Jumping back in, to be clear, I didn't intend to define morality as believing you are good.
To reword the original post, it could be Humans wish to believe they are moral rather than be moral.
The problem, of course, is 'what is moral!?'
A workaround that would allow the discussion of my point without getting bogged down trying to define morality, is to look at this question from the perspective of say a Catholic. For a catholic, their morality is pretty clearly defined. Yet we see the mental gymnastics they will use to live a life contrary to the well-defined morality, and still believe they are a good catholic.
For the rest of us, the details of morality are a little fuzzier. But I think the same principle holds.
To reword the original post, it could be Humans wish to believe they are moral rather than be moral.
The problem, of course, is 'what is moral!?'
A workaround that would allow the discussion of my point without getting bogged down trying to define morality, is to look at this question from the perspective of say a Catholic. For a catholic, their morality is pretty clearly defined. Yet we see the mental gymnastics they will use to live a life contrary to the well-defined morality, and still believe they are a good catholic.
For the rest of us, the details of morality are a little fuzzier. But I think the same principle holds.
