Dr George John

The English word ‘Morality’ is derived from the Latin ‘ moralis’ and can be defined as the ability to distinguish between right and wrong, good versus evil, and to freely exercise our choice based on principles instead of instinct-driven or self-interested actions. However, the capacity for such moral discrimination may not be strictly moral per se because one can proceed to do precisely the wrong or evil thing notwithstanding one’s knowledge of its sinful and corrupt nature. The consequential theory of morality suggests that whether something is good or bad depends on its outcome. An action that brings about more benefit than harm is considered good, while those that cause more harm than benefit are not. Utilitarianism is the most famous of all outcomes from this theory, and less well-known are the outcomes of Hedonism and Ethical Egoism. John Stuart Mill, the foremost among the proponents of utilitarianism, suggested: “Actions are right if they tend to produce happiness; Wrong if they tend to produce the reverse of happiness”. When the ethical consequentialist theory is applied to morality, judgements are based on the consequences of an action rather than on a moral code or law. A utilitarian model of morality would sacrifice the interests of an individual for the well-being of society as a whole. Is such a value system intrinsic in humans, or are such sentiments cultivated, learned and adopted as we grow up? What is acceptable and required in one culture is not permissible in another. Their traditions, family structure, and life experiences influence their morals in every geographical region and religion. However, there is no general agreement on how morality is actually developed in humans.
Sigmund Freud suggested that moral development occurs as a person’s ability to set aside their selfish needs and replace them with the values of their parents (or role models), the most important socialising agents at that stage. The Swiss developmental psychologist Jean Piaget thought that a child’s ‘social-cognitive’ and ‘social-emotional’ aspects of development helped the child to learn and adopt a moral code for him or herself rather than adopting the values of others. The American behavioural psychologist, BF Skinner, was sure of the power of external forces of praise and disapproval in shaping a person’s moral development, and Professor Lawrence Kohlberg expanded on Piaget’s theory into a six-stage development of moral reasoning, which for the first time explained the nature of a ‘moral dilemma’.
Whatever the theories of the development of morality may be, there is little doubt that the concept of morality changes over time. Broader public morality about other aspects, such as gender equality, pre-marital sex, same-sex relationships and the recreational use of Cannabis, has undoubtedly changed over time. What the bulk of the population once viewed as “wrong”, the vast majority now find “acceptable”. When certain cultures, political thought and religions insist that the use of contraception and termination of pregnancies are immoral, other parts of humanity consider contraception as necessary and terminations of unwanted, unplanned pregnancies and those that arise from outrageous and inexcusable sexual assaults as morally responsible. Other non-controversial morals, such as Bravery and Fairness, transcend time and geographical space. However, bravery and fairness mean different things in different cultures. Today, bravery is too often identified with foolishness and whatever one can say about fairness in this current00 era. Self-interest was a bad word until the 18th century but became a virtue ever since, albeit rechristened as competitiveness. The question of law and morality is tricky, not least when one frames notions of free choice. Sophocles’ play Antigone (written around 411 BCE) is an Athenian tragedy built around the same tension between law and morality.
Whereas both Morality and Ethics deal with “right” and “wrong,” it is necessary to distinguish between them. Morality is mainly personal, while ethics deals with standards in a community. But occasionally, private morality and public ethics may clash. Both morality and laws exist to regulate human behaviour so that harmony prevails while remaining rooted in concepts of individual autonomy and respect for one another. But some argue that Morality and Laws are independent of each other because the law cannot be disregarded even if it is morally indefensible. Society works better when all laws ensure the welfare of the individual and community. Adultery may be considered immoral, but it is perfectly legal in most places. It is sometimes argued that willfully breaking the law is morally correct under certain circumstances. For instance, is it right to steal in order to save lives? Such a question exemplifies what is known as Hienz’s dilemma in Kohlberg’s moral reasoning.

“Brains to care for others and react kindly to even those who try to harm us by creating personal rules of morality that help us live together successfully.”

Humans are unique among living creatures because of our erect posture and large brains. We live in organised social groups like the primates but have distinctive traits beyond our biological instincts, including political and institutional, religious beliefs, language, common sense, science, art, literature, technology and innovation. Our brains help us design our moral, ethical and altruistic behaviour, which involves “unselfish regard for the welfare of others”. However, Immanuel Kant’s moral law theory suggests that one does the right thing for the sake of a principle-based morality that demands compliance regardless of the distress and pain it may cause to oneself and others.
No discussion about morality cannot be complete without discussing whether greed is the engine of progress and whether civilisation is an ideology capitalism breeds quite successfully. And in this regard, the mention of Ayan Rand’s rather popular view on the subject only exposes the inherent fallacy with that line of thought. Others may even argue that any mention of the position of radical neoliberal thinking worldwide now does not add value to a critique of morality. Even when the self-interested groups reject Nietzsche’s influential argument that, in practice, moral codes are designed to protect the interests of the ruling classes of the rich and powerful, there is near unanimous agreement among fair-minded liberal thinkers that arguments on morality raised by the likes of Ayan Rand are mere flimsy fig leaf cover for a blatant capitalist ethic that masquerade as philosophy. However, extreme positions in neoliberal thinking argue that although altruism implies and imposes some cost to the altruist for the benefit of others, they argue that rational selfishness, which opposes the morality of altruism, is a virtue. In other words, greed is good. There is a tendency to justify such arguments by stating the obvious that humans are a species who are powerfully motivated to succeed. The Russian-Irish maverick Alice O’Connor, better known by her pen name, Ayan Rand, argued that rational selfishness is the only objective, fact-based moral code in human history and that morality’s purpose is to teach us not to suffer and die but to enjoy ourselves and live. This erroneous view must be seen for what it is, that such an extreme and improbable theory is advanced to maintain the status quo so that class hierarchies and privileges will remain intact endlessly.
But how did humans, an extremely social species who depend on each other, learn to distinguish good from evil, right from wrong, just from unjust and vice from virtue? Despite the persuasive argument that morality is personal and not rule-based, it may still be misleading to see basic human morality purely as the result of evolution. Whilst this line of argument may also run counter to the moral relativism and culture-specific nature of morality that I mentioned in the opening section of this essay, there is general acceptance that human morality was formed over hundreds of thousands of years through a combination of our genes and our culture and both exert an equal effect. That is to say that human morality arises from a mixture of both nature as well as nurture.” However, it must also be said that this type of instinctive moral code should necessarily exclude those who assert racial, ethnic, political, religious and cultural superiority over others who are of a different persuasion – that way, a distinction can be made between different forms of moral actions and particular moral systems and codes. When one argues that humans are hardwired to be moral at some level, it remains puzzling how and why some very violent actions have been justified on moral grounds. Perhaps a character fault of malignant selfishness associated with narcissistic tendencies may explain such exonerations of inexcusable acts. When skin and hair colour and hues are determined by genes alone, morality is different because our basic tenor and the nature of our societies affect our morality. However, somewhat rose-tinted hopeful examples of exceptional human conduct throughout history show us what is humanly possible. However, there is no denying that human genetic and cultural evolution has played a vital role in shaping human brains to care for others and react kindly to even those who try to harm us by creating personal rules of morality that help us live together successfully. Nevertheless, morality in gender equality and gender justice has continued to evade human moral development in that direction, even up to the 21st century.

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