What is Conscience?

[Grandliseur]

Is it something separate from us?
Is it part of us?
Is it both?
Does it exist at all?
What are we describing when we use the term conscience?

An inner voice that speaks to us about right and wrong, when engaging in wrong we become guilty, unless we repeat the act and keep silencing this voice. Soon, it keeps quiet.

When we do good things to others, we feel the power, the power of love.

 

[Fool]

Is it something separate from us?
Is it part of us?
Is it both?
Does it exist at all?
What are we describing when we use the term conscience?

it is All

unity is informed by it's nature

That which is infinite cannot be many, for many-ness is a finite concept. To have infinity you must identify or define that infinity as unity; otherwise, the term does not have any referent or meaning. In an Infinite Creator there is only unity. You have seen simple examples of unity. You have seen the prism which shows all colors stemming from the sunlight. This is a simplistic example of unity.

 

[allfoak]

it is All

unity is informed by it's nature

This is good news.
This means that that All must dwell within us or it would not be All.

it is All

This means of course that no matter how dim the light, our salvation does not lie in a man, it is in man.
We are the sons and daughters of the All currently enjoying the spoils of our inheritance.
One day we will all find our way out of the darkness and make the journey towards the light.

 

[Fool]

This means of course that no matter how dim the light, our salvation does not lie in a man, it is in man.
We are the sons and daughters of the All currently enjoying the spoils of our inheritance.
One day we will all find our way out of the darkness and make the journey towards the light.

kundalini rising

Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up,

The Hebrew expression "son of man" (בן–אדם i.e. ben-'adam) appears one hundred and seven times in the Hebrew Bible.[1] This is the most common Hebrew construction for the singular, appearing 93 times in the Book of Ezekiel alone and 14 times elsewhere. In thirty two cases, the phrase appears in intermediate plural form "sons of men".[1] As generally interpreted by Jews, "son of man" denotes mankind generally in contrast to deity or godhead, with special reference to their weakness and frailty[2]


the sheperds crook is the kundalini fully raised same concept in horus' djed

 

[joe1776]

Our environments shape our consciences for sure.

I think you are confusing cause with effect.

Several centuries back, slavery was a common element of human environments. What caused the abolition movement if not troubled consciences and changing minds?

 

[URAVIP2ME]

Inherited from what or whom?

Inherent is a different word from inherited, but to me we inherited a conscience from father Adam and mother Eve.
So, originally our God-given conscience originated from the Creator, the God of heaven.

 

[URAVIP2ME]

For what purpose?

To me, for the purpose of having a conscience to be a reliable guide when trained in an upright manner.

 

[URAVIP2ME]

Like being made in God's image?

God's main attributes are 'love, justice, wisdom and mercy', so being made in God's image means we can reflect those attributes or qualities to varying degrees.

 

[leibowde84]

I think you are confusing cause with effect.

Several centuries back, slavery was a common element of human environments. What caused the abolition movement if not troubled consciences and changing minds?

Overtime, the idea of liberty, freedom and morality gained traction and, as a result, the site of slavery began to bother the consciences of many. People's minds didn't just magically change on their own. The norms of society and philosophical advances and understanding along with religious beliefs helped to change the minds of many in regard to slavery.

 

[Twilight Hue]

Is it something separate from us?
Is it part of us?
Is it both?
Does it exist at all?
What are we describing when we use the term conscience?

I don't really know why it's such a big mystery. It's obvious if we didn't have our physical bodies we would not have consciousness, it's obviously an emergent phenomena of matter.

 

[MonkeyFire]

Its an angel.

 

[joe1776]

Overtime, the idea of liberty, freedom and morality gained traction and, as a result, the site of slavery began to bother the consciences of many. People's minds didn't just magically change on their own. The norms of society and philosophical advances and understanding along with religious beliefs helped to change the minds of many in regard to slavery.

I don't follow your reasoning.

The abolition of slavery is an effect of minds changed on the issue. Since causes precede effects you are offering the ideas of liberty, freedom and morality which are ideas which conflict with slavery. So, the abolition of slavery was caused by non-slavery beliefs? Alright, well, what caused them?
In answer to that question, you offer:

The norms of society? Slavery was the norm. Then it wasn't. The question I asked is what caused the norm to change if not the nagging of conscience?

Philosophical advances? Philosophers are humans. What changed their minds on slavery?

Religious beliefs? The sacred texts of the Abrahamic religions condone slavery, yet slavery was abolished in nations which were dominated by those religious faiths. Why did the faithful ignore their sacred texts?

 

[leibowde84]

The norms of society? Slavery was the norm. Then it wasn't. The question I asked is what caused the norm to change if not the nagging of conscience?

No. In the US, it wasn't even the norm. The trend was that more states (and far more of the population) would be slave-free even before the civil war. More and more people were realizing that enslaving humans was immoral, like the rest of the world. Just think about the fact that slavery in England was already banned.

Philosophical advances? Philosophers are humans. What changed their minds on slavery?

I didn't mean philosphers. I meant the philosophy of average people in the US. Most of the rest of the civilized world came to their senses before us. But, experience leads to people's minds changing, minds don't change on their own. Experience is our environment.

Religious beliefs? The sacred texts of the Abrahamic religions condone slavery, yet slavery was abolished in nations which were dominated by those religious faiths. Why did the faithful ignore their sacred texts?

The old testament does, but not the new so much. The old testament also outlawed eating pork, but that didn't last too long with Christians. But, the teachings of Jesus in the Bible squarely contradict slavery. I think it just took some Americans a long, long time to realize that.

 

[joe1776]

... More and more people were realizing that enslaving humans was immoral, like the rest of the world...

My question was: What made them realize that if not conscience? How did the people in the rest of the world realize that slavery was immoral?

I didn't mean philosphers. I meant the philosophy of average people in the US. Most of the rest of the civilized world came to their senses before us. But, experience leads to people's minds changing, minds don't change on their own. Experience is our environment.

If it wasn't the experience of a nagging conscience, then what experience are you talking about that changed people's minds on the slavery issue?

The old testament does, but not the new so much. The old testament also outlawed eating pork, but that didn't last too long with Christians. But, the teachings of Jesus in the Bible squarely contradict slavery. I think it just took some Americans a long, long time to realize that.

Here's a link to 100 Bible quotes on slavery.
What Does the Bible Say About Slavery?

In 1866, a year after America's civil war, Pope PIus IX declared that slavery was okay. According to scripture, he was right.

 

[sealchan]

Is it something separate from us?
Is it part of us?
Is it both?
Does it exist at all?
What are we describing when we use the term conscience?

Your conscience is your brain's ability to produce cognitions which evaluate whether something is good or bad, important or unimportant. It is what Carl Jung might call the feeling function. Its goal is to guide the individual toward what is and what is not valuable for its survival. This also includes what is valuable for the survival of its supporting social group.

To break it down further...the brain is a complex network of interconnected and interacting neurons which produce a series of mutually influential electrochemical stimuli which can be called neural activity. This neural activity is a complex, adaptive pattern of cellular behavior which interacts with the environment, the individual's body, its own memory and other "emergent" properties of our biological, environmental and social world. In humans we have access to this neural activity through a shared language and through a direct witnessing often called self-consciousness.

Systems of logical thought and moral values are generated from within the scope of neural activity. In the consciousness of humans this neural activity supports a sense of "self" which can have fragmented aspects called inner voices. One has been commonly labelled conscience. This is the voice of the feeling function as it is experienced as an alternative inner voice within the multi-voice that is our self an emergent order arising out of a complex, adaptive system of neural activity.

 

[joe1776]

Your conscience is your brain's ability to produce cognitions which evaluate whether something is good or bad, important or unimportant. It is what Carl Jung might call the feeling function. Its goal is to guide the individual toward what is and what is not valuable for its survival. This also includes what is valuable for the survival of its supporting social group.

In my understanding conscience evaluates good or bad, fair or unfair. But important or unimportant? Isn't that a function of reason, the rational function?

 

[Ponder This]

Is it something separate from us?
Is it part of us?
Is it both?
Does it exist at all?
What are we describing when we use the term conscience?

conscience is our sense of right and wrong. It is a thing because people have it.
Does everyone have it? Maybe not. Perhaps some people are actually unscrupulous.

Tell me: Are you honest?
If you are honest, then why? If it's not the right thing to do to be honest, then why bother being honest?
If you are not honest, then how do you feel when someone else is dishonest with you? Does it not bother you if other people lack scruples?

I don't know if your sense of right or wrong is the same as my sense of right and wrong, but since I have a sense of right and wrong, it makes sense to me that other people also have a sense of right and wrong even if their sense makes no sense to me. That's my two cents.

 

[sealchan]

In my understanding conscience evaluates good or bad, fair or unfair. But important or unimportant? Isn't that a function of reason, the rational function?

Feeling, according to Jung, is also a rational function. This is not to be confused with emotion, or affect. It is also not to be confused with Intuition which is often self-consciously described as a feeling, "I feel that he won't understand." Feeling is the rational function of evaluating the world in terms of "value".

A classic example for me is when I was debating with a Feeling type (I'm a Thinking type) and we were talking about whether illegal immigrants should get medical care. I was taking the side of the law and that people whose presence in this country isn't legal don't have any rights so they don't have the right to expect treatment. The other person was considering how a person in need of medical treatment needs help and shouldn't be discriminated on on the basis of their legal status because that is not as important as that they get the medical treatment that they need.

Although both arguments were rational, mine was based on the definition of legal status and rights and the other was based on human need and values. The distinction wasn't perfect but I realized then that both of us were being rational but talking at cross purposes because I was basing my rational argument on the logic of how words and their meanings were defined and the other person was basing their argument on what is important and of value when responding to the needs of another human being.

Evaluating the world according to values and importance is a rational process that involves...

• Defining one's values
• Considering all the relevant aspects of the situation
• Reasoning logically using "valuations" rather than "word definitions"
• Stating a conclusion with supporting statements logically related to that conclusion

Once you see this distinction and once you learn that modern neurologists have found distinct areas of the brain that deal with "logic" and "evaluation" (see Damasio's Descartes Error) you can then begin to realize that many of the arguments people have that go in circles are precisely due to a difference in their natural personal typology (thinking vs feeling rational types).

Of course even within a type the premises may be different but then one should be able to get down to a shared but opposite assumption. Across the types no such specific disagreement can be reached. It is two separate (though also overlapping) realms of rational thought.

 

[sealchan]

In my understanding conscience evaluates good or bad, fair or unfair. But important or unimportant? Isn't that a function of reason, the rational function?

Consider the following situation: one child comes to you crying because their leg is broken and at the same time another child comes to you and says they have dropped their ice cream cone. If you ignore the second child in order to respond to the first your conscience is likely to be appeased by the consideration of the relative importance between the two children's needs.

This is a rational decision that was made based on an evaluation of "values" (feeling function) rather than a logical conclusion based on the definitions of words (thinking function).

 

[joe1776]

Feeling, according to Jung, is also a rational function. This is not to be confused with emotion, or affect. It is also not to be confused with Intuition which is often self-consciously described as a feeling, "I feel that he won't understand." Feeling is the rational function of evaluating the world in terms of "value".

A classic example for me is when I was debating with a Feeling type (I'm a Thinking type) and we were talking about whether illegal immigrants should get medical care. I was taking the side of the law and that people whose presence in this country isn't legal don't have any rights so they don't have the right to expect treatment. The other person was considering how a person in need of medical treatment needs help and shouldn't be discriminated on on the basis of their legal status because that is not as important as that they get the medical treatment that they need.

Although both arguments were rational, mine was based on the definition of legal status and rights and the other was based on human need and values. The distinction wasn't perfect but I realized then that both of us were being rational but talking at cross purposes because I was basing my rational argument on the logic of how words and their meanings were defined and the other person was basing their argument on what is important and of value when responding to the needs of another human being.

Evaluating the world according to values and importance is a rational process that involves...

• Defining one's values
• Considering all the relevant aspects of the situation
• Reasoning logically using "valuations" rather than "word definitions"
• Stating a conclusion with supporting statements logically related to that conclusion

Once you see this distinction and once you learn that modern neurologists have found distinct areas of the brain that deal with "logic" and "evaluation" (see Damasio's Descartes Error) you can then begin to realize that many of the arguments people have that go in circles are precisely due to a difference in their natural personal typology (thinking vs feeling rational types).

Of course even within a type the premises may be different but then one should be able to get down to a shared but opposite assumption. Across the types no such specific disagreement can be reached. It is two separate (though also overlapping) realms of rational thought.

Thank you for your explanation. I thought we were going to agree on how to define conscience but apparently not.

I think we feel the wrongness intuitively. I'm using a dictionary definition for intuition: direct perception of truth, fact, etc., independent of any reasoning process; immediate apprehension.

In his research, Jon Haidt learned that the judgments of conscience were immediate and the explanations for them were post hoc and often not very good.

I first realized the same thing many years ago when I knew immediately that a situation was unfair yet I struggled to explain why.

My guess is that the reasoning function only gets its chance to make the final decision in a moral dilemma. Example: Only options A and B are open and both feel wrong. The process of weighing the consequences of both and selecting the one which causes the least harm is probably up to the brain's reasoning function. Confirming my suspicion, I read that two parts of the brain light up when subjects are considering moral dilemmas. Usually, it's just one.