My mother always says that one of our family members has a conscience that is so big that a tilt car (NL: huifkar) can ride circles in it. This expression came to my mind when I was thinking about the relationship between conscience, morality, vices and virtues. A PsychologyToday article, called “Conscience does not explain Morality”, was a little helpful for this blog.
Vices and virtues are defined in (legal and/or religious) morality. Morality is culturally bound and may vary from region to region. Our conscience defines our tolerance that we apply to this morality.
The law defines speed limits (morality). However, our individual driving habits define whether we adhere (virtue) to these speed limits. Our individual conscience defines which speed is causing a vice and which speed deviation still allows for perceiving a virtue. This tolerance is based on our individual risk appetite. This risk appetite is different from risk perception: the probability of getting caught when breaking a law or regulation.
Since a few days, I am watching season 1 of The Killing, a Danish crime drama, which is also rated an 8.4 on IMDb, similar to its English equivalent Broadchurch. I feel that the mother of the murdered girl is contemplating retaliation. Morality teaches us that killing and murder is wrong. Nevertheless, our conscience may well allow for killing the murderer of our child.
Apart from our individual tolerance level, our conscience also takes into account the circumstances to define the end of a virtue and the start of a vice. Urgency is a well-known circumstance that allows for adjusting our tolerance upwards. However, in certain circumstances risk appetite and risk perception become meaningless. In such a case, the legal punishment for breaking a law becomes irrelevant – whether getting caught or not. Our conscience then allows for – temporarily – skipping morality. Afterwards, morality may sink in again and remorse may take over.
The default level of individual tolerance towards morality is far more interesting than its exceptional level. Why do some people have a huge default individual tolerance? Based on the stories of my mother, the default risk appetite of my family member was far higher than most people around him. My family member also led an adventurous life. These two go hand in hand I suppose.
I think and feel that our default individual conscience is a “mathematical” function of our risk perception and our risk appetite. A high risk perception and a low risk appetite give a very high / narrow conscience. A low risk perception and a high risk appetite result in a very low/broad/loose conscience. At some point on the curve the risk appetite wins from the risk perception. That is the point where the individual conscience deteriorates quickly.
Increasing the risk perception in society – i.e., the perceived likelihood of getting caught – will no doubt increase adherence to laws and regulations (morality). However, even in countries like North Korea, the risk perception will never be a full 100%. Risk appetite is basically the (reversed) accelerator for our conscience. Risk perception is the brake in that analogy.
“A clear conscience is the sure sign of a bad memory.” Mark Twain (1835-1910)
Laura Branigan (1952-2004) – Self Control (1984) – (artist, lyrics, Wiki)
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