Lately you have been hearing about morality, truth, and understanding. It is what creates us to value the things we do in life.

Morality

Morality (from the Latin moralis "manner, character, proper behavior") is the differentiation of intentions, decisions, and actions between those that are distinguished as proper and those that are improper. Morality can be a body of standards or principles derived from a code of conduct from a particular philosophy, religion, or culture, or it can derive from a standard that a person believes should be universal. Morality may also be specifically synonymous with "goodness" or "rightness".
Moral philosophy includes moral ontology, or the origin of morals, as well as moral epistemology, or knowledge about morals. Different systems of expressing morality have been proposed, including deontological ethical systems which adhere to a set of established rules, and normative ethical systems which consider the merits of actions themselves. An example of normative ethical philosophy is the Golden Rule, which states that: "One should treat others as one would like others to treat oneself."
-Wikipedia

Without having the right information, the decision made on what you value from your understanding of truth can change the action you take. The video below shows an example.

There are 2 baby chicks, 1 being a toy, and 6 empty cups turned upside down. The gentlemen explains to the woman that he will give her $100 for smashing all the cups except the one with the toy baby chick inside and the other 2 get to run around and watch. As she is going through this experiment, notice how the baby chicks are closer to the end on the left. When you see the woman crush the #5 cup, you hear him state "Oh!, you scared cody." That was purposefully done. Now the woman is aware if she get's too close, she could scare the baby chicks running around. Before she crushes #6, Once again the gentlemen state's how the baby chicks are between the #1 and #2 cups so naturally, she thought to stay away from smashing those cups. Finally, the woman is left with the #1 and #4 cup. Now will see the gentlemen pick up the baby chicks and present them to the woman near the #1 cup and remind her how "precious" they are to give the impression to be careful and not to bring harm near them. So automatically she will choose #4. Little did she know, the gentlemen had place a real baby chick instead of the toy one under the #1 cup. The woman was shocked and felt terrible that she even participated doing that in the first place and would not have, had she known there was a real baby chick going to be used in the experiment.

The thing was of course this was manipulated the entire time, because it's an experiment, a real baby chick was under the #1 cup attracting the other 2 near the #1 cup.

Would you have done it if you had the right information? the truth?

Most of us have it instilled in us to do the right thing when we find ourselves in moral dilemmas we encounter in our lives. The ones who raised us and our surroundings help create our own understanding of morality.

The next experiment has a barista purposefully giving out the wrong change to customers. The barista has a nice attitude toward the customers that she had given the wrong change to. She walks away to to take care of some things and returns to have those customers morally acknowledge the mistake and return the change.

You won't see this second part of the experiment on the video below but the barista will change from a nice one, to a barista with an attitude. Customers are kept waiting as the barista is on cell phone talking and and giving horrible service. Now you see some customers keep the amount of change that was wrongfully given to them. Not all do this and you even do see a woman say something about the barista's attitude while returning the change. The customers that took the change explained that if it wasn't for the long wait and attitude, they wouldn't have kept the change.

If you want to watch the entire episode, you can watch it on dailymotion by the link below.
https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x4lpq9m_brain-games-s05e03-morality_tv

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Manipulation

1. to manage or influence skillfully, especially in an unfair manner: to manipulate people's feelings.
2. to handle, manage, or use, especially with skill, in some process of treatment or performance: to manipulate a large tractor.
3. to adapt or change (accounts, figures, etc.) to suit one's purpose or advantage.
   -Dictionary.com

Now question yourself, is your own morality being manipulated in some way? well let's take a look at the Images below. Time Magazine portrays a frivolous life to Americans while the rest sending a different message to the rest of the world.

We see this all over the internet.

Some may view the images below as clever marketing but you can see how this can fall in to those definitions of manipulation.

Most of us actually do this to ourselves all the time without even knowing it. There are many parenting books that been written for a long time giving suggestions to parents on better parenting skills. Some call this the "two-choice-technique" and is to present a child with two choices. We see this all the time, "eat your vegetables, or no desert." "Do you want to get to desert? Or have no desert at all?"

Most of us blindly go through life without being aware. When it comes to adults, it's usually business and many know the term as "A.B.C. = Always Be Closing."

“John, you’re really a whiz with that new software today. Would you prefer to train your staff yourself, or shall we provide the training?”

Boiler Room is a great movie that shows how extreme this type of manipulation goes when we are adults. The scene below is actor Vin Diesel taking a call from a junior stock broker to close the sale. The victim in the scene is a doctor. You can hear the choices throughout the video and at the end of the call you will also hear him say "do you want the confirmation sent to your office? Or your mansion?"

Another scene from Boiler Room that shows how far people are pushed and manipulated.

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Social Conformity

We can see this come to question in this social conformity experiment video below. A woman is waiting to see the doctor along with others and every time there is a beep in the office, everyone will stand up. She is not aware of this "rule" or behavior and after enough times, being in a social setting, was manipulated into being in the "social norm" and stand up along with everyone else. When they take everyone away and the woman is alone, she continues to stand up. A new person is added to experiment that doesn't know about the "rule" and asks the woman why she is standing up. She explains to him she saw everyone else do it so that's why she does it. She doesn't even know why she's doing what she's doing.

Responsibility

We have a responsibility to enforce morality with truth and understanding without personal gain. Being aware can give someone the knowledge and the advantage to have influence in a manipulative manner. Whether you choose to be moral or not with this awareness, it starts with you make the decision and be the change.

Sources 1, 2, 3

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