Register | Sign In


Understanding through Discussion


EvC Forum active members: 65 (9162 total)
4 online now:
Newest Member: popoi
Post Volume: Total: 915,815 Year: 3,072/9,624 Month: 917/1,588 Week: 100/223 Day: 11/17 Hour: 0/0


Thread  Details

Email This Thread
Newer Topic | Older Topic
  
Author Topic:   Why It Is Right To Do Good To Others
anastasia
Member (Idle past 5952 days)
Posts: 1857
From: Bucks County, PA
Joined: 11-05-2006


Message 136 of 304 (406406)
06-19-2007 8:09 PM
Reply to: Message 132 by Stile
06-18-2007 2:56 PM


Re: A Summary
Stile writes:
My apologies, please disregard the previous explanation. I got hung up on "your mom's feelings increasing" that I forgot to identify the action in the first place. Your mom and husaband can think whatever they want. The action is "going to church". No one's getting affected by it. The action is morally neutral.
Must be nice to be so ...unencumbered or something. In my life, people are definitely affected by my going to church.
But hello, you are leaving thousands of actions open to debate that are not covered by your idea of morality.
Are you one of those people who have no opinion about being wasted drunk or doing drugs, as long as its not affecting anyone?
You must be in the minority. By your logic, a person can drink and drive up to and until they hit someone, and even then they didn't knowingly and willingly interact with a person. Don't be naive. Everything we do can affect someone, and if it has the potential to be bad, our society treats it as bad, by and large.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 132 by Stile, posted 06-18-2007 2:56 PM Stile has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 139 by Stile, posted 06-20-2007 3:32 PM anastasia has replied

  
anastasia
Member (Idle past 5952 days)
Posts: 1857
From: Bucks County, PA
Joined: 11-05-2006


Message 137 of 304 (406410)
06-19-2007 8:40 PM
Reply to: Message 131 by Stile
06-18-2007 2:41 PM


Re: Motivation and Action are seperate
Stile writes:
Must I say this is every post...
I'm NOT saying Morally Good = anything that increases the inner feelings of anyone.
I'm being very specific in saying:
Morally Good = an action that increases the inner-feelings of the being acted upon
Stile, what's the bloomin' difference?
As to the rest of your post, I definitely 100% feel that motivation is what makes us moral or immoral. You are way, way confused.
There are things which make people happy, they can be done accidently, purposefully, chain reaction ,etc. Morality is NOT about any random thing which happens to please someone. It is about whether YOU knowingly and from sheer belief in the goodness of it, perform an action when you could have done otherwise.
Every possible fallacy that you are giving to me and others here, is in reality your own. It is YOU who are making everything and everyone moral, because YOU say that we can be moral by accident. Nice challenge there.
You are also dodging every question and shifting the goals, or reposting your 'points' while nitpicking over words that express the same concept.
I don't care what kind of morals you have, but I am frustrated at your communication/conversation skills, and the difficulty you have with understanding how anyone else feels. For all your preaching it is you who is being close-minded and holier-than-thou. Everyone here is entirely familar with your whole system, and not liking it either. When I tell you about what I do, you deny it having any importance or validity.
I don't mean this to be offensive, it's just what it is, but I should have ended this a ways back when you kept reposting things that were irrelevent.
I asked your motives for doing whatever you think is good. Apparently you can do good with bad motives, but that doesn't make you moral. Neither does an accident. I would rather do bad with good motives.
Edited by anastasia, : No reason given.
Edited by anastasia, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 131 by Stile, posted 06-18-2007 2:41 PM Stile has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 140 by Stile, posted 06-20-2007 3:50 PM anastasia has not replied

  
ikabod
Member (Idle past 4493 days)
Posts: 365
From: UK
Joined: 03-13-2006


Message 138 of 304 (406442)
06-20-2007 3:42 AM
Reply to: Message 135 by Stile
06-19-2007 3:06 PM


Re: More clarification
sorry to say this but GOT YOU !
just look at what you have done in you reply to the dilemma answers .. you have played god .. you have given yourself the power to know and anaylsis way beyond any human ... you HAD to base you responce on JUST the give info .. you do not have superpowers to slow down time so you can go look up the mothers life history .. or read her mind .. or be so all powerfull that all knowleged is yours ..you just dont know IF she ...
it was a single mother, no family left, no friends, and she was terminally ill (miraculously not affecting the baby) anyway. She dies the next day. The baby had a foster family waiting for it to take care of it and give it a full life where it would meet lots of friends and do many great things.
That sounds bad too.
.. life is harsh you dont get all the facts you get a small window to see through
so you morallity has to be able to cope with very limited info .. not infinate knowledge .
And sorry but as youtr rule one did not include the words treat .. and not get in the was . i think my point about it being a absolute statement is made either you mean exaclty that or you was to have a fexible staement to allow you grey morality ..
and im sorry but you DO
prevent anyone's pursuit of life or happiness if it doesn't abuse anyone elses pursuit of life or happiness.
you live a western world life style ..you create mass amounts of garbage , you consume way more that a equal share of the world resorces , this prevents / impedes others pursuit of happiness directly ... and yes we are all guilty ..
Not at all. I'm not denying the existance of values on good and bad. I'm just saying this system doesn't touch any of that. All it simply does is identify good and bad. Ships crew and passengers... each choice has good and bad aspects to it. Do you deny that observation? It seems relatively obvious. That my system correctly depicts each choice containing both good and bad seems to be in it's favour. If it didn't, than something's obviously wrong with it.
err how can you id good and bad with a system that does not touch on the existance of good and bad ?????
crew OR passenges .. remember you MUST pick one , therefore you must it matters not if one or the other has some good some bad aspects .. you must pick ONE .. you are allowed to be wrong ..all your system is doing is delaying the choice and giving you a out , by saying both contain some bad .. in the mean time the ship sinks and both die while you are debating .. now that is bad ...
your system does not give you a answer .. if it did you could tell me that answer .. if the system fails to provide a answer it is not fit for purpose .
My system doesn't rely on hope to identify good and bad. And it identifies good and bad very well, too.
firstly i disagree and further its not giving you any answers to the moral question and dilemma's crew or passengers mother or child which ??
Removing their cocaine IS a morally bad thing. Why do you think you should get to decide if someone should use cocaine or not?
hmm so allowing some one to kill them selves is morally good ??
if your brother went from a couple of drinks at the weekends to a bottle of gin every day would you not intervene .. ask them why , try to help them reduce the amount of alcohol they drink to a safe level .
do you think all drugs should be legal and unrestricted .. should 13 year olds be able to buy alcohol , cocaine , etc.
Morallity makes demands on us ,here to help others even if they do not want that help .. deal with peoples needs , even if this means not "treating" them equally .
My system doesn't rely on hope to identify good and bad. And it identifies good and bad very well, too.
I'm so very glad my moral system is not a "look-up" table.
err does your system not produce the same answer for the same input each time ?? thus it will produce look up tables compiled from the results .. and you could use it in advance to run events to add to you lookup table ....... or does it give different answers if you rerun a situatuiion ??
Edited by ikabod, : edit due to interupt ..
Edited by ikabod, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 135 by Stile, posted 06-19-2007 3:06 PM Stile has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 141 by Stile, posted 06-20-2007 4:11 PM ikabod has replied

  
Stile
Member
Posts: 4295
From: Ontario, Canada
Joined: 12-02-2004


Message 139 of 304 (406493)
06-20-2007 3:32 PM
Reply to: Message 136 by anastasia
06-19-2007 8:09 PM


Let's stick to the topic
anastasia writes:
Are you one of those people who have no opinion about being wasted drunk or doing drugs, as long as its not affecting anyone?
Sure I have my opinion. But that's not what I'm talking about here. I'm talking about what IS good.
By your logic, a person can drink and drive up to and until they hit someone, and even then they didn't knowingly and willingly interact with a person. Don't be naive.
Wait... when did we start talking about legalities? I've been talking about morality and what IS good.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 136 by anastasia, posted 06-19-2007 8:09 PM anastasia has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 153 by anastasia, posted 06-21-2007 9:28 PM Stile has replied

  
Stile
Member
Posts: 4295
From: Ontario, Canada
Joined: 12-02-2004


Message 140 of 304 (406495)
06-20-2007 3:50 PM
Reply to: Message 137 by anastasia
06-19-2007 8:40 PM


Re: Motivation and Action are seperate
anastasia writes:
Stile writes:
Stile writes:
Must I say this is every post...
I'm NOT saying Morally Good = anything that increases the inner feelings of anyone.
I'm being very specific in saying:
Morally Good = an action that increases the inner-feelings of the being acted upon
Stile, what's the bloomin' difference?
Scenario: Person A murdering victim B decreases the inner-feelings of victim B and increases the inner-feelings of bystander X.
What I'm NOT saying:
Morally Good = anything (the murder) that increases the inner feelings of anyone (bystander X)
-By this logic, this scenario is a morally good act.
What I AM saying:
Morally Good = an action (the murder) that increases the inner-feelings of the being acted upon (victim B)
-By this logic, this scenario is a morally bad act.
I don't know how to show the difference any simpler.
As to the rest of your post, I definitely 100% feel that motivation is what makes us moral or immoral. You are way, way confused.
What you've described isn't confusion. It's just "different from anastasia". My system also prevents anyone from corrupting others into following whatever "they say" are good actions. My system does not allow "whatever anyone wants to be good" to be good. I would say that motivation can make us better or worse, but doesn't make a difference to how we actually treat other people.
Morality is NOT about any random thing which happens to please someone.
I agree.
Morally Good = an action that increases the inner-feelings of the being acted upon
It is about whether YOU knowingly and from sheer belief in the goodness of it, perform an action when you could have done otherwise.
No, this is trying to be moral. It's not moral. Living like this will certainly cause you to make a few mistakes that are not morally good. My system recognizes these mistakes for what they are (accidentally doing bad), and then incorporates the correct actions in order to always do as much good as possible.
Every possible fallacy that you are giving to me and others here, is in reality your own. It is YOU who are making everything and everyone moral, because YOU say that we can be moral by accident. Nice challenge there.
No. You, anastasia, think that's what I'm saying. Even when I repeatedly show you that I'm not saying that.
I don't care what kind of morals you have, but I am frustrated at your communication/conversation skills, and the difficulty you have with understanding how anyone else feels. For all your preaching it is you who is being close-minded and holier-than-thou.
The whole reasons this thread is here, is because YOU stated that my system DIDN'T EVEN EXIST. If you no longer care, than stop posting. However, as long as you state my system doesn't exist or is impossible, I will correct you.
I asked your motives for doing whatever you think is good.
Answered right away in Message 1
Clarified a bit in Message 97

This message is a reply to:
 Message 137 by anastasia, posted 06-19-2007 8:40 PM anastasia has not replied

  
Stile
Member
Posts: 4295
From: Ontario, Canada
Joined: 12-02-2004


Message 141 of 304 (406497)
06-20-2007 4:11 PM
Reply to: Message 138 by ikabod
06-20-2007 3:42 AM


But what IS good?
sorry to say this but GOT YOU !
You're allowed to "win" as many battles in your mind as you please.
.. life is harsh you dont get all the facts you get a small window to see through
Agreed. However, that's not what we're talking about. We're talking about what IS good. Not what WE THINK or WE HOPE is good.
so you morallity has to be able to cope with very limited info .. not infinate knowledge .
Of course it does. We try to be good. The usage of this system is to identify to ourselves when we've failed. Then we can use this knowledge to learn how to correct our actions and progress onto doing as much good as we possibly can at all times.
you live a western world life style ..you create mass amounts of garbage , you consume way more that a equal share of the world resorces , this prevents / impedes others pursuit of happiness directly ... and yes we are all guilty ..
I never said I never did anything bad.
What I said was that this system identifies good and bad actions.
How the system judges me has no bearing on how the system works.
You're making this discussion extremely personal. That's not what it's meant for. The discussion is about what IS good. Not if anyone DOES good, or if STILE is good or not. It is about what IS good. The proposed system identifies what IS good.
err how can you id good and bad with a system that does not touch on the existance of good and bad ?????
How does it not touch on the existance of good and bad? It defines "good". That's the whole point. To get a definition for what "good" is.
Morally good = an action that increases the inner-feelings of the being acted upon
your system does not give you a answer .. if it did you could tell me that answer .. if the system fails to provide a answer it is not fit for purpose
Agreed. If the system does not give an answer, it is not fit for the purpose of answering that question.
The system has nothing to do with telling someone what to choose. Therefore, the system is rightfully useless when telling someone what to choose.
The system is equally rightfully useless when identiying plant-life.
The system identifies if an action on a being is good or bad.
The person, after good/bad identification, can choose to be good, choose to be bad, or choose whatever they want.
These actions involve more than 1 person. We'ed need a way to measure the value of good in order to decide these questions objectively. This system proposes nothing of the sort.
hmm so allowing some one to kill them selves is morally good ??
if your brother went from a couple of drinks at the weekends to a bottle of gin every day would you not intervene .. ask them why , try to help them reduce the amount of alcohol they drink to a safe level .
What if my brother was 105 years old? What if he lived in constant pain, had seen everything he possibly wanted to see in life, and knew he was a constant stress on everyone he loved? What if he than wanted a bottle of gin every day in order to kill himself because he wanted to leave this world? Why is it bad to help him?
ANY action can be "good" or "bad" in different situations. The situations all depend on HOW different people are affected.
err does your system not produce the same answer for the same input each time ?? thus it will produce look up tables compiled from the results .. and you could use it in advance to run events to add to you lookup table ....... or does it give different answers if you rerun a situatuiion ??
Different answers. I thought that was obvious.
Morally Good = an action that increases the inner-feelings of the being acted upon.
How a being's inner-feelings react to a situation are personally subjective to them. The responses are not a "look-up" table. However, you can look them up (by getting the information from the being acted upon) and objectively discover if the action was good or bad.
The same action, on the same person, can easily be good one time, and bad the next.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 138 by ikabod, posted 06-20-2007 3:42 AM ikabod has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 143 by ikabod, posted 06-21-2007 10:24 AM Stile has replied

  
pelican
Member (Idle past 4985 days)
Posts: 781
From: australia
Joined: 05-27-2007


Message 142 of 304 (406516)
06-20-2007 8:30 PM


motivation is everything
Motivation has everything to do with our actions. Not one action is taken without a motive. You may not be aware of your motive but it is there. At a deep level, I don't believe we do anything for anyone else. Every action is a statement of who we are in one form or another.
Morals are just a way of control, even if it is for the greater good. Morals bypass our motivation and emotions. In fact, moral codes create just as much anger, frustration {read all the posts) and confusion.
We don't need moral codes to tell us if we are hurting someone or if we are being hurt. The real problem of those who do not 'do good' and cause harm is because they don't know they are doing it. They don't see it. They fully justify their actions. It doesn't seem 'wrong' to them. Now that is worth a debate.

Replies to this message:
 Message 144 by ikabod, posted 06-21-2007 11:37 AM pelican has replied
 Message 145 by Stile, posted 06-21-2007 3:02 PM pelican has replied

  
ikabod
Member (Idle past 4493 days)
Posts: 365
From: UK
Joined: 03-13-2006


Message 143 of 304 (406567)
06-21-2007 10:24 AM
Reply to: Message 141 by Stile
06-20-2007 4:11 PM


Re: But what IS good?
You're allowed to "win" as many battles in your mind as you please.
sorry do you not wish to debate any more ... or do you have no anwsers ...
We're talking about what IS good. Not what WE THINK or WE HOPE is good.
no we are talking about what you think is good , base on two rules you chose , rules which over many posts you have changed from
beings ARE equal .. to TREAT beings equally .. which is diffirent in so many ways ..
ANY action can be "good" or "bad" in different situations.
rules which give a different result for the same event ...hmm. ..because you are unable to know and therefore define and build into your rule system a way to cope with multitude of factors invold in each act
. ..
Morally Good = an action that increases the inner-feelings of the being acted upon.
How a being's inner-feelings react to a situation are personally subjective to them. The responses are not a "look-up" table. However, you can look them up (by getting the information from the being acted upon) and objectively discover if the action was good or bad.
The same action, on the same person, can easily be good one time, and bad the next
... so how is this knowing what IS (your capitals) good .. does your system give space time coordinate for each considered act .. and what happens is some one changes their mind ..and now says that the act lowered their inner feelings
does that mean the good act becomes bad or was it always bad .. will it chance again if the person has third or fourth thoughts ??
what happens if the person is insane and like feeling emotional pain.. does that really turn bad acts into good cos the madman says they incresse his inner feelings??
The system has nothing to do with telling someone what to choose. Therefore, the system is rightfully useless when telling someone what to choose.
The system is equally rightfully useless when identiying plant-life.
The system identifies if an action on a being is good or bad.
The person, after good/bad identification, can choose to be good, choose to be bad, or choose whatever they want.
These actions involve more than 1 person. We'ed need a way to measure the value of good in order to decide these questions objectively. This system proposes nothing of the sort.
ok follow the quote line one/two vs line6/7 so does the system allow one to choose or not ?
so your system only works if only one person is affected by the act ... so may be a hermit and hmm a wandering sales man high on a mountain ??
people are not isolated ,what happens to one affects others .. this is why picking the ships crew to die is a morally good act ..because the passengers are effected by the act as well .. the act is the whole not a isolated part .. you system suffers the classic fault .. it works well(for you ) in the lab but is useless in the real world ..
any moral system has to work in the real world ... or have such power and backing to change the world to its shape .
What if my brother was 105 years old? What if he lived in constant pain, had seen everything he possibly wanted to see in life, and knew he was a constant stress on everyone he loved? What if he than wanted a bottle of gin every day in order to kill himself because he wanted to leave this world? Why is it bad to help him?
ok lets fisrt us your rules ... hmm well he is not treating me equally and is breaking my rights to happiness (are you not sad about him too) and he is not incressing my inner feelings thus it is a bad act ...
ok real world .. age is irrelevent i do not discriminate by age .. he is in constant pain .. so are many people and they live with it ...how can he know he has seen all of life ?? tomorrow is unwriten ..he may be able to save a life tomorrow is that not worth living for ? .. so he is a constant stress .. we love him as a human being , we accept that price , its a morally good thing to do .. drinking a bottle of gin a day is a slow way to die , and we will have to deal with the fall out of his drunken state for a long time while suffeering the pain or seeing him slowly kill himself .. further rsuch a metod of suicide is very selfish in the pronlonging our agony.... if he truley wish to die why doe he not use a gun or jump off a tall building ... so how can it not be a bad thing ..
find this cause , do not let it be masked by drink , and deal with the issues ... do the morally good thing ...
inaction is a crime ......would you let a 3 year old play with a bucket of live grenades in the middle of a minefield if it incressed that childs inner feelings .
ok one last time
Morally good = an action that increases the inner-feelings of the being acted upon
i grow some very powerfull "grass" in my greenhouse .. i package it , i go out and find a group of people who want it and i GIVE it away free , this makes them happy ..is this morally good .
i create a new strain of the flu virus 10 million time more deadly and 100 million times more infectious ,i package it , i go out and find a group of people who want it and i GIVE it away free , this makes them happy ..is this morally good.
i have trated all equally , i have not infringed anyones right to life and happiness
now as your system only looks at the act on the single person affected by the act ,i think both a good acts , as your system does not worry about the concequences ...
gosh i want to do good .. so dealer of cheap drugs , or weapons ,or porn please tell me when to stop ..
your system fails because
1. its rules are not water tight , they have to bend to cope with reality .
2. they are poorly defined .. how do YOU treat beings equally ?, does not knowing / meeting them allow you not to account for them in your actions ?
3. you base moral good on someone feeling , insolated from the rest of the world (how), with no way to measure such feelings .. , with the chance the person my change their mind
4. with out knowing if that person is reaction "normally" to the act , with out knowing if the person is capable of experiencing the correct feelings , or is able to express how they feel accuratly .
5. you admit the same act will give differing results .. so you cannot make any reasonable predictions apon it ... thus you can "test" it , or rely on it to make future choices
6. it is not able to deal with events involving mutlipe effecties from a single act
7.it fails to deal with the most well know moral dilemmas ie real world events .
Edited by ikabod, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 141 by Stile, posted 06-20-2007 4:11 PM Stile has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 147 by Stile, posted 06-21-2007 4:00 PM ikabod has replied

  
ikabod
Member (Idle past 4493 days)
Posts: 365
From: UK
Joined: 03-13-2006


Message 144 of 304 (406578)
06-21-2007 11:37 AM
Reply to: Message 142 by pelican
06-20-2007 8:30 PM


Re: motivation is everything
sorry no room for debate i agree with you too much ..).

This message is a reply to:
 Message 142 by pelican, posted 06-20-2007 8:30 PM pelican has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 151 by pelican, posted 06-21-2007 7:46 PM ikabod has not replied

  
Stile
Member
Posts: 4295
From: Ontario, Canada
Joined: 12-02-2004


Message 145 of 304 (406611)
06-21-2007 3:02 PM
Reply to: Message 142 by pelican
06-20-2007 8:30 PM


Motivation is rather a secondary thought.
dameeva writes:
Motivation has everything to do with our actions. Not one action is taken without a motive. You may not be aware of your motive but it is there.
Agreed. However, I don't think motivation dictates whether or not we're "doing good".
Have you never tried to do good, and actually ended up doing somthing bad?
It may not be our fault, we may have been trying our best, there may have been no possible way to avoid it, even. But how would any of that make a bad action good?
Take a scenario. A guy's washing windows on a building. He wants to do a great job. He's trying so hard to clean the windows so well he accidentally drops his squeegee and it falls for 50 floors, just happens to hit some other innocent regular-guy on the head in the wrong spot and kills him.
-The washer's motivations were very good.
-The washer did a bad thing
Granted, doing this bad thing is obviously "less bad" than if he brought a gun up there and sniped the same guy dead. But it didn't make his action of killing the poor guy "good". It was an accident. Simply a bad accident. Still bad, however. Regardless of his motivations. There is nothing his motivations could have done to make that accident "good".
At a deep level, I don't believe we do anything for anyone else.
That's nice. I don't agree.
For instance, I often do things for other people.
Every action is a statement of who we are in one form or another.
I agree with this nice, open general statement
Morals are just a way of control, even if it is for the greater good. Morals bypass our motivation and emotions.
How so?
I would say that "morals" are simply an identification of what is "good" and what is "bad". How we apply that knowledge and incorporate it into our actions would be our motivation. How do morals bypass our motivations? I would say that for most of our conscious decisions, what we think is moral helps shape our motivations, and is therefore fundamental rather than bypassing.
We don't need moral codes to tell us if we are hurting someone or if we are being hurt.
What are moral codes to you?
To me, moral codes are exactly what does tell us that someone is hurting. Specifically, our ability to empathize with others. And "moral codes" tend to be rules laid out from retrospection upon empathizing with others.
The real problem of those who do not 'do good' and cause harm is because they don't know they are doing it. They don't see it. They fully justify their actions. It doesn't seem 'wrong' to them. Now that is worth a debate.
Agreed. That exact point is the main focus of this entire discussion. It just seems that not many of the replies could focus on this topic. It's extremely difficult to pin-down and discuss rationally.
What I've been saying is this:
Morally Good = an action that increases the inner-feelings of the being acted upon
Another less-specific way to say this is:
Hurting people is bad
The only thing this definition does is make sure that it's the "other people" who say if they are being hurt or not rather than allowing any particular person to declare exactly what does or does not hurt everyone else.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 142 by pelican, posted 06-20-2007 8:30 PM pelican has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 146 by New Cat's Eye, posted 06-21-2007 3:35 PM Stile has replied
 Message 150 by pelican, posted 06-21-2007 7:44 PM Stile has seen this message but not replied
 Message 152 by pelican, posted 06-21-2007 8:27 PM Stile has replied

  
New Cat's Eye
Inactive Member


Message 146 of 304 (406621)
06-21-2007 3:35 PM
Reply to: Message 145 by Stile
06-21-2007 3:02 PM


Re: Motivation is rather a secondary thought.
However, I don't think motivation dictates whether or not we're "doing good".
Have you never tried to do good, and actually ended up doing somthing bad?
The motive doesn't dictate whether the result of the action was good or bad but it does dictate whethor or not the actor was morally good or morally bad.
Like you say, if you were trying to do something good but you ended up doing something bad on accident, then you were not morally bad.
OTOH, if you were trying to do something bad but ended up doing something good regardless, then you were morally bad.
Of course, your system of morality identification does not account for this because it is based soley on the action, in error IMHO.
Morally Good = an action that increases the inner-feelings of the being acted upon
What happened to the inner-feelings being positive?
Making fun of people increases their inner feelings, but that isn't morally good.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 145 by Stile, posted 06-21-2007 3:02 PM Stile has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 148 by Stile, posted 06-21-2007 4:18 PM New Cat's Eye has replied

  
Stile
Member
Posts: 4295
From: Ontario, Canada
Joined: 12-02-2004


Message 147 of 304 (406630)
06-21-2007 4:00 PM
Reply to: Message 143 by ikabod
06-21-2007 10:24 AM


Where's your system?
ikabod writes:
base on two rules you chose , rules which over many posts you have changed from
beings ARE equal .. to TREAT beings equally .. which is diffirent in so many ways ..
From the 1st post I stated the rule in:
Stile, Msg 97 writes:
1. Beings are equal, and deserve equal rights to life and pursuit of happiness.
It clearly states that by "beings are equal" I'm talking about their rights to pursue life and happiness.
rules which give a different result for the same event ...hmm. ..because you are unable to know and therefore define and build into your rule system a way to cope with multitude of factors invold in each act
No. More because of the very reason that I stated in the same post you're responding to:
Stile, Msg 141 writes:
How a being's inner-feelings react to a situation are personally subjective to them.
Therefore, we'll have different results depending on people's differing feelings. We can still objectively find out what those feelings are simply by talking to them, sometimes even by just observing them.
ikabod writes:
Stile writes:
Morally Good = an action that increases the inner-feelings of the being acted upon
so how is this knowing what IS (your capitals) good?
Because it's specifically defining what IS good. If you have another specific definition that you think is better, please share it, that's exactly what this discussion is for. If you can show me how your definition can work better than mine, I'd like to use your definition. I want to try to be as good as I can. So far, this definition is the best I've come up with. It also seems to be rather universal around the globe, although rarely specified. It's really nothing more than the definition of empathy, though.
and what happens is some one changes their mind ..and now says that the act lowered their inner feelings
Then the action becomes bad.
What's wrong with that?
When I was 4 I brought my mom a dandelion. She thought it was wonderful. She put it in a vase and kept the lovely present from her child. I liked how it made her feel, I brought her 50 more that day. She started to not like them.
Bring my mom dandelion #1 -> Good action.
Bring my mom dandelion #50 -> Bad action.
Same action, same person, different results, different judgement.
does that mean the good act becomes bad or was it always bad .. will it chance again if the person has third or fourth thoughts ??
Certainly would change again. Like this:
A man brings a woman a sunflower.
The woman loves the sunflower
--> Giving sunflower to woman is a good action
The woman discovers she's allergic to sunflowers and gets sick.
--> Giving sunflower to woman is a bad action
Woman thinks more about how the man probably was only trying to help, and adores such a nice thing
--> Giving sunflower to woman is a good action
Woman finds out man actually knew she would be allergic to sunflower
--> Giving sunflower to woman is a bad action
Of course it can change. Of course, we can say that answer #4 was the "correct" one all along... but we could also say that for #2 or #3 if the scenario had of stopped there.
People's feelings are not set in stone. Any moral system that's going to work has to be able to deal with this fact. Mine just happens to use people's feelings as the actual foundation. It seems to be working just fine. I still haven't heard of any better alternatives.
what happens if the person is insane and like feeling emotional pain.. does that really turn bad acts into good cos the madman says they incresse his inner feelings??
Why does the person have to be insane? Sadists exist. They are not insane.
Inner-feelings = inner-feelings. If someone likes feeling emotional "pain", it's not really pain to them, is it? The action didn't "turn" good, it's always been good for them.
so your system only works if only one person is affected by the act ... so may be a hermit and hmm a wandering sales man high on a mountain ??
people are not isolated ,what happens to one affects others .. this is why picking the ships crew to die is a morally good act ..because the passengers are effected by the act as well .. the act is the whole not a isolated part .. you system suffers the classic fault .. it works well(for you ) in the lab but is useless in the real world ..
The system works just fine in the real world.
Killing the engine crew guys is bad.
Saving the rest of the crew is good.
Killing the rest of the crew is bad.
Saving the engine crew guys is good.
Do you disagree with any of those statements? That's all the system says.
Disagree with one of those things, and show why it's incorrect in order to say the "system doesn't work".
The fact that we have to do one "good" think and one "bad" thing simultaneusly is just a fact of life, the way things are. It has nothing to do with the system.
ikabod writes:
Stile writes:
What if my brother was 105 years old? What if he lived in constant pain, had seen everything he possibly wanted to see in life, and knew he was a constant stress on everyone he loved? What if he than wanted a bottle of gin every day in order to kill himself because he wanted to leave this world? Why is it bad to help him?
ok lets fisrt us your rules ... hmm well he is not treating me equally and is breaking my rights to happiness (are you not sad about him too) and he is not incressing my inner feelings thus it is a bad act ...
What are you talking about? Why would I be sad to stop the excruciating pain my brother is constantly living in?
...how can he know he has seen all of life ??
He's 105. He can't exactly jump on a plane and just go anywhere he wants. Plus he's in constant pain. Moving only makes it worse. Who's not dealing with the "real world"?
..he may be able to save a life tomorrow is that not worth living for ?
Actually, the health-care keeping him alive isn't available for another young man who just died. Tomorrow another young man will likely die as well. Still doesn't sound so good...
.. so he is a constant stress .. we love him as a human being , we accept that price,
What?? I'm not accepting my brother living in constant pain for my own simple "piece of mind". That sounds rather selfish. That sounds extremely selfish. Certainly can't be "good".
.. drinking a bottle of gin a day is a slow way to die , and we will have to deal with the fall out of his drunken state for a long time while suffeering the pain or seeing him slowly kill himself ..
He's 105. Likely half a glass would do it just fine. Who's not living in the real-world?
further rsuch a metod of suicide is very selfish in the pronlonging our agony.... if he truley wish to die why doe he not use a gun or jump off a tall building ... so how can it not be a bad thing ..
Nope. Legal implications, and availability make drinking the gin the safest, easiest, quickest and best way.
Still not good, not good at all.
i grow some very powerfull "grass" in my greenhouse .. i package it , i go out and find a group of people who want it and i GIVE it away free , this makes them happy ..is this morally good .
Sure, why wouldn't it be?
i create a new strain of the flu virus 10 million time more deadly and 100 million times more infectious ,i package it , i go out and find a group of people who want it and i GIVE it away free , this makes them happy ..is this morally good.
Scenario as stated? Sure, why wouldn't this be a good thing?
Infection spreads to others who didn't want it?
Not good, by same definition.
gosh i want to do good .. so dealer of cheap drugs , or weapons ,or porn please tell me when to stop ..
Stop when you hurt someone.
It's easy to show how my system will fail. All you have to is tell me how:
An action that increases the inner-feelings of the being acted upon is not morally good.
And not have it be based on "because ikabod says it's bad". This will generally require you to state what you think "Morally Good" is. I'm still waiting on your definition of that as well.
You have yet to do so. Please just show me one example, and explain why. That's all you have to do.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 143 by ikabod, posted 06-21-2007 10:24 AM ikabod has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 154 by ikabod, posted 06-22-2007 8:14 AM Stile has replied

  
Stile
Member
Posts: 4295
From: Ontario, Canada
Joined: 12-02-2004


Message 148 of 304 (406636)
06-21-2007 4:18 PM
Reply to: Message 146 by New Cat's Eye
06-21-2007 3:35 PM


Hell is paved with good intentions.
Catholic Scientist writes:
Like you say, if you were trying to do something good but you ended up doing something bad on accident, then you were not morally bad.
Did I say that?
If someone is trying to do good, and ends up doing bad. I would say they were trying to be morally good, and ended up being morally bad.
Why does everyone want a definition that allows for a person to never actually "do" bad?
Isn't that what accidents are? When we do bad, even though we didn't mean to?
It's still bad.
I see no reason to sugar-coat this.
To me, good = morally good. What's the difference between "good" and "morally good" when talking about morality?
I can see the difference between "a B+ on a test is good" and "trying to be nice is morally good".
Is that people's definition of "morally good"?
Morally Good = trying to do whatever we think is good?
Of course, such a definition leads us, again, to the conlusion that everyone is Morally Good all the time.
Of course, your system of morality identification does not account for this because it is based soley on the action, in error IMHO.
Technically, I certainly do account for this. I'm just not trying to do so here, because it's another topic completely. Remember when we talked about this:
Good Motive, Good Action = Best (pure?) Good
Bad Motive, Good Action = Good
Good Motive, Bad Action = Bad
Bad Motive, Bad Action = Worst (evil?) Bad
The system I'm describing here does not cover this, though. But that's because it's not supposed to. What it's supposed to do is propose a foundation for what good is.
And that's what it does. Want to talk motives? We can do that somewhere else...
What happened to the inner-feelings being positive?
I thought that increase and positive was becoming redundant. Perhaps it wasn't.
Making fun of people increases their inner feelings, but that isn't morally good.
Remember, the system doesn't monitor anyone's inner-feelings, only the inner-feelings of the person being acted upon. So... how does making fun of people increase the inner-feeilngs of the people you're making fun of?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 146 by New Cat's Eye, posted 06-21-2007 3:35 PM New Cat's Eye has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 149 by New Cat's Eye, posted 06-21-2007 4:45 PM Stile has replied

  
New Cat's Eye
Inactive Member


Message 149 of 304 (406641)
06-21-2007 4:45 PM
Reply to: Message 148 by Stile
06-21-2007 4:18 PM


Re: Hell is paved with good intentions.
If someone is trying to do good, and ends up doing bad. I would say they were trying to be morally good, and ended up being morally bad.
Well then we have a difference of opinion.
If you're trying to do something good (help an old lady cross the street) and you end up accidently doing something bad (she gets hit by a car), then you weren't being morally bad even though a bad thing happened.
You aren't morally responsible for her being hit if you were just trying to help her.
OTOH, if you are trying to lead an old lady into the street so that she does get hit then you are being morally bad. If you inadvertantly prevented a piano from falling on her instead of getting her hit by a car, then your action doesn't become morally good because the result was good. You'd still be an evil fuck for trying to get the lady hit by a car.
[ABE] You might even increase her positive inner feelings, which would let you know that you were morally good according to your system, when in reality you were morally bad for trying to hurt an old lady. The result of your actions don't automatically make you morally good when your motive was morally bad.[/ABE]
Is that people's definition of "morally good"?
Morally Good = trying to do whatever we think is good?
Of course, such a definition leads us, again, to the conlusion that everyone is Morally Good all the time.
Not when they know what they are doing is not good but do it anyways.
But I do think that you have to understand that what you are doing is wrong in order to be morally responsible for it.
Bad Motive, Good Action = Good
Good Motive, Bad Action = Bad
But that isn't true, as applied to my old lady examples above.
I thought that increase and positive was becoming redundant. Perhaps it wasn't.
Well, you could increase a person's bad inner feelings (or inner bad feelings?) and still be increasing their inner feelings.
how does making fun of people increase the inner-feeilngs of the people you're making fun of?
You increase their inner feelings of embarassement and sadness and humiliation, but their inner feelings are being increased none-the-less.
Edited by Catholic Scientist, : see ABE

This message is a reply to:
 Message 148 by Stile, posted 06-21-2007 4:18 PM Stile has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 156 by Stile, posted 06-22-2007 3:39 PM New Cat's Eye has replied

  
pelican
Member (Idle past 4985 days)
Posts: 781
From: australia
Joined: 05-27-2007


Message 150 of 304 (406680)
06-21-2007 7:44 PM
Reply to: Message 145 by Stile
06-21-2007 3:02 PM


Re: Motivation is rather a secondary thought.
Hey Stile, you obviously have a busy mind that perhaps tries to deal with too many ideas at the same time. I can't keep up with you ha ha.
With regard to you doing things for others, yes, but ultimately it's because you see yourself as a good person. Motive! You have a choice whether or not to do good things and your motive dictates your choice. Motive isn't even thought about, never mind being secondary, but it is there.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 145 by Stile, posted 06-21-2007 3:02 PM Stile has seen this message but not replied

  
Newer Topic | Older Topic
Jump to:


Copyright 2001-2023 by EvC Forum, All Rights Reserved

™ Version 4.2
Innovative software from Qwixotic © 2024