In Reply to: What is "conscience"? posted by Oldtimer on February 18, 2004 at 13:10:22:
I used to think that conscience was that little voice that supports or warns us. I am not too sure now. I very much like Ray's post and who we are running with has a lot to do with that. Does the voice go away or does the new environment get a new voice? If my conscience is only one voice, then it makes sense that the other(s) are something else but at that point I would probably be so confused that there is no easy u-turn. It is frightening to think we could have so many voices inside and in great darkness. But what happens if we DON'T hear any voices?
AG's explanation of empathy is also attractive but the same question comes up, what if empathy is not there? I know people with little or no empathy but who want to "do good" and "be good", how can they get norms?
I think then is the more simple way of an external source, the "outside rules" you talk about.
But all in all, to me the question always was, is one more valuable than the others? My answer has so far been NO. I see all of them as part of the rich variety of humanity and as we come in all shapes and forms we also come with our own strengths and limitations. We all start with with the milk of the word but not every one becomes a Moses or a Melchisedec.
Sometimes it is easy to know what the right thing to do is but not always and what works for me is not to allow myself to be in situations where hard decisions may come up. When the easy decisions come up, it is a matter of remembering what worked and what didn't work before. When a difficult decision comes up I just do my best.
I guess all of this is to say that I don't know what conscience is but that it is easy to "hear" what my consience says when the decision is easy but it becomes very difficult to hear when the stakes are high.