# For people who are convinced we are meat-machines: why is killing bad? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [October 23, 2005, 3:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/for-people-who-are-convinced-we-are-meat-machines-why-is-killing-bad/327529 "2005-10-23T15:51:28Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 8
**Author:** ![Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/8edcca/32.png) [@Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hentor_the_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2005, 2:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/for-people-who-are-convinced-we-are-meat-machines-why-is-killing-bad/327529/141 "2005-10-30T14:45:45Z")
> [@DSeid](#): > > It is the possession of the value system that counts. I agree with you, and I strongly suspect I am not about to say anything that you haven’t said, but just to clarify - the possession of that value system in an environment that renders that value system successful is the key. We seem to have achieved an equilibrium with respect to the individual and the environment (at least, as far as I know, in much of the world) in which a “do not markedly and obviously harm others” value system is supported, and people can perceive themselves as successful within the confines of that system. I think a clear argument can be made, however, that there are a set of circumstances that will make any “nice person” indistinguishable from a “selfish asshole.” No doubt there are countless examples, but having just seen “The Magdalene Sisters,” it is fresh in my mind, and institutions putatively founded on principles of kindness and compassion can effect the most horrific of behaviors by individuals who nevertheless believe they are (and are seen by others as) “nice people.” Were a drastic negative change to occur to our current sociopolitical environment in America, you would no doubt see a drastic change in people’s value systems, such that anything that helps me and my family will be acceptable. Yet, even as things are, we tend not to directly harm others, but I know that I have a nice big screen TV and a new sporty car, and my conscience is only slightly pricked when I see the conditions that others live in here in our country. It is salved enough when I write my charitable contribution checks and vote for Democrats and liberals. Contrary to what many here would say, I am a “nice person,” but how would anybody but a “selfish asshole” be okay with the inequalities I just noted? I was thinking about this discussion on Friday while attending a lecture. The lecturer reminded me about studies of the voles. It turns out that two types of voles, the prairie voles and the mountain voles are, naturally, largely similar to one another. Yet one of them (I think it is the prairie vole) has developed socialization around pair-bonded mating, and the other is socially isolative. Thus, it isn’t inconceivable that humans have evolved in such a way that we are geared to greater socialization. There are also studies of individual differences in the development of empathic responses in infants and children. I would say that an avoidance of killing other people is a complicated combination of evolutionary processes, innate predispositions and societal structures, and that logical constructions play very little part in all of this. Most killers can express a logical construction - highly idiosyncratic, of course - to justify their actions. ---
**Author:** ![clairobscur](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/839c29/32.png) [@clairobscur](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/clairobscur)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2005, 9:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/for-people-who-are-convinced-we-are-meat-machines-why-is-killing-bad/327529/142 "2005-10-31T21:20:51Z")
> [@Polerius](#): > > But, however sophisticated we are, we are still machines (if we take the mechanistic view of things), so all our “feelings” (love, joy, pain) are just some electrical signals flowing around in a bag of meat. > > Why do we care that some electrical signals flowing around in a bag of meat stop flowing, and the bag of meat starts disintegrating? I’ve no really rationnal reasons to think murder (or anything else) is wrong. It’s only based on feeling, the result of integrated social norms, upbringing, and also, I think, an hardwired feeling of empathy. Rationnally, you could mention the “social contract” or somesuch, but I believe people rarely act on the basis of rationnality, but rather follow their feelings (and only after try to rationnalize their actions, feelings, preferences, etc…), and I’m quite happy with that because it seems to me that otherwise, we would all be sociopaths. By the way, I don’t perceive people as “meat machine”, and perception, once again, is key. And regarding the flow of electrical signals,we are this flow. This flow is our “soul”, sort of. ---
**Author:** ![clairobscur](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/839c29/32.png) [@clairobscur](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/clairobscur)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2005, 9:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/for-people-who-are-convinced-we-are-meat-machines-why-is-killing-bad/327529/143 "2005-10-31T21:33:25Z")
> [@Polerius](#): > > I hate to make this about existing religions, but, for the sake of argument, if someone is 100% convinced that if he kills people (for _any_ reason) he will go to hell and if he doesn’t he will go to heaven, and if he is 100% convinced that hell is a horrific place that you want to avoid, do you think that this person might kill another human being? > > I highly doubt it. Logically, it should follow, indeed. But in my anecdotical experience, belief or lack thereof seems to have very few bearing on what it should logically strongly influence, like for instance living a moral life or fearing death or not, apart from a very tiny minority of extremely religious people. ---
**Author:** ![Polerius](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/d78d45/32.png) [@Polerius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polerius)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2005, 10:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/for-people-who-are-convinced-we-are-meat-machines-why-is-killing-bad/327529/144 "2005-10-31T22:04:26Z")
> [@Pochacco](#): > > Polerius, your argument isn’t supported by real-world data. If “selfish assholes who don’t believe in God” are more likely to commit crimes than “selfish assholes who do believe in God” then we should see a higher proportion of atheists in the prison population than in the general population. I responded to this in post #120: > [@Polerius](#): > > … it would seem like a biased sample because, I assume most atheists are more educated and richer than the average American, and I assume most people on death row are less educated and poorer than the average American, so it makes sense that people on death row are less likely to be atheists. > > In order to determine in a quantitative fashion the “protective factor” of soul-belief we would need a controlled experiment that controls for factors such as education and wealth. … > [@Pochacco](#): > > In fact, the prison population pretty closely mirrors the general population in religious composition, which suggests that a person’s religious beliefs actually have very little to do with whether he behaves morally or not. > > [Cite](http://www.adherents.com/misc/adh_prison.html). > > (Interestingly, while criminality doesn’t seem to correlate with a lack of religious **belief** , it does seem to correlate with a lack of religious **observance**. It seems to be worse to believe and not act upon it than to not believe at all. I don’t know what you’re trying to prove with your cite, since at the very top it says: “This document discusses some of the statistics available pertaining to prison incarceration and religious affiliation. This is not an in-depth study. **Accurate, reliable statistics on this subject may not be readily available. Statistics (reliable or not) have been used by various writers to support two different, contraditory conclusions**.” Nevertheless, the idea that lack of religious observance is correlated with higher criminality makes sense, and in some ways agrees with what I’m saying in this thread. Also, as your cite mentions, stating a religious preference is different that actual religious belief: “This is based only on **religious preference** statistics. American sociologists are well aware that nearly all Americans profess a religious preference. But there is a major difference between those who are actually religious affiliated, that is, members of a congregation (approx. 45 to 65% of the population, varying by region), and those who merely profess a preference, likely the name of the denomination that their parents of grandparents were a part of.” Also, “Even without adding the “.209%” of the population that specifically identified themselves as atheists, **the segment of the prison population which self-identifies as non-religious is approximately twice as large as found in the general population** ” This agrees with my assertions in this thread, if you consider a non-religious person to be someone who doesn’t buy the religious argument of punishment in the afterlife. To me, it seems that someone who declares himself an “atheist” does so after a lot of deliberation and thought and analysis of competing theories. This is more indicative of someone who is well educated, and as such, less likely to come from the lower classes from which a lot of criminals come from. I would say that an uneducated non-religious person corresponds to an agnostic or atheist. Anyway, as I have mentioned, and as your cite mentions, the prison population don’t provide for a nice, controlled, sample from which to gather definitive answers to this question. ---
**Author:** ![Polerius](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/d78d45/32.png) [@Polerius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polerius)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2005, 10:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/for-people-who-are-convinced-we-are-meat-machines-why-is-killing-bad/327529/145 "2005-10-31T22:17:18Z")
> [@clairobscur](#): > > Logically, it should follow, indeed. But in my anecdotical experience, belief or lack thereof seems to have very few bearing on what it should logically strongly influence, like for instance living a moral life or fearing death or not, **apart from a very tiny minority of extremely religious people.** What you say supports what I stated because these “extremely religious people” are people who are 100% convinced that immoral acts will land them in a horrific place for eternity. So, it makes sense that “extremely religious people” would try to live a moral life. The rest of us are convinced x%, where x varies from 0 to 100. The larger x is, the more difficult situation we have to find ourselves in, in order to be forced into doing something immoral. When x is 100, no situation can force you to do something immoral. (Of course, I somewhat doubt that anyone is at 100%) ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2005, 1:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/for-people-who-are-convinced-we-are-meat-machines-why-is-killing-bad/327529/146 "2005-11-01T01:00:31Z")
**Hentor** and **clair** , I’d like to re-emphasize how important and ingrained conforming with others is to the human animal with [a recent cite](http://staff.washington.edu/xtoph/anth469metro/metrop_readings/Berns_Conformity.pdf.). We conform not because we are rationally analyzing the costs and benefits. We conform because we are hardwired to alter our very perceptions in order to conform. Nonconformity is hard to do and requires paying a price of some emotional pain. Once we understand what society thinks is right, we percieve it to be right as well. ---
**Author:** ![Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/8edcca/32.png) [@Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hentor_the_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2005, 1:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/for-people-who-are-convinced-we-are-meat-machines-why-is-killing-bad/327529/147 "2005-11-01T01:15:49Z")
> [@DSeid](#): > > **Hentor** and **clair** , I’d like to re-emphasize how important and ingrained conforming with others is to the human animal with [a recent cite](http://staff.washington.edu/xtoph/anth469metro/metrop_readings/Berns_Conformity.pdf.). > > We conform not because we are rationally analyzing the costs and benefits. We conform because we are hardwired to alter our very perceptions in order to conform. Nonconformity is hard to do and requires paying a price of some emotional pain. Once we understand what society thinks is right, we percieve it to be right as well. Very true, like the Asch studies (which have probably already been cited here) support. (BTW, **DSeid** , nothing came up for me when I clicked on your link.) ---
**Author:** ![Polerius](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/d78d45/32.png) [@Polerius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polerius)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2005, 1:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/for-people-who-are-convinced-we-are-meat-machines-why-is-killing-bad/327529/148 "2005-11-01T01:28:16Z")
> [@Hentor the Barbarian](#): > > (BTW, **DSeid** , nothing came up for me when I clicked on your link.) Correct [link](http://staff.washington.edu/xtoph/anth469metro/metrop_readings/Berns_Conformity.pdf) ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2005, 3:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/for-people-who-are-convinced-we-are-meat-machines-why-is-killing-bad/327529/149 "2005-11-01T03:21:24Z")
Thanks for suppying it in a correct form **Polerius**. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/for-people-who-are-convinced-we-are-meat-machines-why-is-killing-bad/327529.md?page=7)