what morals are. Perhaps God decides them, if he even exists. Just curious, do you think the idea of freedom is absolute? Or is freedom even subjective? In other words, can we rationally conclude what freedom means? To me there's alot more to morality than this, but I think basically you could look at it as morality being actions which generally create harmony between people. Simple example: lets say you break into my house and try to kill me. Clearly, being a human being, I will be compelled to defend myself and my family by any means neccessary. So I will be free to take your life in defending my own. Anyone whose life is under threat in that manner will view their attacker as 'immoral.' Thus, even from a subjective, individual point of view, when each individual is the victim they see morality in the same way. Every person sees an unwarrented attack against his life or freedom as immoral. So even if, perhaps, morality does not exist at all, we can still construct a "moral" society based on the freedom each individual inherently has, inherently because every human being naturally asserts a right to defend it. As for the insane, you ask 'why do they have a different idea of right and wrong than most people do?' Probably because they are insane!

James S Saint
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Posted 10/25/09 - 11:14 AM:	#10
Lord Henry wrote: If morals are universal, then who gets to decide what the morals are? If we are born with an instinctive moral code written into our genetic code, then why do different cultures have different laws and/or moral paradigms? Also, what about the insane? Why do they have a different idea of right and wrong than most people do? I think the resolve for that is that "Reality" is what decides. If we each give authority to Reality, then we each not only agree on morality, but we also agree with Reality. We know Reality through the process of Logic and verified observation. What we CANNOT do, is allocate that logic and observation duty to someone ELSE to do for us. But what that means is that we MUST do it for ourselves and not merely argue. We must "agree to find agreement".

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