The Responsibility Project^®. Exploring what it means to do the right thing

Quiz: Testing Your Moral Mettle

21 Comments

January 28, 2008 by Kathy McManus

Is morality hard-wired into the human brain? Is there such a thing as “moral intuition”? Are emotions linked to moral judgments?

Harvard psychology professor Marc Hauser asks those and other probing questions in his job of studying the science of moral decisions. How do human beings decide what is right and what is wrong? Surprisingly or not, our answers about what is morally acceptable don’t vary much, despite our differences in nationality, age, religion, and sex.

To offer your answers for Hauser’s consideration, take his online Moral Sense Test. There are 13 thought-provoking scenarios, each followed by one question. Your responses are confidential and will help researchers gain further insight into the moral judgments we all make.

The test takes only 10-15 minutes and is painless. Any slight numbing sensation may be just a tiny prick of your conscience—remember?

21 Comments

What do you think? Leave a comment

• January 31, 2008 by Dorothy Gardiner

  I know that deciding whether to save one life or 5 lives is a difficult scenario to be in. But personally the more you save even if you lose one in the process will be the best outcome.

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  • March 8, 2008 by Sandy

    Because other's opinions may bias your answers, as the authors of the test advise...No "cheating"! Your rationale seemed the logical choice for me at first quick glance, but then it became clear to me that preventing the deaths of 5 people through justifiable INACTION was preferable to killing one through preventable action. Failure to stop something bad from happening (that you had no part in causing) is not as bad as causing something bad to happen-that was my logic. But an intersting test.

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  • March 8, 2008 by Sandy

    If it were indeed as you say a decision to "save one life or 5 lives" I would agree. But it's not. It is TAKING one life to save five. It's a fine line...but one I don't think I could cross.

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• February 1, 2008 by Geoff Blair

  Interesting dilemma, however I choose to believe that natural selection should eliminate anyone stupid enough to stand on railroad tracks while there exists even a remote possibility of a train coming their way. Maybe I'm just playing devils advocate here, but doesn't betterment of the species come into play when considering whether or not to save someone's life? Lets put it this way. If you could cure cancer by killing just one newborn baby, would you do it?

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  • February 1, 2008 by Dorothy Gardiner

    In regards to the Saving Lives? comment, no one in their right mind would kill a newborn child to find a cure for cancer, especially if the newborn is healthy and has cancer free genes, why would you eliminate a human who is healthy to cure those who are genetic carriers of a defect? - as you stated in the begining of your statement "natural selection" includes cancers and other diseases especially since we have brought these upon ourselves with our modern lifestyles. Killing a child just for finding a cure is diabolical and not a normal thing to do - science and medicine already are playing God and causing more havoc than cures. We just need to accept the fact we cause all diseases because we are irresponsible with what God has given us. We want more and more and we want to live forever instead of taking life as it is even if it is going to be a short one. It is like the story about the person who received a Heart transplant and after their release from the hospital the very next day, gets run over by a car and dies. This was fate and nothing could have changed it. Life is a chance. We need to make and live life in the best way we can. Live your life as if it was your very last day.

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    • June 11, 2009 by Parrot

      Because of all the nasty chemicals and pollution in this world today, you cannot say that cancer is natural selection. Also, using embryonic stem cells is not killing a newborn. You need to be educated on what research really is and how stem cells are used. First of all, the babies are not "killed" just for research. They are usually unwanted children and when people have babies when they do not want them, it is a murder of sorts because then the child is neglected or ends up with emotional problems later in life. On the other hand, finding cures for people who are suffering from cancer is a breakthrough. They have found chemotherapy and other treatments that have saved lives and families. Cancers and diseases are also triggered by environmental problems. Don't be so smug to think that you have exceptional genes just because you have not had any life threatening illness yet. I hope you never have to live through anything so terrible like cancer, but remember you are not immune to it.

    • December 22, 2009 by F

      Why do people feel the need to mention a god on issues of ethics? Gods are nothing more than human delusions meant to dehumanize the word. We are talking about "real" issues here. F

• May 22, 2008 by juan mendez

  My biggest hesitation in this test was placing a value on some else’s life. To say that the life of one is less than that of another is not a decision, I think, anybody is qualified to make. Playing God is better left to the higher powers, whoever it or they may be.

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• August 7, 2008 by Pasquale Bottiglieri

  I have two perspectives: software engineering and several years working with incarcerated adults as well as adjudicated adolescents. One of those years was in a state penitentiary. I am not a biologist but I try to see the human mind in the same general framework in which I see a computer; memory capacity (hardware) only capable of supporting cognitive thinking (software) in the form of instructions. How that software is created in the human mind is, I am sure, a combination of experience, learning capability (firmware), and, an area with which I can only speculate, possibly instinct. I am guessing here and don't mean to be insulting, but the weight of the individuals I encountered while working in prison disallows my accepting the idea that morality is hard wired, at least not in all cases. I do believe that rational thought leads to moral conclusions if the greatest good is the goal but rational thought may not be a gift acceptable to certain people. This is a difficult question and I thank the sponsor for providing the opportunity to comment.

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• November 15, 2008 by amber quiambao roseo

  I would agree that it does not seem likely for morality to be hard wired in a person's brain. If morality were a product of some biological disposition, then without education or experience, a person would make the same decision over and over again. This behavior would also continue on to their adulthood. But a child that does not share and is punished is less likely to repeat that behavior. I would argue that because children are taught that being selfish is bad, they choose not to do it again. It seems to me that morality is learned or developed. I think morality is founded on logic. People draw the line between rights and wrong based on the effects those choices have on the world. Some people choose to volunteer because they understand how helping can improve another's condition. I do not think emotions affect morality. I actually believe it is the other way around. A person reacts to situations based on their perspective. An act deemed immoral would result in negative emotions. If emotions affected morality, then everything that makes a person sad would be deemed immoral. This would mean paying respects to those that have passed or death itself would be determined immoral. If emotions ruled our morality, then nothing in this world would be definite. Laws put in place for practical reasons would be changeable based on the mood of the judge ruling. And I am quite certain judges are meant to look at situations objectively. At least I hope they would.

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• October 8, 2009 by stewart langley

  I couldn't even finish this test because it was so awful. You can't possibly test a person's morals based on outlandish scenarious. Morals are social constructs.

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  • December 22, 2009 by F

    What makes-up society? F

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• October 23, 2009 by Thomas Masty

  I think St. Thomas Aquinas had it right. We are all born with a spark of conscience and have a choice to exercise it like a muscle or to let it rot away to nothing. Keep in mind that 99% of ethics and morality is common sense and very rarely do the "trick questions" come up in life. We need to educate our youth on the 99% using practical traditional teaching methods before we have them struggle with nearly impossible moral problems.

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• December 11, 2009 by Ian MacLeod

  Killing one to save two is not a kind of math that can be called "right." Number applied like that to human beings is an algebra that never equates to any sort of balance. There are always other options. As evidence, look at the reactions of others after such things are done. It's a horrible, horrible situation to be in, and no matter what we do, we will not be in the right to most people. You simply cannot balance one person's suffering against another's, and numbers don't figure in these types of scenarios. Also, philosophical ideals rarely stand up in real world situations. Just as "a hungry man is no philosopher," while I suspect that ALL of us have ideals that we filled out this form with, I doubt that ANY of us could have followed them in MANY instances, little say MOST. I wish I were sure of what that means; I'm not, but I'm almost certain it's true. Ian

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• January 29, 2010 by ron

  I believe that we should love others even if they hate us.

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• February 22, 2010 by ric jimenez

  where's the test?

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• June 10, 2010 by Luis

  Some options given shouldn't be the only options. I know it says not to talk specifically about the test but I wanted to bring one question up.. John Doe makes spills juice on a rope that is being used by cliffhangers. A goat starts to chew on the rope. The test suggests his only options are between letting 5 people using the rope die or pushing 1 person to fall to his death but hit the goat in the process. The debate is like many others: 1 life vs 5.. but in this case, if it's HIS fault and feels so strongly about saving their lives... what about the option of jumping HIMSELF onto the goat and saving them, maybe sacrificing his own life in the process? Any of the other two options would make him wrong.

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• June 10, 2010 by Luis

  ..by the way, my point was that it makes the test a little inaccurate. If I disagree with his decision to push the 1 person, it is not because I place more value on that person over the 5 people.. it is that it should've been a different decision entirely.

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