Wednesday, May 9, 2012

I'm (relatively) moral!


I don’t like books that just preach to the choir. They make their opponents into strawman and, therefore, they are simply not convincing. Besides, I don’t need to be told what I believe, I already believe it. For this reason, I really like the work of Steven Pinker. He can take very complex things like the brain (How the Mind Works), language (The Language Instinct), and evolutionary psychology (The Blank Slate) and makes it interesting and persuasive (at least to me).

I’m currently reading his latest book, The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence has Declined. I’m still at the very, very violent part of the decline of violence, where Pinker explains how people justified the violence at different time frames. It’s very interesting/scary to see how it would have been to believe that extreme violence is okay if you’d  been raised that way. You hope you would have the empathy, the logic, or the courage to somehow be ahead of your time. But most people aren't ahead of their time, by definition.

Consequently, it makes me really happy that I’ve been raised right. I don’t mean in relatively inconsequential things like belief in gay marriage, separation of church and state, or vegetarianism (my parents are against the last thing anyway). I mean in things like being against stoning homosexuals to death, creatively torturing infidels, and slowing burning live cats for fun.

The fact that the majority of people today would consider torturing a blasphemer to death to be unethical behavior goes to show that we, as human beings, have made progress over the centuries. The fact that the majority of people used to consider torturing a blasphemer to death to be entertaining goes to show that we may owe at least some of our morality to our environment. Isn’t that just a little terrifying?

Sure, I’d like to think that, were I alive back then, I’d be the lone voice for anti-torture, anti-murder, anti-child sacrifice, but when the majority of people do bad things, you’re statistically likely to be part of that majority. That’s basic math.

Witch Burning:
Now me: It's wrong.
Dark Ages me: “Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live.” Exodus 22

Capital Punishment:
Now me: It's wrong.
Dark Ages me: Rules are rules are rules.

Slavery:
Now me: It's wrong.
Dark Ages me: The Bible says it’s okay so long as you show some restraint. “When a slave-owner strikes a male or female slave with a rod and the slave dies immediately, the owner shall be punished. But if the slave survives for a day or two, there is no punishment; for the slave is the owner’s property.” Exodus 21

Conversion by Torture:
Now me: It's wrong.
Dark Ages me: Sure, it hurts now. But what’s a couple of day of agony followed by death to an eternity of bliss? You’ll thank us later.

Human Sacrifice:
Now me: It's wrong.
Dark Ages me: Yes, one person has to die, but now we’ll have rain!







8 comments:

  1. Hahah, I love the "Now me" parts:) It's true though, it's pretty scary how easy it would've been to fall prey to that sort of thought. But I'd like to think if you have a questioning, open-mind now, perhaps you would still have it in the Dark Ages as well? I would hope that having some basic humanity would be an inherent trait, haha.

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    1. I hope you're right! Otherwise, dark ages me would be a fairly terrifying person. You have a great screen name, by the way : )

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  2. Haha, I didn't even realize that was my screen name! Must be from an account long ago...:P

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    1. Well, it's a good one. Who are you? All I can find when I click on your name is a recipe for pomegranate raita. I don't even know what a raita is : )

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  3. what about future you? did i just blow your mind?

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  4. Ironic that you specifically condemn child sacrifice and in a later post rave about a movie glorifying child sacrifice and depicting it using the best special effects on earth (which are pretty damn good).

    Oh, I know it was just pretend, but the only thing telling your brain the difference is the conscious part, which is the small part, though you would know that better than I do.

    Honestly how different do you think it was in the middle ages? Do you think they were actually comfortable watching it? I don't, I think they could because society said it was ok, they had "progressed" to the point that they could differentiate between what happened on the chopping block and themselves, just like we, great, benevolent society that we are, can differentiate between what happens on the screen and our own lives, lives in which most of the earth is starving or war torn, etc etc.

    I'm no better than you, I'm typing this on a computer that was assembled by slaves in China (I know because it took 5 painstaking days for it to ship from China because I have some custom hardware) in clothes weaved, dyed and sewn by children slaves.

    I understand the points you're trying to make, but I don't think we've progressed away from anything, we've just gotten more clever at hiding it from ourselves and justifying it and finding opportunities in which we can rationalize staring it in the face and reveling in it.

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    1. Right, because when movies depict something, that’s the same as supporting it. I think this is the right time to tell you that I was shocked to see that you own genocide-supporting material like Hotel Rwanda. I don’t know if I can be friends with someone like that.

      Is it important to you that no actual children were harmed in the making of this movie? I believe there is a difference in supporting screen writers, actors, costume designers, etc. and supporting child murderers, but that may just be me. It does make a difference to me whether I actually am harming someone with my actions, or just pretending to. I’m certain you have fantasized about hitting certain people, but there is a difference between fantasying and actually doing it, and the difference is a jail sentence.

      I do think it was different in the middle ages. There is giant step forward between being okay with real (though supposedly subhuman) people being tortured and watching non-existent people being tortured. Yes, human beings have a long way to go, but I think the next step should be saving those wage-slaves in China or the child sweatshop laborers, not a fictional character.

      I think I get your point. First, it’s scary that people are entertained by violence. There is definitely a do not do this cool thing (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/DoNotDoThisCoolThing)irony about being entertained by the Hungar Games while, at the same time, supposedly siding with Katniss. The truth for me is that the harm I’m doing to myself by watching the games (minimal) and the harm I’m doing to others (none) is worth it for the entertainment factor. I like to think I’d be capable of recalculating the harm versus selfish convenience/entertainment equations if say the movie’s message was actually supportive of the violence (Ocean’s Twelve), or if I were an active participant in virtual violence (Halo), or if I were actually hurting someone (hockey) Huh, what did all those examples have in common? : )

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