Does Deciding Among Morally Relevant Options Feel Like Making a Choice? How Morality Constrains People’s Sense of Choice
In any given society there exist ascribed rules and regulations that determine how people conduct themselves. The ascribed rules and regulations are not strictly enforced. However, people are born into them and simply learn how they should conduct themselves. One of the ascribed rules and regulations is morality which determines whether a person conduct is acceptable. Through morality individuals are in a position to differentiate between decision, actions, and intentions which is deemed right or good and the ones considered wrong or bad. Therefore, morality is simply conforming to the right conduct rules. In deciding among morality relevant options, it can be argued to be automatic where a person makes choice because individuals are brought up in a manner that they can decipher the right and wrong.
In a society, individuals are compelled to make choices, decisions, and follow actions which align to the expectations of morality. According to moral principles, individuals can either choose to do the wrong or the right thing by making the choice among the two options. On many occasions, people are said to have made bad decisions because the right choice is always available. In a classical example, when students are taken to college, they are expected to follow their parent’s advice of taking their academic journey seriously which is automatically considered as moral. However, there are other choices which tend to deviate from the expectation. For instance, a student may choose not to listen to the advice of the parents and take an independent path of abuse of drugs and relating to bad company an aspect which is considered immoral. Thus, it can be argued that deciding among morally relevant options is a choice.
Decision making that touches on moral principles are characterized by both positive and negative consequences. In many occasions, people tend to settle towards doing the right thing with the aim of escaping the consequences even though they have the desire of doing the opposite. For example, in colleges students will choose to focus on their studies and avoid bad company simply because they want to either please their parent or pass the exams. Under this case, the choice of completely focusing on the studies averts parent’s disappointment or expulsion from school. In real sense, a student would want to pass exams and at the same time have a good time in college. Because the latter is often associated with negative repercussions a student is compelled to fully concentrate on the studies and avoid attending parties and drug abuse.
Ordinarily, people have the perception that they have limited choices to make even though they are argued to be autonomous. Under this case, there are appraisals of right and wrong. As a result, a person is in a position to know that certain actions, decisions, or conduct would lead to a specific consequence. For example, a person automatically knows that production, selling, or consumption of drugs is illegal. If a person chooses to sell or distribute drugs they are aware that their action would land them in trouble. As a result, they are compelled to comply with morality expectation. In case of failure, the consequences are dire such as serving time in prison. Therefore, deciding on the basis of morality is a choice which is often compelled upon people.
According to Darwin, moral sense is part of human being and aids in dictating what people ought to do while at the same time impelling towards certain behaviors to the extent where there is no choice. At the societal level, Darwin’s ideology is consistent with a functionality view of morality as a set of values, norms, and practices that often work closely to suppress unacceptable conduct such as selfishness. As a result, it can be argued that individual’s behavior is often constrained in a manner that permits groups or communities to thrive because of a uniform imposed morality belief. Therefore, when it comes to making a decision or an action people will always settle for options that are accepted by their communities or groups even though they have the desires of doing the opposite. Thus, morally relevant options are a choice that is already made on behalf of a person by a group or a community.
In the society, preferences are often converted into values at individual and cultural level. In a classical example, traditionally smoking was considered as a non-moral choice. However, the new culture has embraced smoking to the extent of becoming a morally tinged choice. Thus, the conversion of preferences to values often offers no choice to people. For example, in the society people are compelled to conform to societal expectations where they must follow the laid rules and guidelines. In contrast, the same people are argued to be autonomous yet most choices have already been decided. In the instance where autonomy was to be fully practices moral choices would be challenged because people would be reluctant into adhering what have been dictated unto them.
