Does a Moral Law exist?

The Volt

From my understanding, Moral Law is based on an idea that there is a right and a wrong. I think that this is something that everyone believes in. Do you think that if there wa no physical law in place, the majority of humans would know how to behave towards one another?

I know that Kant was a firm believer that this is something that we do not get from a higher source. Do we as humans possess an inbuilt morality complex and is something scientific? Or do we use our pure reason to decide what ought to and not be done?

Joycey

Voltwad wrote: »

From my understanding, Moral Law is based on an idea that there is a right and a wrong. I think that this is something that everyone believes in. Do you think that if there wa no physical law in place, the majority of humans would know how to behave towards one another?

Do you mean physical law like gravity or physical law as in if you kill someone you will be subject to a prison sentence of no less than X years or whatever? The first one doesnt make sense to me , I dont think humans would be lost if there were no enforcing authority of laws like the second one, no.

Do we as humans possess an inbuilt morality complex and is something scientific?

I think its more something which allows us, or makes us tend towards, an ability to think in moral terms, as well as a certain predisposition to find some things abhorrent, and as a consequence morally wrong. For instance, we are genetically programmed to dislike, or to be made anxious by, large quantities of blood.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aAFQ5kUHPkY
also comes to mind.

Or do we use our pure reason to decide what ought to and not be done?

Well I dont believe in "pure reason", to quote Heidegger (sorry) "Yet even the purest theory has not left all moods behind it; even when we look theoretically at what is just present-at-hand, it does not show itself purely as it looks unless this theory lets it come towards us in a tranquil tarrying alongside". This tranquility is a value which is attributed to something, or which exists along with it, and in it, by means of our perceiving it, whether we are conscious of it or not.

Things which appear to us, and hence which are comprehendable and calculable by our faculty for reasoning, are given to us in terms of affectivity, or mood. Hence there is no perfect rationality, which may apprehend perfectly a situation in order to determine the objectively 'right' course.

The Volt

Joycey wrote: »

Do you mean physical law like gravity or physical law as in if you kill someone you will be subject to a prison sentence of no less than X years or whatever? The first one doesnt make sense to me , I dont think humans would be lost if there were no enforcing authority of laws like the second one, no.

I meant the second one luckily Kant was very much so of the opinion that we wouldn't be lost without physical laws, well most of us anyway!

Things which appear to us, and hence which are comprehendable and calculable by our faculty for reasoning, are given to us in terms of affectivity, or mood. Hence there is no perfect rationality, which may apprehend perfectly a situation in order to determine the objectively 'right' course.

We have the ability to reflect, so even if we act out of hastiness, or irrational emotion, we can still backtrack later and realize that we were in the wrong. Can't we?

raah!

Morality can be understood to a certain extent through evolutionary biology. For example, a group of apes that kills each other is less likely to survive than a group of apes that does not kill each other. From this one thing you can probably derive other things like "stealing a bannana from another ape will increase that apes likelyhood of killing you, and therefore the less you steal the more your genes are propogated"

So in these terms, it's no different than what causes us to not eat poo. You'll get sick if you eat poo. So in that sense we have an "inbuilt morality complex" , but obviously this is not the same as abstract definitions of good or bad. I would say it could account for a kind of recipricol altruism, but pure altruism wouldn't make sense.