ee163cz (04/04/83)
Proposed definition of 'good' and 'evil':
'good': That which benefits a sentient being, in the final opinion of
that sentient being.
'evil': That which harms a sentient being, in the final opinion of
that sentient being.
These seem like basically workable definitions, but I think a refinement
is in order: in some cases, 'sentient being' should be replaced by
'conscious entity'; this takes into account drastic personality changes
whereby one 'conscious entity' may be destroyed and another created in
the same body (in the opinion of a deranged person who is terrified by the
prospect of becoming somebody else, this is important).
Given these definitions (which I dreamed up a couple of days ago in
an attempt to put my personal moral beliefs in writable form; I'm sure
somebody has mentioned essentially the same definitions before), it is
possible to derive (dynamically) a personal guide to conduct, simply by
examining all available information and choosing whatever course of
action appears to involve the least evil.
There is, of course, nothing new about this, but then there's nothing
new about a lot of things discussed in this group, and I thought I might
as well point out that a perfectly workable guide to morality can be reduced
to a two-line definition, its complement, and a little judgment.
Yours for better one-liners,
Eric J. Wilner
sdcsvax!sdccsu3!ee163cztim (04/05/83)
Simplified is right! Do you really think that finding a definition for `good' and `evil' even begins to encapsulate morality? What are `good' and `evil', that is, not what acts are `good' and `evil', but what are they themselves? Are they physical phenomena, or at least physically detectable? Are they psychological? Why is their perception not as uniform as the perception of other phenomena; that is, why do people have such different sets of exciting stimuli for the definition of a phenomenon as `good' or `evil'? Do `good' and `evil' somehow transcend the physical and the psychological? If so, what is their source? If a single being created both, then how can this same being be said to have a vested interest in one and an adversary relationship in the other, given that the creation of both was deliberate and done with foreknowledge of the results? Aren't `good' and `evil' nothing but a flimsily-veiled carrot-and-stick psychological device used be rulers of men to control their behavior? If not, then why do they seem so much like one? If you are going to examine morality, start honestly. The ultimate goal is a procedure for determining in advance what actions you should or should not perform. Don't start with abstract nonsense like `good' and `evil'. Start with people and yourself, and your interactions with them, and theirs with you, and the most desirable environment for those interactions. Tim Maroney
djhawley (04/05/83)
One of the big problems I can see with defining 'good' and 'evil' in
terms of what benefits/harms a sentient being in its "final opinion"
is the meaning of "final opinion". If this means judgment over the
passage of a lifetime, then morality cannot judge behaviour until
way too late to affect the behaviour. This is also a variety of the
same problem that afflicts pragmatism -- the effects of an action
should really be taken in the looooooooooong view.
Secondly, this is a very simplistic view of morality. What about morality
in relation to others ( ex. Hobbesian selfishness vs enlightened
self-interest ) ? Moral philosophers have struggled with this question
for a long time. What about altruism, and the instinct to benevolence
which ( perhaps infrequently ) we observe. If this neither helps nor
harms us, it is thus amoral !
-----------------------------
Yours for a more courageous morality
David Hawleydjhawley (04/05/83)
Those who hold Reason supreme are forced to deny what they can't understand.
- Morality
- Human freedom ( vs determinism )
to name some biggies.
Any comments ?
This ( hopefully inflammatory message ) ( but still serious )
( if not overly precise, it gives the idea ) brought to you by :
David ( yours for a more humble, but courageous humanity ) Hawleytim (04/06/83)
From duke!decvax!utzoo!watmath!djhawley Tue Apr 5 12:50:28 1983
Subject: Re: Morality simplified [somewhat serious]
Those who hold Reason supreme are forced to deny what they can't
understand.
- Morality
- Human freedom ( vs determinism )
to name some biggies.
Any comments ?
The fact that you can't understand these things doesn't mean that they
are not apprehensible by reason. I feel that I understand morality on
a basis of reason; as for human freedom vs. determinism, I have never
been able to get a clear definition of the issue. Obviously, humans
make choices. The issue seems to revolve around the nature of those
choices in some way, but no one has ever been able to explain what
"freedom" means in this context. If it means some force outside the obser-
vational range of science, then I see no reason to deny it; I do have
to wait for some sort of evidence to accumulate, though.
What is the alternative to reason? Arbitrarily picking some belief
system and clinging to it no matter what? What fun.
Tim "Not A Materialist" Maroney