I'm a new member, and one of the questions that I've always found fascinating is the question of moral relativity vs. moral absolutism. I define moral relativity as the idea that people, having grown up with different beliefs and cultures, should be allowed to hold different morals and cannot be held accountable to any set of universally set standards. Personally I believe in moral absolutism; what I've learned of Nietzche's theories hasn't really done a lot to convince me otherwise. I believe that people inherently know that death, persecution, and slavery are wrong. -Jocelyn
I do believe in moral relativism. I.e. I believe that one is free to choose his duty. (And one is free to ignore his instincts.)
A person is indeed free to adopt their own morals. However, when their morals and actions interfere with another's freedoms against their will, it becomes necessary to interfere on the side of your own morals. As an example, in some cultures a wife is treated as property. Sometimes, the woman accepts this role inconsiquentially. Other times, they feel oppressed by this and are unable to resist, and at this point it is the duty of people who's morals do not agree with the actions going on to put a stop to it. In this there is a balance between relativity and absolutism. People should have freedom of morals up to the point when they force them on someone else.
Do you know or know of anyone or any nation or any culture or any civilization in all of human history where people would agree that it's "good" to be lied to? Does anyone like to be lied to? Anywhere? Baron Max
Small isolated communities exist in the world. They are entirely seperate from the "global community" that we have begun to establish. There is virtually no need for these communities, which do not interact with the larger community, to adopt an absolute morality, which we are trying to govern ourselves with. If the entire world were comprised of one communitiy, then moral absolutism would be necessary, and vice versa...if there were a lot of seperate communities, relativism would be fine. The problem really is people's reaction to another group's morality. And I feel that as long as the morality works for the group, and the group members are embracing it, and working within it, and are interested in its proliferation (hopefully not statically), then no one should worry about this group's morality. (Thank goodness there's not been any ridiculous religious crap here yet.)
These morals are defined by instinct and nature. Whether or not you live in the U.S. or in a small island near New Guinea, your consciousness knows how to love and respect others, and knows how to grieve over murder and crime. All humans want freedom. Some will argue that humans inherently seek someone to govern them, but don't people always want a choice as to who governs them? All people, no matter what background they come from or what situation they're in, want autonomy and inherently know that it is wrong to take it away from others. It just comes down to how much a person cares about being moral...
That is apparently not true of Muslims and the subjugation of women! And surprisingly, many Muslim women agree!!! So ....what do you have to say about that? I still can't think of or imagine any human who'd agree that it's okay to be lied to ...can you? Even the world's worst liar doesn't like to be lied to. Baron Max
Do you think that the all these Muslim women truly agree? Or just don't feel comfortable arguing otherwise? I read an article about Muslim women being mutilated because they failed to do their housework correctly. Are you saying that women don't instinctively know that it's wrong? These "morals" that allow such heinous acts aren't really morals at all, but just man-made justifications that result from the idiocy that comes with mob-mentality. And about lying... People don't generally like being lied to, but I've seen many people who prefer to believe that ignorance is bliss. When my friend's father passed away, she told me that she wished her mom hadn't told her that it was suicide.
Well, I don't know about "all" of the Muslim women, but....? Also you said "...and inherently know that it is wrong to take it away from others." And yet the Muslim MEN are more than willing to take it away for the women. So, no, I don't think you're correct that it's "inherent" in humans. Ignorance is NOT the same thing as being lied to. Baron Max
It IS if her mom said, "You dad dies of a heart attack", for example. MANY people prefer to be lied to in this way in AMNY different situations if they think it will make their lives easier. I do not agree with that philosophy, but I think more people do than do not.
Yeah but they're only applying that rule to a specific situation, and that is to themselves. Some people think that lying is alright in certain circumstances, especially if it doesn't involve themselves being subjected to the lie. In what way is that absolute? Unless the absolute is 'Don't lie to me, or the people i care about, but don't mind me if i don't apply that in my approach to other people.'
Lying sometimes becomes the truth for the more that the lie is said, the more it becomes accepted as true.An example would be that NASA says it must go to the moon or Mars or wherever and we believe that to be true, Why is it that anyone would want to spend 100/s of billions of dollars to go somewhere that isn't needed except to make money for themselves.
i know that morals are relative but it annoys the hell out of me.so i just go by my moral.whatever they happen to be, they are right.
Moral is something we are taught, but also something that is needed and which we see is needed, some more obvious than others. There are such a thing as absolute moral when it comes to interactions with people, take such a thing as fairness, people should be treated equal, tasks should be distributed equally, it isn't a need to worry that being fair would lead to bad things, since it won't, since if you see something unfair you would react to it, because of that people can be taught either by you or see for themselves that not being fair leads to bad things. Some morals has to do with "group morals" which is rather rules within the group that is not accepted to cross, the rules may conflict with natural morals which we don't have to be taught and can be considered to be absolute in that sense that they don't change unless the people change that the moral apply to, the people would thus have to change in such a way that the problem that the moral applied to is gone. But in a way even that moral is absolute since even if the people were gone the idea of the moral would still exist. In that I mean that if the people came back the moral would again apply. The moral thus hasn't vanished or changed.
