Our strange sense of justice

[heliocentric]

Ive been pondering this a great deal lately, it seems absurd that we should have this biological inherent sense of what is fair and just; while the wider state of nature has no such sense of justice or morality.
It seems we're the most intelligent beings on earth but we are the least able in terms of grasping how reality truely operates. We're the only creature that expects life to be 'fair' as a normative state and behaves as if some kind of cosmic error has been made when something bad happens to us.
What on earth makes us treat a murder, a rape, an attack as a tragedy and not simply 'the way of things'?
It seems as though we're the most naive creatures on the planet with a chronic failure to truely accept life for what it is.

 

[S.A.M.]

Ive been pondering this a great deal lately, it seems absurd that we should have this biological inherent sense of what is fair and just; while the wider state of nature has no such sense of justice or morality.
It seems we're the most intelligent beings on earth but we are the least able in terms of grasping how reality truely operates. We're the only creature that expects life to be 'fair' as a normative state and behaves as if some kind of cosmic error has been made when something bad happens to us.
What on earth makes us treat a murder, a rape, an attack as a tragedy and not simply 'the way of things'?
It seems as though we're the most naive creatures on the planet with a chronic failure to truely accept life for what it is.

Thats an interesting viewpoint. What do you suppose is the cause of this naivete?

 

[heliocentric]

I dont know samcdkey, it deeply bothers me in some ways in a way i cant even explain.
Its as if self-awareness has lead to us spotting some kind of flaw in the opperation of the universe, but why should we even assume that there is a flaw in the first place if we dont know anything else but this reality?

If this is all we know then why are we constantly being shocked/hurt/bewildered by the unfairness of it all. We logically shouldnt know any better and should just accept injustice as the natural state of play, but it seems this is something we just cannot do.

 

[spidergoat]

We expect beings that can act fairly to act fairly. The unverse itself isn't fair, but few people expect it to be.

 

[Theoryofrelativity]

I dont know samcdkey, it deeply bothers me in some ways in a way i cant even explain.
Its as if self-awareness has lead to us spotting some kind of flaw in the opperation of the universe, but why should we even assume that there is a flaw in the first place if we dont know anything else but this reality?

If this is all we know then why are we constantly being shocked/hurt/bewildered by the unfairness of it all. We logically shouldnt know any better and should just accept injustice as the natural state of play, but it seems this is something we just cannot do.

For a society to work there has to be rules, those rules are designed to ensure 'compliance'.

In exchange for 'compliance' we are given 'rights' which enable us to enjoy a certain level of existance. Those rights can be revoked at any time, but as long as we 'comply' we may enjoy the 'right's' that have been bestowed upon us by the powers that be. (Government)

All species which form a 'community' of sorts, have designated job roles and a code of behaviour and a 'chief' etc. Can we observe 'fairness' within non human species?

I am not certain but I imagine for example with a pride of lions, that the food is given first to the young and then perhaps to females ane eventually the males. This order may be incorrect, but I am sure there is an order. Fairness is only about an agreed 'order of things' afterall. Without agreement the illusion of what is fair is only that..an illusion.


Here we are

fairness in non humans

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2003/09/030918092951.htm

"Yerkes Researchers First To Recognize Sense Of Fairness In Nonhuman Primates
ATLANTA In the first experimental demonstration of its kind, researchers led by Sarah Brosnan and Frans de Waal, PhD, at the Yerkes National Primate Research Center of Emory University, and the Living Links Center, have shown nonhuman primates respond negatively to unequal reward distribution, a reaction often seen in humans based on their universal sense of fairness. While researchers have long recognized the sense of fairness within the human species, Brosnan and de Waal are the first to confirm this trait in nonhuman primates. The findings appear in the September 18 issue of Nature.........."

 

[Theoryofrelativity]

Meanwhile empathy in animals is also a possibility

http://www.empathogens.com/empathy/animal.html

"The ability to empathise is often considered uniquely human, the result of complex reasoning and abstract thought. But it might in fact be an incredibly simple brain process ­ meaning that there is no reason why monkeys and other animals cannot empathise too.
That is the conclusion of Christian Keysers of the University of Groningen in the Netherlands and his colleagues. The team used a functional MRI scanner to monitor volunteers while their legs were touched and while they watched videos of other people being touched and of objects colliding.

To the team's surprise, a sensory area of the brain called the secondary somatosensory cortex, thought only to respond to physical touch, was strongly activated by the sight of others being touched.

This suggests that empathy requires no specialised brain area. The brain simply transforms what we see into what we would have felt in the same situation. "Empathy is not an abstract capacity," Keysers concludes. "It's like you slip into another person's shoes to share the experience in a very pragmatic way." "

Basically Helio

fairness and empathy are unlikely to be uniquely human, thus fainess is infact the 'natural way' of things.

 

[Baron Max]

We expect beings that can act fairly to act fairly.

"can", and "should" or "do" are entirely different things!

We can see clearly, via news media and crime reports, that those beings that we "think" can act fairly, DON'T act fairly at a horrendous rate! Shouldn't that, alone, give us some evidence that our expectations are much, much too high when considering other humans? Like, ....what are the odds?? ...LOL!

Baron Max

 

[Baron Max]

Human have empathy, ...

Do we really? Or do we just say that we do????

Making the claim of empathy is not the same thing as feeling it. And with as much violence and vicious crime that's going on in the world, I'm beginning to question that idea that "empathy" is innate in humans!

I thought it was very interesting that during the New Orleans disaster, the dollars spent on entertainment in the USA stayed almost exactly the same. Yet everyone (except perhaps me) claimed they had "empathy" for the victims. Can you actually be empathetic towards such a disaster and still go out to enjoy a movie and fine dining? Hmm, I don't think so!

Baron Max

 

[Baron Max]

I am not certain but I imagine for example with a pride of lions, that the food is given first to the young and then perhaps to females ane eventually the males. This order may be incorrect, but I am sure there is an order.

Ain't sure why you used that example! As it's totally wrong ....the females usually make the kills, then the males always eat first. If there's anything left, the females eat, then the young eat. You had it almost totally backwards ....so I'm sure that you didn't intent to make that comparison!

Baron Max

 

[spidergoat]

"can", and "should" or "do" are entirely different things!

We can see clearly, via news media and crime reports, that those beings that we "think" can act fairly, DON'T act fairly at a horrendous rate! Shouldn't that, alone, give us some evidence that our expectations are much, much too high when considering other humans? Like, ....what are the odds?? ...LOL!

Baron Max

That's totally irrelevent. If someone does you wrong, are you upset? I'm sure you would be. That is what I mean by people expecting others to act fairly.

 

[Baron Max]

That's totally irrelevent.

No, Spider, it ain't totally irrelevant, it's nothing more than proof that expecting everyone to be "fair" is a stupid thing to do! There's proof, absolute proof, that not everyone is "fair"!

If someone does you wrong, are you upset? I'm sure you would be. That is what I mean by people expecting others to act fairly.

No, that shows/proves nothing. Even if I didn't expect him to be "fair" and he did me wrong, I'd still be upset by it. Shit, you ain't thinkin' real good today, Spider, what's wrong with you?

Baron Max

 

[Theoryofrelativity]

Ain't sure why you used that example! As it's totally wrong ....the females usually make the kills, then the males always eat first. If there's anything left, the females eat, then the young eat. You had it almost totally backwards ....so I'm sure that you didn't intent to make that comparison!

Baron Max

The eating order was not relevant, the fact they eat in order was the reason for the comparison.

I did state I may have got the order wrong.

 

[heliocentric]

I guess i overlooked the possiblity that other mammals could have a similiar sense of 'fairness', too easy to forget how non-unique our traits are at times.
so thanks for bringing that up Theoryofrelativity.

I do believe we have a more complex sense of fairness to mammals though, which extends not only to how we inter-relate but how the universe as a whole relates to us.
Even someone like me who doesnt believe in karma can find myself bitter that i can preform good deeds, behave with integrity but still receive no goodwill back.
Mammals expect each other to be emphatic, we expect the universe itself to be empathic!
An example might go something like: 'my mother got killed in an earthquake...it isnt fair'.
Well, why should we expect tectonic plates to behave in fairness and empathy towards our species?
We seem to have a vastly unrealistic sense of justice so far out of balance with the justice we are likely to receive, we set ourselves up for misery and bitterness everytime.

 

[Roman]

I dont know samcdkey, it deeply bothers me in some ways in a way i cant even explain.
Its as if self-awareness has lead to us spotting some kind of flaw in the opperation of the universe, but why should we even assume that there is a flaw in the first place if we dont know anything else but this reality?

If this is all we know then why are we constantly being shocked/hurt/bewildered by the unfairness of it all. We logically shouldnt know any better and should just accept injustice as the natural state of play, but it seems this is something we just cannot do.

We expect, or at least want, people to behave a particular way. We can talk of fairness and justice when it comes to people within a particular cultural paradigm.

But fairness and justice in any unversal discussion is just projection.

 

[Theoryofrelativity]

An example might go something like: 'my mother got killed in an earthquake...it isnt fair'.
Well, why should we expect tectonic plates to behave in fairness and empathy towards our species?
We seem to have a vastly unrealistic sense of justice so far out of balance with the justice we are likely to receive, we set ourselves up for misery and bitterness everytime.

the problem here is that the grieving family may think it's not fair based on the fact their mother worked hard all her life and that layabout neighbour who sponged on the dole managed to survie. So the fairness aspect relates to them considering one life more worthy of existing than another and as you say 'unrealistically' so as the cosmos does not abide by our 'rules'.

But the rules we set ourselves may indeed incorporate an aspect where one life is considered more valuable than another. This is then indoctrinated into us and so then becomes a general expectation...and then misplaced expectation when relating to natural disasters/accidental deaths etc.

Fairness as I said before is 'agreed' between ourselves, for the benefit of living communally.

Fair for example has a different meaning in my house to perhaps my friends house. This is because I (not the governement or my neighbour) define what is fair and what is not in my house. The kids live by my rules.

Though these words 'not fair' do seem to be innate (in my kids) in that they appear by themselves and are used with great regularity.

Perhaps humans are born just expectating all their needs to be met and anything outside that is 'not fair'

and thus what we learn through life is NOT what it is reasonable to expect as fair treatment but to learn instead what is an unreasonable expectation of fairness.

Do you understand what I mean by this? We are born expecting everything to go our way, and so the lesson is instead to learn that it does not and should not always go our way.

But this explains why we are as you say so preocuppied with 'fairness'.

 

[heliocentric]

Yes i know exactly what you mean, thats exactly what im talking about - we expect fairness to be the natural state of being from birth and may only come to accept the unfair nature of existance untill our 30s/30s/40s/50s or prehaps never. Its still incredibly strange to me that we should have such an unrealistic view of life and how it should play out. Who places those expectations on us? is it our media? society at large? or is it something inherent within us..

 

[Theoryofrelativity]

Yes i know exactly what you mean, thats exactly what im talking about - we expect fairness to be the natural state of being from birth and may only come to accept the unfair nature of existance untill our 30s/30s/40s/50s or prehaps never. Its still incredibly strange to me that we should have such an unrealistic view of life and how it should play out. Who places those expectations on us? is it our media? society at large? or is it something inherent within us..

innate I would guess and children have the most skew perception of injustice.

 

[Baron Max]

Its still incredibly strange to me that we should have such an unrealistic view of life and how it should play out. Who places those expectations on us? is it our media? society at large? or is it something inherent within us..

It's society ...and I use that term to mean many and various groups, not "society" as some mystical "human society", which is patently absurd.

Liberal, socialistic nations think it's fair to take money from those who work in order to to give to those who don't work. How can that be "fair"?

No, society is what sets the standards for a people. But remember, there'll always be those who don't like those standards, and thus will yell "Unfair!" about things.

Baron Max