The essence of morality. Identifying ethics as a science in the history of philosophy. /part 4/

There are other essential characteristics that bring morality "beyond" social discipline and make it even more creative, premonition, opposing, protest, even rebellion. The content of the norm is determined by what it obligates, allows, and prohibits man from doing. That's her disposition. And under "conditions for the application of the norm" are meant the situations in which it should (can, or should not) be realized. This is its so-called legal science hypothesis. Norm is therefore a prescription according to which a certain action must be (can or should not) be accomplished to achieve certain goals. Not every prescription, however, is a rule, but only that which has the character of a general rule reckoned for repeated application.

Dov Talpaz, "The So Called Morality" image source

Therefore, the normative prescription takes the form of a measure of scale (equal in scale) of the acceptable and obligatory variants of behavior. Norma - this is a historically created standard way (principle) of behavior, the observance of which stands out for the individual (the public group) as a necessary condition for his subordination to a particular social entity. All these signs and attributes are inherent in the whole class of social norms of behavior - political, legal, moral, artistic, religious, etc. The specificity of the different types of social norms is defined, as has already been pointed out, by the content of their requirements to man and by the way (the nature of the means) by which the regulation of human behavior is carried out. On the basis of the justified prerequisites, the deontological concept of the moral norm could be defined as follows: The moral norm is a type of behavioral precept, a measure (the same scale, principle) of the acceptable and obligatory moral variants of behavior by means of which programmatic, cyclical and personally motivated regulation of behavioral acts of people in terms of the moral objectives of society (class) and in the closest interaction with the other components of the moral system. But norms can not express all the force, in this obligatory force of morality, because norms are not a convincing force unless they imply self-commitment, self-esteem.

The moral norm in this sense is autonomous because it presupposes the personal acceptance and approval of the perpetrator. This comparability and mutual "entanglement" of normality and freedom is a characteristic feature of morality. Without this peculiarity, we can not understand why morality is a great stimulating force and a powerful motivational idea, valued much more often than other spiritual powers and practitioners of human creative power. Morality is not only a social discipline, not just a requirement addressed to the moral person, but a spiritual space of a real social and historical situation in which human suspicion and choice, conflict and freedom, everyday life and feats are manifested. This contradictory and incomplete moral experience of the human community universalises moral values ​​and moral norms, transforms them into a comprehensive world of directness in which norm and value, purpose and means are subject to evaluation. The third notion defining morality is to identify it with universal values. These universal values ​​are proclaimed, accepted as a universal criterion and a universal expression of interests serving man as a kind, person, and individual. In other words, here the level is extremely abstract, the summaries are expressive, the social experience has reached the greatest density of its expression.

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part 1

part 2

part 3