This is just so confused. Atheism isn’t itself a set of explanations. It’s simply a label given to people that don’t jump to a particular set of conclusions.

Conclusions which, I might add, never really provide any serious answers to those questions. “It got done by something that can do anything” is basically synonymous with saying “I have no idea how it got done.”

How much of a feral child’s behavior is due to never being taught normal behavior, vs. never having the opportunity to naturally develop normal behavior through interactions with others? Sort of how a muscle will atrophy if you never use it.

I would point to inner city gangs as an example of what you are talking about I think. Sure looks like regressive behaviour to me…

How much of a feral child’s behavior is due to never being taught normal behavior, vs. never having the opportunity to naturally develop normal behavior through interactions with others? Sort of how a muscle will atrophy if you never use it.

Just wild speculation, since I really know very little of psychology.

According to some child psychologists that I have read, understanding yourself in relation to other people or objects can only come through social interactions (i.e. Object Relations Theory). Without that essential definition of consciousness, I don’t see how a feral child could be altruistic, which is understanding right and wrong at the most basic level.

Agreed – these feral children also lack the symbology of social interactions i.e. language and seem incapable of any ‘internal dialogue’ that we take for granted. But this is far from established fact – but a plausible hypothesis.

As for animal altruism, the best example I can think of are elephants. Elephants in the wild have been repeatedly documented apparently grieving for dead members of the herd. When they pass the spot where the other elephant died, whey will stop and trumpet in distress

Anyway, I really don’t know how I feel about humans and other animals having an innate since of good and wrong, or of altruism. I’ve heard a lot of really compelling stories of animal altruism, and I don’t doubt it’s prevalence, but I do wonder if it is a learned behavior, a social construct. Even among social insects there is a strong sense of altruism, but is it programmed behavior or copied behavior? I don’t know. I think this is a problem that comes up again and again though, because it’s very difficult to separate socially generation meme-ish behaviors from actual instincts, since almost every living thing has been socialized to some extent.

I spend a great deal of time a few months ago reading about cases of feral children. Feral children, and especially isolated children, lack everything that could be considered normal human behavior, including the ability to display emotions and walk upright. I’ve read that the mind of feral children lack “consciousness,” that is they lack an understanding of themselves in relation to other people or the outside world. According to some child psychologists that I have read, understanding yourself in relation to other people or objects can only come through social interactions (i.e. Object Relations Theory). Without that essential definition of consciousness, I don’t see how a feral child could be altruistic, which is understanding right and wrong at the most basic level.

The proverbial man on a deserted island is incapable of committing evil acts, as there is simply no one to be the recipiant of his evil! Sure, he can cause himself physical or emotional pain, but pain without empathetic interaction is not evil. It is simply pain.

Well put…What I am about to say will vex Christians reading it – but I am going there anyway

Even Anton LaVey’s Satanic Bible had the central tenet of ‘Do as thou wilt, save it harm not other’. Not too far from the Golden Rule or the philosophy of the Jain religion. Just as an aside – a good (to me at least) book on this subject is ‘The Science of Good and Evil’ by Micael Shermer…avalable here