The Evolution of Morals

            Hopefully, this will be a more comprehensive and explanatory presentation of my theory behind the evolution of morals than my attempts of trying to convey it orally.

            I believe that morals and moral standards, on which religion and, to some extent, laws are based on, were derived in order to create a transition from the state of nature to civilized society.

            The state of nature is not fun to be in. It is somewhat Hobbesian and very Darwinistic. Survival of the fittest is the rule. It is a time of endless war, just like any anarchical state. The strongest leaders with the strongest followers fight battles over territory, food, and other resources. The killing is plentiful; people die in droves. The competition is fierce, whole groups of people are wiped out of existence regularly. And, like the trench warfare of WWI, very little is gained from the fighting. Eventually, these ancient people come to decide that all the war and carnage isn’t really getting anywhere. They learn that what they are doing isn’t accomplishing anything and that there has to be another way to live. So, they will resort to peace. This has to occur in one of the stronger cells or tribes. If a weak tribe goes up to the enemy and says, “We don’t think we should fight anymore”, they’d be wiped out faster than you could say “Nooooooooooooooooo”. But a strong tribe, they have the power to continue fighting if provoked. They also have the clout to say, “Let’s have a truce”. If they can agree to end the war, the ensuing peacetime brings in the morals. In order to keep from delving back into anarchy, a person or persons will create moral edicts, like say, the 10 Commandments, to try to dictate and scare people into morality. They will outlaw stuff like theft and murder because those things do not work to keep the peace, but to provoke violent retaliation. Don’t steal because it’s wrong, don’t kill or you’ll go to hell, and don’t sleep with other peoples’ spouses or they’ll want to kill you. But why is it wrong? It just is dammit, don’t question the edicts of the faith or you’ll suffer eternal damnation in the afterlife! (That last sentence was to be said with that trademark Mike Menard high pitched, cracking voice) Boom, you now have a religious faith that has been created to impose morals on the people in order to stop the state of nature. Welcome to civilization.

            And so comes religion, and societies built on religious practices. The people can live in better-formed groups and communities because it is “immoral” to do “evil” things. Punishment for immoral actions will ensue, in the life and afterlife. The threat of punishment in the afterlife comes first. Then, when that fails to work, laws and codes of conduct are established to further deter immoral actions. But that is how I believe the concept of morals began. Humans needed a way to end the ceaseless war, so they just made war immoral. To further strengthen the morals, they created an entire belief system upon it. Religion is a way to try to strong-arm someone into moral standards. It has many, many, more qualities, but morals are definitely prime subjects.

            Civilization rises with the establishment of a moral code. People don’t continue running around doing whatever they want, they have to answer to the morals in some way. Someone somewhere is going to call “Foul” and try to stop and punish the wrong doers. At the end of uncontrolled liberty is civilization, people coexisting without the state of constant war, living in a mutually accepted peace.

            The question has been posed that these moral standards do not work, that there are still people killing and stealing. Those are primal instincts; instincts that feed on the need to survive. Only higher-level thinking, thinking based on moral standards, can intervene and stop the primal passion.

            Morals and religion were created to congeal society, to promote peace and civilized actions. There just doesn’t seem to be any other purpose.