Why do right?

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That is soooooo not the point. You have so far said that 'good' is a reaction to empathic signals in the brain, and that 'evil' selfish actions are the result of a different brain function. You seriously make it sound as if we had no CHOICE!!!!! Maybe I am going too fast for you, but do you sort of understand where this goes? If we have no choice, we did no wrong. We did no right. It is all 'good' since it is natural. THAT in a nutshell is why God-fearing people get nervous about this type of reasoning. I am sure you will never follow these thoughts to an extreme level, because your 'compass' is already installed no matter where you think it came from. It does not make the thought any more valid in itself, just more harmless.

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So what's the practical difference between a moral compass put there by God or put there by evolution?If it was put there by God, then you don't have any choice, either.

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If we have no choice, we did no wrong. We did no right. It is all 'good' since it is natural.

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If we ALL have a moral compass, put there either by God or by evolution, then it makes no sense to say "it is all 'good' since it is natural".Our moral compass tells us that it isn't, no matter where the compass comes from.

It is not a competition between God and evolution.Let me try very carefully to explain.Larni has told us that the brain reacts in certain ways and causes us to feel either empathy or selfishness.That may be evolution, but it is NOT THE COMPASS. It is the map.The moral compass tells us that even when we feel like being selfish, WE DO NOT HAVE TO go there. We can if we want.It tells us that when we feel empathy WE SHOULD go there. We don't have to. Thing is, we do have a choice. We all do. That is why a person can talk till they are blue in the face about brain signals telling us this and telling us that. The signals mean NOTHING as long as we do not have to act upon them. They are completely irrelevent for determining where we got our moral compass. Feeling selfish is natural. What makes no sense is to have purely natural explanations for why we can tell that being selfish is bad. For survival, selfish can be very good. But we hate it. So, folks keep talking about the survival of the 'species' versus the survival of the individual. That means nothing. We act contrary to this idea every day. We choose the survival of an individual over the birth of a child who will carry on the species. We act at all times sporadic and without the instinctual behavior that such evolved survival skills bring to other species. We have choice. We feel one way, we can over-ride it. We need a compass to tell us not to. Where did we get it?

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Feeling selfish is natural.

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Yes.It is also natural to feel empathy, and to feel altruistic.

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What makes no sense is to have purely natural explanations for why we can tell that being selfish is bad.

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Sure it makes sense, for all the evolutionary reasons everybody's been talking about and you've been handwaving away.

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For survival, selfish can be very good.

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Yes.

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But we hate it.

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We do? No, humans love being selfish. Just hang around any child under the age of 8 or so.But, as we get to be older, we start to extend the "self" to include other people like our families, groups of friends, classmates, coworkers, parishes and communities.We are social animals. We care about what happens to "our" people.

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So, folks keep talking about the survival of the 'species' versus the survival of the individual. That means nothing. We act contrary to this idea every day.

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We also act consistent with this idea every day.We all do things (and refrain form doing other things) that help our species to survive every day.

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We choose the survival of an individual over the birth of a child who will carry on the species.

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Uh, one could also say that we end a pregnancy so that the Earth's already overtaxed resources are not depleted further.(there is currently no shortage of people, and in fact there are WAY too many people on the planet)

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We act at all times sporadic and without the instinctual behavior that such evolved survival skills bring to other species. We have choice. We feel one way, we can over-ride it. We need a compass to tell us not to. Where did we get it?

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We are social animals.We evolved to be very receptive to social programming.

You are making my point quite nicely. If this is all natural, evolved, learned, survival based behavior, there really is no reason to worry about bad or good.All we need to do is what is natural, evolved, learned, and good for survival. We can choose whether we want ourselves to survive, or our offspring. We can choose to act selfishly because it is oh so natural, or empathically because that is so natural too. There is nothing wrong with either. We can say, I evolved this way, no big deal. We can blame the actions of every criminal on what he has learned and evolved to be, and tell him it is not his fault. Where is the 'wrong' in this? What makes wrong wrong? It's natural, right? I have seen none. Think harder. I have seen someone tell us that we have areas of the brain that feel selfish. I have not seen anyone explain why we feel it is bad, and apparently, you don't. You stay there, ok? That is exactly what I am talking about. You are saying humans like being selfish, and we DO. We absolutely love it. But some of us choose to ignore our petty little fallen 'nature' and do something better than human. Tell me again that we don't hate selfishness, and then see if that applies to your own selfishnss or the selfishness of others. Of course we like our own, we are selfish remember? But we HATE other people's, and thus we know that we want something more than NATURAL.And do not tell me that the older we get the more self-less we get. You paint this beautiful portrait of life. Go watch some news. Come on.Edited by anastasia, : No reason given.

We could, but we would be liars. Can you imagine a girl walking into a clinic and saying 'I want to help the earth?' In fact, just a moment ago, you said this; Now we care about what happens to Earth. Sure that is important, but most people can't even do the tiniest thing to conserve other than kill their offspring I guess.

Hi, Annie, the we/you is used in a general sense.
Royalty (the Queen of England, etc.) always uses the monarchic 'we'.
It was a joke (sigh).

I suppose you could say the epitome of being selfish is to use altruism to ensure one own`s salvation.

That's where you "fall" down. What does "better than human" mean?You seem to be claiming that there is some "feeling" that doesn't come from our natural will to survive and to help our society and our species survive. You seem to be claiming that that "feeling" is somehow "better" than the natural will to survive and to help our society and our species survive.I have asked you how your "feeling" is different from my "feeling". Now I'll ask how your feeling is "better" than my feeling.Better in what way?

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I am. I am claiming that morality has nothing to do with survival. If that were true, we would call it instinct. I am. I am claiming that we have the survival of our soul subconsciously in mind. There is no 'better'. Your feeling is just as valid, your compass works as well as mine does, and you will be judged upon how well you use it in the exact same manner as I will.The question is, where is it pointing?At survival?Our entire beautiful, noble, heroic, and sacrificing morality, the one thing that, with free-will, seperates us from lesser animals, is just a survival instinct?Edited by anastasia, : No reason given.

That is a win/win, not selfishness. Makes religion seem rather nice actually. We get a few people here and there to start working on their own salvation, world gets better. Get a few more, hey, a lot more, world starts looking real purty. Everyone in their gardens working out their salvation with the guy next door...ah, wishful thinking. No one likes forcable religion.

Why not?What else?

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Once again, we do not have a shred of consistancy in relation to survival and morality.We use drugs, murder each other, abort our children, destroy natural resources, fight wars, commit suicide and genocide, don't exercise. smoke, eat like crap, drink our guts out, sky-dive, fly around in the air, tunnel underground, you name it.Then we turn around and prevent disease, wear safety belts, fight fires, plant trees, and learn karate.If this is ALL survival, again, we have the Hitler problem.

You ignored the more important question: What else?You asked for explanations. People gave you explanations. You handwaved them away.What explanation do you have?

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I did not ask for explanations, I have no questions.I waved nothing away, I pointed out that other explanations were unsatisafactory and incomplete.You know my explanation, Ringo. The good 'ol Compass Pointing to God theory.

The most unsatisfactory and incomplete explanation of all. To qualify as a "theory", it would have to explain what makes the compass point in that direction. What is the "magnetic field"?

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