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Yup, Steve. There is no doubt that evolution and personal experience and development hardwire us to make 'ethical' and 'moral' impulse decisions. Thing is that we also are equipped with the software to instantly override these automotic settings.
Think of a modern digital camera with wee buttons to produce the best results in specific lighting conditions: dawn, sunny, overcast, evening, darkness. Even automatic focus. Then there's the manual override for special situations when you may need an in-between light setting and want to, say, focus on background rather than foreground.
We have the manual overdrive. And that allows us to quickly adjust to a special situation that wasn't anticipated by the manufacturer.
A becoming-famous example is that of the man on the railway track.
Is it moral to deliberately change the points so that you divert the midnight special to knock him down and kill him? Of course not. That's cold-blooded murder. Our hard wiring tells us so. A no brainer, eh?
But ... is it ethical and moral to sacrifice that stranger's life if it saves the train from a line blockage and potentially saves a half-dozen other lives? Hmmm ...
Hard-wired morality and ethics won't help you. Manual override must be instantly brought into play. Your hand is on the lever. You have a split second in which to use it or let it fall to your side. One life or six?
The very last post in this thread from Nyrath is poignant: "Never let your sense of morals prevent you from doing what is right."
My question is simply; can it?
This is all a very complex study with answers and puzzles a-million and, perhaps, better discussed on a more specialised board. The kind of place where, again, I always seem to leave scratching my head and wondering, enriched with questions rather than overwhelmed by answers.
Hoots toots. Neil
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