In what way have we reinvented the discussion, though?

And what about our understanding of ourselves as moral beings has changed?

I guess what I'm getting at is daily life, the way these advances influence our daily conduct. What are we to draw from these advances as moral agents?

Just one question: haven't people been asking the questions "what do we typically do" and "how do we typically decide" for at least a thousand years?

Buddhism begins with these questions and moves from there.

Not that I'm aware of. Other than Buddhism do you have examples?

It's not the same, though. Granted Buddhism has psychological insight that's absent from any other ancient religion, largely because it's so focused on thought rather than ritual. But still they're not asking the psychological questions analytically. The earliest moral precepts in Buddhism, like the Eightfold Path, are discussed in contraposition to the "what do we do". It happens that the Buddhist idea of suffering has psychological merit, but they don't present that as the result of some kind of inquiry.

Rather, we are told how we ought to think in contrast to how we do think. Much as in Judaism we are told to eschew idolatry, etc.

Vipassana, or insight meditation, also starts with concentration exercise susing appropriate objects on which one focuses. In this procedure, however,once a certain level of concentration is achieved so that undistracted focusing can be maintained, one goes on to examine with steady, careful attention and in great detail all sensory and mental processes. Through this contemplation, one becomes a detached observer of one's own activity.The objects of this contemplation are classified as fourfold: body,sensations, mental states, and "mental objects"--for example, various moral and intellectual subjects. The aim is to achieve total and immediate awareness, or mindfulness, of all phenomena. This leads, it is claimed,eventually to the full and clear perception of the impermanence of all things and beings (Majjhima Nikaya, I, 1888-1902; Samyutta Nikaya, V, 1884-1898).

Quote:

Aedes wrote:

Perhaps both idolatry and Buddhist-style suffering could be seeds for further study, but that's not the direction these traditions went.

What direction did Buddhism and Judaism go? I know for a fact that Buddhism went in the direction of studying suffering and developing practices, essentially through trial and error, for the cessation of suffering. And I'm pretty sure that Jews have devoted some attention to ways of addressing man's tendency to be idolatrous, ect.

Not that I'm aware of. Other than Buddhism do you have examples?

It's not the same, though. Granted Buddhism has psychological insight that's absent from any other ancient religion, largely because it's so focused on thought rather than ritual. But still they're not asking the psychological questions analytically. The earliest moral precepts in Buddhism, like the Eightfold Path, are discussed in contraposition to the "what do we do". It happens that the Buddhist idea of suffering has psychological merit, but they don't present that as the result of some kind of inquiry.

Vipassana, or insight meditation, also starts with concentration exercises
using appropriate objects on which one focuses. In this procedure, however,
once a certain level of concentration is achieved so that undistracted
focusing can be maintained, one goes on to examine with steady, careful
attention and in great detail all sensory and mental processes. Through
this contemplation, one becomes a detached observer of one's own activity.
The objects of this contemplation are classified as fourfold: body,
sensations, mental states, and "mental objects"--for example, various moral
and intellectual subjects. The aim is to achieve total and immediate
awareness, or mindfulness, of all phenomena. This leads, it is claimed,
eventually to the full and clear perception of the impermanence of all
things and beings (Majjhima Nikaya, I, 1888-1902; Samyutta Nikaya, V,

Don't moral notions arise because someone notices a certain way in which humans tend to act that the person despises?

It seems to me that we are just getting better information about the way man acts with science

Isn't the whole of the tradition presented as an inquiry? The Buddha develops his dharma through inquiry, meditating on the problem of suffering, and in teaching suggests that practitioners do the same - discover these moral precepts on their own.

The aim is to achieve total and immediate awareness, or mindfulness, of all phenomena. This leads, it is claimed, eventually to the full and clear perception of the impermanence of all things and beings

What direction did Buddhism and Judaism go?

Still, that's not the same question. The Buddhist approach is contemplative, but not systematic. And the question in Buddhism arises from a priori assumptions (the Noble Truths are assumptions) that are arrived at through contemplation.

This is revelatory and somewhat mystical contemplation of metaphysical truths. And in this statement it assumes the conclusion of impermanence. It doesn't study the process of thought that predisposes to that conclusion. It assumes that that conclusion will be reached with the correct approach. This is the opposite of the scientific question.

DT, maybe this isn't innate to you if you don't think about science much, but science is not a kind of question -- it's a kind of method. The same question can be asked and answered in many ways. But the scientific approach is the only one whose answer illuminates the way we humans think about morality. Of course on the other hand it gives no insight into moral conclusions -- but we don't turn to science for that.

Science and Morality:

Reinventing Morality

A group of patients with damage to a small region in the ventromedial frontal cortex has been examined with respect to moral reasoning. These patients are otherwise normal by available criteria. If confronted with the hostage example, most people will say that it is morally wrong to kill the specific person singled out randomly. We would enter into a complex set of moral issues to decide what to do. Instead, those with the ventromedial lesion, which appears to impair the connection between our emotional system and our rational system, have not the slightest hesitation in agreeing that the specific person should be killed to save the rest. They have become good utilitarians.

I said that Buddhism does ask those questions, and approaches them analytically ("what do we do?" "how do we decide").