If morality is imprinted by god into the hearts of man, why is it that feral children adapt the morality of the host species? (so much for god imprinted on the hearts of men) Not only is such social behavior learned, but it is rarely unlearned, with the vast majority of these kids becoming institutionalized after capture—even after being baptized by the well intended, they remain in their adolescence mindset, be it wolf, monkey, antelope, or bear. 
Interesting side note; feral children also develop the acute senses of their host species. Nocturnal vision, acute hearing, and sense of smell are all superhuman compared to the tame man, showing adaptations develop much more rapidly than one would expect.
TheCommonAtheist 
Hello Jim. Talk about Tarzan? I wonder what switches in our minds are controlled solely by what society we grow up in, or the environment of our childhood. Once thrown it seems most of those switches can not be easily changed. Hugs
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Also, after about 7 years of age, speech centers in the brain atrophy, basically separating themselves from the ability to ever learn spoken language. The remainder of life is grunts, barks, chirps and howls. The kids learn to communicate in the host language.
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I am afraid that “calling bullshit” on these people will avail us of very little. These are people who claim that their god created us to worship him and at the same time they say that their god is complete in and of itself. Two more contradictory statements cannot be made. Creating a race of sentient beings to worship the creator is sick, sick, sick. Even in all of our discussions of creating conscious artificial intelligences we only want them to be our slaves, not to worship us. Are we better than their god?
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Nice repone Steve. Since god is a human construct I’d say were right there with him in many respects. I do know the type, but most regular people don’t want to be adorned, just left alone.
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One must adapt to one’s surrounding, otherwise you become dinner, or a bedtime snack. As long as there is a nuclear family, breaking the brainwashing will be a superhuman task. Yet it is doable. Congratulations to us!
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I’d like to hear the story of Daniel, The Andes Goat Boy.
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No kidding. My favorite is probably the antelope boy, living on the plains as an herbivore. They had to run him down with several men and a Jeep. The reports said he ran about 50kph, but whatever, he was able to keep up with the herd.
The girl from Columbia is pretty cool too because she can tell the story. At 5 she was abducted for ransom then abandoned in the jungle, and for 5 years lived as a capuchin monkey. They taught her everything. She actually regained he speech and became human again.
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But still flinging pooh, I guess.
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She has her own kids now and tells them stories as her life as monkey girl. It is fascinating how the other animals react to even human babies. It’s not a special human trait as we’ve been taught to believe. Another young girl was taken by wolves at about 2 and the family assumed she was dead. She was found many years later living in a wold den and completely nocturnal. Adaptive we are.
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Didn’t know of these stories. I should probably do an online search
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It’s pretty interesting. The most recent cases seem to be from urban areas where a baby is locked in a room with animals and no human contact.
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Is this out of malice or by accident?
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Both. The mental health of the caregiver is a big part of it.
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Mowgli anyone?
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Kipling is assumed to have written that based on one of these accounts from India. He made up the dancing bear pert though, I think.
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I googlied feral kids and read that the character was likely based on a real child. Some amazing tales.
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Really the worst cases are when kids are locked away in the city somewhere and chained to a toiled for 10 years. Never having touch or talked to…humans? Ha! Of course that’s fairly rare as well, but disturbing nonetheless.
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Interesting, thanks.
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all behavior is learned behavior. neuroplasticity proves the brain itself is not ‘fixed’ but fluid and changeable. it changes according to the environment. ‘morality’ is an idea, a man-constructed concept. it has no reality of its own.
morality will make man do something good either because it feels good or he knows it is good. but the awakened man, being in tune with true reality, does good because he has no other choice.
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Interesting discussion.
Some of what is here could have worked well on Fandango’s Provocative Question on nature and nurture (and may be there. I’ve not looked again).
However, I do not agree that all behavior is learned. DNA // nature // provides abilities and limitations in unequal measure (we are not all the same), as well the ability to learn said behavior. I’ve mentioned Pinker’s ‘The Blank Slate’ before. I did not know there were children raised by bears. Had I been raised by eagles, I still could not fly.
Skeptic overflow :-).
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It is an interesting adaptation of human possibilities. Who knows, maybe we grunted around a hundred thousand years until some alien spoke to an ancestral child. Speech is another one. After about 7 years old they never learn to talk.
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i was always fascinated by the idea of what we are/ what remains, when we strip away absolutely everything that society teaches? was imagining some ideal, pure being. the truth is quite different.
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Certainly. It’s been a long process that can be unraveled very quickly it appears.
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what do you mean you can’t fly??😯
walking, flying are abilities more than behaviors. and even those could be changed for other purposes. people with no arms will use their legs instead.
have you heard of that family in Greece than walk on all fours?
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2698298/Turkish-family-walks-fours-scientists-say-dont-like-four-legged-animals-ARENT-example-reverse-evolution.html
language is a fascinating behavior, and not coincidentally, it corresponds with the Homo erectus.
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You’re right. I have at times been quite high and surely could have soared with the eagles. 🙂
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LOL!!
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You Stated — “If morality is imprinted by god into the hearts of man, why is it that feral children adapt the morality of the host species? ”
My Response — The word “morality” isn’t in the bible so where is this coming from?
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You not follow Christian apologetics? I’ve never heard a Christian say morality is a random happening. So would you say the Bible doesn’t teach moral principle ordained by god? There are a lot of words not in the Bible that imply many other things.
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You Stated — “You not follow Christian apologetics?”
My Response — I sometimes follow my wife, my boss and God but that’s the limit.
You Stated — “I’ve never heard a Christian say morality is a random happening. So would you say the Bible doesn’t teach moral principle ordained by god?
My Response — Morality has never been “a random happening”. Morality is an intentional effort to create a standard. I’m not sure anyone would say it’s random, christian or not.
The Bible is not a book of morality and it doesn’t claim to be. It’s a book of commands.
You Stated — “There are a lot of words not in the Bible that imply many other things.”
My Response — If I write a book I can only be held to what I wrote not all the words I left out.
Just a thought
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You Stated — “Interesting side note; feral children also develop the acute senses of their host species.”
My Response — It occurs to me that if man seeks to be like animals he moves in that direction, only to go half the distance that they have gone.
Maybe, looking towards god, they seek to be more than man and animal. Maybe this is the spark that changed within man’s evolution so many years prior, putting us on a path so far removed from the rest of the animals.
Just a thought
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Absolutely brilliant Jim. I wish my mind worked like yours! 🙌🙌
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I have seen a lot of back and forth about morality. Atheists vs. Christians, occasionally atheists vs. Muslims. I have seen different religious views clash over morality as well.
One of the main problems that I see is that most use the word “morality” to signify that which they agree with and consider good. That makes any other system of morality a priori “immoral” which just comes out to mean “wrong” or “evil”. In these discussions I never see a listing of the actual assumptions and values underlying a set of moral ideas. What is almost always done is this. A set of values and assumptions are snuck in without examination, and then the moral system or subject in question is evaluated based on how it matches up to another moral system based on those values and assumptions.
I understand why the bases of moral systems are not usually brought up. Most people don’t think about them, or maybe most can’t even consider thinking about them. Maybe that is a good thing for the sake of the group. If everything were questioned all the time, we’d never get on with living. Many want to believe that their idea of morality is “innate” because then they don’t have to consider it a construct that can be examined.
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Bravo! Well stated. Morality is in essence a set of arbitrary rules with one purpose: to control individuals via authoritarianism.
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