Poll: Do we believe things, just because we're told to?

[Ago Iterum]

No.

I just came out of an argument with someone who stated that 'morals aren't universally correct, because they are opinions'. He actually believes that paedophilia, and murder, and all the rest, are right, and that imprisoning offenders of such crimes, is a crime in itself.

This argument got me so heated, because he stated everything he said as if it were fact. And my argument of 'morals aren't opinion, they're empathy driven' was basically negated every time by arguments that may aswell have been 'NO U'.

Am I going insane? Or am I corect that, given the chance to think for yourself, you will come to the conclusion that morals are embedded into our sense of empathy and intelligence?

 

[gremily]

This requires a lot of thought... I'll come back later.

 

[Avatar Roku]

I'd go with Empathy, but I'm tired and can't properly think about the question. I'll bookmark this and come back.

 

[Fuuten]

No.

I just came out of an argument with someone who stated that 'morals aren't universally correct, because they are opinions'. He actually believes that paedophilia, and murder, and all the rest, are right, and that imprisoning offenders of such crimes, is a crime in itself.

This argument got me so heated, because he stated everything he said as if it were fact. And my argument of 'morals aren't opinion, they're empathy driven' was basically negated every time by arguments that may aswell have been 'NO U'.

Am I going insane? Or am I corect that, given the chance to think for yourself, you will come to the conclusion that morals are embedded into our sense of empathy and intelligence?

The problem with that person's argument is that those crimes are based off of hurting others. It is (Or should be) ingrained in us by nature that harming others is wrong , or "Bad". One could argue that things that are illegal in which the offender is only harming themselves are incorrectly labelled as "Crimes", but anyone who has no basic concept of right or wrong are not human, foolish, or justifying thier less savory urges to themselves.

 

[rokudan]

If we beleived everything we were taught then we would never have the impluse to change things. Consider how many changes have occured within the last 200 years. Change requires, nay demands, to have an alternat way of thinking or looking at something.

 

[Ago Iterum]

If we beleived everything we were taught then we would never have the impluse to change things. Consider how many changes have occured within the last 200 years. Change requires, nay demands, to have an alternat way of thinking or looking at something.

Exactly. Without morals, civilisation would never have developed.

But this person says civilisation is a bad thing.

And surpisingly, no! This person isn't 10! Just stupid.

But even animals have morals, and they're shown to live for their primary urge of surviving and mating (without the need for pleasure). And opinion, I THINK doesn't relate to primal urges. Because if they are primal, embedded survival instincts, they are fact. Opinions are what you choose.

And if animals don't have much capability for opinion (or to little depth, if any) then where do their morals come from?

And they say we're the only species to have empathy (which I don't believe, to be honest) so how would animals get these primal morals, where they get along in groups?




Just to let you know, I'm not 100% on some of my opinions, so feel free to correct me if I'm wrong about something. Just please do it politely.

 

[Pimppeter2]

erased

 

[ffxfriek]

i remain undecided though i think yes we believe everything were told

 

[Gamer137]

Morals are opinions because they are decided by cultural emotions and are not mathematical, scientific, or historical fact. Just look at history. In B.C. the death penalty was used for even the smallest crimes. Now it is banned in a large portion of the world, if not most. Morals change as society does.

 

[fluffylandmine]

I believe in a mix, as usual, but let me explain.

You are at birth, curious. Much like the sperm whale in the hitch-hikers guide to the galaxy who is instantly brought into existence and within a matter of minutes, dead. He questioned the nature of the intents held by the objects around him(IE "I wonder if the ground will be my friend?"). You have the natural ability to recognize immediate danger or friendship(to a degree).

Once you have gained enough knowledge from what your mind alone could fathom, based solely upon what you have been exposed to and your reactions from it, the learning and opinion forming stage begins.

This stage consists of what society tells you and how much trust your sources of society. I for my age have seen a little too much of society's "dark and light sides". This plus the trust I vest upon what I learned these things from allows me to make greater inferences than someone with half the experience.

I do absolutely hate it when a mind is corrupted by disease or misinformation. This then means that it cannot use the natural source of "GOOD OR BAD"(Really it's just naturally known that the harm of others is wrong, without consent of course).

For me, a crime is only a crime is it has a victim who suffers greatly or directly from the action. My example: Someone cons me out of my money, and instead of doing medical research like the scam said, it goes towards a local theater production. I, in this example, had money and hardly a care for what it went towards. So some local children were taken from the violent, crime infested streets to learn the art of drama and gain a new hobby. I am in no way intending to press charges, yet the arrest happens.

While the last example was ideal, I believe I put my point across the river of great misunderstandings.

 

[sequio]

On the subject of imprisonment, the examples listed were crimes that were deemed harmful to society. Prisons exist to remove individuals from society because society has deemed them to be a detriment to that society. Not sure how your friend could argue that removing a harmful agent from a self correcting system is harmful in of itself. Well, i guess he could be completely daft.

As for morality, ask him to define "morals" and an example of something that is universally correct. See if that leads to a fairer argument.

 

[Silver]

Uhm, yeah. You're wrong. Morals are opinions. Based on both empathy and upbringing admittedly, but empathy is individual. Different people have different morals. They're subjective. They ARE opinions, at least in this argument. It's not a perfect choice of words. Subjective is better.


Your friend is still a bigot though, and a bit of an idiot.

 

[fletch_talon]

Being a paedophile isn't wrong!!!

and now I have your attention.

Being a paedophile isn't wrong!!!

It is however a problem and those who suffer from it need help. But paedophilia and zoophilia are sexual preferences, just like hetero/homo/bisexuality, the difference is, that it involves sexual urges for subjects who are either unwilling, or unable to comprehend a sexual encounter/relationship.

I'm not saying those who rape or seduce young children into bed with them shouldnt be punished for it, because despite what is most likely a mental or genetic anomaly they (in most cases) would still have a sense of what is right and wrong, and acting on their sexual urges is incredibly wrong.

The reason I brought this up was because if we start saying that paedophiles need to just stop liking children, we've suddenly labelled it as a choice, and therefore all other sexual preferences could also be considered choice, and many of you I hope see the problem with that.

As for morals in general (I did kinda go off topic based on a small part of the OP) I have to agree with most people here, you arent really born with them. We are, after all, animals, and as such our primary instincts are based around self preservation, (and getting what we want) as a child, if you saw something you wanted you would likely take it, or hit someone then take it. It didn't matter if you hurt someone, all that mattered was you got what you were after, until your parents beat the message into that squishy little head of yours, stealing and hitting is bad (lol hypocrisy).

Also, morals can change, sometimes a perfectly law abiding citizen will decide to do something naughty, or vice versa. Not to mention that our morals are often flexible, eg. killing is incredibly wrong, unless you're threatened.

So in conclusion whilst we have instincts and hormone induced behaviours that we are born with (eat, sleep, mate, survive, protect young/family/territory etc.) what we refer to as morals, are based on nurture as opposed to nature.

 

[Silver]

As for morals in general (I did kinda go off topic based on a small part of the OP) I have to agree with most people here, you arent really born with them. We are, after all, animals, and as such our primary instincts are based around self preservation, (and getting what we want) as a child, if you saw something you wanted you would likely take it, or hit someone then take it. It didn't matter if you hurt someone, all that mattered was you got what you were after, until your parents beat the message into that squishy little head of yours, stealing and hitting is bad (lol hypocrisy).

This part is particularly interesting, since we're born without empathy too.

A newborn person, and up until the ages around 5 in some cases (but often younger than that) has no empathy whatsoever. What is also interesting about this is that despite the fact that females mature faster, and have a higher natural empathy than males, they develop this slower than males do.

So you are absolutely correct, we are born with no part of morals in us, not even the empathic part. It's quite interesting, don't you think?

 

[Zac_Dai]

To harm another innocent human being is universally wrong because human society can only be stable and prosper when we peacefully co-exist, if people were allowed to murder at will we would be in a huge mess. So its empathy which is a natural evolved state for humans.

Other morals that deal with subjects like public nudity are purely opinion.

 

[Zac_Dai]

As for morals in general (I did kinda go off topic based on a small part of the OP) I have to agree with most people here, you arent really born with them. We are, after all, animals, and as such our primary instincts are based around self preservation, (and getting what we want) as a child, if you saw something you wanted you would likely take it, or hit someone then take it. It didn't matter if you hurt someone, all that mattered was you got what you were after, until your parents beat the message into that squishy little head of yours, stealing and hitting is bad (lol hypocrisy).

This part is particularly interesting, since we're born without empathy too.

A newborn person, and up until the ages around 5 in some cases (but often younger than that) has no empathy whatsoever. What is also interesting about this is that despite the fact that females mature faster, and have a higher natural empathy than males, they develop this slower than males do.

So you are absolutely correct, we are born with no part of morals in us, not even the empathic part. It's quite interesting, don't you think?

But I feel this is completely irrelevant anyway, a lot of animals are born ready for the world, a human child is so underdeveloped after birth that its missing a lot of stuff, like fear for instance, the ability to feed itself, even a properly functioning brain, not to mention a hole in its skull.

 

[Silver]

Yes, I know. I should have added an off-topic flag for that. I just thought it made an interesting note. My views on the subject at hand is above.

 

[Ultrajoe]

A newborn person, and up until the ages around 5 in some cases (but often younger than that) has no empathy whatsoever.

Because babies can never tell when people are upset, right?

Your sarcasm sense is tingling.

 

[Ago Iterum]

A newborn person, and up until the ages around 5 in some cases (but often younger than that) has no empathy whatsoever.

Because babies can never tell when people are upset, right?

Your sarcasm sense is tingling.

Silver, what you've said there is quite wrong. I have young nephews and nieces, and even at 18 months they would crawl over and give my sister a hug if she was crying.