The Nature of Moral Values
Morality is the variety of intentions, actions and decisions between the choices of proper and improper. It is the body of standards and principles, which are derivative of a code of manner from the particular philosophy, culture as well as religion. In addition to this, morality can also be derived from the standard that the individuals feel to be universal and abide by psychologically. In most of the cases, the morality of a person is associated with the rightness as well as goodness. Moral philosophy is originated from ontology as well as the moral epistemology. It is the knowledge of morals. Moral behavior arises in the human beings as the extension of biological systems that are involved in the recognition as well as care of their mates or offspring. These arrangements are ancient evolutionarily, encoded in the human genome then hard-wired into their brains. In the human beings, the brain’s circuits as well as the processes, which encode the need to take care of their close relatives, can be extended to the induction of an urge for caring for others to the extended social groups. Moreover, these systems can be coupled with abilities of the human beings for predicting the future consequences of their own actions as well as making choices to the maximization not just in the short-term but also to the long-term profitability. Hence, moral decision-making or morality is informed appropriately by the biology of the social attachments despite the fact that this is governed through the philosophies of decision-making process more usually. These involve not into looking for right choices rather choosing optimal choices, based on the satisfaction of an extensive range of pertinent constraints and assigning priorities.
The critics while analyzing the origin of morality has revealed that morality implies the capability of the moral reasoning and this along with the predisposition to the moral behavior are innate. To these scholars, as the language has to be learned to educate oneself, it is same with the moral behavior as both of these are innate. Unlike the language, these are also culture specific however, constrained by few general yet underlying principles. Human beings may also be born with certain biological essentials as well as systems to incorporate them into the decisions in the social situations, but they are also capable to learn then incorporate some particular contingencies. These pertain to each of them in their individual environment and include the social as well as cultural norms.
Objectivism and Relativism: A Critique
There are controversies about the morality, which is associated with the morals being objective or transcendent. The human beings seem to feel covertly things to be wrong and right, rather than only intellectually becoming aware about the fact that they kowtow to as well as violate the social norms. The most acceptable response relates that the system of morality and conscience emerge from the ancient neural systems which is grounded in the emotions in ascribing the emotional values to different stimuli which also include the imagined values of the possible actions.
Louis Pojman, while explaining the invalidity of relativism states that the two theses of relativism – diversity thesis and dependency thesis – do not clearly suggest negation to moral objectivism (Pojman, 1992). Although Pojman agrees with the diversity thesis, which states that beliefs and values of right and wrong differ according to different culture; he rejects the dependency thesis states that right and wrong depend on, or are linked to culture. The conclusion therefore is that the right and wrong is not objective. An action could be right for one while wrong for the other, as per the culture to which, each belong but to state that there is no objective answer about moral values is wrong. The statement is true because moral values are continuously created and each culture has its own set of these values. By continuously created, it is meant that the actions that were right or wrong once, might not be the same today. To cite an instance, the practice of slavery was once morally right for the white people in previous years but gradually this perception changed. Slavery was considered unethical and immoral even by the whites in the later years.
Herodotus once stated, “Custom is the king of all” (Munson, 1991). By this, he meant that the acceptability of different practices differs according to culture. It relies on what habits and customs individuals are accustomed to, in their respective societies. It is a direct opposition of the theory of objectivism, which states that some moral values are universal and inviolable. Ruth Benedict furthers the argument by stating that the habits of individuals in different societies that are accepted as normal due to social conditioning are also morally correct (Benedict, 1934). However, the author’s statement is wrong because even if the concepts of right and wrong are relative to culture, it does not pertain to the individual’s perception of the same. The individual has his or her own set of moral values that arises from his or her observation of the society and its actions. An example could be of a person who finds homosexuality to be morally right although his or her society or culture totally rejects this practice.
Moral Reasoning and the Role of Cultural Norms
In the previous section, it has been mentioned that moral values are continuously created, meaning that these are not constant. Viewing Benedict’s argument from this perspective would assist in asserting that moral relativism, in its contemporary form does not ascribe to its past form. Benedict’s arguments justifies the practice of slavery in societies where it is or was carried out but she herself discarded ethical relativism when she found that it necessitated her to support Nazi rule in Germany (Gracyk, 2018). Therefore, it is clear that even the proponents of relativism had to change their views according to the changing situations.
As explained in the above sections, moral values have multiple origins and one cannot state that these values have a specific source or origin. While on the one hand, objectivists believed that moral values although differ according to culture, exist independently from individual opinion. On the other, relativists held the view that moral values originate from the social conditioning one is subjected to in a specific culture and the right and wrong is relied upon that culture. Nonetheless, both these theories are justifiable in parts but must not be taken as complete truths. The reason, as already stated, is that moral values are not static they keep on transforming. The valid point made by relativists is the difference occurring in the concepts of right and wrong in different cultures. Objectivists were right when they stated that although moral values vary, it does not mean that there is no objective answer to what is right and what is wrong. In the contemporary world, both views have been repeatedly negated because of the increasing integration of cultures. The effects of globalization have caused cultures across borders to come together, which has allowed individuals and institutions to form moral values of their own. It is visible in the way people behave and object or adhere to certain moral values. Multicultural organizations are a good example of this.
In the end, it can be reiterated that moral values do not come from any single source rather they originate from the changing perspectives of the society. The examples of slavery, Nazism, homosexuality and others affirm this view. In addition, the views regarding marriages and live-in relationships could also be used as good examples of changing views of morality or moral values. Live-ins were once considered as unethical in many societies but now it is being justified and has even received legal support in many cultures.
References
Benedict, R. (1934). A Defense of Moral. The Journal of General Psychology, 10, 59-82.
Gracyk, T. (2018). Relativism Overview. Retrieved from https://web.mnstate.edu/gracyk/courses/web%20publishing/relativism.htm
Munson, R. V. (1991). The Madness of Cambyses (Herodotus 3.16-38). Arethusa, 24(1), 43-65.
Pojman, L. P. (1992). Are human rights based on equal human worth?. Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 52(3), 605-622.
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