We are all though that we should be highly moral and that we should follow legal rules and socially acceptable behavior. This attitude comes so naturally to us that we rarely even stop and think about it for a moment.
But hey, take a look at this example. You’re alone in a middle of a desert, your vehicle broke (or your camel died, poor camel) and you don’t have enough water to reach the nearest settlement or oasis on foot. Luckily, you meet a man that has more than enough water for both of you and you ask him nicely to give or sell you some of his water. Alas, he refuses decisively and completely ignores you afterward, going his way. Knowing that virtually no one ever passes through that deserts, you basically have to choose between PHYSICALLY ATTACKING that man and STEALING HIS PROPERTY or dying from thirst while sunbathing on a hot sand. What would you do?
Sure, we can justify our wrongdoing from the situation above by telling ourselves that the man we attacked and robbed was selfish, cruel, horrible etc. But what about this: you have an opportunity to kill a complete stranger and steal his $1,000,000 in a way that you know that you will never get caught. What would you do? You wouldn’t kill him because you have no way to justify it? Why do you need a justification?
Your need to justify your wrongdoings is naturally inherited because if our conscience wouldn’t naturally prevent us from conducting unjustified wrongful actions, our society would very soon go to hell as we would all selfishly destroy each other in a thousand ways.
Thus, being a person with a high conscience is definitely good for our society, since conscience is a natural force helping our society to advance together without excessively destructive internal rivalry. On the other hand, high conscience is sometimes not too beneficial for ourselves as individuals. For ourselves as individuals, maybe it would be much more useful to always follow the simple cost/benefit logic without thinking about moral issues. Luckily for all of us together, we (or at least most of us) can't do that.
- What do you think about the pros and cons of high morality and conscience for the human society and a human individual?
If you liked this post then you will also probably like my post about human life worth found here: https://steemit.com/life/@lifenbeauty/how-valuable-is-a-human-life-are-we-really-all-worth-the-same
Have a wonderful day, week, and life!