Thus our morality… is as much the result of an evolutionary selection process as our reason… so that one should never suppose that our reason is in the highest critical position and that only those moral rules are valid which our reason endorses.
F. A. Hayek
Thus Our Morality
Topic: Society & Civil Religion
“Thus our morality, whose explanation and justification has seemed so unsatisfactory, is as much the result of an evolutionary selection process as is our reason, which however stems from a separate development, so that one should never suppose that our reason is in the highest critical position and that only those moral rules are valid which our reason endorses. Certain moral rules which are not obvious to our reason nonetheless are the conditions for mankind being able to reach its current numbers.”
Friedrich August von Hayek CH FBA (8 May 1899 – 23 March 1992), often referred to by his initials F. A. Hayek, was an Austrian-British economist and philosopher best known for his defense of classical liberalism. Hayek shared the 1974 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences with Gunnar Myrdal for his "pioneering work in the theory of money and economic fluctuations and ... penetrating analysis of the interdependence of economic, social and institutional phenomena".
Anderson,Gordon L. Toward a Headwing Society: The Harmony of Three Social Spheres (Journal of Unification Studies Vol. 13, 2012), pp. 73-112 [F. A. Hayek "The Presumption of Reason," International Conference on the Unity of the Sciences, 1985].
F. A. Hayek
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F. A. Hayek “The Presumption of Reason”
Gordon L. Anderson
A mature social consciousness also involves the integration of both the non-rational principles that have evolved in human cultural history, and often appear morally relative, as well as those rational principles of logic and science that can be readily understood by people of all cultural backgrounds and are more easily accepted as universal. In the Divine Principle, these two modes of knowledge are considered to be internal and external truth. A mature social consciousness should involve a social yoga that understands the nature of the entire society and how its internal and external parts fit together.
Universal values can also be discovered through science and social science. This is the method of knowledge acquisition taught in modern universities. Rev. Moon also gave major support for the advancement of the relationship between science and values through the International Conference on the Unity of the Sciences (ICUS). Nobel laureates and distinguished scientists attended these conferences and a number of them continue their work today in the schools promoting integral studies.
On receiving the International Conference on the Unity of the Sciences (ICUS) Founder’s Prize from Rev. Moon in 1985, F.A. Hayek made the following observation related to non-rational and rational modes of knowledge: [See Quote in Context above].
–Gordon L. Anderson [Toward a Headwing Society: The Harmony of Three Social Spheres (Journal of Unification Studies Vol. 13, 2012)] pp. 73-112.