moral reasoning

My husband and I had this conversation after watching pop tech on PBS. We had seen this brilliant man talk about synthetically creating life. He talked about the positive possibilities such as creating things that would eat oil, cure disease, etc. The way he talked about it sounded like it would be the most wonderful thing in the world. If you just listened to him, you would be led to believe that this is something that should be done and that there are no possible downsides. I can think of a few things that could be possible downside to this. Biological warfare comes to mind, possibly destroying parts of the ecosystem, hurting and controlling others, also comes to mind. When someone in the audience mentions that this is the scariest thing he has heard for awhile, and starts naming off possible downsides to what this scientist is working on., the scientist comes up with the tried and true, you can’t stop technology (oh really, it makes itself , or do aliens or monkeys?) I’m sorry but his excuse is faulty reasoning. Science should not be held apart from moral reasoning. The nothing stops technology thinking is what gave us escalating atom bombs, atomic waste, star wars, the destruction of the rainforest and the ecological balance in Mexico because of inappropriate farming techniques imposed from western “experts” (I'm sure they were experts in their own climate" and other similar blunders. Issues about technology are not simplistic black and white issues. Simple saying that technological development cannot be stopped or that technology is the root of our problems are extremely over simplified. Moral reasoning for issues such as this, is examining all the possible results of an innovation, and determining which are more likely and which are least likely.



Moral reasoning should be an important part of the directions that we take our society, and the technology that we develop. Moral reasoning is not the same as imposing one moral code over another. I am not talking about so called “family values” which often seem to be a way to cloak hate and fear in pretty clothing. I am talking about using reasoning skills to think about issues such as discovering whether technology “should” be developed, which discoveries are needed the most, and directing the direction of our society together. I believe that part of the reason that people do not use moral reasoning more when looking at technology or social development is because of a lack of understanding about what moral reasoning is.



Moral reasoning is a skill that humans develop across cultures at different levels, such as any reasoning skill it develops naturally when there is time and resources available to allow people to concentrate on growth as opposed to mere survival. Although there is some controversy about whether moral reasoning is consistently developed across cultures, most researchers seems to support the theory that moral reasoning is natural across cultures; but most importantly for us it is in Western culture... Recent cross culture research (Dahlsgaard, Peterson, & Seligman, in press) finds that cultures value their virtues of wisdom, courage, humanity, justice, temperance, and transcendence. This means that certainly valises and morals ARE found across cultures suggesting that moral resaoning and values are intrinsic to humanity.



I recently had a conversation with a couple friends of mine and they both liked the idea of UU church were everyone believes what they want about God and morality with a few moral guidelines, but then they both worried that many people if they joined would lose there moral grounding and start doing horrible things because they don’t believe in God and there are no hard and fast rules that say if u do this I go to hell. I believe that this is a fairly common apprehension in this country. It is related to the reason that a lot of people think that the bible should have more to do with what we do and say as a culture. I believe if more people came to an understanding that moral reasoning is not just an aspect of religion that a lot of these fears and social intolerance that are preeminent I currently in our cultures would be alleviated. I also believe that if a more developed understanding of moral reasoning was more prevalent in the general population that there would be less divisiveness between the “red” states” and the “blue states” and that people would be able to debate issues with the goal of finding the best possible solutions , instead of with the goal of one-upmanship, and even if this is not the case I believe that tolerance and a stronger belief in civil liberties would grow with the understating of true human commonalities.



Right now our culture seems to be operating under the belief that business especially big business IS the moral prerogative. That as long as money and the making of money i.e. greed is giving the perogative that the best well happens. Other people seems to think that morality has nothing to do with businesses, but that other aspects of our lives must be closely monitored so as to keep the populace behaving in a an acceptable “moral” way which will not cause the downfall of our culture. In other words there is a blatant double standard where many of the rich and those in very big business (I’m not talking about small business owners here at all) consider themselves above the moral code, or a normal moral code. Since, and government seems to be operating under this double standard as well?)If this were too change society would become more balanced, and there would not be as many social problems. Living in a society with large social inequity is related (research shows) to having an increase in disease, stress, mental illness and crime. These increases in stress and disease are across the line those with money are not exempt, in fact those with money seems to get sick as much as those without.



Okay, I know that this is not the first time in history of the world that someone has said that if the culture changes in America from making money the prerogative things will be better. I really think that right now it is more important than ever because corporations are being given more and more protection, while civil liberties, the rights of individual people are being taken away. I also know that people have tried to make morality more for a priority before. In the 60’s there were people that tried to “push” a brand of morality on the rest of the country. Right now we are still dealing with the backlash and anger from that push, with another “push” of another brand of mortality called “family values.” I don’t know if there has ever been a time, perhaps when populism was strong, that there has been a call not for a particular “brand” of morality but for an emphasis of moral behavior and a belief that all healthy people have the commonalty of having moral reasoning. I don’t believe that trying to force or push change or growth on people has ever worked very well, but EDUCATION has. I know that in some people’ mind that contours up images of sitting in a boring lecture hall, (loll) but again borrowing from the populists, and the republicans who knowingly or not ironically enough borrowed techniques from them the best way to teach is to get people’s attention with entertainment.



So feel free to borrow this blog, or rephrase it and post it or e-email it, but by all means pass it on. All humans have moral reasoning. It is not irrelevant, but important to human survival (or we wouldn’t all have it). Pretending that there are no morals, or that morality is unimportant, does not make moral questions go away. Pretending that certain institutions are exempt from moral questions, does not make the harm they do go away. I know, whatever, you say it doesn't matter what I do, but look at Betty Freidan, look at Rosa Parks, individual woman who quietly started revolutions that changed the country, and the world. In fact, although there is a societal backlash against egalitarianism, right now three is a quiet change happening for Egalitarianism. The last couple of generations of men in this country have become more egalitarian in the way they behave in their families, and he vast majority of women in the WORLD expect it.



… As Margaret Mead said, “never doubt that one person or a few people can change the world indeed it is the only thing that ever has.”