Is morality inherent or learned? WNYC New York Public Radio recently broadcasted an hour long radio program under their Radio Lab label talking about this issue. I heard a five minute clip on NPR’s This American Life and wanted to learn more – so I looked up the Radio Lab and downloaded the program.
It starts off with two questions: 1) you are standing near a railroad where five guys are working on a bridge. As you stand there, you notice a train coming towards the five guys – you try to warn them, but they can not hear you. Then you notice a lever next to you – if you pull it, the train will move tracks and only kill one worker instead of five. What do you do? Nothing at all? Or pull the lever?
Question #2: Similar situation as #1, only you are standing on a hill above the five workers. The train is headed towards the five men and is certain that they will all die – then you notice that if you push the large man standing next to you down the hill, his body would stop the train from killing the other five. Do you push the man? Or do nothing?
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When questioned, most folks would answer “Yes, I would pull the lever” to the first question, but would not push the large man in the second question. Only, the end result is the same for both questions – you murder one person to save five. So why the different answers?
Joshua Greene, Assistant Professor of Psychology, Harvard University, in a quest to find out why people answered differently, asked these questions to folks under a brain scanner. Whenever anyone replied “Yes, I would pull the lever” to the first question, certain areas of the brain glowed, while different parts glowed when answering “No, I will not push the man” the second question.
His theory is that the parts of the brain that glowed while answering “Yes, I would pull the lever” deal more with logic. Ie. It is more logical to kill one person to save five then it is to kill five to save one. The parts of the brain that glowed during the second question are those of deep, biological morality. Ie. We have an ingrained sense that push someone off a cliff is wrong even if it saves five other lives.
This research is amazing as it shows that God did indeed write His law on our hearts! We all have an ingrain sense of right and wrong – now, we don’t always follow it..but it is there.
Now, unfortunately Joshua Greene does not come to the same conclusion that I do in that he believes that the ingrained morality that we have comes from our ‘ape ancestors’ (ie. don’t push you brother ape off the limb because he may help you later on). In spite of the evolutionary tenacious of the program, it is worth listening too. Download the MP3 or listen online here.
CS Lewis has some good stuff about this topic – I think it is in Mere Christianity (not sure on which book tho)
I believe you are correct in that he does cover the issue in Mere Christianity.
Morality
A quick follow up to my post: After I listened to the Radio Lab’s report, I went back and listened to the original This America Life broadcast that caught my attention. It was a very interest broadcast about whom would you save. They asked some thought provoking questions and had some great stories / interviews with folks wrestling with the issues at hand. It’s another podcast I would recommend. Listen to it here: http://www.thisamericanlife.org/Radio_Episode.aspx?episode=336
actually, I wouldn’t pull the lever. sometimes the unexpected cause more damage than the expected calamity.
What if the workers looked up, then jumped to the other track because they were expecting the train to go down track a, not b. That and it
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and it takes miles for a train to stop so is track b a safe track for the next 10 to 20 miles? Remember, your not stopping the train, you’re only diverting the train. You still have to depend on someone else to stop the train.
=) Wow! Now that’s thinking outside the box!
Point taken.