Occasionally i hear the phrase “there is no morality outside of human society”. I believe, what is meant by it, is that you cannot say whether something is morally right or wrong in nature, if it isn’t part of human society.
For example, when a turtle eats a bird (here’s a video about it), you cannot say whether these deeds are “good” or “bad”. It’s part of nature, it’s part of the circle of life, … if these things didn’t happen, the bird couldn’t be alive in the first place.
Now, i’ve had some interesting talks yesterday with a close friend about what “morality” really means. They very certainly assured me that morality is simply the construct and the set of rules that society uses to organize itself to make itself more successful. In other words, morality aids the fitness of the group, but not necessarily of the individual. Do you agree with this view?
And if so, would that entail that the beneficial effects to the group can overwrite the wellbeing of a single individual? Where do you draw the limits? Like if some republicans claim that some women cannot decide themselves who they are/should be in a relationship with … does that derive from that view of morality? What do you respond to that? I’m seriously wondering because all these discussions make my head spin and sometimes i wonder truly whether i even know anything at all… How can you find certainty in what’s morally acceptable and what is not?
There is some weight to this perspective. One way to define “morality” is as a set of rules governing human behavior, especially behavior towards other humans.
We can have a thought experiment - imagine if you were the only human in existence. Actually the only person in existence to eliminate hypothetical aliens and AIs. How would you derive any rules of right and wrong? Nothing you do would have any impact on anyone else.
Maybe you would extend the rules to encompass natural systems - supporting certain kinds of ecosystems over others. But determining a moral base for those decisions is much trickier.
Now let’s go back to a society. As soon as you start relating to other people, deriving rules of right and wrong becomes much easier. We might disagree on what those rules are, but we agree that there must be some kind of rules.
Disclaimer: This is all based on guessing of a human who lives in a human society. I have no way of knowing how an existence without society might be like.