For the questions:HJCarden wrote: ↑December 1st, 2020, 1:44 pm
Looking at that list of the reasons why we value those around us is interesting.
A couple of questions about that list
1. Do you believe that these reasons justify favoritism, or that they are just biases that have no real import (think of your mom/some stranger in a burning house: do you believe this justifies saving your mom instead of the stranger? or is this just a heuristic that is arbitrary?)
2. In the case of "everyone else", where do you think this empathy originates?
As for the broken bone being healed, do you think Morality is just a step in evolution, or an entirely new chapter in the history of our species?
To me I believe there are two ideas that are immediately attractive. Either
1. Our increased empathy is a product of the complex interdependency created in societies
-Why do we care about others? Because we need all the members of our society to do well in order for it to function
Or
2. We have "turned a corner" in which we have broken the shackles of survival being our only motivator
-why do we care about others? Because we have found a value of compassion that while it might be sacrificial, just ~feels~ right to us as humans
Interested in your response.
1) Yes, that is the reason of favoritism. Is natural to choose your closest person, in this case, the mom in front of a stranger. This is based on the history of engagement.
2) If we go to origins: fear of loneliness . In reality nobody could survive when is born if in the first months or year somebody is taking care of you. No matter how that part is taking care, but when you are new born, you cannot feed yourself. So you start to develop attachment feelings (love, hate, etc), but you are attached to that person. When you hear about something bad happen to someone, a question will pop-up: what if this will happen to me or to the person I care about?" . Why fear? Something bad happen to someone -> feel sorry, think might happen to you or someone you love(what if) -> Put your self in his/her shoes -> start to understand what is feeling-> identify with the emotion = empathy . Similar happen with something good, but in some of the cases there is a little envy when you put yourself in someone else shoes.
Broken bone being healed - is based on feelings: attachment and is a step. Morality is based on religion and that is an entirely new chapter in our history.
In case 1 - we are not yet there, that require advance understandings about "circle of life" and unfortunately we are far from there.HJCarden wrote: ↑December 1st, 2020, 1:44 pm 1. Our increased empathy is a product of the complex interdependency created in societies
-Why do we care about others? Because we need all the members of our society to do well in order for it to function
Or
2. We have "turned a corner" in which we have broken the shackles of survival being our only motivator
-why do we care about others? Because we have found a value of compassion that while it might be sacrificial, just ~feels~ right to us as humans
For case 2. Feels right, is a feeling defined into our subconscious by the education we receive while we were raised and later on by our own choices.
We are selfish beings and everything we do start from one selfish reason, which can be a positive selfishness (good for society) or a negative selfishness (bad for society).
I’ve wrote an article about this somewhere else: “why are people evil?” where I’ve explained the root cause and is all related to selfishness.