Atheists: I am having a small debate with myself and would like other opinions?

[Flying Spaghetti Monster]

ARE PEOPLE BORN WITH A SENSE OF MORALITY, OR IS MORALITY SOMETHING YOU ACQUIRE DURING BABYHOOD? THOUGHTS? OPINIONS?

I am trying to figure out if people are born with a sense of morality or if we acquire it during our lives and whether or not it can be influenced by members of authority.

On the one hand, I think that everyone has a sense of morality outside the foundations of religion because most people don't take the Bible (or other Holy documents) as literal truth. Meaning that they don't believe things like killing disobedient children is a suitable punishment, no matter how many times it is repeated in the '' 100% true Holy document ''. Most religious people pick and choose what they want to take as literal truth in the Bible but then there must be a way they do the picking and choosing in the first place!

On the other hand, I have been reading about things such as the Inquasition and the Crusades online and some sources say that in such times, people thought it was perfectly alright to kill others for having different religious views or ''dangerous thoughts inspired by the devil''. Which leads me to ask myself if they honestly thought what they were doing was acceptable. If they did, then obviously there was no sense of morality that allowed them to see what they were doing was unacceptable.

Perhaps it is the fact that the people who commited these atrocities were religious, and thus, they believed that they had a sense of supiriority over the victims they claimed were ' evil '. Perhaps it is in this sense of underserved supiriority that such people become violent, arrogant, and disturbed in the mind. Perhaps I have just answered my own question, but please put in your opinions as well, did I overlook something, are there any other points you would like to add?

Atheists, I know it is long, but thanks to those who read it.

 

[Alex B]

It's hard to see with a non theiststic viewpont exactly where morality comes from. The only explation I have found which seems to make any sense to myself is Richard Dawkins' chapter about the roots of morality in "the God Delusion" where he speculates that morality could be a by product of natural selection (simpally put, you share the genes with most other humans, therefore genes that pushed being kind and good to humans (i.e. not killing them) would make the genes in other humans more likely to survive, and therefore be accceletated in the gene pool - I'm no expert in this, and he probably argues 5 times better than I could).

 

[Andrew]

I'm pretty sure morality is an evolutionary development to help the furthering of our species. It has nothing to do with god.

 

[neil s]

Both. Kin selection is present in all species, and can be further shaped in novel ways because of the complexity of our cortex.

The problem with religion in this case is it is used to codify ethics, and can thus generate situations where ethical behavior is overridden for the sake of the belief.

 

[British Atheist]

we are born with morals that come about because of instincts, of course influence from our parents and other people around us affect our morals. -its not just genes that are passed on-

modern humans get their morals from the hunter-gatherers, we are tribal by nature.

i could sit here and go on for hours, but im going to bed soon so go look up evolution yourself.

 

[Adam]

what andrew said, its evolutionary to care for other people because they are of value to you, its also largely an environmental factor too though.

 

[C.G.]

Babies do not have the mental capability to form abstract concepts like morality. However I do believe that they are something that are taught throughout growing up. My dad raised me to be a responsible and honest man and he is not religious.

 

[PC User]

I think that morality is a secular type of thought, but it can still be influenced spiritually or not. As forum signatures say, if some popular person said that breathing wasn't cool anymore, 87% of teenagers would die. If you're part of the 13% that would be laughing, copy and paste this into your sig.