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If you want people to trust you, stick to commonsense morality If you want people to trust you, stick to commonsense morality
(about 1 hour later)
Who would you trust more, someone whose moral principles are absolute, black and white, or someone who carefully considers the rights and wrongs of specific situations before leaping to judgment? My guess is that most people reading this would say the former. “Rigidity” is a dirty word for most thinking folk, and being comfortable with ambiguity the hallmark of sophistication. But according to new research by experimental psychologists at Oxford and Cornell, in practice most people trust the absolutists more than the ponderers. Who would you trust more, someone whose moral principles are absolute, black and white, or someone who carefully considers the rights and wrongs of specific situations before leaping to judgment? My guess is that most people reading this would say the latter. “Rigidity” is a dirty word for most thinking folk, and being comfortable with ambiguity the hallmark of sophistication. But according to new research by experimental psychologists at Oxford and Cornell, in practice most people trust the absolutists more than the ponderers.
In fact, all the experiments show is that people who refuse to kill an innocent person to save the lives of many others are considered more trustworthy than those who would do so for the greater good. It’s quite an inferential leap to go from that to the view that rigidity in general confers trust.In fact, all the experiments show is that people who refuse to kill an innocent person to save the lives of many others are considered more trustworthy than those who would do so for the greater good. It’s quite an inferential leap to go from that to the view that rigidity in general confers trust.
Nonetheless, there is something suggestive in these findings that challenges an assumption we’ve inherited from the kind of religious ethics most in Britain no longer follow. It’s the idea that morality in some sense stands above human behaviour, representing an external standard we have to conform to. Our goal is to do the right thing, to make the choice that is judged as the best one from some kind of impartial viewpoint. But what if this is profoundly misguided? What if morality is in fact nothing more than a system for managing social interaction, a way of promoting harmony and keeping us from each other’s throats?Nonetheless, there is something suggestive in these findings that challenges an assumption we’ve inherited from the kind of religious ethics most in Britain no longer follow. It’s the idea that morality in some sense stands above human behaviour, representing an external standard we have to conform to. Our goal is to do the right thing, to make the choice that is judged as the best one from some kind of impartial viewpoint. But what if this is profoundly misguided? What if morality is in fact nothing more than a system for managing social interaction, a way of promoting harmony and keeping us from each other’s throats?
We have very good reasons for thinking this is precisely how we should view morality, and it is none the worse for it. Morality is primarily a matter of how we should treat others, for the good of everyone. You don’t need to posit any kind of transcendental source for the principles that should govern this. All you need to think about is what helps us to live and flourish.We have very good reasons for thinking this is precisely how we should view morality, and it is none the worse for it. Morality is primarily a matter of how we should treat others, for the good of everyone. You don’t need to posit any kind of transcendental source for the principles that should govern this. All you need to think about is what helps us to live and flourish.
What if morality is in fact nothing more than a way of promoting harmony and keeping us from each other’s throats?What if morality is in fact nothing more than a way of promoting harmony and keeping us from each other’s throats?
If this is what morality is, then it is not difficult to see why we should prefer simple, fixed rules to case-by-case calculations. First, for morality to work as a social system we need others to be predictable. If we cannot be sure whether someone might decide to kill us tomorrow in order to save others, we can never be sure that we are safe from anyone. We can have no faith in a justice system that allows the odd innocent to be punished in order to deter those who might otherwise harm even more. So although having a fixed rule that we should never harm the innocent might sometimes result in more innocent people being harmed, on balance the price we pay for that is much less than the cost of uncertainty. From a social point of view, the predictability and reliability of moral behaviour are much more important than getting it right from some abstract, absolute perspective.If this is what morality is, then it is not difficult to see why we should prefer simple, fixed rules to case-by-case calculations. First, for morality to work as a social system we need others to be predictable. If we cannot be sure whether someone might decide to kill us tomorrow in order to save others, we can never be sure that we are safe from anyone. We can have no faith in a justice system that allows the odd innocent to be punished in order to deter those who might otherwise harm even more. So although having a fixed rule that we should never harm the innocent might sometimes result in more innocent people being harmed, on balance the price we pay for that is much less than the cost of uncertainty. From a social point of view, the predictability and reliability of moral behaviour are much more important than getting it right from some abstract, absolute perspective.
Related to this is the problem that we really don’t want to live among relativists. To be clear, relativism is not the commonsense view that what is right or wrong always depends at least to a certain extent on the particular circumstances. It is the view that there is no shared standard of right and wrong, and what might be right for you could be wrong for me, depending on the day, our mood or the weather. When we are relativists in that sense, we really cannot trust anyone to stick to any kind of principle at all. We might legitimately worry that a lot of flexibility is too dangerously close to relativism to be admirable.Related to this is the problem that we really don’t want to live among relativists. To be clear, relativism is not the commonsense view that what is right or wrong always depends at least to a certain extent on the particular circumstances. It is the view that there is no shared standard of right and wrong, and what might be right for you could be wrong for me, depending on the day, our mood or the weather. When we are relativists in that sense, we really cannot trust anyone to stick to any kind of principle at all. We might legitimately worry that a lot of flexibility is too dangerously close to relativism to be admirable.
Another reason not to trust people who are very intellectual in their moral thinking is that they can very easily simply be rationalisers, using their brain power to justify whatever they want to believe. Evidence from psychology supports this, suggesting that most thinking we do about moral choices is an after-the-event rationalisation of whatever immediate, intuitive impulse we have.Another reason not to trust people who are very intellectual in their moral thinking is that they can very easily simply be rationalisers, using their brain power to justify whatever they want to believe. Evidence from psychology supports this, suggesting that most thinking we do about moral choices is an after-the-event rationalisation of whatever immediate, intuitive impulse we have.
It might seem a troubling thought for anyone who favours a more reflective ethics that in practice, ethics is rooted much more in feeling than in thinking, but there is good reason for this. The fundamental impulse to treat others well derives from a kind of empathy, not obedience to authority or a rational principle. For sure, we ought to use our reason to check whether our impulses are misleading us, as they undoubtedly often do. But in daily life, it makes perfect sense to trust the person of generosity and good heart more than the professor of abstract intelligence.It might seem a troubling thought for anyone who favours a more reflective ethics that in practice, ethics is rooted much more in feeling than in thinking, but there is good reason for this. The fundamental impulse to treat others well derives from a kind of empathy, not obedience to authority or a rational principle. For sure, we ought to use our reason to check whether our impulses are misleading us, as they undoubtedly often do. But in daily life, it makes perfect sense to trust the person of generosity and good heart more than the professor of abstract intelligence.
In that sense, the research has it back to front. The people we most trust are not absolutists, but people who don’t think too much about moral principles at all and stick to common sense. And morality is a form of common sense: the sense we have in common of what we all owe to each other. It can only work if we refuse to make ad hoc exceptions, no matter how intellectually justified they appear to be.In that sense, the research has it back to front. The people we most trust are not absolutists, but people who don’t think too much about moral principles at all and stick to common sense. And morality is a form of common sense: the sense we have in common of what we all owe to each other. It can only work if we refuse to make ad hoc exceptions, no matter how intellectually justified they appear to be.