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Has the World Population Grown in Morality?

Has the World Population Grown in Morality?


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I would say its about the same. For every gain (such as women's suffrage or a progressive tax system) we have probably lost something (public manners or the value of civility). However this only applies to first world nations.

Other nations, I have no clue.
 
Within the last 100 year has the world as a whole grown in morality?


In my youth, I used to have great optimism that we would see growth in morality but I have sure not seen any evidence of it. We just have more venues for our immorality to work its magic.

That's why I continue to be................a disappointed evolutionist.
 
In my youth, I used to have great optimism that we would see growth in morality but I have sure not seen any evidence of it. We just have more venues for our immorality to work its magic.

That's why I continue to be................a disappointed evolutionist.
Things take time...I think that over the 100 year span, improvements have occurred, despite the emergence of the conservative tea party ( a pot hole or bump in the road).
Let us hope its not a sink hole......lol
Do we have any public poll for this morality business ?
 
Things take time...I think that over the 100 year span, improvements have occurred, despite the emergence of the conservative tea party ( a pot hole or bump in the road).
Let us hope its not a sink hole......lol
Do we have any public poll for this morality business ?

Perhaps, although I've not personally observed it in my 58 years on the planet. In regards to your question about public polls, I found this Gallop poll on morality:

"A broad majority of Americans are convinced that morality is in decline in the United States. 76% of Americans recently told Gallup that morality is getting worse. Among other measures, Americans now believe that parents are failing to pass along their values to their children, society has grown less religious, crime is on the rise, business leaders and public officials are less trustworthy, sexual promiscuity has increased, and people treat each other with less respect.

45% of Americans rate morality in the United States as "poor." 15% of Americans say that morality is in "good shape." The figure has stayed relatively constant over the past decade. The vast majority of Americans believe our scientific and technological progress hasn't been matched by a similar elevation in the realm of ethics. By any standard of measure, the man on the streets agrees with YWC that there has been a decline across the board.

A minority of progressives strongly feel otherwise. They are inclined to cite a black president, a female Speaker of the House, and a "wise Latina" on the Supreme Court as proof that an inherently flawed America has made progress in overcoming its failures as a nation.

Public sentiment is trending in the opposite direction. Distrust of the federal government and public officials is at record highs. Most Americans believe their children will inherit a world that is worse off than the one they inherited. They believe morality is in decline. America's economic outlook is equally bleak.

How long will it be before the narrative of unlimited progress collapses under the weight of the hard facts of reality?"

Gallup Poll: Morality in Decline
 
There is no universal standard for morality so there is no definitive answer. On the average, certain areas like racism and sexism have really improved.
 
There is no universal standard for morality so there is no definitive answer. On the average, certain areas like racism and sexism have really improved.

And I'd say we were about the same on killing people to control their stuff.
 
Within the last 100 year has the world as a whole grown in morality?

Morality is Subjective.

There would have to be a concensus on what is universally considered immoral, or moral for this question to have an answer, but here's a few that come to mind.

Murder/Mass Murder: nope, we murder just as much as we always did. See Rwandan Genocide and Holocaust for further reading.

Rape: Nope, still happens just as much as before. See Democratic Republic of Congo for further reading.

War: Ah we're still good at that. So that's a no.

Greed: Nope. Still doing that, by a massive margin, and we've become exceedingly efficient at it too.

Meh I could go on. Frankly I don't think we're any more "Moral" or "Immoral" then we were in the past... We're human, what more can I say.
 
The world is far more cosmopolitan - and thus less prone to racism and xenophobia - than at any time in the past. We're FAR better off in that regard, despite having more progress to make. Women's rights have seen nothing short of a revolution in most parts of the world in the last century. The number of people per capita who die from wars is at its lowest point since at least World War II...and possibly in all of human history.

Yes, I would say that the world is far more moral than in the past. It's not that we have become less moral, it's that we hold ourselves to higher standards than our ancestors did, which is itself a sign of progress.
 
The world is far more cosmopolitan - and thus less prone to racism and xenophobia - than at any time in the past. We're FAR better off in that regard, despite having more progress to make. Women's rights have seen nothing short of a revolution in most parts of the world in the last century. The number of people per capita who die from wars is at its lowest point since at least World War II...and possibly in all of human history.

Yes, I would say that the world is far more moral than in the past. It's not that we have become less moral, it's that we hold ourselves to higher standards than our ancestors did, which is itself a sign of progress.

But still a long way to go. In the main the leaders are still self-righteous about others and scandalous in their personal lives.
 
Within the last 100 year has the world as a whole grown in morality?

Depends on who you talk to. Some will say yes. Others will say no. Still others won't give a crap.

For the "yes" crowd it will be because people will have seen more laws being passesd that represent thier own personal views of morality. Never even considering that those laws actually only apply to a relatively small part of the world.

For the "no" crowd it will be the exact opposite of the "yes" crowds first sentence that I just wrote. Second sentence will pretty much stay the same.

For the "don't give a crap" crowd...well they don't give a crap so who cares? ;)
 
I believe world morality has declined and is continuing to decline.
 
I would say its about the same. For every gain (such as women's suffrage or a progressive tax system) we have probably lost something (public manners or the value of civility). However this only applies to first world nations.

Other nations, I have no clue.

To put "the progressive tax" system in the same sentence as women's suffrage is idiotic and you should be ashamed of yourself.
 
Morality is too subjective to judge the entire world as a whole. Sure, we've seen advances in "morality" in the civil rights and women's rights movement in America, and the fall of the Berlin Wall in Europe, along with the dismantling of the Soviet Union, which allowed "freedom" for those nations that had been under its thumb. However, in the same time period we've had world wars that created the Soviet Union and Berlin Wall in the first place, and horrific inequalities in the USA before civil & woman's rights were implemented.

The sheer number of wars going on throughout the world during the past 100 years has been staggering. Africa as a continent has probably not seen a single year without wars tearing up old borders and creating new ones. We've repeatedly seen horrific genocides around the globe. Mexico is now destroying itself from within because of crime cartels. People are starving in record numbers, because there are record numbers of people.

Government corruption is still rampant, as it has been throughout the past century. Some countries have cleaned up their act, other countries have succumbed, but like the "morality" on a global scale, every "moral improvement" has been offset by a "new immorality".

Besides, what I view as moral/immoral is not a view shared by many parts of the world. Morality is simply not a thing that lends itself to a global definition. Therefore, the question is not only moot, it is unanswerable.
 
To put "the progressive tax" system in the same sentence as women's suffrage is idiotic and you should be ashamed of yourself.
The common thing is fairness.
The response was one of intolerance, as I see it.
Morals ?
This is constantly being redefined and there are as many opinions on this as there are people..
IMO, in order to determine if people are more moral than 50 years ago, I would have to go mack in time and make 100 observations, then I'd have to do the same today.
Polls, I do not trust them at all, the Youth for Western Civilization is right wing extremeist in my opinion...
How the hell can people think they are right when they disrespect others so ???
Yes, we do have a long ways to go.
Try truth.
 
What we have experienced in the west in the last 100 years is a growth in the popularity of moral and cultural relativism. At it's extreme, this moral relativism is actually amoral (though not necessarily immoral), since it is predicated on the absense of moral judgements.

Correspondingly, at least here in the states we have also experienced a rise in religious fundamentalism where morality is so arbitrary, and so devoid of reason that it can lead to the taking of positions with results that harm others -- hardly an act of true morality.

I don't view morality as entirely normative as do the relativists, nor do I view morality in terms of a recipe to follow as do the fundies. Instead, I see morality as the inevitable product of reason. In my world, if a cultural norm cannot be justified without resorting to sophistry, it should not be addressed in terms of morality, but only in terms of social convention.
 
It is very difficult to say, on a global scale.

Many good things have happened in the past 100 years. A rejection of insitutionalized racism, for one. A general rejection of personal racism, at least in many 1st world nations, for another.

A lot of people are more free and more properous today than was the case 100 years ago.

However, we've also regressed in some areas. The rise of moral relativism in the West has left us as a rudderless culture without moral anchor or compass. We have a 50% divorce rate and too many children growing up fatherless, along with the disorder and crime that that tends to breed.

On the whole I think our advances have been counterbalanced by our losses... perhaps even toward the negative side of the ledger. Also, looking at things on a global scale, there are still many places where life is cheap, where people are more concerned with self-intrest than with what is right or wrong, and where barbarity still reins on a daily basis.

I don't think we could be considered to have done more than struck even, at best... more likely down a little, depending on your yardstick.
 

So, mankind consists of racists, haters, rapists, liars and general scumbags...
What else is new.
In Egypt, as I recall, hundreds of prisoners escaped, than there was the rape of the journalist.
Unexpected ?
Why not some common sense, dangerous, Islamic areas are no place for a Western woman.
 
So, mankind consists of racists, haters, rapists, liars and general scumbags...
What else is new.
In Egypt, as I recall, hundreds of prisoners escaped, than there was the rape of the journalist.
Unexpected ?
Why not some common sense, dangerous, Islamic areas are no place for a Western woman.


Hey that sounds like Chicago!! :lol:
 
Morality is Subjective.

There would have to be a concensus on what is universally considered immoral, or moral for this question to have an answer, but here's a few that come to mind.
Health is subjective. There would have to be a consensus on what is universally considered healthy, or unhealthy for this question to have an answer.

DiAnna said:
Besides, what I view as moral/immoral is not a view shared by many parts of the world. Morality is simply not a thing that lends itself to a global definition. Therefore, the question is not only moot, it is unanswerable.
Besides, what I view as healthy/unhealthy is not a view shared by many parts of the world. Health is simply not a thing that lends itself to a global definition. Therefore, the question is not only moot, it is unanswerable.

Imagine if all doctors thought like this. Fortunately, we accept general conceptions of what consittutes "good" health and "bad" health and conclude that "good" health is better than "bad" health. We have the science of medicine and we automatically recommend and prescribe based on what is better for our health. We do this regardless of the philosophical issues that can be raised the way we can raise it for morality.

There is a similar danger when we think about morality in this way. Abiding to and enforcing and expecting moral codes such as don't lie, don't steal, don't kill, etc. all perpetuate one effect: better cooperation in a society. Living in a society that cooperates better will give a desirable effect for the well-being of those involved. Granted, we cannot focus on things like the average well-being or the total well-being without running into problems, but it must aggregate somewhere. I think we can accept that most of us desire to improve our well-being, and find it obvious that improving your well-being is better than reducing it or doing nothing about it. Although we find it obvious, we won't necessarily accept it to be true, and so many of us reject this assumption. They will also commonly cite or partially relate to the is/ought problem. Not being able to derive an ought from an is just means you would not be able to make a logical argument on it through deduction. So what? This does not exclude induction. We can still infer to better explanations. Heck, you have to establish inferences as to what to do the second you accept the is/ought problem. The same way we accept "better" health and "worse" health and have a science of medicine, we can accept what is "better" and "worse" for our well-being and have a science of morality., if we agree to base morality this, and I'd argue this is the only thing we can base it on. I won't cover that in this specific post, but I will in another if someone asks me to. Granted, health is essentially a part of well-being, which simply means that matters of health will in part be covered both morality and medicine, but in different ways. A science of morality can be used to determine what is better for our well-being (mainly through examining different brain states and how that changed according to specific circumstances) the same way medicine is used to determine what is better and worse for our health. If we refuse to use science for this purpose, then we damn well better stop using medicine for the purpose of improving our health if we want to remain consistent.

A person who says we cannot say that we ought to stamp out the practice of burning people alive, but at the same time will be perfectly comfortable saying that we ought to take or prescribe a pill to treat a condition is being silly. If anyone wants to refrain from condemning peoples actions based on a violation of morality, then they better be prepared to do the same in regards to other peoples medical practices, because many philosophical propositions about conclusions on morality can be said for conclusions on health. I see no reason why we don't say that a cultures morality is bad because of it's effect on their well-being the same way we can say their medical practices is bad because it is it's effect on their health.
 
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No. People are still manipulating others to achieve their objectives without regard for the intrinsic worth of the people they manipulate.
 
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