Does amorality actually exist?

[Hereandnow]

ThamiorTheThinker:
That's an interesting response. Is there any basis that dictates perceived harm as necessarily wrong, or is it merely natural intuition? That is to say, do you believe that it "feels" wrong because you don't wish to be harmed, and don't want to be hypocritical? Do you think that there is some logical, philosophical basis outside of perception and emotion that could constitute it as morally unallowable?

Sorry for not getting back sooner to your thoughts on this.

A difficult idea to convey. In a perfect world,everyone would be happy, and let's call that an unquestionable premise. Happiness simply means the possession of things, states of mind that are good, or, have value. Of course, ion the real world this will never happen, but we use these and other terms as meaningfully functional in ethics. Why? I think it's because it's there: the world IS a moral place, that is, a place where this very odd thing called value exists. Value is what makes all the difference. If nothing mattered, then no ethics. But this business called "mattering" or "caring" changes being human from a scientific object into an ethical subject. It changes everything and makes science into an abstraction. After all, value cannot be observed. Sure, pain and pleasure can be quantified, measured, talked about. But value is much different. value is the good and bad of things, and science cannot see good and bad. Of course, there is the contingently good and bad, as in, this is a good chair, but this is not the value of ethics. The value in ethics is absolute: That pain is bad. Indeed, pain is always. already bad. It is bad by df. So, we are, to use Heidegger's phrase, thrown into the world, and we care. And I have been leading up to what can only be called the given of Being here: Value.

There is a ton to say about this, but the thumbnail is this: the world IS good and bad, we never invented this. It is one very spooky ontology. (This is NOT science's world.) This is the grounding of the harm i talked about in the post. Harm is something we are born into; it is part and parcel of Being here, or it is a foundational given, as solidly there as this cup on my desk. (It makes one think twice before conferring explanatory value onto science's theories about what we are, doesn't it? What good is a theory that cannot even SEE what is at the core of being human?) And since our intersubjective ethical world is so imperfect in its distribution of joys and pains, the best we can do is do no harm, for harm is, per the above, intrinsically bad.

[quoteHere's my personal argument, and I don't expect anyone to agree with it: Moral "wrongness" does not exist outside of perception and cognition. The universe's processes occur regardless of any desire for these things to not be so dictated by an organism. That is, organisms within the universe (namely us homosapiens) may put forth some ethical code or moral, but these things exist naturally because of our evolutionary history and evolutionary processes. It is equally true, I think, that the tendencies of some humans to fall outside of these naturally occurring moral beliefs generated by survival instinct are natural.

In essence, our morality makes sense in evolutionary terms. However, actions that fall outside of those beliefs are equally as natural. The universe and its processes shall continue to occur the way they have for quite some time, including the falling outside of moral standards by some people. If there is one thing we can assume about the universe thus far, it is that it does not appear to have any opinion of us and our actions. No objective morality, no expectation of it. In fact, most people we consider to be "evil" don't perceive themselves as evil. That is because, I think, an organism is above all else built to protect its own existence. Can we blame anyone for that? [/quote]

I look at things quite differently. First, while I certainly accept evolution, I believe it begs the question on value: it can tell us under what conditions value arose--we are inclined to pursue those things which foster reproduction and survival, and the converse for pain, displeasure-- but we are left with the question, what is it? that is, ok. the world does this, but why THIS? The torture, the horrors, the amazing joys, etc. My favorite: Why are we born to suffer and die? Science is silent on t his. No: value is just as objective as death and taxes.

Put into so few terms, wrongness cannot exist outside of our minds, because we are not the source of the universe and its natural order and physical laws.

I take issue with this, of course. Long story. Up to you.

[Wilson]

No, morality is NOT always in relation to a group. In its most basic sense, morality is individual. A group may agree on certain moral principles, but everybody pretty much has some opinions on right and wrong that are different from everyone else. Dictionary.com defines amorality as: "having no moral standards, restraints, or principles; unaware of or indifferent to questions of right or wrong: a completely amoral person."

So what is the meaning of right and wrong, then, in your sense? Is it not always in relation to others? Imagine you lived as an individual in a world with no others - what would morality mean? Is self-abuse immoral? Suicide? (This use of 'others' mostly implies other people but does extend to animals, for many. This ties in to which other beings we individually confer as having rights.)

Yes, morality is indeed in relation to others. It's what tells us to act in other than our own self-interest. What I objected to was the idea that morality is group-based.

The fact that people differ on what they consider right and wrong is why we need the authority of a moral code. We all have our individual, uniquely personal senses of right and wrong, yes, but these are conditioned, developed, to different degrees, during our lives in the context of our own personal histories as part of our respective human societies. (Though I would concede this conditioning could be compromised by biological constraints, as evidenced, perhaps, by psychopathy.)

How I might put it is that the characteristic morality of a society relates in part to function (what it wants to achieve) in the context of the world it finds itself in, and in part to its values (what it thinks it is) in the context of the grand scheme of things -- it is only ever contextual/relative; there is no universal morality. When I look back through human history, and observe such bewildering acts of piety, or cruelty, this is clear to me.

My opinion, as I said earlier, is that morality is individual - but of course people in a group do have generally agreed upon standards of behavior. However, when a person is faced with a moral issue, does he consult the laws or the general moral code of his community to decide for himself what's right and wrong? I say that he does not - he has his own moral standards, based in some cases on the rules of church or society, but not always - and he does (or thinks he ought to do) what feels morally right to him. Or more accurately, there may be a negotiation between what's the moral course of action, and what's in his own (or his loved ones') self-interest.

I agree with your last paragraph, by the way, for the most part.

[John Bruce Leonard]

Thank you for your clarification, Thamior. In following, I had a question regarding this comment:

ThamiortheThinker wrote:
I believe that moral wrongs are a judgment we pass over things which we perceive as harms. It is the wrongness itself which is arbitrary, not the harms we perceive. ... [T]he evil/badness isn't an actual property of actions.

I wanted to ask you how these two ideas fit together in your thought. If the harms we perceive exist and are not arbitrary, then what is arbitrary about our judgement on those harms? In other words, where is the locus of our disagreements about morality? If these disagreements are only disagreements over the degree of harm of this or that action, then does this not provide a basis for legitimate (non-arbitrary) conversation over the wrongness of this or that action?

There is a point here which is perhaps related:

Jutfrank wrote:
[The morality of a society] is only ever contextual/relative; there is no universal morality. When I look back through human history, and observe such bewildering acts of piety, or cruelty, this is clear to me.

The variety of moralities over the course of history – or even in the present moment, in different places on the globe – does not seem to me to demonstrate, nor even to suggest, the relativity of morality. It does not answer the question, “Is there a universal right and a wrong?” but rather imposes that question; for if we all agreed on right and wrong, inquiry here would be superfluous.

Put otherwise, the bewildering diversity of human moral judgements does not seem to me to be the closure of our investigation, but in fact the beginning of it.

John Bruce Leonard

[ThamiorTheThinker]

If amorality is the lack of moral beliefs and/or actions based on moral principals, and morality is a term which applies to any code of conduct or "good/wrong" belief that one applies to themselves and/or others - where does this leave amorality? Are murderers amoral if they believe that murder is justified, or do they merely have different morals? I may have answered my own question, but I don't think this question is answered so simply. What are your thoughts?

My answer to the question involves trying to clear up some of the terms used.

If morality is the code of conduct concensually agreed by a group of people,
then amorality is the lack of any such code
and immorality is the contravention thereof,

then the adjectives moral/amoral/immoral would refer to the above concepts in such as way that a moral act would be an act which accords with the code, an immoral act contravenes the code and an amoral act is not possible within a moral community. People cannot be moral or immoral - but their acts are in how they relate to the moral code of the group, though one may disagree with what should constitute the moral code. Of course moral codes look different throughout history and across culture.

So a 'murderer' by definition (we don't call soldiers 'murderers' when they kill people in the context of war) would be committing an immoral act, but only in the context of the group's moral code. The murderer may or may not see himself as part of the moral group.

Because morality is part of human culture (you wouldn't say a spider can be immoral), then you could say that the Universe is amoral, animal societies are amoral, and you could in principle conceive of human societies as amoral, if they lacked a moral code.

Morality is always in relation to a group, so the countable noun, e.g. people "have different morals", could be confusing. We could say that people have different principles, or judgements of right and wrong in particular contexts.

I understand your argument, and I in fact agree. The question here is: If morality is relative to groups, and all moral principles exist across the whole of all logically possible worlds (LPW), then doesn't that mean that one is never amoral, since in some LPW, to some group, they shall be following their moral guidelines?

-- Updated February 12th, 2016, 4:58 pm to add the following --

If amorality is the lack of moral beliefs and/or actions based on moral principals, and morality is a term which applies to any code of conduct or "good/wrong" belief that one applies to themselves and/or others - where does this leave amorality? Are murderers amoral if they believe that murder is justified, or do they merely have different morals? I may have answered my own question, but I don't think this question is answered so simply. What are your thoughts?

My answer to the question involves trying to clear up some of the terms used.

If morality is the code of conduct concensually agreed by a group of people,
then amorality is the lack of any such code
and immorality is the contravention thereof,

then the adjectives moral/amoral/immoral would refer to the above concepts in such as way that a moral act would be an act which accords with the code, an immoral act contravenes the code and an amoral act is not possible within a moral community. People cannot be moral or immoral - but their acts are in how they relate to the moral code of the group, though one may disagree with what should constitute the moral code. Of course moral codes look different throughout history and across culture.

So a 'murderer' by definition (we don't call soldiers 'murderers' when they kill people in the context of war) would be committing an immoral act, but only in the context of the group's moral code. The murderer may or may not see himself as part of the moral group.

Because morality is part of human culture (you wouldn't say a spider can be immoral), then you could say that the Universe is amoral, animal societies are amoral, and you could in principle conceive of human societies as amoral, if they lacked a moral code.

Morality is always in relation to a group, so the countable noun, e.g. people "have different morals", could be confusing. We could say that people have different principles, or judgements of right and wrong in particular contexts.

I understand your argument, and I in fact agree. The question here is: If morality is relative to groups, and all moral principles exist across the whole of all logically possible worlds (LPW), then doesn't that mean that one is never amoral, since in some LPW, to some group, they shall be following their moral guidelines?

-- Updated February 12th, 2016, 5:00 pm to add the following --

By the way, John Bruce Leonard, I accidentally conflated the terms "amorality" and "immorality". What I meant to refer to was immorality in my original post.

-- Updated February 12th, 2016, 5:15 pm to add the following --

Addresing your first point, Hereandnow: Is pain not an indicator of harm, therefore being something which is useful to an individual? You called pain "bad" by default, but it actually serves a useful function. Of course, the lack of a need for pain is what most of us would consider to be "good", but the lack of pain in and of itself is not good, for this inhibits us from understanding when, where and how our bodies or minds are injured/dysfunctional.

Also, we must not assume that value is some metaphysical concept. It appears strange and different to us, but only because it is a property of human nature that is inherently difficult to explain. Give an extremely advanced electronic or quantum computer a form of consciousness, and it might wonder why its programming is the way it is, or why it would "want" to follow its programming. That does not mean that the computer's programming is metaphysical to the computer, only that it is something which cannot be understood by the computer's "mind" or main processing component. We could relate this to the concept of value, insofar as value is related to the term "intrinsic motivation". I hope it makes sense to you that I relate the terms value and intrinsic motivation.

if not, here's an explanation: Intrinsic motivation is a factor which causes an individual to perform certain actions. Value does this, because an individual which values certain things (principles, goods, etc.) shall act in specified ways to gain the source of that valued thing. Value, then, is an intrinsic motivation. It makes sense, under this description, to compare it to a computer's programming. Does it really make sense to say that value actually exists as a separate entity, or is it just our programming, and we somehow perceive it as a separate entity?

[John Bruce Leonard]

Intrinsic motivation is a factor which causes an individual to perform certain actions. Value does this, because an individual which values certain things (principles, goods, etc.) shall act in specified ways to gain the source of that valued thing. Value, then, is an intrinsic motivation.

I think that the point you are making could be summed up at least partially as follows: there can be no value without a valuer. I am tempted to agree with this. But there are a number of different ways that “value” could be “intrinsic motivation.”

1. Value might be arbitrarily and deliberately decided upon. For example, I might wake one day and proclaim, “From henceforth on, all red beetles will be valuable to me. I will permit no harm to come to them, and I will do what is necessary to help them flourish.” But this is clearly abnormal behavior, and my sanity would be doubted. This suggests that value is not the product of a random imposition on our parts, but is rooted in our nature – which you point to by saying that it is “programmed.”

2. At the same time, it is not “programmed” in the sense of being unalterable. Over the course of our life, many things become valuable to us that were not before, and many others lose their value to us. Indeed, even those “imperatives” which are radically ingrained in us can be challenged, as is shown by the fact that sexuality, which certainly imposes its “values” on the world, is nonetheless held in check and often even molded or circumvented by various social or religious codes. We ourselves through our philosophizing are capable of altering our own notions of right and wrong.

So we may say: value is not simply arbitrarily imposed by us on the world, nor is it simply rigidly imposed on us by our nature.

Herein lies the necessity of morality. Moral investigations, so far as I understand them, have the twin purpose of determining what is valuable on the one hand, and what is the best way to attain the valuable on the other. These investigations are necessary because we do not intrinsically know what is good, nor how to attain it. The consequence of this, is that the single real moral imperative we in our ignorance may embrace, is the imperative to eliminate our ignorance as much as possible and to strive to see the truth of things.

Most of us most of the time ignore this imperative, preferring instead, and thoughtlessly, to follow prescriptions and proscriptions which have been established by society or by authorities diverse. I would hesitate to say that we act immorally in this, but I cannot say that we act morally. Returning to the question of the original post, then, I wonder if we must not say, not only that amorality exists, but that, strictly speaking, most people are amoral most of the time?

John Bruce Leonard

[ThamiorTheThinker]

I agree with your points about value, John. Thank you for your input. You're right, this does leave us asking the same original question: Are people truly acting out of a lack of morality? That is, are we constantly trying to redefine morality such that yesterday's good becomes today's bad? I think of old religious dogmas and superstitious Victorian beliefs with regard to your point about humans not knowing intrinsically what is "good". Insofar as we must create morality for ourselves, morality changes between people. Therefore, we are all good, and all bad, at different times and to different people.

I hope I've interpreted your writing accurately. Please correct me if I went off-course.

[John Bruce Leonard]

[A]re we constantly trying to redefine morality such that yesterday's good becomes today's bad?... Therefore, we are all good, and all bad, at different times and to different people.

This is quite certainly true, Thamior, although I am not sure it is the same thing as saying that we are amoral. I believe you have presented a description more of the confusion regarding morality into which we are all of us born, many of us without ever realizing the fact. I would say rather that amorality indicates actions that are performed automatically – without due moral deliberation. A person who, attempting to find the right way to live, alters moral perspective every year or so, falling into hopeless contradiction and perhaps even hypocrisy, seems to me already to be acting in a way morally, as compared with a person of stolid respectability who never in the course of a lifetime questions his society's principles. Yet no one, I think, would say that the person of stolid respectability is immoral.

That I might explain myself better, let us consider a dog. Now, it would be absurd to say that a dog is or behaves morally or immorally. A dog quite simply is; he lies beyond the realm of moral choice. This is further demonstrated by the fact that we do not punish a dog as we do a human being. If a man, for example, attacks another man, we say that he has committed a crime, if not a wrong. If a dog attacks another dog, he has committed no crime, and certainly no wrong; he is simply an aggressive dog, or a vicious dog, or a “bad dog,” this last meaning not that he is immoral, but that he is not of a quality suitable to be a domestic animal. From this, I infer that a dog and the actions of a dog must be considered strictly amoral.

Nonetheless, a dog is trained to act in specific ways – to follow certain commands, to avoid certain actions, to perform certain others. Many of the principles we seek to inculcate in a dog are at least analogous to our moral codices. For example, it is considered immoral in our society for one human being to physically assault another; and it is a principle in the training at least of most household dogs to suppress their urge to attack strangers. A dog can be trained, in other words, to follow certain elements of our moral code, although he does so without being moral or acting morally. The which suggests to me that also human beings might be capable of acting in accord with a system of morality, but of acting nonetheless amorally.

Can we say that a human being might act amorally in this sense? And if so, under what conditions?

John Bruce Leonard

[ThamiorTheThinker]

That might be true, Leonard. This is evidenced by the fact that some children act in specific ways without justifying those behaviors. If you ask a child why they shouldn't steal cookies from a cookie jar, they might respond with "My mother told me that I can't/shouldn't steal them". It all relates to evolutionary psychology - the parent births the child, and by definition was an evolutionary success. It follows that the parent teaches the child to act in ways that the parent was raised, since those behaviors were "good enough" for the parent to survive and reproduce. To the child's mind, it does not require a questioning of the principle of the action, the child merely follows the command. Children are, in this sense, very susceptible to dog-like training, all due to developmental/evolutionary psychology.

[Boots]

If amorality is the lack of moral beliefs and/or actions based on moral principals, and morality is a term which applies to any code of conduct or "good/wrong" belief that one applies to themselves and/or others - where does this leave amorality? Are murderers amoral if they believe that murder is justified, or do they merely have different morals? I may have answered my own question, but I don't think this question is answered so simply. What are your thoughts?

Psychopaths are believed to be amoral in that they have very low empathic ability and are, therefore, mostly devoid of a personal moral compass.

[ThamiorTheThinker]

If amorality is the lack of moral beliefs and/or actions based on moral principals, and morality is a term which applies to any code of conduct or "good/wrong" belief that one applies to themselves and/or others - where does this leave amorality? Are murderers amoral if they believe that murder is justified, or do they merely have different morals? I may have answered my own question, but I don't think this question is answered so simply. What are your thoughts?

Psychopaths are believed to be amoral in that they have very low empathic ability and are, therefore, mostly devoid of a personal moral compass.

You're correct in that.

For everybody who is participating in this discussion: if you look through the comments, you'll find that I wanted to discuss "immorality" but I conflated the two terms. So, when I looked for the technical definition of "immorality", I found amorality instead - and that's what I wrote about. I want to redirect the conversation toward discussing immorality, that is, the perception of a person going against moral principles, but not lacking belief in them altogether.

[Boots]

(Nested quote removed.)


Psychopaths are believed to be amoral in that they have very low empathic ability and are, therefore, mostly devoid of a personal moral compass.

You're correct in that.

For everybody who is participating in this discussion: if you look through the comments, you'll find that I wanted to discuss "immorality" but I conflated the two terms. So, when I looked for the technical definition of "immorality", I found amorality instead - and that's what I wrote about. I want to redirect the conversation toward discussing immorality, that is, the perception of a person going against moral principles, but not lacking belief in them altogether.

Ah. In that case, a person who acted immorally would have to be moral. In other words, a person could not believe themselves to be acting immorally if they did not have a moral compass to begin with.

As for the murderer question. If I were to murder a person and believe that it was necessary (say to defend my child from being killed), then I would be acting morally according to my personal moral compass and according to many societal moral norms as well.

[John Bruce Leonard]

For everybody who is participating in this discussion: if you look through the comments, you'll find that I wanted to discuss "immorality" but I conflated the two terms. So, when I looked for the technical definition of "immorality", I found amorality instead - and that's what I wrote about. I want to redirect the conversation toward discussing immorality, that is, the perception of a person going against moral principles, but not lacking belief in them altogether.

It is only after this post of yours, Thamior, that I at last understand. My apologies for dwelling so intently on amorality in my previous posts!

Speaking now to the proper subject: the Platonic Socrates seems to equate wrong with error; he says on several occasions that no one does the wrong, knowing that it is wrong. This would suggest, of course, that immorality does not exist, it being only a species of confusion or a mistake of our reason. A person who commits a wrong, under this interpretation, does so because he erroneously believes it is really right.

On the other hand we find in Augustine the following passage:


There was a pear tree close to our own vineyard, heavily laden with fruit, which was not tempting either for its color or for its flavor. Late one night -- having prolonged our games in the streets until then, as our bad habit was -- a group of young scoundrels, and I among them, went to shake and rob this tree. We carried off a huge load of pears, not to eat ourselves, but to dump out to the hogs, after barely tasting some of them ourselves. Doing this pleased us all the more because it was forbidden. Such was my heart, O God, such was my heart -- which thou didst pity even in that bottomless pit. Behold, now let my heart confess to thee what it was seeking there, when I was being gratuitously wanton, having no inducement to evil but the evil itself. It was foul, and I loved it. I loved my own undoing. I loved my error -- not that for which I erred but the error itself. A depraved soul, falling away from security in thee to destruction in itself, seeking nothing from the shameful deed but shame itself. (St. Augustine, Confessions, Book 2)


Although I think that the above interpretation of the Platonic Socrates might prove simplistic as an explanation for all the complexities of human behavior, I wonder if Augustine's description of his own act can really be called embracing the wrong for the sake of the wrong - or, to use his own words, if he really had "no inducement to evil but the evil itself." Another way of phrasing this question: did Augustine not really seek some "good" in the "evil" of his theft, even if it were the very adolescent and wrong-headed good of pleasure in rebellion or the thrill of transgression? If he was seeking out a good, and not an evil, can we really call his act "immoral," or must we agree with the Platonic Socrates that he was simply in thrall of an error of his reason?

[Alec Smart]

Without morality human beings couldn't live as social animals. In order for society to exist it is necessary for there to be a mechanism which prevents us from clubbing our neighbour on the head and taking those of his possessions that we would quite like to own ourselves. Somewhere along our evolutionary path natural selection has incorporated a capacity for conscience and a sense of wright and wrong into our psychology and any individual lacking these attributes should not be considered to be a normally functioning human being. The fact that such people may exist has no bearing on the general subject of morality. I would say that it is not possible for a non genetically defective person to be born into and brought up in a functional society and be amoral.

[Boots]

Without morality human beings couldn't live as social animals. In order for society to exist it is necessary for there to be a mechanism which prevents us from clubbing our neighbour on the head and taking those of his possessions that we would quite like to own ourselves. Somewhere along our evolutionary path natural selection has incorporated a capacity for conscience and a sense of wright and wrong into our psychology and any individual lacking these attributes should not be considered to be a normally functioning human being. The fact that such people may exist has no bearing on the general subject of morality. I would say that it is not possible for a non genetically defective person to be born into and brought up in a functional society and be amoral.

I disagree. I think psychopaths, who are basically amoral due to very low empathy, have a place in society. Otherwise, evolution would have weeded them out long ago.

[Alec Smart]

I disagree. I think psychopaths, who are basically amoral due to very low empathy, have a place in society. Otherwise, evolution would have weeded them out long ago.

I'm not quite sure what you are disagreeing with. I imagine there are situations when being a psychopath in a world where most other people are complying to a set of rules that he has exempted himself from can be greatly to his advantage. Therefore, it isn't surprising that evolution hasn't eliminated them completely.