This writing developed like a summer thunderhead over the Montana landscape. I didn’t intend to get into the basics of moral philosophy but that is where I landed. I’m perplexed by my fellow Americans. I have been perplexed in great intensity in the last few years. I’m not alone. This writing was an attempt at resolving some of my questions. I have mentioned a helpful device at the end in which to expand some understanding into human nature if you so choose to try what has helped me. But in the end I’m still perplexed most undoubtedly. I address misconceptions and moral systems in many of today’s Americans in these very frightening times.
Below are some quotes on the word “misconceptions” to supplement my verse of today from several contemporary authors.
“We are sitting on top of a vast cultural and historical pyramid of accumulated misconceptions, lies and myths, built one on top of the other.”
― Bryant McGill, Voice of Reason
Bryant McGill (b. 1969) is a human potential thought leader, international bestselling author, activist, and social entrepreneur. He is one of the world's top social media influencers reaching a billion people a year.
“If we do not hesitate to set sail for the deep waters of our thinking and take the time to cultivate the right words that we need to conceive and express what we feel, we can avoid many misconceptions. ("Life was a misunderstanding")”
― Erik Pevernagie
Erik Pevernagie (born 1939) is a Belgian painter and writer, living in Uccle (Brussels).
“Unfortunately, human perception is not very developed. Everyone sees whatever they know or what they want, without considering the limitations of their knowledge or what is moral in the world. As a result, humans are a flawd species.”
― Maria Karvouni
Maria Karvouni aka Maria Karvouni Truth aka Maria Truth is a millennial international writer/author who's been published, mentioned and has cooperated in 6/7 continents of the world (except Antarctica).
“Life is surrounded with illusion, ignorance, perceptions and misconceptions. The primary issue is, not knowing about it.”
― Vikrmn: CA Vikram Verma
Vikrmn is the pen name of CA Vikram Verma who has authored many mind-bending and thought-provoking novels and various books on niche global systemic issues.
My research led me to the philosophy of morals in considering a very pertinent subject for this particular time. Below are quotes from several individuals greatly noted for their philosophical thought and writings on human morals.
“Moral character carries with it the highest power of causing a thing to be believed.”
— Aristotle.
“Moral excellence comes about as a result of habit. We become just by doing just acts, temperate by doing temperate acts, brave by doing brave acts.”
— Aristotle.
Aristotle (384–322 BC) was an Ancient Greek philosopher and polymath. His writings cover a broad range of subjects spanning the natural sciences, philosophy, linguistics, economics, politics, psychology and the arts.
“Out of the crooked timber of humanity, no straight thing was ever made.”
― Immanuel Kant, Idea for a Universal History with a Cosmopolitan Purpose
“Act in such a way that you treat humanity, whether in your own person or in the person of any other, never merely as a means to an end, but always at the same time as an end.”
― Immanuel Kant, Grounding for the Metaphysics of Morals/On a Supposed Right to Lie Because of Philanthropic Concerns
Immanuel Kant (22 April 1724 – 12 February 1804) was a German philosopher (a native of the Kingdom of Prussia) and one of the central Enlightenment thinkers. Born in Königsberg, Kant's comprehensive and systematic works in epistemology, metaphysics, ethics, and aesthetics have made him one of the most influential figures in modern Western philosophy.
“Because of the diverse conditions of humans, it happens that some acts are virtuous to some people, as appropriate and suitable to them, while the same acts are immoral for others, as inappropriate to them.”
—Thomas Aquinas
“In choice there are two things, the intention of the end, which belongs to moral virtue, and the preferential selection to the means to the end.”
— Thomas Aquinas
Article V.—Is justice a general virtue?
R. Justice directs a man in his relations with another. That may be either with another in his individual aspect, or with another in general, inasmuch as he who serves a community serves all the human beings who are comprised in that community. Justice in its proper essence may deal with either of these objects. All who are comprised in a community stand to the community as parts to the whole. Now all that the part is, belongs to the whole; hence everything good in the part is referable to the good of the whole. In this way then the goodness of every virtue, whether it directs a man in regard of himself, or directs him in regard of other individuals, is referable to the general good to which justice leads. And thus the acts of all the virtues may belong to justice, as that directs a man to the general good; and in this respect justice is called a general virtue. And because it is the office of law to direct a people to the general good, hence the above-described general justice is styled legal justice, because by it man keeps accord with the law that directs acts of all the virtues to the general good.
— Thomas Aquinas, Aquinas Ethicus
“Beware the man of one book.”
— Thomas Aquinas
Thomas Aquinas OP (1225 – 7 March 1274) was an Italian Dominican friar and priest, an influential philosopher and theologian, and a jurist in the tradition of scholasticism from the county of Aquino in the Kingdom of Sicily, Italy.
“My country is the world, and my religion is to do good.”
— Thomas Paine
Thomas Paine (born February 9, 1737 – June 8, 1809) was an English-born American Founding Father, political activist, philosopher, political theorist, and revolutionary.
“The only freedom which deserves the name is that of pursuing our own good in our own way, so long as we do not attempt to deprive others of theirs, or impede their efforts to obtain it. Each is the proper guardian of his own health, whether bodily, or mental or spiritual. Mankind are greater gainers by suffering each other to live as seems good to themselves, than by compelling each to live as seems good to the rest.”
— John Stuart Mill
“The liberty of the individual must be thus far limited; he must not make himself a nuisance to other people.”
— John Stuart Mill
John Stuart Mill (20 May 1806 – 7 May 1873) was an English philosopher, political economist, Member of Parliament (MP) and civil servant. One of the most influential thinkers in the history of classical liberalism, he contributed widely to social theory, political theory, and political economy. Dubbed "the most influential English-speaking philosopher of the nineteenth century" by the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, he conceived of liberty as justifying the freedom of the individual in opposition to unlimited state and social control.
“A just society is a society that if you knew everything about it, you'd be willing to enter it in a random place.”
— John Rawls
“In all sectors of society there should be roughly equal prospects of culture and achievement for everyone similarly motivated and endowed. The expectations of those with the same abilities and aspirations should not be affected by their social class.”
— John Rawls
“A society regulated by a public sense of justice is inherently stable.”
— John Rawls
John Bordley Rawls (February 21, 1921 – November 24, 2002) was an American moral, legal and political philosopher in the liberal tradition. Rawls received both the Schock Prize for Logic and Philosophy and the National Humanities Medal in 1999. The latter was presented by President Bill Clinton in recognition of how his works "revived the disciplines of political and ethical philosophy with his argument that a society in which the most fortunate help the least fortunate is not only a moral society but a logical one".
The following below from Frontiers in Psychology is from a paper and study on moral judgment. Two perspectives are expanded upon a) the deontological perspective and b) the utilitarian perspective that are exhibited by humans. It is inferred that one can make no moral judgment as well, that an indifference can occur to the witness of another’s behavior, thereby not making any moral judgment. There have been other philosophical perspectives listed over time, but to my assumptions the two listed above are the two most widely considered at this time. First an overview of what appears to be a widely studied subject:
The following is an overview of what are termed the five most important categories of moral philosophy:
Consequentialism is an umbrella term that describes a moral philosophy where the most moral action is that which brings about desirable consequences. Utilitarian is subcategory of consequentialism, according to what I have gathered. Liberalism* is a moral philosophy that prioritizes human freedom. This philosophy was summarized by the nineteenth-century philosopher John Stuart Mill. Virtue ethics takes its name from its emphasis on virtue. According to this moral philosophy, an act is moral if it contributes to a person’s virtuous character. Moral absolutism claims that there are moral facts that never change. The Ten Commandments are an example of moral absolutism. Moral nihilism claims that there are no moral facts whatsoever. Moral non-cognitivism (a form of moral nihilism) states that most (or all) of our moral statements and beliefs are not based on reason.
*To connect deontology to liberalism we find the following. Deontological liberalism is a species of political morality. It has three distinctive features. First, it is deontological (as opposed to teleological) in it focuses on in the work of John Rawls. Utilitarianism, in contrast, provides a classic instance of teleological theory. Deontological liberalism is liberal because theses moral entities are primarily to individuals and guarantee them a degree of moral immunity against the claims of others or of the community as a whole. Deontological liberalism is committed to the distinction between the right and the good. The right defines a set of entitlements, a position from which the individual may choose a conception of the form of life to pursue. This chosen conception is the individual’s conception of the good.
From Frontiers in Psychology:
Moral judgment is the evaluation of a certain behavior as good or bad, or as right or wrong. The goal of moral psychology is to clarify why individuals make the judgments they do about moral issues. Research on moral judgments has been especially influenced by the two most important normative ethics theories of the last several centuries, that is deontology and utilitarianism. Both theories prescribe logic for determining the morality of behavior. A deontological perspective is one that evaluates a behavior as right or wrong based on the action itself. A utilitarian perspective is one that evaluates a behavior as right or wrong based on the outcome of the action. In the field of moral psychology, the “moral dilemma” is a classic moral judgment problem that has been used in numerous studies to discover people’s tendency to make moral judgments in various situations.
What are the consequences when people make their moral judgments? One important consequence may be that people’s judgments of moral dilemmas affect how others view them. Haidt (2001) argued that moral judgments are essentially social in nature because they convey important information about the person making the judgment. The assumption is that observers make inferences about a person’s character based on the person’s moral judgments.
Numerous studies have found that people are sensitive to the psychological factors that drive others to make moral decisions. Recent works have also shown that bystanders make inferences about others’ personalities based on the moral judgments they make. According to research, people who make deontological decisions in moral dilemmas are rated as more empathetic and as having higher moral qualities than those who make utilitarian decisions, and those who express utilitarian views are considered less moral than those who express deontological views, sometimes even less moral than those who express no clear views at all. People who make deontological judgments are also more likely to be chosen as social partners and are considered more moral, likeable, and trustworthy, including being more trustworthy in economic games than those who make utilitarian judgments . In several experiments conducted by Rom et al. (2017), participants made inferences about how emotion and cognition affected the moral decision maker’s judgments, and they used this information to infer whether the decision maker was warm or competent. Specifically, participants rated people who made deontological judgments as relatively warm and enthusiastic, whereas people who made utilitarian judgments were rated as relatively competent.
Researchers such as Everett et al. (2016) argue that these findings provide empirical support for the selection of moral intuitions and that deontological judgments confer an adaptive function by increasing the likelihood that a person will be chosen as a partner. Thus, deontological moral intuition may represent an evolutionarily prescribed a priori condition that is realized through partner selection mechanisms. This similar trend has been found in the context of China and other countries, suggesting to some extent that the sociocultural connotations of ethics may be consistent across cultures.
However, in some cases, utilitarianists are preferred to deontologists. According to previous studies and theories, it is well known that utilitarian judgments are often the result of slow, deliberative cognitive processes and they maximize revenue. In real life, when people choose social partners, what they value most about others may vary from relationship to relationship. When choosing an emotional partner, a deontologist may be viewed most favorably, but when choosing a doctor or lawyer, a utilitarian might be preferred.
Krebs (2008) argued that the evolutionary mechanism of dynamic strategic interactions between communicative individuals explains the moral judgments that group members make, how they choose to accept or reject these judgments, and how certain moral judgments are copied and repeated enough to constitute cultural norms. Krebs proposed a simple model to describe the relationship between biological and cultural processes in the evolution of ethics. Every time an individual expresses a moral judgment of another individual, the receiver decides to accept or reject it depending on evolved information-processing and decision-making mechanisms. Senders (and receivers and observers) tend to repeat what others have accepted, and they avoid repeating what is not accepted. In this way, the process not only forms feedback but also contributes to the formation of a culture’s ethics. Therefore, moral judgments, which were found in this study to be sensitive to social perceptual factors, can also be seen as playing a role in promoting or maintaining moral norms.
As far the limitations of the utilitarian perspective in the world today of in the use of neoliberalism policies we find the following from Investopedia:
The Limitations of Utilitarianism
In the workplace, though, utilitarian ethics are difficult to achieve. These ethics also can be challenging to maintain in our business culture, where a capitalistic economy often teaches people to focus on themselves at the expense of others. Similarly, monopolistic competition teaches one business to flourish at the expense of others.
A limitation of utilitarianism is that it tends to create a black-and-white construct of morality. In utilitarian ethics, there are no shades of gray—either something is wrong or it is right. Utilitarianism also cannot predict with certainty whether the consequences of our actions will be good or bad—the results of our actions happen in the future.
Utilitarianism also has trouble accounting for values like justice and individual rights. For example, say a hospital has four people whose lives depend upon receiving organ transplants: a heart, lungs, a kidney, and a liver. If a healthy person wanders into the hospital, his organs could be harvested to save four lives at the expense of his one life. This would arguably produce the greatest good for the greatest number. But few would consider it an acceptable course of action, let alone an ethical one.
So, although utilitarianism is surely a reason-based approach to determining right and wrong, it has obvious limitations.
What about those who may have a cognitive disorder and their tendencies in the moral universe? The reason this is applicable should be obvious.
Iranian Psychiatry Study The following study was of interest to me in that it ascertained the “moral proclivity” of university students who were tested for disorders under DSM-5 criteria. This may have signicance in my discussion. One of the measures why were used to gage the morality of the students, which they had completed, was the measure of moral identity. The Z score of the internalization subscale of moral identity measure was used as the inclusion and exclusion criteria to find the participants.
Many approaches in moral education intend to increase morality and moral-related variables in the people from childhood, the variables such as moral reasoning, moral emotions, and moral behaviors. One of the core moral variables that can be considered as a predictor of other aspects of morality is the moral identity. Moral identity is defined as a cognitive schema that a person holds about his or her moral character.
Studies indicate that frequently doing prosaically or moral behaviors have positive relationships with wellbeing and mental health and vice versa, frequently doing antisocial, aggressive, or immoral behaviors have negative relationships with mental health. Having frequently violent, immoral, or antisocial behaviors or lack of responsibility and respect to other’s rights are seen in the characteristics of antisocial personality disorder. Charlady asserting the criteria of other disorders in cluster B of personality disorders considered all disorders in this cluster as moral disorders: criteria such as “lack of empathy” in narcissistic personality disorder, “inappropriate, intense anger” and “instability in interpersonal relationships” in borderline personality disorder, and even “excessive attention seeking” and “inappropriate sexually seductive and provocative behavior” in histrionic personality disorder.
The higher tendency to antisocial personality disorder in the people with less moral identity was highly predictable because of the definition and criteria of antisocial personality disorder as “a pervasive pattern of disregard for and violation of the rights of others”. The higher tendency to the narcissistic personality disorder in the people with less moral identity is comprehensible by viewing the lack of empathy as one of the criteria of narcissistic personality disorder. Indeed, many studies confirmed the importance of empathy in making morality and prosaically behavior or in preventing from aggressive and antisocial behavior.
The study showed that extremity at both high and low amount of morality in the identity of individuals could be problematic. Indeed, the tendencies to the antisocial personality disorder, narcissistic personality disorder, and even a clinical disorder such as somatoform symptoms are related to the hypo-morality and obsessive-compulsive personality disorder is related to the hyper-morality. It has some implications for moral education and moral philosophy to prevent the extremism or wastage and considering the doctrine of the mean in the emphasis on moral values.
The study included the following categories of disorders. It was found that only four were statistically different (those in bold print) to a normal population of people not having a disorder. Somatoform disorder, also known as somatic symptom disorder (SSD) or psychosomatic disorder, is a mental health condition that causes an individual to experience physical bodily symptoms in response to psychological distress. In this study it was noted that most likely this disorder was shared with the antisocial personality disorder or narcissistic personality disorder, or a comorbidity.
1: schizoid, 2A: avoidant, 2B: depressive, 3: dependent, 4: histrionic,
5: narcissistic, 6A: antisocial, 6B: aggressive or sadistic, 7:compulsive, 8A: passive-aggressive or negativistic, 8B: self-defeating, S: schizotypal, C: borderline, P: paranoid, A: anxiety, H: somatoform, N: bipolar or manic, D: dysthymia, B: alcohol dependence, T: drug dependence, R: post-traumatic stress disorder, SS: thought disorder, CC: major depression, PP: delusional disorder
I have been wanting a reason to write about the teachings of Samael Aun Weor. Perhaps his name is unfamiliar to you, as it was for me five years ago. I can only say that some of the esoteric teachings are difficult to comprehend and not have skepticism toward. But I have to recommend he is basic teachings to all to understand yourself and others much more deeply. At least that has been my experience. I’ve used his writings below to broadly address some of the factors I have addressed in this posting. Take it as you will.
Samael Aun Weor is a syncretic writer and his teachings are of the same. Syncretism is the practice of combining different beliefs and various schools of thought. Syncretism involves the merging or assimilation of several originally discrete traditions, especially in the theology and mythology of religion, thus asserting an underlying unity and allowing for an inclusive approach to other faiths. Syncretism also occurs commonly in expressions of art and culture, known as eclecticism, as well as in politics, known as syncretic politics.
“We are in a state of hypnosis, we are asleep…Through the mechanisms of fantasy we always justify our worst infamies, we evade responsibilities, we look for loopholes, we’re self considerate, we rate ourselves the best, we believe ourselves just and perfect.”
“Hypnotism is harmful to humanity…We see the need that we have to wake up from hypnotic sleep. It is a bit difficult for people to understand this, because there is a marked tendency to believe we are awake.”
“…due to the fact that everybody is hypnotized; the most serious thing is that he does not realize that he is in a state of hypnosis; that is the most serious thing…If we are mistaken in our minds, in our memories, with all that which our parents teach us at home, our teachers at the school, our little friends on the street, etc., all that false data, everyone is in a state of hypnoses very far from the real consciousness, to such an extent that the real consciousness is tucked away in a far corner, totally forgotten…thus an artificial, a false consciousness is formed, which is the one that dominates, the one that expresses, the one that imposes itself everywhere…Behold then, a consciousness which is divided in two, namely, authentic consciousness and false consciousness…so I had to eliminate what I had learned, the false consciousness which I had formed during my life, and bring out the true consciousness by discarding the false.”
“We project onto people all our psychological defects. If we are mean, we will see everyone as mean. If we are full of hatred, we will see everybody in that way. If we are envious, we will believe others are envious as well. If we are violent, we don’t comprehend the violence of others; we believe only we are right and, others are wrong.”
“Therefore, it is lamentable we relate so poorly with people. Unfortunately, if we are poorly related with ourselves, obviously, that is how we will be with others. If we know how to relate correctly with ourselves, we will know how to relate with others, this is obvious. As one advances in this, one realizes how mistakenly he walks along the path of life.”
“The only important thing in life is radical, total and definitive change…Meditation is fundamental when we sincerely want such change.”
“In no way do we wish for insignificant, superficial, vain meditation.”
“The one who cannot meditate, the one who is superficial, the ignorant, will never be able to dissolve the ego; he will always be an impotent log in the raging sea of life.”
— Samael Aun Weor
Samael Aun Weor (March 6, 1917 – December 24, 1977), born Víctor Manuel Gómez Rodríguez, was a spiritual teacher and author of over sixty books of esoteric spirituality. He taught and formed groups under the banner of "Universal Gnosticism", or simply gnosis. A prolific author of syncretistic books, Gómez first made a name in the early gnostic movement in his native country of Colombia, before moving to Mexico in 1956, where his movement gained increased popularity, and his works became popular among practitioners of occultism and esotericism, and were translated to other languages.
Some of the American groups following Samael Aun Weor teachings on Meetup. Com for reference if interested.
Finally a limerick, or near limerick (a little too wordy) on the absurdity of a man, and his behavior. It is all deadly serious, and despicable in nature, but the absurdity shouldn’t be lost upon one.
37th posting, June 16, 2023