Why do we expect the World to be fair?

Why do we expect the World to be fair?

Not a day passes by without hearing somebody say “it’s not fair”, or “I don’t deserve this”. Why do we expect this? Religions certainly promote this concept and expectation. “Be good and you will be rewarded”, by God’s will or by other supernatural means, or perhaps a conclusion reached through mere observation on how life operates - assault somebody and he does not like you, praise somebody and he likes you. Seems pretty obvious doesn’t it? Buddhists have a principle called “Paticca Samaupadda” or dependent origination which essentially means that every effect has a cause and the Law of Karma is part of this belief. Do good and beneficial results follow, and vice versa.

Why should the material Universe apparently have Moral Laws? To believe that an action produces a reaction is understandable but why should this have a moral dimension? For Society to function laws are necessary and laws essentially reward good behaviour and punish bad ones. But we have expectations beyond that. "What have I done to deserve this sadness of losing my loved one prematurely?", "Why is that crooked Businessman so rich and powerful in spite of all the shady deals he is responsible for?" Ah! You say, he will be eventually punished but is that really true? We know of many who died naturally without ever being punished. The only way now to invoke moral justice is to extend life beyond death and say he will suffer in his next birth or that he will go to Hell or some such undesirable place.

But things become more difficult when we explore deeper. It may be perfectly logical for a man to kill another when he is threatened in a situation where failure to do so would almost certainly bring about his own death. But does taking the life of a man deliberately always result ultimately in bad consequences? There are certainly people who believe that through unknown mechanisms, our “bad” and “good” actions are noted in a “ledger” of some sort and these will count in the final analysis.

What I know is that time and time again, it has been shown that many men without any religious beliefs and men who are pure Atheists have an innate sense of moral behaviour. It is “wired” into us. We don’t need Religion to be good citizens. On the contrary, Religion (or interpretation of it), has been responsible for the most heinous crimes in History.

My own conclusion as a one who accepts the Theory of Evolution as a fact, is that survival of a species is favoured by behaviours such as cooperation, love and concern for each other and peaceful co-existence. This does not mean that every bad action inevitably leads to a bad result but on a probability basis there is a high likelihood that it would. To postulate that it is inevitable goes against the laws of Nature, unless you invoke supernatural concepts such as God or karma. Within the framework of life and the Universe, random events and "chance" operates. A tree may fall on a car and crush the passenger to death. Do we need to invoke a theory that somehow, the unfortunate occupant "deserved" this because of some previous action, or in other words, he is responsible for experiencing this?