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[RAM]

The study seemed to me to indicate that these people were completely incapable of respecting intent and dealt almost entirely with situations in which the result was already known, which completely invalidates its findings to me as morality has no function after the fact. Even in the case of using hindsight to determine how to treat someone who has performed an act, which, with hindsight, is a moral failure, the function of morality is in guiding those who do not know the results of their judging the action.

Will killing someone stop others from doing the same thing? If they were considering the consequences when they did it, then it may maintain pressure on those who chose not to. If they were acting without consideration however, then chances are that the punishment has no influence on those performing the act...

Morality is not about judging others who have acted, it is about judging decisions that might be chosen. Emotions are always bad for morality, but the brain almost certainly has a different definition of emotion than humans do..

[Grakelin]

I do not understand why people keep saying emotions are bad for morality. It is only our emotions that would keep us from nicking a small child from somebody to escape from the Titanic.

[RAM]

It is only emotion that would cause the child to grant access to escape craft and mostly emotion that would cause someone to value their own life over the effective evacuation of the vessel. If one only assesses the child's significance then it is superior for a unit of a parent and child who are familiar with one another's details and are therefore better able to support one another than for a unit of a child and adult whose abilities to support one another are unknown and almost certainly inferior. It would require a significant leap of logic to justify stealing a child that would infer a great personal conviction that was believed to be well founded. Furthermore, accepting a situation in which children are being stolen makes it highly unlikely that you will reach the escape craft without losing the child to another thief. Of course, logic does not imply intelligence or infallibility, though accuracy in all things, morality included, do somewhat rely upon them...

[eerr]

I believe the best system is, and remains, a hybrid of logic and emotion.

Significant maintenance is required though...

[Earthquake Damage]

I believe the best system is, and remains, reason.

Fixed.  More or less.

[Duke 2.0]

I believe the best system is, and remains, reason.

Fixed.  More or less.

Theoretical, mayhaps, but not a system humans can use.

[eerr]

I believe the best system is, and remains, reason.

Fixed.  More or less.

If only people remained reasonable at all times.

[Vitamin P]

Gulliver's last journey in Gulliver's Travels is to a society of intelligent horses where everything is completely governed by reason. I recommend reading it, you might change your mind.

[Maggarg - Eater of chicke]

The problem with emotion is that it's unreliable. It's hard to know if emotion is telling the truth or not. We like logic, why can't we rely on it exclusively? 

Because we're squishy meat-people governed by a blob of chemical-saturated blancmange.
I thus reserve the right to be irrational.

[Zangi]

Reminds me of the Vulcans.

No emotion, all logic.

If you mean the study reminds you of Vulcans, then you should read it again.  This has nothing to do with emotionless logic.  It has everything to do with a failure to connect intent with (potential;  no, make that probable) action.

Still does, but I was mostly referring to whatever people here are talking about in relation to that study.

The problem with emotion is that it's unreliable. It's hard to know if emotion is telling the truth or not. We like logic, why can't we rely on it exclusively? 

Logic also requires common sense... >.>  else it'll just be as bad as emotion... if not worse.  It doesn't cure human stupidity, but it can help mitigate it... to a point.  Still gotta deal with that lowest common denominator.

Think of the potential for War Crimes the "ends justify the means" logic... also the potential for immoral amoral scientific and medical advances...

[RAM]

What if the ends really do justify the means?

Human morality is based upon emotion, human morality is insulting, the obvious flaws in it are painful...

Human morality clearly states that it is better to steal food from two starving families than to let your own family starve. Logically if there is a lack of food and an abundance of humans your should add humans to food(not directly for various reasons...) until there is a perpetuation of the humans, or completely remove the humans as an impractical expenditure of resources. The end result is that you either end up with more, better off humans, or a far more robust system. The idea that humans are sacred is the pinnacle of both human morality and human evil...

Atrocities throughout human history have almost always involved making the victims appear less human, at which point the atrocities are humane by 'protecting the good civilised folk', or 'ensuring the purity of the species', or 'giving the gift of human civilisation to the savages' or even just uplifting them to a proper human democratic government if we need to level half their country to do it. Its not like it matters, they weren't properly living anyway...
 Likewise virtue has always been more potent when applied to humans, killing a pet is worse then hunting, why? Because the pet is considered part of human society, the wild animal is just meat. Attempting to genocide entire kingdoms from your domain is considered virtuous in some quarters. Some people attempt to add all mammals to their 'human' category, becoming vegetarian or something. Some even try to protect the trees and insects. But the simple fact is that the path of morality doesn't lie in expanding your bias, it lies in abandoning it...

[Zangi]

Well, I do lean toward the "end justifies the means" side of things.  I figure it generally isn't looked upon as favorably...

I do agree on your assessment of atrocities.  Some A few people are now dehumanizing the Al-Queda and Taliban, considering I've had an argument/debate earlier on it in this forum.

There could be a few other current examples of such things happening right now in this world... but its all about perspective...

[Grakelin]

This study is different than doing evil for the sake of good, though. The woman isn't alive because of anything her friend did. She's alive despite what her friend did.

[RAM]

This study is about people with brain damage being unable to interpret other people's intent...

[Strife26]

Logic can't work without emotion.

To logically define a series of choices, one must figure out all the consequences of each choice. When those choices deal with other people, logic tends to break down, becuase some things aren't reducible to numbers and inequalities. How does one choose between saving two people with logic? Do you rate usefullness to society, usefulness to self, age, sex, probability of rescue (which opens up its own can of worms trying to find a constant), so on and so forth. Not only do you need an answer, but you need the logic behind that answer.

TLDR: Logic doesn't work by itself, it requires undefinable things to be defined.