Mel Gilbertson
What is morality? How do we know what is right and what is wrong, and why do we make that distinction in the first place? Morality is often seen as religious in nature, either as an innate, god-given gift or as a set of guidelines taught to us through religious texts like the Bible or the Qur’an. Moral philosopher Iris Murdoch suggests that the two are inevitably intertwined, for morality seeks its perfection in religion.[1] However, evidence suggests that morality has far more to do with biology than with religion. Morality does not require religion in order to develop; in fact, it is most likely a natural aspect of the human experience.
To begin with, let us clarify the definitions of “morality” and “religion.” In this context, morality is really shorthand for moral judgment — the ability to distinguish “right” from “wrong.” Ethical codes (e.g., the Ten Commandments) exist to assist this judging process. According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, religion can be defined as “an organized system of beliefs, ceremonies, and rules used to worship a god or a group of gods.” Religion is thus a particular type of belief system — a coherent set of beliefs that inform one’s view of the world. Secularism, atheism, agnosticism, and non-theistic spiritualities are also belief systems, but are not religions per this definition. Depending on how you define “organized,” some theistic spiritualities — including many kinds of paganism — may not be considered religions under this definition, either.
Firstly, if morality were indeed religious in nature, then it could not develop within these non-religious belief systems. No morality means no ethical codes or other guidelines for moral behavior. And yet, non-religious ethical codes exist. Secular humanism, an atheist philosophy, includes “the common moral decencies: altruism, integrity, honesty, truthfulness, [and] responsibility” as well as rationality, justice, fairness, compassion, and tolerance among its list of core principles.[2] Confucianism, an agnostic philosophy codified by the Chinese teacher Kǒng Zǐ,[3] has the Five Constant Virtues of humaneness, justice, propriety, wisdom, and integrity.[4] Most Wiccans and some other pagans follow the Wiccan Rede, “an it harm none, do what thou wilt.”[5] Political and social ideologies usually include moral guidelines that their adherents are expected to follow — feminists believe that it is morally wrong to infringe on someone else’s bodily autonomy; vegans believe that it is morally wrong to cause harm to animals. These ethical standards would not exist without a moral drive.
So, if morality is not inherently religious, where does morality come from? The Moral Sense Test, a four-year study developed by researchers at Harvard and Georgetown University in which close to 9,000 participants evaluated and responded to hypothetical moral dilemmas, suggests that morality is innate.[6] In fact, on average, participants agreed with each other on the proper moral course of action in each scenario about 88% of the time. Religious factors played a very small role in the participant’s responses to most of the scenarios presented, and no role at all in others. The participant’s gender, level of education, and politics did not significantly impact their sense of morality, either, with most variables accounting for less than 5% variance. The uniformity of responses means that either morality relies on values that the study did not measure, or that a good portion of our sense of morality is innate.
Why, then, do people disagree about moral issues at all? Dr. Ingrid Storm of the University of Manchester conducted a study evaluating the relationship between moral values and religiosity in Europe between 1981 and 2008, during which time many European nations became more secular.[7] In this study, she made a critical distinction between two kinds or “dimensions” of moral values — the first group of values being those which prioritize either personal autonomy or traditional, group-centered consciousness, with the second group being those which prioritize either self-interest or social norms that have been generally accepted across cultures and eras (i.e., don’t murder, don’t steal, etc.). She found that the former group of moral values were highly variable across the population and that as religiosity declined, so too did traditional, group-centered values while personal autonomy values rose. On the other hand, socially normative values remained relatively constant over time and across the population regardless of religiosity. It is these core, steady values, specifically, which I argue are natural and innate, while one’s feelings on personal autonomy vs. traditional values are derivative and taught by institutions like religion and politics.
This division between innate and derivative morals also neatly accounts for the fluctuation of what is or isn’t considered socially acceptable across cultures and eras; in some cases, derivative morals are held to be more important or stronger than conflicting innate morals. For example, the Romans allowed slavery as part of the ius gentium or international law even though it conflicted with the well-recognized natural law that all humans are born free. This legal distinction indicates that they recognized that slavery was immoral but practiced it anyways. Religions, too, have been (and still are) used to justify derivative moral values even when they would otherwise be considered immoral. During the Crusades, for example, the murder of Muslims, Jews, and Orthodox Christians in the Holy Land was considered justified and absolvable by the Catholic Church even though the Ten Commandments include an injunction against murder. On the other hand, core religious concepts reflecting our innate moral values tend to be similar across religions. The most famous and widespread of these similarities is the Golden Rule or law of reciprocity, a moral injunction shared by the vast majority of religions and philosophies which encourages people to treat others with respect.
Another way to examine the nature of morality is to look to people whose sense of “right” and “wrong” is diminished or absent. Antisocial Personality Disorder (ASPD), colloquially known as sociopathy, affects at least 0.6% of the U.S. population.[8] Psychopathy (as evaluated by the Psychopathy Checklist: Screening Version or PCL: SV) affects a similar percentage of people in the U.K.[9] Other studies estimate that sociopaths and psychopaths together make up about 1%-3% of the general population. Sociopaths have a sense of morality, but it is substantially different than most and they are more strongly influenced by self-interest. Psychopaths lack a sense of morality altogether and act purely out of self-interest.[10] Neither can empathize with others, although they can understand other’s emotions intellectually and can mimic empathy when it is in their interest to do so. Empathy is a key factor in the ability to make altruistic moral decisions, or decisions solely for the benefit of another. For example, let’s say you were to pass by a child drowning in a small pond. No one else is around, and intervening would save the child but your clothes would get wet. Is saving the child forbidden, permissible, or obligatory? This was one of the questions on the Moral Sense Test, and 97% of the participants agreed that saving the child is obligatory.[11] A sociopath or psychopath, however, would not save the child unless they saw it as beneficial to themselves in some way. Their self-interest and lack of empathy wins out over a diminished or absent sense of socially normative moral values. Because sociopathy and psychopathy are neurological variances that occur across all demographics, the logical conclusion is that morality is a neurological function.
The evidence is clear that our basic sense of morality is not religious in nature. So why is morality assumed to be religious? The belief that morals can only develop within a religious framework is a common source of discrimination against non-religious people. Indeed, this belief is so prevalent in our society that even atheists tend to be biased against other atheists.[12] One possible explanation is that most religions teach that their particular set of moral values are right and others are wrong, making no distinction between innate and derivative morals. Recognizing the non-religious nature of morality also means recognizing the virtues of other religions and non-religious belief systems as well as the failings of one’s own religion or belief system. How many of one’s moral assumptions are based on derivative or traditional morals, and to what degree might those conflict with one’s natural morals? How might one be judging others unfairly for not conforming to one’s moral standards? A non-religious concept of morality encourages tolerance and critical thinking in equal measure.
[1] Iris Murdoch, “Morality and Religion,” 1992, in A World of Ideas: Essential Readings for College Writers, 9th edition, ed. Lee A. Jacobus (Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2013), 366, 370.
[2] “Affirmations of Humanism: A Statement of Principles,” Council for Secular Humanism, accessed October 29, 2016, https://www.secularhumanism.org/index.php/12.
[3] “Master Kǒng,” the most common way he is referred to in Mandarin Chinese. “Confucius” is a latinization of Kǒng Fūzǐ, “grand master Kǒng.”
[4] These one-word translations are imprecise; please look into the original Chinese terms (rén, yì, lǐ, zhì, and xìn, respectively) if you wish to learn more.
[5] There are many variants of the Wiccan Rede, all essentially meaning that anything is permissible unless it causes harm to someone.
[6] Konika Banerjee, Marc Hauser, and Bryce Huebner, “Intuitive Moral Judgments are Robust across Variation in Gender, Education, Politics, and Religion: A Large-Scale Web-Based Study,” Journal of Cognition and Culture 10, no. 3 (2010): 253-81. doi:10.1163/156853710X531186.
[7] Ingrid Storm, “Morality in Context: A Multilevel Analysis of the Relationship between Religion and Values in Europe,” Politics and Religion 9, no. 1 (2016): 111-38. doi:10.1017/S1755048315000899.
[8] Ronald C. Kessler, Michael C. Lane, Mark F. Lenzenweger, and Armand W. Loranger, “DSM-IV Personality Disorders in the National Comorbidity Survey Replication,” Biological Psychiatry 62, no. 6 (2007): 553–564. doi:10.1016/j.biopsych.2006.09.019.
[9] Jeremy Coid, Robert D. Hare, Amanda Roberts, Simone Ullrich, and Min Yang, “Prevalence and Correlates of Psychopathic Traits in the Household Population of Great Britain,” International Journal of Law and Psychiatry 32, no. 2 (2009): 65-73. doi:10.1016/j.ijlp.2009.01.002
[10] This is but one model; in truth, the distinction between sociopathy and psychopathy (if any) is unclear as neither is an officially defined diagnosis. It is generally accepted that sociopathy correlates to ASPD, but even that is debated by some. Some researchers believe that the only significant difference between sociopathy and psychopathy is that the latter is inborn while the former develops in youth. Others view the two along a spectrum, with psychopathy representing an extreme form of sociopathy.
[11] Peter Singer and Marc Houser, “Godless Morality,” Project Syndicate, January 4, 2006, https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/godless-morality
[12] Will M. Gervais, “Everything Is Permitted? People Intuitively Judge Immorality as Representative of Atheists,” PLoS ONE 9, no. 4 (2014): e92302. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0092302