Moral Pill
It was summer of 2009 when I had got the
chance to read Anthony Burgess’s novel (and Stanley Kubrick’s film) A
Clockwork Orange which in turn narrates Alex, an unrepentant psychopath, who has
his eyes pried wide open(in the pic above) and is forced to watch violent
images. Like Pavlov’s dog, Alex is being programmed to respond with nausea to
violence and sex. This scene remains shocking to me till date, but, like most
science fiction, it has aged. The behaviorist psychology it was drew upon has
long expired, and the fear that science will be used to make, or even force,
people to be morally better now sounds old-fashioned.
The basic idea or the framework of
morality and concept of deliverance on which the science fiction works has an
implied short age but a very long after life. In recent past decade an army of
psychologists, neuroscientists, and evolutionary biologists has been busy
trying to uncover the neural “clockwork” that underlies human morality. While
reading an article written by Milton Friedman I found scientists have started
to trace the evolutionary origins of pro-social sentiments such as empathy, and
have begun to uncover the genes that dispose some individuals to senseless
violence and others to acts of altruism, and the pathways in our brain that
shape our ethical decisions. And to understand how something works is also to
begin to see ways to modify and even control it. Scientists have not only
identified some of the brain pathways that shape our ethical decisions, but also
chemical substances that modulate this neural activity. He further mentions
that the anti-depressant Citalopram
can change the responses of individuals to hypothetical moral dilemma
scenarios. Individuals given the drug were less willing to sacrifice an
individual to save the lives of several others. Another series of studies has
shown that when the hormone Oxytocin
is administered via nasal spray, it increases trusting and cooperative behavior
within social groups, but also decreases cooperation with those perceived as
outsiders. Neuroscientists have even magnetically “zapped” carefully targeted
areas of people’s brains to influence their moral judgments in surprising ways
– for example, making it easier for them to lie.
Well as of now, no one is developing a
“moral pill” that will transform us into saints and trammels to immoral
behavior. But the research is advancing fast, and it is almost certain to
suggest new ways to reshape our moral intuitions, sentiments, and motivations.
Now the implied question is should we use
our growing scientific understanding of the basis of human morality to try to
make people morally better?
A said novel The Clockwork
Orange was accused of glorifying violence, and some of its scenes are
still hard to watch. But Burgess himself argued, the novella has an almost righteous
message: What makes us human is our
freedom to choose both good and evil, and
for society to crush individuals into servile conformity is as wicked as, and
perhaps even worse than, the sadism of psychopaths like Alex.
I have a feeling that many will agree
with this view. They will agree that our ability to distinguish right from
wrong is something precious that we should safeguard, not a broken clock that
scientists should fix.
Let’s go a little further, most of us
don’t need to be conditioned to feel repulsed by rape or torture. But this does
not mean that we are morally good, or good enough. As you read this, perfectly
ordinary people somewhere in the world are doing unspeakable things to others. The
most advanced and affluent societies have put a vast concentrated effort which
is needed to preserve even minimal decency: think of locks, security alarms,
police, courts, and prisons. And it is doubtful that we really care enough
about others, or give enough to the less fortunate.
Suppose we take two person from society.
One a serial killer and one top sales person for a tobacco company. Now Society
as per its judicial policy will punish the serial killer for multiple homicide
by giving capital punishment where as the top sales man will get accolades, bonus
and benefits as his cut for the yearly sales. Let’s see, Killer is accused of
dozen of killings where as the tobacco sales man kills millions yet both are
treated differently. It’s like the grave and diverse and well spread your crime
is the more respective you will get in society. Now the Society with its
prejudiced judicial system will argue that there is a difference in both cases.
The Sales man gives a choice but killer doesn’t. Well a life lost is a life
lost and we are not going to discuss tangible or intangible crimes. Yet this
will ring certain minds.
Talking about society let’s consider another
example which I observed few days back and in fact which inspired me to write
this article. I was having a soda standing in front of a stall at the angle of
a crowded square at Surat, Gujarat. Nearby was an unlicensed stall for a
Vada-pav. There were two people managing that stall, one in preparing the
merchandise using all the questionable raw materials which will straight fail
to any standards set by the health departments and the other one was
distributing and collecting bills while a good number of labor class customers
are enjoying the Indian burger with fries chilies mixed with salt which were
served on past days news papers. Nearby a kid, not more than 5 to 6 years was
busy collecting poly-wraps and poly-bags strayed on streets. Judging by his
clothes and cleanness he was certainly a gypsy settled somewhere nearby. While
collecting the scraps he was randomly asking people for money and out of my
curiosity I observed a pattern of his targets. Most of his target people are
generally young and look careless with clearly giving the message to the world
that ‘my Dad is my ATM’. Few moments later his asked me. As usual out of my
better judgment I fished out an Rs2 coin and put it in his dirty hand as he
gave me this cute smirk and moved on forward. At that moment I saw a guy who
enters this setting. He parked his red Pulsar 150 nearby. Produced a Rs100 bill
and asked for 4 Classic Regular and a Pepsi RGB small bottle soda and indulged
himself in the process of pandering himself which was inhaling the black smoke as if there nothing
better to do rather than sucking the black acrid smoke which will momentarily
numb the various material priorities. As a habit of studying people I observed
that the guy was wearing casuals consisting of a UCB Denim and a checked Spykar
shirt. He has a RayBan Aviator model glares and Woodland as shoes. Had a
Longinies watch and what I perceive was wearing a Hugo Boss Black perfume. He
has this cocksure attitude in him with a very little beard and very short hairs
both well trimmed. The kid came to him and asked for money. He smiled and took
him to the stall and ordered for two burgers. The stall owner said a fresh
batch was just getting out and he will then give the burgers. The guy
instructed the kid to stand there and came back to shop to where he had left
his soda. The kid was standing there and our guy finished his drinks and went
to his bike.
Here at the stall out of two owners one
came running at the kid with water at his hands and shooing him away. The kid
ran back.
Stallowner-2: “Bhag Chor Kahin-ka! How many times I will tell you not to come here
Phoot idhar-se”.
He has an expression on his face when
usually people get shooing away a stray dog. The guy get down from his bike and
catch the kid who way running by his side. He had his hands on the kid’s shoulders
and approached to the stall while removing his glares. His eyes have a piercing
character in them.
Guy: “What just happened? Why are you
treating him like this? Don’t you have a least bit mannerism?”
Stallowner-2: “Arey sir these Chor
deserve to be treated like these. Theses gutter rats are good for nothing and
loot my customers and disturb the business. The governments should do vasectomy
and sterile these people so they won’t copulate and populate the society.”
Guy: “Excuse me!! And who gave you that
right to judge these people.”
StallOwner-1: “Sorry sir here is the
burgers. My brother didn’t know that.”
(He gave his brother a stop-talking-now
look)
Guy: “You know you are too much a problem
for the society as much you think they are. Have you ever subjected yourself to
the same judgment? And he is only a kid for god sake how will he differentiate
what’s right and what’s wrong.”
Salesman-2: (irritated) “Arey sir ji jao jao!! I don’t go around
begging at his age and even now I earn fair from my hard work.”
Guy: “Right said. But do you have a
certificate from the health dept with your quality of your product. Do you pay taxes?
And does your Thela is cleared by the
municipality.”
Guy: “No, I thought so. Now since you
don’t pay taxes that tax money which might have used for this kids free
education in not available to govt. Now you sell the vada pav which spreads diseases and you cannot deny that. You have
a Thela in the road side which
sometimes blocks road causing traffic jams thus hampering the country’s
progress and for you many natural resources like fuel are wasted. So now tell
me who the bigger culprit here is…”
The Stall owner-2 was going to say something
but his partner stopped him as people have started to gather around.
The kid did not understand any of the
conversation but just stood there as he listened to the hot arguments and cold
replays from the guy.
Our Guy smiled at the kid and returned to
his bike and went along the kid joyously crossed the traffic my eyes followed
him as he expertly crossed the traffic and was about to get lost in the masses
of crowd and dust when he turned back and gave a blank smile at the scene.
This
whole scene made me thinking about the semantics of the morality. Humans are
born with the capacity to be moral, but it is a limited capacity which is ill
equipped to deal with the ethical complexities of the modern world. For
thousands of years, humans have relied on education, persuasion, social
institutions, and the threat of real (or supernatural) punishment to make
people behave decently. We could all be morally better, but it is clear that
this traditional approach cannot take us much further. It is not as if people
would suddenly begin to behave better if we just gave them more facts and
statistics, or better arguments.
So we shouldn’t be too quick to dismiss
the suggestion that science might help – in the first instance, by helping us
design more effective institutions, more inspiring moral education, or more
persuasive ethical arguments. But science might also offer more direct ways of
influencing our brains.
Science fiction sometimes limits rather
than expands our sense of what is possible. It would be self-defeating, or
worse, to try to promote morality through brutal coercion. Governments must not
be given the power to control its citizens’ moral code – we know that if they
had such power, they would misuse it.
It would be ideal if individuals could
freely explore different ways to improve themselves, whether by practicing
mindfulness, reading moral philosophy, or, yes, by taking a ‘morality’ pill.
But it is also true that although some people are eager to take pills that make
them feel better or think faster, it is not so obvious that people would really
want to take pills that would make them morally better. It is not clear that
people really want to be morally better. And those who, like the
psychopathic Alex, need the most help are probably those who would want it least.
These are, of course, hypothetical
questions. We don’t yet know what is possible. But it is better to begin the
ethical discussion too early than too late. And even if “moral pills” are just
science fiction, they raise deep questions. Will we want to take them if they
ever become available? And what does it say about us if we won’t?
Can you take the Morality Pill??
2 comments:
It is something which should depend on person willingness and not to be forced by any authority.
From the very first day of our life, we always taught to survive and learn better things for survival..
May not be something should create a huge impact with our packed mind..Our depressed thoughts.
But off course the awareness towards the humanity is became a major concerns to the half-satisfied society…as we ready to gain the pain but not ready to get it in other way …. Nothing will help a human to be a human. Until his soul identifies the humanity inside…science may touch the goals of light years..
But it’ll always have its prerequisites and some defects around we called mistakes….
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