Moral consideration must extend to all beings — not only to those who share our nationality, language, religion, or species.
Humans form groups — by geography, ethnicity, ideology, class, religion. Belonging is a fundamental need. The problem arises when group identity becomes the basis for moral distinction: "us" receives compassion, "them" does not.
This operates at every scale. Nationalism privileges citizens over foreigners. Sectarianism privileges believers over non-believers. Racism privileges one phenotype over another. Even well-intentioned movements fall into the same pattern when they draw the circle of concern too narrowly.
The common thread is sentiment — emotional attachment to a group that unconsciously limits moral consideration to those inside it. Geosentiment, sociosentiment, and other forms of groupism are natural human tendencies — but when left unexamined, they produce most of the organized exploitation and cruelty we see in the world.
Humanism recognized that all humans deserve dignity regardless of origin — a significant step. But it still draws a boundary: the human species. This boundary permits the industrial exploitation of animals, the destruction of ecosystems, and the treatment of the natural world as raw material. Humanism operating at the level of nations — internationalism — can itself become group sentiment, privileging national interest over universal welfare.
A sentiment cannot be defeated by suppression — only by a stronger sentiment. The universalistic approach is to expand group feeling until it includes all beings and the universe itself.
When a person's sense of belonging extends beyond nation, species, and self-interest, the Morality Principles — non-harm, non-exploitation, truthfulness — naturally apply without boundary. All living beings share the capacity for suffering. Human wellbeing cannot be separated from the ecosystems we inhabit. Environmental destruction is not a separate issue from social justice — it is the same issue at a different scale.
For the deeper reasoning Fundamental philosophy.