Political Obligation - Are you obligated to follow the law?

> I tend to agree: the core laws merely codify pre existing morals while the accessory laws exist to encourage a certain desirable outcome. And to justify punishment (i.e. the parental perspective that is so common in politics, religion and authority). Essentially. The critical laws that we have to have to even function as a society (laws against murder, for instance), are moral ideals that are almost innately understood by almost everyone in the first place. When you start making other laws where the morality gets a lot more blurry (like prohibition of particular substances), you end up with these kinds of bad laws that people are willing to break because it does not line up with their general moral view. > However the rabbit hole goes deeper when you start questioning what morals are founded on: pragmatism (don't kill is better for the tribe) or something else? That's a good question too, and it's a hard question. For instance, Frederick Nietzsche, when he announced the death of God, said that human beings would have to create their own moral systems and create new value systems. One of his students (I forget who) refuted that, basically saying (drastically simplified) "Who says you can create your own values? You can't even act without some kind of value system in the first place. But maybe we could re-discover the values that we've lost [with the death of God]". It's such a hard thing, because I know it's wrong to kill, for instance. Outside of very specific, narrow circumstances (protecting my life or the life of another), it's morally wrong. And I think most people would agree with that. Is that something learned? Through culture or something along those lines? Is it taught through the various stories and myths that surround our existence and history? Is it something innate, a sense of morality that's inside us, the same way veins and arteries are? I don't know what the answer is, and it's hard thing to answer.