Knowledge of Good and Evil

[William]

Q: Without knowledge of good and evil, can we have morality?

[The Tanager]

Obviously, I want a society where we all work for the good of others, including the other species we live with. But ideals are one thing, the situation we have is another.

The answer is to keep the ideal in mind and push for it, but not wail about how terible it all is and promise some kind of magical wand (religious or political) that will make everything perfect.

So I prefer my own explanation rather than your list of options that doesn't explain my position very well.

I wasn't trying to explain your position, I was asking a question to help understand your position better. I need to ask another question towards that end. What do you mean by "the good of others" here? You've said there is no absolute good/evil, which would seem to mean there are just different (not objectively better or worse) moral preferences in your understanding. But please correct any misunderstandings I have.

[TRANSPONDER]

[Replying to TRANSPONDER in post #3]

Do you prefer any of these options:

(a) a human society where every hurt individual was healed up by the human community
(b) a human society where most individuals seek to heal others, but there are some that are okay with harming others and not healing others if they think it serves their benefits best
(c) different human tribes where they look out for their own tribes' interests, but not others
(d) something else
(e) none

Obviously, I want a society where we all work for the good of others, including the other species we live with. But ideals are one thing, the situation we have is another.

The answer is to keep the ideal in mind and push for it, but not wail about how terible it all is and promise some kind of magical wand (religious or political) that will make everything perfect.

So I prefer my own explanation rather than your list of options that doesn't explain my position very well.

You first suggested the religious view of morality involves an absolute, cosmic law set by God, but what stops it from being just as you describe here? i.e., God has a preference / ideal no different from you that God continuously pushes for and calls us to and that God would have as the basis for a cosmic law, should such a thing ever exist?

I don't think the worlds are as far apart as you may want to think. While we can know of good and evil, what we posit these to be is ultimately a matter of faith. Probably the most important belief in the entire religious belief system. (Far more important than, say, belief that God exists, or in any other mumbo-jumbo people tend to tie religious belief to.)

Yes, It could work that way, but the problem is the old, old one - you are thinking of God - your god - as the default, when any other god is equally likely and 'no god' even more as it makes more sense as a human ideal to make life better for us all, rather than a god (name your own) saying 'let them work it out for themselves', which rather bins the idea of a Law handed out 10th BC to one tribe, and then revised 1st c AD by another one. Human betterment is for ALL tribes, so, liker science, there is only one Democratic system we generally have or pretend to have, but many different religions, none of which look much better than the others·

[William]

Q: Without knowledge of good and evil, can we have morality?

What do you think morality means?

I think it means "the conscious ability to sort things as either right or wrong/correct or incorrect/perfect or imperfect" et al.

That is ok to me. I think that also means we can have morality without knowing good and evil.

Is that like we can have icecream without knowing flavours?

[1213]

...admitting that without education, we revert to a more brutish state of our species. Primitive tribes do not know how to play chess, and if we don't teach it, we all forget how.

yes, and that is why I believe there must have been original teacher, God, who thought how to live well. Otherwise people would still be in brutish state.

[1213]

Q: Without knowledge of good and evil, can we have morality?

What do you think morality means?

I think it means "the conscious ability to sort things as either right or wrong/correct or incorrect/perfect or imperfect" et al.

That is ok to me. I think that also means we can have morality without knowing good and evil.

Is that like we can have icecream without knowing flavours?

I don't think so. Perhaps I understood wrongly what you meant with moral. I thought you meant it is ability to think what is right or wrong. If so, it doesn't necessary require knowledge about right or wrong in the beginning, if we can sort it out by thinking and experience.

[TRANSPONDER]

...admitting that without education, we revert to a more brutish state of our species. Primitive tribes do not know how to play chess, and if we don't teach it, we all forget how.

yes, and that is why I believe there must have been original teacher, God, who thought how to live well. Otherwise people would still be in brutish state.

But that is the same with all evolutionary processes. We didn't know where they came from, so we said it was a god. Now we have clues that showed it grew out of critters adapting to situations, including how we devised ways to live together in complex societies.

Now, I know you will deny that, but it doesn't matter as 'my view is as good as yours' as the Bible apologists say. And in fact better, because I can point to the evidence, of animal society and evolution of society and the law - codes devised to operate in them.

Q: Without knowledge of good and evil, can we have morality?

What do you think morality means?

I think it means "the conscious ability to sort things as either right or wrong/correct or incorrect/perfect or imperfect" et al.

That is ok to me. I think that also means we can have morality without knowing good and evil.

Is that like we can have icecream without knowing flavours?

I don't think so. Perhaps I understood wrongly what you meant with moral. I thought you meant it is ability to think what is right or wrong. If so, it doesn't necessary require knowledge about right or wrong in the beginning, if we can sort it out by thinking and experience.

For a moment I thought William had written that, as you are actually agreeing with his position, or mine morality (originally on a par with animal pack and family co - operation) was 'worked out' by us to deal with complex society, just as we developed technology.

You know that at one time slavery was generaly considered ok, though everyone knew it was bad for the slaves. Then Enlightenment thought pushed philosophy on to enable abolition, and nation by nation it spread as a global ide, like democracy.

None of this was down to a god, and religion, rather resisted such things. co - operation, and human social evolution and the constant revision of law -codes.

[1213]

You know that at one time slavery was generaly considered ok, though everyone knew it was bad for the slaves....

I think it is still considered ok, people just call it with a different name to feel like they are better. Everyone who must pay taxes is a slave.

[TRANSPONDER]

You know that at one time slavery was generally considered ok, though everyone knew it was bad for the slaves....

I think it is still considered ok, people just call it with a different name to feel like they are better. Everyone who must pay taxes is a slave.

That is palpably dishonest and utterly discredits your case. Slavery - ownership of one person by another - is not to any reasonable person the same as contributing to the society one lives in. This is more than just saying it wasn't Slavery back then because taxes, but is saying it would be ok now, because of taxes.

I have felt amusement, irritation, near disbelief at your denialism so far, but I don't often feel disgust. Tell me, who would play for your police, judiciary, road repairs, street lighting?

If anyone wanted a good reason not to be at least a Fundamentalist Christian, you just gave 'em one.

“None is righteous, no, not one; 11 no one understands; no one seeks for God.
12 All have turned aside; together they have become worthless; no one does good, not even one.”
13 “Their throat is an open grave; they use their tongues to deceive.”
“The venom of asps is under their lips.” 14 “Their mouth is full of curses and bitterness.”
15 “Their feet are swift to shed blood; 16 in their paths are ruin and misery,
17 and the way of peace they have not known.” 18 “There is no fear of God before their eyes.”

They claim to lecture us on good and evil, but they don't know which is which. Truth is lies, lies are truth. They lie about science, they lie about Logic, and they lie about what the Bible says. Because of course that would mean their case would fail.

[bjs1]

Q: Without knowledge of good and evil, can we have morality?

It depends on what you mean. Let us not commit the fallacy of equivocation by treating the word “knowledge” as if it means the same thing in every instance.

By way of analogy, someone can describe to me what the different flavors of ice cream taste like. Vanilla, chocolate, and mint chip can all be put into words. An entire book could be written to describe the flavors of ice cream, and by reading that book I would be knowledgeable about what the flavors of ice cream taste like.

Tasting different flavors of ice cream would provide a different kind of knowledge.

Similarly, morality cannot exist without an intellectual understanding of right and wrong. However, if someone were able always to do what was right that person, who understands right and wrong intellectually, would have no experiential knowledge of evil.

I would point back to the opening chapters of Genesis. Adam and Eve had an intellectual understanding of right and wrong while they were in the Garden, but it was not until they ate from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil that they gained the experiential knowledge of doing something immoral. Or again, they could understand shame as a concept, but it was not until they sinned that they had something to be ashamed of.

[Clownboat]

Q: Without knowledge of good and evil, can we have morality?

If being moral is doing what is best for societies, then yes I would think.

Morality far too often gets confusing once we pretend a god concept is involved. Next thing we know, we're on crusades as if that is good for anyone. God concepts can be a mechanism to harm societies while feeling justified.

Would the world not be a better place if we discard all the available god concept ideas and focused instead on doing what is best for societies? Killing/shunning people for believing in the wrong God would no longer be a thing and actions would be determined to be good/evil based on whether or not societies are benefiting.