What IS good, and how do we determine it?

[Catholic_Lady]

It's almost like we instinctively know it's wrong. But where does it come from? And if someone was brought up being taught that it's ok to kill people, and they do so, they would still be doing something immoral. Because murder is immoral regardless of how the person feels about it.

See, that's exactly the idea every theist brings into this board as if it was something novel. First, you have to descent from the religiously inspired human high horse and have a look at the world surrounding you. We know because we're a social species. There are advantages to being what you call good, since you get the support of your peers if you are.

And we're not the only species working that way. Not by a long chalk. Virtually every social species refrains from hurting or killing their peers. And, maybe you're different from the other we had here before, you can easily look up recent cognition research on animals to see that compassion and other so called human emotions, aren't exclusively human either.

And I can't understand for the life of me why every new arrival needs their very own "why be good" thread.

Abaris, here's the problem I see with that.

You can be born into Isis and be taught that killing infidels is good and then get support from your peers for it. But the fact remains that this action is still definitively wrong, even if your society views it as a good thing. Wouldn't you agree?

Hm.. Animals kill their own species more than we like to believe. I do know that felines (from lions to feral cats) will kill the babies that are not from their own group.

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It's almost like we instinctively know it's wrong. But where does it come from? And if someone was brought up being taught that it's ok to kill people, and they do so, they would still be doing something immoral. Because murder is immoral regardless of how the person feels about it.

You do realize you've said two mutually exclusive things, within two sentences, don't you? You began with "we instinctively know morality," but then a moment later you're asking us to envision a person who was brought up being taught that murder is morally okay, and thus believes that. So which is it?

Thanks for bringing this to light Esquilax.

I believe that by default we would all know that murder is wrong. But I do believe it is possible to brainwash someone from a very early age to think otherwise.