The idea that right and wrong - or good and evil - exist in some abstract sense, independent from humans who only somehow come to perceive them, is a powerful and stubborn illusion. Indeed, for many inclined to spiritual or religious beliefs,
it is one area where science has not until recently encroached on theological ground.
While the Creator has been made redundant (for a growing number) by the evidence for evolution by natural selection
and the immaterial soul
similarly superfluous by the evidence that human consciousness emerges from the activity of the physical brain, morality has remained apparently impervious to the scientific approach
In any case, this question is
approached from the wrong end, as if humans were designed out of thin air and
the system could ever have been purely rational. We evolved from other animals without
reason (or with varying degrees of problem-solving faculties).
For these
animals to survive, neural systems are adapted to encode urges and beliefs in
such a way as to optimally control behaviour.
Attaching varying levels of
emotional credibility to different types of stimuli offers a means to prioritise
certain factors in making complex decisions (i.e., those factors most likely to
affect the survival of the organism or the dissemination of its genes).
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