MORAL REASONING V. MORAL KNOWLEDGE

Question: "What is the significance of the difference between moral reason and moral knowledge?"

An old saw has it that knowledge is information and wisdom the ability to put it to effect. In the context of the above question, moral knowledge is awareness of right and wrong, but moral reasoning involves the wisdom which comes with experience of living.

While they may have developed to Kohler's stage of moral judgement which entails an awareness of how their behavior impacts on others, children typically have not reached a level that they are able to independently reason the nature of morality. By their early teens, however, many young people have attained the ability to effectively implement their moral knowledge to new, unfamiliar situations, without being told what to do by an external authority. This internalization constitutes growth in wisdom.

Children learn what they live, another old saw says. They learn by example more than by words, and only by their own free will.

There can be little doubt that the highest morality is Love (agape). Since nothing can exist which is contrary to natural law, all events must be equally lawful. Human duty, then, consists in determining to experience the right event from one moment of consciousness to another. This can be attempted by moral reasoning, or by an existential acceptance of the fruition of one's being. Moral reasoning follows moral knowledge with the internalization of this experience. The significance of the difference, in developmental terms, is what we commonly refer to as maturity.

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Thomas S. Rue, MA, NCC
December 28, 1991

Psychological and Quantitative Foundations 7P:109
The University of Iowa - College of Education
Socialization of the School Age Child - Assignment #2
© 1991, Thomas S. Rue

Thomas Rue 1991-1993.
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