Human Nature: Morality, Aesthetics, and Metaphysics
Sources of Moral Capacity
Morality is part of human nature. The answer depends on key anthropological convictions. Those who make rationality the defining trait of humans will tend to rely on moral reasoning to consider how good and evil are ideas. This knowledge can be known and will be the key to moral conduct. This is rationalism, as advocated by Plato and Socrates. They advocated moral intellectualism, which is convinced us to pursue knowledge. Others give more weight to emotions and feelings, defending that good and bad are feelings. This is moral emotivism.
Another dispute about the origin of moral capacity is between spiritualism and materialism. For spiritualists, moral capacity is the real sign of our spiritual condition. Only humans are capable of altering natural laws. The worlds of nature and morality are realities of a different nature. For materialists, moral capacity can only come from nature and, in recent years, an evolutionary conception of nature. The inhibitory mechanisms in humans are proportional to their natural capacity for destruction. Human nature has no inhibitory mechanisms able to cope with the increasing destructiveness that we have.
Moral Development Stages
- Heteronomy: The point of view of this stage is the ego. It does not recognize the interests of others as different from their own. Actions are considered only physically. It does not consider intentions and mistakes the view of authority itself.
- Individualism: The perspective feature of this stage is the concrete individual. It unties the interests of authority and their own and recognizes that all individuals have interests that may not coincide. It follows that right is relative, that it is tied to personal interests and the need to exchange with others to make one’s own interests are met.
- Mutuality: The prospect of this step is to get in the place of another: the point of view of the individual in relation to other individuals. It highlights feelings, understandings, and shared expectations, but it does not yet come to a generalization of the system.
- Law and Order: The viewpoint from which the individual exercises his moral is identified at this stage with the social system that defines individual roles and rules of behavior. Individual relationships are considered in terms of their place in the social system, and one is capable of differentiating interpersonal motives agreements. The point of view of society or social group is taken as a reference.
- Utility: At this stage, there is a perspective of society: that of a rational person with values and rights prior to any agreement or social ties.
- Autonomy: In this last stage, a proper moral perspective is reached, from which social arrangements derive. It is the point of view of rationality and freedom.
Determinism vs. Freedom
Determinism states that the universe is orderly and follows some laws, some regularities. In this, individual initiative is forbidden, and we cannot change these laws. Universal order and human freedom are our two most radical convictions, where we make our most valued creations: science and morality. Our two great truths do not seem reconcilable. Determinism arises, which is a denial of a person’s freedom of choice. There are different types of scientific determinism: sociological, historical, astrological, etc.
Morality and Ethics
In moral and ethical conduct, we have the moral capacity to distinguish between what we do and what we should do. Besides this, we create standards of behavior. These are moral standards. Ethics is the reflection on morality.
Aesthetics
It comes from “aisthesis,” which means “to perceive.” Aesthetics is the philosophical discipline responsible for reflecting on beauty and art. Philosophy has dealt with reflection and beauty since ancient times. However, it was not until the late eighteenth century when aesthetics became an autonomous philosophical discipline, independent of the hand of Baumgarten and Kant. The importance of Baumgarten and Kant lies in recognizing aesthetic taste as a new faculty of human beings. Through this ability, one can judge an object that produces pleasure or pain and can say that in order to seek a disinterested pleasure, it is beautiful.
We must also distinguish between an art object and an aesthetic object. An art object is an object produced or created by the artist. An aesthetic object is one with which all objects of aesthetic experience are described.
Beauty
The first object of concern has been to define beauty. Throughout history, people have offered alternative approaches to defining beauty. These criteria are:
- Moral Good: This is the Greek conception of beauty because beauty is identified with good, as presented in the Platonic theory of beauty.
- Truth: This is characteristic of Romanticism and especially Hegel, who argues that truth and beauty are two expressions of the same reality. Truth is the objective, while beauty is its sensible manifestation.
- Symmetry: This idea was first advanced by Aristotle and revived again after the Renaissance. It involves the reflection of the idea of a “canon” in the perfection of decoration.
- Sensitive Pleasure: Representation can be seen as perfect or as sensitive pleasure that accompanies sensitive activity, according to Kant, to insist on the sublime nature of beauty.
Art
The other major concern of aesthetics has been to reflect on what art is and what its characteristics are. A general definition is the view that art is all that the human being produces, as opposed to the works of nature. It is not easy to find a universal definition of art because art cannot be described either by the materials used, or what you do with these materials, or for the purpose of the creation. But for a work to be classified as art, it must meet the following conditions:
- It is the product of the perception of reality and imagination of the artist.
- It is a source of knowledge and individual and social aesthetic pleasure.
- It is open to new interpretations or new meanings.
- It helps to form more accurate notions of life.
- It improves our sensitivity.
- It fosters reflection and tranquility.
Metaphysical Environment
For humans, to live is not just to exist but to have some knowledge of why we live. Our life cannot be really good if we do not know what purpose it has. It is clear that, whether or not we are conscious, the way we live our life depends on the meaning we give it. There are those who put the meaning of life in this world (historical progress, social transformation, etc.). Others put it in an unearthly world (salvation, contemplation of God), while others opted for denying any overall sense of our existence.