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Is there Any Such Thing as a Perfectly Wise Moral Code?
- Thread starter Sunstone
- Start date
To me there's no rule book. But there is a perfectly wise moral direction - to make every thought, word and deed a reflection of the greatest love you are capable of.
This does not mean giving in to someone's whims and desires because sometimes lessons need to be learned the hard way and sometimes what people think they want is not what they truly need.
But it means living the life of compassion.
Of course most, myself included, are far from being able to do that. But it's my aspiration.
This does not mean giving in to someone's whims and desires because sometimes lessons need to be learned the hard way and sometimes what people think they want is not what they truly need.
But it means living the life of compassion.
Of course most, myself included, are far from being able to do that. But it's my aspiration.
Reminds me of situation ethics. Good response.
CruzNichaphor
Active Member
No.
Reason: the concept in and of itself is an oxymoron; the idea of a "perfectly wise moral code" is just another expression for obnoxious self-righteousness and, thus, renders it immoral or amoral depending upon the reason(s) one might have for insisting upon it.
Just hyperbole on my part.
There might be but I'm not sure how we might discover this. I personally don't believe in such - in absolutes or an objective or ultimate code, that then might be perceived as coming from a divine entity. I just see humans as being rather messy and having to evolve our own consensual code - and hopefully we will - but I'm also doubtful of this. But we can still live with the majority signing up to the core values that I think most of us just sense as being right for humanity. We will always have transgressors of any moral code we might want to see applying to all - if indeed this at all possible, which again is doubtful - such that we will have to live with this. The biggest problem that I see is that essentially many peoples are still living in the past in many ways and/or are held back by their cultures and/or religions. But no doubt this has always been the case and always will be so. Who knows. I know this smacks of cultural imperialism but there it is. One has to defend the moral values that seem to be best for humanity as a whole - as in the Secular Humanist code for example.
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Altfish
Veteran Member
Probably not; but whatever it is, the code MUST evolve as humans evolve and be expanded/amended to reflect moral norms of the time.
Duke_Leto
Active Member
Why should it? Do societies' moralities necessarily become more ethical with the progression of time?
Altfish
Veteran Member
I would argue they do.
In stone age times cannibalism was accepted
In the 16th Century few questioned slavery
In 18th century women were (and still are) treated as inferior to males.
LBGT rights are now generally accepted in much of the world.
You could argue that they should have always been accepted but it is progress non the less.
Danny1988
Member
Mankind has always been the same, we have always killed each other like savage beasts. Nothing has changed, except we have more effective weapons to do the job.
joe1776
Well-Known Member
Yes, there is a perfectly wise moral code. You've probably heard it before.
"Let conscience be your guide" is all we need to know. Conscience is an intuitive sense that will warn us of wrongness immediately. It's capable of doing that despite the fact that moral situations happen in an almost infinite variety.
Example: An American soldier in Vietnam in 1968, who believes he's fighting in a worthy cause, is willing to kill enemy soldiers. However, he's ordered to kill civilians in a village called My Lai. He would immediately feel the wrongness of the act. It's an intuitive feeling emerging from his unconscious mind. This is conscience offering guidance which he, having free will, can follow or ignore.
Conscience seems to work in both real and imagined situations. If you can imagine yourself in the soldier's position, you might be able to feel the wrongness yourself.
Now, consider that the facts involved in this situation are unique. Human acts happen in an infinite variety and yet his conscience immediately offered guidance. The soldier didn't have time to think about it. Moreover, if he follows this immoral order, he will feel guilt when remembering this act for the rest of his life.
Now, consider the axiom "All knowledge begins with an observation of the senses." Our long-ago ancestors, even before language was invented, didn't see, smell, taste or hear the difference between a justified killing and one unjustified, so they must have felt it intuitively just as the soldier in Viet Nam felt it.
So, everything we know , or think we know, about morality, we learned from conscience. Then, with an excess of pride in our ability to reason, we wrote moral rules and laws which succeeded only in confusing moral judgments.
Our laws on murder are stupid attempts to write absolute rules covering future situations that will be as unique as snowflakes. Those in the USA have a history that goes back over a thousand years. They have been edited countless times and yet they differ in all 50 states. The same killing might be considered justifiable in one state but unjustified in the neighboring state.
Only conscience is equipped to judge the endless variety of moral situations that will happen and it does so instantly. Reason's only function in most moral situations should be to get the facts straight.
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If there is, it would only laugh at questions like this one.
A static code is logically impossible.
Come to think of it, so is a dynamic one, because it will always be seeking its own improvement.
Edited to add: in both cases, that is so because actualized, manifest ethics demand awareness of the circunstances. Ethical expression requires the expansion of its own boundaries and therefore keeps pressing itself towards new challenges.
Come to think of it, so is a dynamic one, because it will always be seeking its own improvement.
Edited to add: in both cases, that is so because actualized, manifest ethics demand awareness of the circunstances. Ethical expression requires the expansion of its own boundaries and therefore keeps pressing itself towards new challenges.
Yerda
Veteran Member
I don't know but I'm starting to find stoicism interesting in this regard. It seems to hold the possibility of a general guide that can help us act without evil.
Sir Doom
Cooler than most of you
I'll go with no. I think time is too large of a factor on decision making. We humans enjoy speaking of morality in hypotheticals for hours on end but when it is time to act, we rarely have the time to think so objectively. Its often only after the fact when we are literally dealing with the consequences that we even consider the relative righteousness of what we've done.
That is not to say we shouldn't consider the question as often as we do. I have to believe that long discussions on the internet and consideration for the topic in general have at least some bearing on what my knee-jerk reactions might be in any given situation.