How we acquire a sense of morality

Abstract

Wilson fights a brave battle against political correctness (and factual incorrectness), the absurdities of moral relativity, and Marxist social enviromnentalism. It is difficult to see how anyone with an ounce of common sense could ever believe that our standards of behavior reflect the needs of the social order, or are determined by the economic dictates of our means of production, distribution and exchange. The arguments in favor of such an unlikely thesis are so obviously incorrect that it should not take much research to disprove them. Let me look at the problem first in common sense terms; I will then take up the more difficult task of trying to show how conscience (the bearer of our moral sense) originates. Those who favor moral relativism often point to the fact that certain activities are freely permitted in some societies, but severely punished in others. Even in the same society there may be sudden changes from forbidden to permitted; homosexuality was against the law in England until 1967 when it suddenly became legally permissible. In fact, homosexuality is a good example for relativity of moral sense, being actively encouraged in ancient Sparta, and punished by torture and death in some medieval societies! Sodomy is now permitted in England between consenting males over eighteen years of age but forbidden between man and wife! Altogether, sex provides us with a multitude of insane laws--I recall attending an annual general conference of the American Psychological Association where the printed material sent to all participants included a separate notice warning us that in the particular Southern state where the conference was held oral sex was legally prohibited, even among married couples! (It would be interesting to know how this law was enforced. There are many political and religious areas where there are sharp differences from country to country, and from time to time. In the Hitler Germany where I grew up (and which I left in protest) one could be severely punished for not giving the Hitler salute. In Catholic Italy Galileo was severely punished for asserting the truth about our heliocentric solar system. In Turkey once could have your nose slit for smoking-modern America seems to be approaching the same point, but as yet has not quite reached it. Prostitution is not legal in the USA, but permitted in Germany and England. The list is endless, but what does it prove? It simply shows that powerful people may impose their social, religious or moral ideas by law, usually by inventing victimless crimes. But these are a tiny minority of crimes; the vast majority of crimes do have victims (burglary, assault, mugging, rape, murder, thieving, looting, robbing, grievous bodily harm, industrial espionage, and many more). And these crimes are universally condemned; there is no relativity there. From time immemorial men (and occasionally women) have committed these crimes, and from time immemorial the state has punished the wrongdoer. There is 95 percent of universality and 5 percent of relativism about our moral sense; to believe in 100 percent relativity is not meaningful. No state could exist for any length of time that permitted its citizens to carry out these activities without let or hindrance, and this solid core of don't do to others what would not like them to do to you establishes a robust air of universality for our moral sense. Is this moral sense learned, in the sense that we learn Latin, or algebra, or history? Clearly not. Criminals have often been quizzed, as have normal citizens, about the morality of certain actions, and their lawfulness; criminals know as well (or even better!) what is lawful, what is not. After all, it is their business to know! But this knowledge is quite irrelevant to their actions; every criminal who steals, or rapes, or murders, knows perfectly well that what he is doing is unlawful, and subject to punishment; this does not prevent him from carrying on stealing, raping and murdering. …