It should be like this: what is morality and how does it change over time?

Morality is a set of standards that allow people to live together in groups—what societies deem “right” and “acceptable.” Sometimes acting morally means that people must sacrifice their short-term interests for the good of society. Individuals who go against these standards may be considered immoral. But can we say that morality is the same for everyone, stable and unshakable? Let's understand the concept and see how morality changes over time.

Where does morality come from? Scientists have not yet agreed on this issue, but there are several most common theories:

Freudian Morality and the Superego - Freud proposed that moral development occurs when a person's ability to ignore his or her egoistic needs is replaced by the values of important socializing agents (such as a person's parents).
Piaget's Theory of Moral Development - Jean Piaget focused on the social-cognitive and socio-emotional perspectives of development and proposed that moral development occurs over time, at certain stages, when children learn to accept certain moral standards of behavior for their own sake, rather than simply complying with moral standards. norms because they don't want to get in trouble.
Behavioral theory of B.F. Skinner - Skinner focused on the power of external influences that determine human development. For example, a child who receives praise for being kind may treat someone kindly again out of a desire to receive positive attention in the future.
Kohlberg's Moral Reasoning - Lawrence Kohlberg proposed six stages of moral development that go beyond Piaget's theory. Kohlberg proposed that a series of questions could be used to determine an adult's stage of thinking.

When it comes to what triggers the development of morality, the dominant modern view on this issue is close to the position set forth by the 18th-century Scottish philosopher David Hume. He considered moral reason to be a "slave of the passions"

, and Hume's view is supported by research that suggests our judgments of right and wrong are influenced by emotional reactions such as sympathy and disgust. This view is consistent with the recent discovery that the elementary moral sense is universal and appears very early. Thus, infants as young as six months judge people by how they treat others, and one-year-old children exhibit spontaneous altruism.

Looking at the big picture, this means that we have little conscious control over our understanding of right and wrong

It is quite possible that in the future this theory will turn out to be erroneous due to the complete denial of reason. After all, emotional reactions by themselves cannot explain one of the most interesting aspects of human nature - the evolution of morality.

Values such as caring, compassion and safety, for example, are more important now than in the 1980s, the importance of respect for authority has fallen since the early 20th century, while judgments of right and wrong based on loyalty to country and family have steadily risen. increased. These results were obtained by the authors of a study published in PLOS One

, which showed distinctive trends in people's moral priorities between 1900 and 2007.

How we should understand these changes in moral sensibility is an interesting question. Morality itself is not a rigid or monolithic system; moral foundations theory, for example, posits as many as five moral rhetorics, each with its own set of virtues and vices:

Morality based on purity, ideas of holiness and piety. When standards of purity are violated, the reaction is one of disgust and violators are considered unclean and tainted.
A morality based on authority, valuing duty, respect and public order. Hates those who show disrespect and disobedience.
A morality based on justice, which is opposed to a morality based on authority. Judges good and evil using the values of equality, impartiality and tolerance, and despises bias and prejudice.
In-group morality that values loyalty to family, community, or nation and views those who threaten or undermine them as immoral.
A harm-based morality that values caring, compassion, and safety and views wrongness in terms of suffering, mistreatment, and cruelty.

People of different ages, genders, backgrounds, and political beliefs use these types of morality to varying degrees. Cultures as a whole, over time, increase emphasis on some moral foundations and decrease emphasis on others.

Historical change in moral concepts

As cultures and societies develop, people's ideas about good and evil change, but the nature of this transformation remains a matter of speculation.

Thus, some believe that our recent history is a history of demoralization. From this perspective, societies become increasingly less prim and judgmental. We have become more accepting of other people, rational, non-religious and trying to scientifically justify how we approach questions of right and wrong.

The opposite view involves a re-moralization that our culture is becoming more and more critical. We are offended and outraged by more and more things, and the growing polarization of opinions reveals the extremes of righteousness.

The authors of the study mentioned above decided to explore which of these views best reflects the change in morality over time, using a new field of research - culturomics. Culturomics uses very large text databases to track changes in cultural beliefs and values, since changing patterns of language use over time can reveal changes in how people understand their world and themselves. The study used data from Google Books, which contains more than 500 billion words from 5 million scanned and digitized books.

Each of the five types of morality was represented by large, well-founded sets of words reflecting virtues and vices. The results of the analysis showed that the main moral terms ( "conscience"

,
“honesty”
,
“kindness”
and others) as we moved deeper into the 20th century, they began to be used in books much less frequently, which corresponds to the narrative of demoralization. But, interestingly, around 1980, an active rise back began, which may mean an astonishing remoralization of society. On the other hand, the five types of morality individually show radically different trajectories:

Purity morality shows the same decline and rise as the basic terms. Ideas of holiness, piety and purity, as well as sin, pollution and obscenity, fell until about 1980 and then rose.
The egalitarian morality of justice has shown neither consistent growth nor decline.
The morality of power, based on hierarchy, gradually declined during the first half of the century and then rose sharply when a looming power crisis rocked the Western world in the late 1960s. However, it retreated again just as sharply during the 1970s.
Group morality, reflected in the general rhetoric of loyalty and unity, shows the most obvious upward trend in the 20th century. The marked increase in the periods around the two world wars indicates a transient rise in "us and them" morality in threatened communities.
Finally, harm-based morality represents a complex but intriguing trend. Its prominence declines from 1900 to the 1970s, interrupted by small increases during wartime when themes of suffering and destruction became understandably pressing. At the same time, a sharp increase has been occurring since about 1980, and against the backdrop of the absence of a single dominant global conflict.

Arguably, the decades since 1980 can be seen as a period of renewed moral concern, and the research that has been conducted points to some important cultural transformations.

The way we tend to think about good and evil today is different from how we once thought and, if trends are to be believed, from how we will think in the future

However, what exactly leads to these transformations is a question open to debate and speculation. Perhaps one of the main engines of moral change is human contact. When we interact with other people and share common goals, we show affection towards them. Today we communicate with many more people than our grandparents and even our parents. As our social circle expands, so does our “moral circle.” However, such a “contact hypothesis” is limited and does not take into account, for example, how our moral attitudes may change towards those with whom we never communicate directly: some donate money and even blood to people with whom they have no contact and little in common.

On the other hand, perhaps it is all about the stories that circulate in societies and arise because people come to certain views and seek to pass them on to others. Although few of us write novels or make films, people are natural storytellers and use storytelling to influence others, especially their own children.

Note 52. “The Emergence of Morality”

Note 52 . "The Emergence of Morality"

Most thinkers who dealt with the problem of morality came to the conclusion that morality is self-sufficient and has grounds in itself. This means that it cannot be derived from the laws that govern economics, politics, or the human psyche; morality cannot be justified on the basis of these laws.

Naturally, these laws are subject to morality. Thus, economic activity does not depend solely on the personal benefit of the entrepreneur: in modern society it is necessary that any subject of economic activity build his behavior in accordance with moral standards. On the other hand, morality to a certain extent depends on the laws that govern the various spheres of society. For example, in a society with a market economy, the behavior of a person defending his right to property will be treated differently than in a society with another type of economy. Even in Russia, where market relations play an increasingly important role, public opinion does not always clearly evaluate the defense of such a right. The moral values common in our country were formed under the influence of Orthodoxy, which has always had a negative attitude towards material values. Of course, Orthodoxy does not play such an important role in the life of Russians as it did before. However, in general, a negative attitude towards such phenomena still persists. In the Russian language there is even the word “possessiveness”, which has a pronounced negative meaning and in its meaning is close to words such as “greed” and “stinginess”. Gradually, however, this meaning is being lost: now we call people who simply own something owners, and thus we do not evaluate them either positively or negatively.

There are several explanations for where morality came from:

1. According to one view, morality arose from practical relations between people within society. This means that morality depends on how society is structured, what goals it has, and what relationships people enter into. For example, a positive assessment of the struggle for one’s property rights, which we have already discussed, is closely related to the structure of a market economy.

This point of view is confirmed by the fact that within a particular society morality is usually heterogeneous. Different social groups support different moral values. Usually they do not come into strong contradiction, however, they cannot be reduced to each other.

2. According to another mode of explanation, the source of morality is God (or absolute reason); some thinkers believed that the source of morality is human nature. From this point of view, morality represents natural laws that were either given to man from above or correspond to his nature. In the latter case, a person is viewed as initially good, fair, that is, moral, and everything bad in a person is associated with society.

It is often even expressed that morality exists only thanks to religion. Perhaps this is too strong a statement, since not all people who share moral values are believers. This means that a person can be moral regardless of whether he believes in God or not. An equally important role from the point of view of the formation of moral convictions is played by art, legal and political norms. However, there is a lot of truth in this statement. A set of moral and ethical guidelines is an essential component of any religious system.

3. Finally, there is the view that morality is created by the individual. It is he who evaluates his own actions and the actions of other people. It is clear that such an explanation denies both the connection of morality with the activities of people and its givenness from above.

This point of view does not explain why morality becomes generally valid. Indeed, the evil done to a person is assessed by him as something bad, while the evil that a person causes to other people will not necessarily be considered by him as evil. The simplest example is causing pain. A person does not want to be hurt, he considers it evil. But he himself may derive pleasure from causing pain to other people, which, of course, does not correspond to moral standards.

Questions and tasks

What is the universal validity of morality?
What is a double standard? How do you assess this phenomenon?
What is conscience?

How is morality related to religion?

How did morality arise?
How is morality different from law?
Explain the statement that morality is self-sufficient.
What explanations exist for the emergence of morality?

Personal values and moral principles of society

What values you have, and how they align with the moral values of your community and your own actions, directly influence your sense of belonging and, more broadly, life satisfaction.

Personal values are principles you believe in and have invested in. Values are the goals you strive for; they largely determine the essence of personality. But more importantly, they are a source of motivation for self-improvement. People's values determine what they want personally, while morals determine what the society around those people wants for them.

Humanistic psychologists suggest that people have an innate sense of values and personal preferences that tend to be hidden beneath layers of social demands and expectations (social morality). Part of the human journey involves the gradual rediscovery of those innate and highly personal desires that are unconsciously hidden when they are found to conflict with the demands of society. However, if one takes an inventory of values, most well-socialized people will find that there is a high degree of correspondence between what they want and what society wants.

Yes, certain behaviors are considered desirable and others are not, but for the most part, as we have seen, morality is not set in stone and often reflects local cultural characteristics and historical aspects that tend to change.

CONCEPT OF MORALITY

What is morality? We know that society is not a simple aggregation of individuals, but an integral organism, a complex system of socio-economic, political and spiritual relations, the bearer of which is ultimately a person as a particle of large and small: groups, collectives, classes, nations. Man is an active being, and in his behavior he is guided by his needs and interests, beliefs and habits. And society is interested in ensuring that the needs and views of the individual do not contradict the interests of other people. One of the forms of coordination and regulation of these interests, different in content and social significance, is morality.

What is ethics?

Ethics is the science of the essence and content of morality, the laws of its emergence, development and functioning. Marxist ethics is an integral part of the ideology of the working class; it includes a theoretical understanding of morality. Marxist ethics for the first time determined the socio-economic source of morality, the patterns of its development and functioning. She pays special attention to the content of morality, expressed primarily in its requirements (principles, norms and rules), as well as the laws of its functioning - the fulfillment of a regulatory function, the process of transforming moral knowledge into beliefs and needs.

The study of ethics attracts a person’s attention to the moral side of his behavior, teaches him to see the moral aspect in any type of activity, helps him correctly solve his moral problems: to form an idea of the meaning of life and the moral ideal, to understand that morality is not established on its own, spontaneously, but requires a person’s activity in the struggle with himself, with the remnants of bourgeois morality in his consciousness and behavior, that he embodies morality” in practical affairs, in the fight against manifestations of evil and the affirmation of good. The study of ethics gives a person the opportunity to understand the entire system of moral relations in society and help him in organizing moral education and self-education.

Concepts of the emergence of morality

A separate branch of philosophy, ethics, studies the essence of morality and its influence on the consciousness and actions of people. Answering the question about the origin and development of human morality, scientists divided into three main groups, each of which tends to a certain point of view:

Morality is given to people by God

Divine law (which has the highest, primary significance for the foundations of morality) consists of three steps:

the eternal law, which is hidden in the divine mind, implies that without faith in God there will be no morality;
the natural law of morality, the meaning of which is that human nature, the soul created by the creator, constantly strives to merge with him;
positive human law, the lowest level of the three, is a community of legal and moral norms that are accepted in society.

The religious concept is authoritarian and unchanging, it presupposes clear boundaries in the consideration of good and evil. The requirements of divine law are expressed in commandments.

Ethical standards are inherent in people from the very beginning

Proponents of this naturalistic concept, relying on the scientific works of Charles Darwin and P. Kropotkin, expressed the idea of the similarity of the psychology of consciousness and behavior of primitive people and animals. In ancient times, a person’s first place was the clan with all the customs and rules established in it, taboos and prejudices, habits and interests that were mandatory for the majority, which implied the merging of individual representatives into a single whole. From here, adherents of this idea believe, ethics arose and began to develop; from this identification of oneself with others, the concept of justice, and later - morality, appeared.

The emergence and improvement of morality occurred only with the development of society

Representatives of the sociological point of view believe that the answer to the question of the emergence of morality should not be sought in human essence. The primary source here is the historical and social conditions for the development of society, as well as its needs, the satisfaction of which is expressed in the desire to organize the optimal coexistence of people with each other in a more profitable and convenient way for oneself (society).

Common ground between law and morality

There is much in common between morality and law:

Morality and law are social regulators (and moral and legal norms are social norms ) that regulate individual and social behavior.
Morality and law have a single goal - to maintain social balance and public order.
Moral and legal norms exist in the form of generally binding rules of behavior .
Violation of moral and legal norms entails negative sanctions .
Morality and law reflect the level of development of society, state, civilization.
It is assumed that the norms of morality and law reflect the will of the majority of members of society .
It is assumed that morality and law should be a social good and affirm universal human values in society.

In the last two paragraphs it is precisely “assumed”, because ideally law, like morality, should be a measure of goodness, justice, equality, but unfortunately, the practice of states shows that this is not always the case.

Correlation and mutual influence of morality and law

The question of the relationship and mutual influence of morality and law is extremely difficult and does not have a clear solution. In philosophy and jurisprudence, several concepts have emerged about the relationship between these concepts.

In general, morality and law are autonomous entities , each of which has a completely independent meaning . But morality appeared much earlier than law. And the law is based on moral norms and cannot ignore them, since moral norms were developed over a long period of time and voluntarily accepted by the majority of members of society for execution. Thus, by violating legal norms, a person almost always simultaneously violates moral norms.

It must also be remembered that the essence of the concepts “ morality ” and “ law ” have similar content : “moralis” - moral, “jus” - right, “justitia” - truth, justice, i.e., law is the “art of good” , law must reflect equality and justice.

The ideal of the existence of human civilization is the voluntary compliance by all members of society with the norms of morality and law . The less the state is forced to interfere in people's relations, the higher the legal awareness of society.

Currently, the relationship between morality and law can manifest itself in the following ways :

1) Legal norms and moral norms completely coincide.

For example, all natural human rights - the right to life, to protection of honor and dignity, etc., initially existed in the form of moral norms, until they began to be protected by law. Prohibitions and taboos associated with these rights also acquired a legal form: “thou shalt not kill” (criminal liability for the murder of a person - Article 105 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation), “thou shalt not steal” (criminal liability for theft - Art. 158 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation) and etc.

2) Legal norms and moral norms partially coincide.

For example, the Hippocratic oath, which every doctor is obliged to observe, initially contained only moral obligations - the doctor’s duty to his patients. However, some provisions from this oath have now become the legal obligation of the doctor (for example, the prohibition of euthanasia, medical confidentiality).

3) Legal norms and moral norms do not coincide, they are in conflict.

As noted above, the scope of moral norms is much wider than the scope of legal norms. Therefore, law is sometimes indifferent to any situations, in contrast to morality. For example, from the perspective of family law, the fact of adultery does not entail any negative legal sanctions, while from a moral point of view, such behavior of a legally married person will be condemned by the public.

A more conflicting situation is also possible. For example, from a moral point of view, some consider euthanasia to be the murder of a person, others - to save a hopelessly ill patient, and almost the moral duty of a doctor who is obliged to save the suffering person from suffering. In most countries of the world, euthanasia is expressly prohibited by law, but in these countries there are supporters of its implementation. Meanwhile, there are countries where euthanasia is already officially permitted (and there are more and more of them), but not the entire population of these countries accepts such laws. In such a situation, there is a conflict: “law permits, morality condemns,” and vice versa, “law prohibits, morality permits.”

Thus, morality and law are two special, spiritual, value-regulatory social areas that cover independent spheres of influence in the life of society.

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Historical forms of morality

The process of moral development is complex and contradictory: progress in one direction may be associated with regression in another. Thus, F. Engels called the transition from a classless to a slave-owning society “a fall from the simple moral heights of the old tribal system.” Indeed, slave-owning communication gave rise to base moral feelings: greed, passion for pleasure, contempt for physical labor. Yet slavery gave rise to moral progress: as labor productivity increased, for the first time in history, man became valuable as a labor force.

The rejection of moral values is first carried out in practice. In ideology, the ruling class still continues to propagate its moral standards; therefore, hypocrisy is growing, the gap between the theory and practice of moral life, between what should and what is, between word and deed, is widening. However, progress is inexorable. In bourgeois conditions, the importance of proletarian morality begins to increase, which contains opportunities for more perfect regulation of relations between people. In its content and purpose, it is directed against bourgeois morality. Having emerged in bourgeois society, proletarian morality is enriched and developed under the influence of the revolutionary movement, and after the victory of the socialist revolution it becomes dominant.

Today in the world two moralities are opposed to each other: modern and bourgeois. These are antipodes. There is an uncompromising struggle between them. The moral progress of humanity is associated with the establishment of modern morality.