Prompt 02

I found todays lecture to be very interesting and made me have several realizations while I was reading.  I have never thought about morality in terms or realism and relativism however, after reading this I struggle to determine where I stand on the matter.  I think it is probably through good upbringing that the I take morals to be given by some higher power.  But through introspection I have been able to realize that the morals that I hold true are ideas that were held by people before me and because of their success they have been passed down.  I think that this hold's truest with cultural relativism, which suggests that all morals are is a set of commonly agreed upon ideas for what is right and wrong.  One of the questions on the quiz made me think very critically asking if we thought that god or some other higher power determines the code that we live by.   The rational part of myself is very quick to dismiss this idea, how can our morals be determined from a higher power if there has never actual been a scientifically confirmed connection with a god.

However, there is also a part of me that believes that some morality is born into us and is almost primal in nature.  I present the idea of a mother taking care of her young, for humans we consider the idea of a mother taking care of her baby.  I like this example because it is not an idea that is not limited to humans, i.e. bears, deer, etc.  This idea suggests that there is some sort of deeper bond between mother and child.  And I think that this idea of morality within a family is what gave me some trouble answering questions on the quiz.

The question on the quiz about the boy and the mother posed and interesting question for me.  Which is what precedent is supreme here.  On one hand we have the notion of a last wish which the agrees to then blatantly disregards once the mother has passed.  The good part of me wants to believe that he is a good son and would want to make his mother happy.  However, the accompanying task of having to visit his mother every week may be tough and maybe slightly unreasonable and if he made the promise to give his mother some comfort before her passing then I see the merit there too.  I think that this touches a gray area of ethics that is should we be truthful and hurtful or lie to let her ease her mind.

I was also interested by question about the cat.  My initial reaction is repulsion, I am the owner of a cat, and I would never eat my cat under my own free will even if it had died.  However, it took me a brief second to consider that all this person has done is eat an animal that is already dead.  What they have done is eat a dead animal, something that I do daily.