Conscience

Where and how does conscience come about?

Is it something innate, something each human is born with? Or is it socialized into us during childhood?

Most social animals rely heavily on positive/negative feedback from their members. Selfless acts (altruism) towards those who are close receive positive feedback and selfish acts toward those who are close receive negative feedback. Could this conditioning eventually bias our species towards altruism and against selfishness (the birth of guilt)? And on more primitive level, could conscience simply be a manifestation of an earlier instinct of what is harmful and helpful (good vs. bad) that has been passed on (and eventually evolved) from our ancestors based on their experiences?

Or is conscience likely formed on its own during the development of ego in childhood? The first sign of conscience in children is a display of guilt, and conscience is normally understood by psychologists as development of sense of guilt. Freud claimed that conscience (through superego) comes about as a result of child’s attachments to and consequent conflicts with his parents (authority figures). In this context, could parental upbringing (spoiling the child?) possibly explain the few people who appear to have weaker conscience and guilt?

Conscience also plays a big part in spirituality (relationship of ego to the ultimate Altruism/God). The main view seems to maintain that conscience is the highest point in the development of human egoism, the point where ego starts to sense a difference between self and absolute altruism (god).

There is a notion that conscience is a product of civilization. Do people societies with less developed culture (primitives) have a less defined conscience/guilt as is often claimed?