Morality is something that many people think they understand, but few could define it. Typically morality is something that people use in an argument when they realize that they are unable to support their views with facts or logic. They use an additional set of axioms, branded as a universal 'morality' to avoid defeat.

Some people try to justify their morality on the stated morality of others. Morals based on a religious work, such as the Bible or Koran. Other times people simply claim the moral high-ground with universal 'inalienable human rights'.

The fact that people disagree with others about what the morality is is an indication that inalienable rights are anything but universally accepted. In practice morality is the set of rules which one individual would like others to follow, but which they can't justify.

Sometimes this set of rules is trained over a period of time. 6453 repetitions make a truth. Children tend to copy the behavior of their parents, and adopting their beliefs is part of that.

None-the-less it is worth exploring common morality within people's beliefs. If people fundamentally disagree about questions of morality, logical argument is unlikely to convince them, but it is useful to identify at what points people disagree.

This work assumes the following morality as axiomatic

• It is your right to do anything, except initiate force against another person or their property.

From this follows the corollaries:

• You are responsible for all your own choices.
• You are not responsible for any of the choices of anyone else.
• More choice does not make you a victim.

Pragmatically it also accepts libertarian fragility.

• Any group of people who do not pool their resources for their own protection will be overtaken. Hence government taxation for police and military purposes is inevitable.

Whether these are merely self-serving is left as an exercise to the reader, but this suggests another definition

Someone who doesn't cheat, steal, lie, bash or rob isn't necessarily following some moral code - he may just know that his long term interests are served by people around him knowing that he will deliver what he says he will. The small short-term benefit of (for example) stealing would be lower than the long term cost of people knowing that he was a thief. This net benefit would not exist in all environments, only environments where there will be benefit from others who see the pattern - like a society based on the free market.

Indeed in many other cultures, that behavior may be seen as weakness.

Interestingly the same argument can be made for revenge.

See

• Exploring Common Morality
• Moral Hazard
• Group Selection Theory
• Passivists