Bradley Childs

Does morality exist? 

Today, the concept of relative morality is highly prevalent. Phrases such as “whatever floats your

boat” are spoken casually and regularly. In such a world morality does not truly exist, for a person

dictates what is right and what is wrong for him without thought or concern for others. In this world

everyone is right and no one is wrong. 

The question of whether morality exists may have been easier to answer a few thousand years

ago, when people groups were essentially isolated and basically uniform in racial and cultural

composition. In the isolated world of single villages and tribes, people share a common mindset,

morality is absolute; those with different cultures are aliens, infidels; they are the enemy. Morality

becomes fuzzy when cultures begin to intermix, not as enemies but as allies. These cultural difference

can be points of contention, alliances can falter and fail simply because one group wears perfume and

the other doesn’t (an alliance in ancient Egypt failed for such a reason). Realizing that waging war over

small differences in values is highly destructive to all parties, civilizations began to tolerate their

differences. This tolerance over centuries evolved into the dissolution of absolute morality. If morality is

absolute, then some cultures are wrong and others are right, those cultures that are morally corrupt

forfeit their right to existence. Once again, those cultures that are morally right wage war to destroy the

corrupt and evil, resulting in a never-ending spiral of violence. People cling to relative morality because

it is easy and prevents insult and violence. However, taken to the opposite extreme total moral relativity

leads to a different untenable situation, the sacrifice of any moral compass, where all actions are valid

and justified. While it is difficult, the search for moral absolutes is important and necessary in order for a

culture to survive (many cultures have fallen, not due to war, disease, or famine, but because they sunk

into complete moral depravity).  

 
Bradley Childs

Take the practice of infanticide for example. In the United States the killing of an infant is

considered taboo. However, in other cultures infanticide was regularly practiced as a means of pruning

the population from physically deformed individuals who would later be burden upon the society. Thus,

the moral dilemma is presented, is killing deformed infants a moral good or a moral bad? A person from

the United States who is considered a highly moral individual would work hard to preserve the life of a

deformed infant, and would consider the act of killing the child an act of depravity. On the other side, a

moral individual from ancient Sparta would consider it their moral obligation to drop the deformed

youth from the top of a cliff or leave it in the forest. Is one morality wrong, the other right, or are both

amoral, and the concept of right and wrong simply doesn’t apply? 

While morality might be difficult to define in such a specific situation, it may be better to start by

looking for the commonalties between the American and Spartan rather than focus on the glaring moral

difference. While the actions of the individuals are diametrically opposed, their modi operandorum are

similar. Both individuals have the concept of right and wrong embedded within their respective selves

and strive towards what they feel is right. It is here that the American and Spartan can find mutual

respect, even though they deplore the specific actions taken by the other. The American can respect the

Spartan for doing what she believes to be right despite the heart wrenching pain of sacrificing her child.

The Spartan meanwhile can respect the American for following his belief of right in his self-sacrifice of

burdening himself with a child who will never be able to contribute to society. By recognizing this

baseline of morality a conversation can begin between the two cultures; neither culture needs condone

the practices of the other, but they can interact peacefully without the need for war.  

Morality does exist. While the search for absolute truth may be akin to climbing Mount Everest

in a winter storm, the quest for universal good begins by realizing the universal traits of a moral

individual; such as when a person seeks the right, steering away from the wrong, even when doing so is

difficult.