Is morality partially derived from authority?

[Khantazm]

Or, "not another morality thread!" Sorry... but there's no harm in asking, right? :P

People perceive actions as right or wrong based on (in part) what those whom they consider authority do or say in relevance to those actions.

 

[Ryan_m_b]

There's nothing wrong with a thread about ethics so long as it is absolutely free of any personal theories/ideas and sticks to referencing actual research.

Regarding your question you may be interested in reading about the Milgram experiment and the Stanford prison experiment. Both death with morality under authoritarian conditions but note that both involve controversial experimental methods and their findings, whilst interesting, aren't definitive.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milgram_experiment

The Milgram experiment on obedience to authority figures was a series of social psychology experiments conducted by Yale University psychologist Stanley Milgram, which measured the willingness of study participants to obey an authority figure who instructed them to perform acts that conflicted with their personal conscience.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanford_prison_experiment

The Stanford prison experiment (or SPE) was a study of the psychological effects of becoming a prisoner or prison guard. The experiment was conducted at Stanford University from August 14 to August 20, 1971, by a team of researchers led by psychology professor Philip Zimbardo.[1] It was funded by the US Office of Naval Research[2] and was of interest to both the US Navy and Marine Corps as an investigation into the causes of conflict between military guards and prisoners.
Twenty-four male students out of seventy-five were selected to take on randomly assigned roles of prisoners and guards in a mock prison situated in the basement of the Stanford psychology building. The participants adapted to their roles well beyond Zimbardo's expectations, as the guards enforced authoritarian measures and ultimately subjected some of the prisoners to psychological torture. Many of the prisoners passively accepted psychological abuse and, at the request of the guards, readily harassed other prisoners who attempted to prevent it. The experiment even affected Zimbardo himself, who, in his role as the superintendent, permitted the abuse to continue. Two of the prisoners quit the experiment early and the entire experiment was abruptly stopped after only six days. Certain portions of the experiment were filmed and excerpts of footage are publicly available.

 

[Khantazm]

Those experiments were actually part of the base for my speculations, for which I apologize. Would you be aware of any place where those would be invited? I thought instead of starting an obsession I should discuss this with a professional, but I stumbled in excitement.