On Moral Authority

Moral authority is external to the self and is derived through the coercive power of the conventions and the religious, social, and intellectual establishments. There is no inner source of morality because all human instruments of knowledge rest on sense perception which lacks the capacity for bridging the gap between the “is” and the “ought.” Our mind might give us a clue about the “is” but to derive an “ought” from it we need to accept theories that we learn through our conventions and institutions. The instruments of political and social power in a society are the fountainhead of all moral beliefs.