Its very simple really (and maybe obvious) but its never ocurred to me that it is such a straight forward relationship before;
Inner empathy manifests outwardly as morality.
Empathy = Morality
- Thread starter Light Travelling
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Hapsburg said:
Agreed, I know people with little empathy for others yet they do live by a moral code.
Empathy is being able to identify with peoples feelings, morality is about abiding by the boundaries that the society you live in has decreed is acceptable or not acceptable.
Morality may differ within society as education differs within society. Religion also installs certain moral values in people, they take these on through a process of brainwashing or blind acceptance, little to do with their ability to empathise with others.
A greater sense of morality may be experienced by those with a greater emphatic ability or just more sensitive to their envornment and nature, but the two are not conjoined twins.
Hapsburg said:
But you don’t have alot of empathy and no morals do you – or no empathy and high moral?
I know ‘little’ and ‘some’ are not really scientific measures but basically you have a small amount of empathy and (apparently) a small amount of morals??
BTW; before you say you have no morals think about what that means. I mean are you a murderer, rapist and torturer? Would you do those things? No - So you have a reasonable moral standing then.
Theoryofrelativity said:
No, abiding by the boundaries that the society you live in has decreed, is simply obeying the law.
To obey the law we not need be moral – just obedient. Being moral may mean disobeying societies laws. Societies laws may be immoral !
Theoryofrelativity said:
It does, but again this simply requires obedience.
Theoryofrelativity said:
If brainwashed or just blind acceptance then little to do with morality either.
Theoryofrelativity said:
Without the ability to project our awareness to experience the feelings of others, we have no reason at all to treat others with kindness or to avoid causing physical (or mental) pain.
The mistreatment (the immoral mistreatment) that has occured through history - of animals, of women and of people of different races - has always been justified by objectifying them. You cant empathise with an object, you can only empathise with other sentient beings.
Example: When men ‘treat women as sexual objects’ in such immoral acts as rape, the reason they can do this is because they are either unwilling or unable to empathise with the woman – if they could (or would) really empathise, they would be unable to commit the immoral act of rape.
Light Travelling said:
You misread what I said , I said societies boundaries I DID not say legal laws, I meant what I said and again the two things are different. Moral boundaries are generally accepted codes of conduct within that culture and can as such vary from culture to culture. ie. Not having sex with married people, yes it happens, but it is generally regarded as immoral. It is not however illegal. ie Not a law!
Empathy and morality are not the same, people can respect this moral boundary without empathising a jot with married people.
meanwhile with regards to your comments on 'rape' this is only illegal and considered immoral in cultures that have decreed it as such, there is no universal law that this is the case. India is still very much in the process of trying to convince the male majority this is immoral and wish to enforce this view with the backing of law.
I know thieves who are deeply traumatised and confused when they are themselves the victims of theft and they empathise greatly with their families who are victims of theft, does not stop them from theiving. Empathy does not prevent immoral acts form occurring. These theives while empathising do not consider theft immoral. That is the difference.
I know thieves who are deeply traumatised and confused when they are themselves the victims of theft and they empathise greatly with their families who are victims of theft, does not stop them from theiving. Empathy does not prevent immoral acts form occurring. These theives while empathising do not consider theft immoral. That is the difference.
Theoryofrelativity said:
Societies 'boundries' are usually set by laws. Inside of those boundries there is a grey area where some of the population feel acts are immoral and some dont.
So yes a society's laws do not completely define its morailty but they are a good guide.
Adultry and homosexuality used to be illegal, because society felt they were so morally reprehensible they had to be. As societies morals changed so the laws changed to reflect them.
Now a large section of society does not feel adultry to be a great moral crime - maybe a bit unfair on the spouse but not immoral. Some people still feel it is immoral, but no longer a large enough proportion to warrant illegality.
You used the word 'boundry' - the boundry is the law. Within the law there is subjective moralising.
Theoryofrelativity said:
No I still say that empathy with a married woman on behalf of a mistress would not allow her to commit adultry with the husband. It is lack of empathy that allows this.
Light Travelling said:
I will leave you to your biased view, you refuse to listen to every opposing view and examples that are contrary to your own. A blind spot. I empathise with your tunnel vision and need for 'rightness' but I do not feel morally obliged to be nice to you because of that empathy.
hows that?
meanwhile your idea is not a new one and has been discussed a lot, with arguments for and against
"Objective Morality
Allott, Robin (1991) Objective Morality. Journal of Social and Biological Structures 14(4)
p. 455-471.Abstract
An objective basis for morality can be found in an evolutionary account of its origin and development. Morality is a key factor in the success of human groups in competition or co-existence with each other.A group's moral code represents an increasingly rational pattern of behaviour derived from the collective experience of the group handed down from generation to generation. Group selection is a controversial idea for animal evolution but it is inescapable in accounting for human evolution under the influence of language and the accumulation of cultural patterns. Morality has an objective physiological and neurological basis in so far as it exists to moderate the expression of the array of genetically-derived emotional patterns. Emotions represent the combination of action tendencies (neural motor programs) with (physiologically-derived) affective concomitants. The relation between emotion, empathy and morality is important. Empathy (a special form of perception still largely unexplained) has a key role both in the formation and cohesion of human groups and in the observance within groups of a moral code. Ultimately observance of moral rules depends on recognition by each individual of an integrating purpose in his life. In so far as the moral code is directed towards achieving this integrating purpose, morality for the individual becomes objective"
So we have objective morality and subjective morality, subjective morality being influenced by empathy and emotion, objective morality as dictated by society.
You are speaking clearly of subjective morality.
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Theoryofrelativity said:
It is only still considered moral is societies that objectify women and are therefore unable to empathise with them.
Theoryofrelativity said:
Young offenders are now given therapy whereby they meet their victims face-to-face. The victims explain the pain and suffering that has been caused by the offenders actions. This has proved to prevent re-offending to a greater effect than prison or other punishments. Why - becuase it develops empathy in the criminal and they then find it harder to continue to commit similar crimes.
Thieves also steal from necessity not because they justify it morally. They know its wrong but know of no other way to get money.
Light Travelling said:
Apparantly you don't know many theives.
Bye bye little miss
Theoryofrelativity said:
You cant empathise with tunnel vision, tunnel vision is an abstract mental construct not an emotion or feeling. Are you sure you understand what empathy is?
Theoryofrelativity said:"Objective Morality
Allott, Robin (1991) Objective Morality. Journal of Social and Biological Structures 14(4)
Abstract
A group's moral code represents an increasingly rational pattern of behaviour derived from the collective experience of the group handed down from generation to generation.
.
So this equates morality to rationality. What utter horseshit. In reverse this would mean that every action that can be justified by well reasoned argument is moral - which would mean practically everything is moral. As can be seen from this website most moral dilemas have rational arguments presented for both sides of the issue.
It also means that by the above definition society has no choice but to become more moral. Whatever we do in the future it must be more moral than what we did in the past (as a society). Becasue it increases through handing down from generation to generation. - again false
Theoryofrelativity said:
I clearly am, and clearly intended to.
There is nothing else but subjective morality; there is an individual subjective morality and a collective subjective morality. Even your quoted abstract states that emotions play an important part - the word objective cannot possibly apply here.
And the collective morality (that you term objective) changes through time and geographic as the balance of individual moralities change - change which occurs through numerous factors.
It is the individual that affects the collective not vice versa.