What are your morals?

Currently I am reading a book entitled, The Righteous Mind which at times is dry and at other times fantastic! I hope to write more about this in the future but in the meantime, I will share with you a site that is set up that asks you questions about your morality. Your responses are then compared to others who have taken the tests and you will begin to see what areas drive your morality.

Here is an excerpt from the book:

"Republicans don’t just aim to cause fear, as some Democrats charge. They trigger the full range of intuitions described by Moral Foundations Theory. Like Democrats, they can talk about innocent victims (of harmful Democratic policies) and about fairness (particularly the unfairness of taking tax money from hardworking and prudent people to support cheaters, slackers, and irresponsible fools). But Republicans since Nixon have had a near-monopoly on appeals to loyalty (particularly patriotism and military virtues) and authority (including respect for parents, teachers, elders, and the police, as well as for traditions). And after they embraced Christian conservatives during Ronald Reagan’s 1980 campaign and became the party of “family values,” Republicans inherited a powerful network of Christian ideas about sanctity and sexuality that allowed them to portray Democrats as the party of Sodom and Gomorrah."


His point in this is that conservatives generally have a larger pallet for making moral claims than liberals do. (Mind you the author is very liberal on all accounts). His point is that if liberals want to become proactive in helping others move toward a more liberal society, then liberals must tap into more than just concern for victims and fairness.

Dr. Seuss and Ethics - Repost from Buzzfeed

As a child I was captivated by a short Dr. Seuss cartoon tape we had at our home. It had Cat in the Hat, The Sneeches and The Zax stories on it. And the past couple of weeks I have been telling my son bedtime stories and he loves the Sneeches and the Zax. 

In a news amalgamator I use, I came across this little post in which Buzzfeed renamed some Dr. Seuss classics. 

I did not want to lose these and so I posted them here to share with all seven people who run across this blog. 

Enjoy.

In a Divorce, Who Gets the Organs? - By Freakonomics

In a Divorce, Who Gets the Organs?
By Freakonomics

Dr. Richard Batista’s wife’s health was failing, and so was their marriage. To save them both, he offered to be the kidney donor his wife Dawnell badly needed.

Dawnell recovered, but their marriage didn’t. A few years later she filed for divorce. Now her husband says he wants his kidney back. If he can’t have it, he wants a payment of $1.5 million, the estimated worth of the organ.

Medical ethicists say Batista is unlikely to get either, as it’s illegal to exchange money for an organ and the law is clear that no gift, once given, can be forcibly taken back.

This is a sad story on all fronts. But would it be possible 10 or 20 years from now? As Dubner and Levitt wrote in The Times Magazine, our repugnance toward assigning monetary value to human life has grown, receded, and changed over time.

How long until, and under what conditions, will a market in donated organs become acceptable?
(Hat tip: Alex Hagen)