this post was submitted on 04 Jul 2025
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Showerthoughts
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A "Showerthought" is a simple term used to describe the thoughts that pop into your head while you're doing everyday things like taking a shower, driving, or just daydreaming. The most popular seem to be lighthearted clever little truths, hidden in daily life.
Here are some examples to inspire your own showerthoughts:
- Both “200” and “160” are 2 minutes in microwave math
- When you’re a kid, you don’t realize you’re also watching your mom and dad grow up.
- More dreams have been destroyed by alarm clocks than anything else
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Thanks for the response :) it's an interesting question you've raised, and I haven't looked into it enough really.
I think I've keyed into your phrasing, particularly "precursor", in my answer. If "premoral behaviour" is a step in developing morality, does that make it a precursor?
What happens between premoral behaviour and morality that develops it? I would have assumed that reward/punishment behaviours between humans socially based on those "premoral" behaviours I described would have led to more nuanced moral systems that would have then been written into religious and spiritual practices.
What do you think happens between premorality and morality? What role does spirituality or religion play -- does a higher power give us our morals?
Yes.
Mysticism and spirituality is what is between "premoral behavior" and "morality".
We had spiritual practices before written word. These were kept through oral histories.
I see the path to the idea of morality like this:
Once a species begins to show "premoral behaviors" (Things like demonstration of altruism to other members of the species) overtime these behaviors ingrain into that specific population of the species. However, these animals will still go against those behaviors and will require as you said a "reward/punishment" system. This helps to reinforce those behaviors within that specific group.
This will work for a few dozen people, but even then there would be dissent and disagreement over what is and isn't acceptable leading to violations of rules in place. The consequence is violence.
What I believe was needed to get past this point and have larger groups of humans work together was an idea that being "good" was "bigger than us". Spirituality is that step from "rules" to "morally correct". Without the idea of something bigger making the rules and declaring actions "good", we are simply making rules that other agree and disagree with that require enforcement through violence.
Which isn't to say that Religion isn't a history of violence and disagreement, but there is a difference between "Rule enforced by Man" and "Rule enforced by an all powerful being" when trying to get a group of people to act "appropriately" in precivilization humans. "I can kill you if I disagree, but this "God" thing sounds like I don't want a piece of that".
No. All evidence suggest there is no God, no afterlife, and nothing special about our species beyond becoming smart enough to kill ourselves.
I honestly still just feel like we're agreeing on the order of things here though. Premoral behaviours develop naturally, become ingrained, and then get written into religions or spirituality to give them even more weight -- sort of like how a lot of myths about evil water spirits supposedly being warnings to children to not play near water cos they'll drown.
Just to clarify, when I say "written into" I'm not necessarily meaning physically written down. I mean more like "built into".
I don't think we're disagreeing here, right?
You're agreeing on the order. The difference is he's trying to stuff his religious beliefs into a process that doesn't need it.
I am not religious, and you are a bigot for assuming so. Not everyone who talks about religion is religious.
I don't know enough about your though process to say we agree or disagree, but it seems we aren't in disagreement.