The Morality Pill

Apropos of Evolving Consciousness, Empathy and Advanced Hon-Human Intelligence, a post I wrote back in late April, there's a thought-provoking opinion piece in today's Globe and Mail that I recommend to everyone - Would We Swallow A Morality Pill, by Guy Kahane, who is deputy director of the Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics at the University of Oxford. Kahane asks the following question: Should we use our growing scientific understanding of the basis of human morality to try to make people morally better?

Here's an excerpt:

It would be ideal if individuals could freely explore different ways to improve themselves, whether by practising mindfulness, reading moral philosophy or, yes, by taking a “morality” pill. But it’s also true that, although some people are eager to take pills that make them feel better, it’s not so obvious that people would want to take pills that would make them morally better. It’s not clear people really want to be morally better. And those who, like the psychopathic Alex [of A Clockwork Orange], need the most help are probably those who would want it least.

Well worth a look, and then consideration, less so for the idea that an actual "morality pill" might be invented than for the question that Kahane leaves the reader with:

"Will we want to take them if they ever become available? And what does it say about us if we won't."

Paul Kimball

Isn't It A Pity?

"Some things take so long

But how do I explain

When not too many people

Can see we're all the same

And because of all their tears

Their eyes can't hope to see

The beauty that surrounds them

Isn't it a pity?"

- George Harrison

One can imagine, if there really is an advanced non-human intelligence that interacts with us, and that has developed into a truly empathic being (or beings / civilization), that they might recommend this song to all of us.

To look at it another way, all that we have to do is look at ourselves as an extraterrestrial civilization would look at us - not as Canadians, or Americans, or Russians, or Iranians, or whatever, but rather as members of the human race, floating through space together on what Carl Sagan famously called this pale blue dot. As Sagan wrote: "There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known."

Seen from 6.1 billion kilometers (3.7 billion miles), Earth appears as a tiny dot

Harrison would have undoubtedly agreed with the sentiment, as evidenced by his songs, even if he framed his views in a spiritual context that Sagan rejected. Two paths, one journey. Unfortunately, most of us don't think of these things as Harrison and Sagan did. Indeed, we rarely think of these things at all.

Isn't it a pity?

Paul Kimball

"Denis" - a short film

Denis is a short animated film by some young Halifax filmmakers / animators, including Jullian Reynolds, the son of my good friend, Veronica Reynolds, that touches on the difference between the society that we have built for ourselves, and the one that we need to build for ourselves.

Paul Kimball

Evolving Consciousness, Empathy and Advanced Hon-Human Intelligence

Fascinating video, which raises an intriguing question - how might it apply to a more advanced, non-human intelligence (NHI) that may have gone through the same development?

What if, for example, an NHI is actually us, from the future (making it an advanced human intelligence, of some sort), where we have moved much further along in terms of empathic development, and where our "sense of identity" really has broadened to a communal outlook? Could "we" be trying to help our less developed selves along the way, to lay the groundwork for a truly empathic civilization.

Or perhaps the NHI, if it isn't a future "us", has developed itself into a truly empathic consciousness, and feels obliged to help less developed species to the same destination, without directly interfering in their society?

Possibilities worth considering...

Paul Kimball