CS Lewis' Oughtness
Occasionally updated and edited.
Copyright © 2009
OUGHT
CS Lewis converted to Christianity after deciding that “oughtness” — a sense of morality present in humans — could only come from God. (I call it "oughtism")
NAUGHT
Oughtness is contradicted by "naughtness." It's that notion postulated by Christians that, without a faith in God, we have no moral directives and digress to an state of Machiavellian amorality.
Both can't be true.
If Lewis is correct in his summation that oughtness is a God-instilled human character trait, then we must conclude that God is morally unjust. This is seen in the gradation of altruistic variations among individuals. Some possess a keen sense of morality; others are radically Machiavellian from birth.
The variations of altruism from compassionate to sociopathic are well known and well documented. Criminal psychology and anthropology are fields dedicated to understanding why some humans are deprived of oughtness in varying degrees.
Psychology clearly identifies anti-social personality disorders in which "psychopaths" display little or no oughtness.
"The essential feature for the diagnosis is a pervasive pattern of disregard for, and violation of, the rights of others that begins in childhood or early adolescence and continues into adulthood."[American Psychiatric Association (1994). Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. Washington, DC: American Psychiatric Association. pp. 645-650. ISBN 0-89042-061-0.]
The Kindness Gene
Whether we call it altruism, morality or oughtism, there is no doubt that a sense of compassion is evident among humans. Like everything, it can be explained naturally.
It can be observed that most species care for their herd as a matter of self-preservation. That instinct innately survives and is often expressed in the saying, "Blood is thicker than water."
Immediate families tend to prefer one-another over members of our extended families. We will celebrate the birthdays of our next of kin more readily than those of our cousins, twice removed. We prefer our sports team over the other, have a sense of loyalty to our home states and go to war wearing our nation's uniform, not that of another. Neighborhoods are defined by religion and race and, in spite of school desegregation, students racially segregate themselves in lunchrooms, fraternities and sororities.
Species whose members care for one another, survive. Those who do not care for one another, do not survive. It's natural selection, plain and simple.
The earliest human troupes that developed a sense of group protection would have survived while those whose members were more selfish did not survive. Could this have been one of many contributing factors to the demise of Neanderthal?
Naughtism's flaws
Naughtism believes that, without God, morality comes to nothing; or naught. It also believes that we must have a belief in God to be moral.
Aside from contradicting oughtism, naughtism fails elsewhere.
First, if we believe that God exist because his existence is necessary to human morality, are we not creating God? More accurately, are we not concocting an image of God to fill a need? After all, they say, necessity is the mother of invention.
Second, if God is the object of our faith because of the oughtness that faith instills, it would follow that our faith should be directed to whichever deity best instills oughtism. That places the God of Christianity at risk of being dethroned by another deity whose ability to instill oughtism is superior.
Third, we can assume that "kicking God out" of our government schools has contributed to the desensitivity to oughtism. Immorality has increased in our schools, we conclude, because God has been removed. Or, more specifically, we have removed the Ten Commandments from our school walls.
We wonder, then: Why do students in South Korea, Japan and China excel where the Ten Commandments have never been displayed? Where the Christian God has never been welcomed?
