“What, precisely, is so bad about sex between adult siblings, bestiality, and the eating of corpses?”
I’m glad you asked.
Paul Bloom of Yale looks at the oft-irrational premises of disgust in modern times, delving also into its more ancient roots to look at where disgust comes from (for those who don’t want to read the whole article, it’s this [vastly oversimplified, of course]: a biological adaptation to keep us from eating things we shouldn’t). An interesting article. Moral of the story? There is generally nothing inherently moral about disgust, and we’d do well to be wary about using it as a moral compass. We’d do better yet, in fact, looking to other avenues of decision-making.
(Guardian: “To urgh is human,” by Paul Bloom [July 22, 2004])