Moral mash-up
Finished the dreaded morality chapter. Really a challenge, but I think it came out well. Here’s 9,000 words condensed to 200:
Don’t pinch a liberal or pee on a conservative. I’m good because I want people to like me, and eleven other reasons. I say Stalin and Torquemada are bad, and Quakers agree with me. Abolitionists and feminists impress me. And how helpful those shy Scandies are! When in doubt, the tie goes to the Big Guy, and despite evolution, there are few rapes on planes. Survival of the fittest doesn’t mean survival of the fittest, you know, and Herbert Spencer isn’t Charles Darwin. (He wishes.) Violent crime is lower than ever, so stop sending me emails. Cooperation’s more adaptive than mutual slaughter, go figure. There’s about the same percentage of Protestants in the federal pen as in the U.S. population, but thirty times fewer atheists than there should be. Why are people so (generally) good, and why do we think we’re so bad? We could kill each other with space lasers in Pardus, but we mostly don’t. Oxytocin and mirror neurons make me feel your pain, morality changes (thankfully) — and JESUS! did Jesus ever say a bad thing in Mark 7:9-13. Did you know obeying orders doesn’t make you moral? Carrots and sticks and Kohlberg levels, Golden Rules around the world, and most people turn out just fine, so relax.
There’s other stuff too.
(By way of explanation: Foundation Beyond Belief clinched $20,000 in the Chase grant competition. I’m a little lightheaded. *THANK YOU* for voting.)