[jgilias]

We really can not know this. We can only infer from cultures and religions in the relatively short timespan covered by written history. And even then, morality has changed significantly through time. A simple example - would you think that someone telling a story about someone else beating his wife to a pulp is something to laugh about?

Here, check out how the audience reacts just a bit more than 50 years ago: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ccyu44rsaZo

I think the only moral that may have been something close to universal throughout times would've been something like: "Don't kill a member of in-group without a good reason if you're not the head honcho."

Everything else? We have literally no idea.

EDIT: Really, watch the video, it actually applies to the discussion really well. It's basically an argument about morals.

[wolverine876]

> We really can not know this. We can only infer from cultures and religions in the relatively short timespan covered by written history.

That written history covers an enormous amount of ground, with records going back 6,000 years and in diverse cultures, from Sanskrit in what is now India to cuneiform to China for thousands of years, etc., and those records including older materials. Anthropologists have been studying different cultures for a long time and have plenty of evidence of what is consistent across them. Much is known about how morality develops in children. Etc.

Every human being understands it. You don't walk into a room in a strange culture and wonder, 'maybe these people think it's funny to poison each other' or 'maybe they are pure anarchists' or 'maybe they eat all their children'.

We can't have perfect knowledge of this question or anything, but to confuse that with no knowledge is absurd. For example,

> We have literally no idea.

Why is it important to you (and others) to try to push a transparent falsehood that empowers evil behavior?

[jgilias]

Yes. 6000 years, that's 3% of the time we have been around as species. It's not important for me to push anything, let alone something that would empower evil behavior. It's just that I really, really can not see how the idea that pretty much all human societies have similar morals revolving around 'be a good person' goes together with the following facts:

1. Tens of thousands of people are part of societies where initiation into the society entails killing someone. (Various gangs).

2. Hundreds of millions of people are living in societies where honor killings is a thing.

3. Depending on how you count, there have been more than twenty genocides in the last century. That's during 0.05% of the time Homo Sapiens have been around.

4. Hundreds of millions (if not billions) of people are living in societies where a blogger can get lynched for a blasphemous post.

5. There have actually been societies in recent times ending up literally poisoning each other.

6. Just some 5 years ago around 10 million people lived in a society where people were thrown off roofs for being gay.

The list is obviously non-exhaustive. And all of the above is basically going on now, I'm not even getting into what we know went on a few centuries from now. Burning innocent women on pyres for imagined slights, anyone?

Like... Do all these people know/knew they are evil according to our 'common' and 'universal' core morals? I bet they feel pretty good about themselves when lynching the blasphemer. It's just that I refuse to accept that our core morals are similar.

[wolverine876]

6,000 years of evidence isn't enough? That's what makes this a discussion about philosophy, not reality.

Because people do something, it's moral? Gangs are considered moral? The existence of evil means there is no morality?

> I refuse to accept

Then the truth doesn't matter.

[jgilias]

Truth matters.

You got me quite interested in your worldview, can we please continue this discussion a bit? I hope it doesn't take too much of your time!

So, you're saying that you have the same set of core morals as a guy returning family honor by beheading his daughter[1] at night over her plans to run off with her boyfriend?

[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/07/world/middleeast/honor-ki...