Philisophical Question: What is good? What is bad?

[XZeroII]

For example, killing another person is bad, right? But what if you were to go back in time and kill hitler while he is a child? Would that be bad still, or would it be good?

Another example would be lying to our gov't is bad. But lets say you lived in Germany in WW2 and they came to your house asking if you were harboring jews (which you are). Would you tell the truth and let the jews be taken away to be killed, or would you lie? Is that good or bad?

A continuation of that is this: What if, after the war, that jew that you were harboring went on a killing spree and killed 100 men, women, and children?


Can you honestly say what is good or bad? It makes you think about just common everyday things that you do. You think you are doing good, but are you really? When you think someone is doing something bad, are they really?

Discuss

 

[DougK62]

Hindsight is 20/20.

"Good" and "bad" are different for everyone.

 

[Zenmervolt]

The thing about going back in time to kill Hitler is an interesting question. The man's effects are so incredibly wide-ranging that it's impossible to say how things would be now if he hadn't existed. WWII was a huge technological boom for the west, and while nothing can excuse the atrocities that Hitler ordered to be committed, killing him is a very dangerous thing considering the amount of ripple effect it would cause. You'd effective "kill" most of the baby-boom too since without a WWII, there wouldn't be the huge increase in the number of children. You'd extend the Great Depression. You'd give the nuclear bomb to Germany before the US in all liklihood. There are certainly a billion other things that would be different.

And then there's the whole paradox of time travel. If you go back in time and kill Hitler, then you remove your reason to go back in time, so you don't because if Hitler doesn't live then the future has no knowledge of the need to kill him, so no-one would get sent back. So then Hitler would live. Which would result in someone getting sent back. Which would mean that Hitler died. Which would mean that no-one got sent back. Which would mean that Hitler lived...

ZV

 

[Wuffsunie]

Good and bad vary in accordance to time, place, individuals, and situation. People just make the best judgement that time allows based on the facts they have at hand and do whatever they decide is good.

Considering that pretty much anything can and has been rationalized thoughout history by various people, there's very little (if anything) that one can say is concretely good or bad. Though most of what people consider difinitive good and bad usually relates directly back to them (ie, "It's good for ME, or bad for ME.") as opposed to the masses, large groups, society at large.

-- Jack

The charm of history and its enigmatic lesson consist in the fact that, from age to age, nothing changes and yet everything is completely different.
-- Aldous Huxley - The Devils of Loudun

 

[XZeroII]

Right, everyone, but lets say someone robs you and takes your TV and stereo (combined worth, $3000). Would that be good or bad? Can you really say that it is one or the other?

 

[StageLeft]

I think that there is an ultimate sense of good and bad and those who say it's all relative are merely rationalizing away their conscience.

 

[conjur]

Originally posted by: XZeroII
Right, everyone, but lets say someone robs you and takes your TV and stereo (combined worth, $3000). Would that be good or bad? Can you really say that it is one or the other?

If someone willfully inflicts injury (or death) upon another person (and it's not self-defense) or takes something that belongs to another person without permission, then, yeah, that's bad.


mmmmkay?

 

[XZeroII]

Originally posted by: conjur

Originally posted by: XZeroII
Right, everyone, but lets say someone robs you and takes your TV and stereo (combined worth, $3000). Would that be good or bad? Can you really say that it is one or the other?

If someone willfully inflicts injury (or death) upon another person (and it's not self-defense) or takes something that belongs to another person without permission, then, yeah, that's bad.


mmmmkay?

But what if there were some sort of wiring flaw in your TV and in one week, it's starts on fire and burns down the criminal's house. It would have happened to you, but it happened to the criminal instead. Was him stealing your stuff good or bad?

 

[Wuffsunie]

Originally posted by: Skoorb
I think that there is an ultimate sense of good and bad and those who say it's all relative are merely rationalizing away their conscience.

Okay... back it up.

 

[conjur]

Originally posted by: XZeroII

Originally posted by: conjur

Originally posted by: XZeroII
Right, everyone, but lets say someone robs you and takes your TV and stereo (combined worth, $3000). Would that be good or bad? Can you really say that it is one or the other?

If someone willfully inflicts injury (or death) upon another person (and it's not self-defense) or takes something that belongs to another person without permission, then, yeah, that's bad.


mmmmkay?

But what if there were some sort of wiring flaw in your TV and in one week, it's starts on fire and burns down the criminal's house. It would have happened to you, but it happened to the criminal instead. Was him stealing your stuff good or bad?

How would make the theft good? You can't look to random consequences after an occurence to judge the occurrence itself.

 

[Ausm]

Hitler as a child did not commit any crimes against humanity so killing him would be considered as a homicide.


Sysadmin

 

[gistech1978]

Originally posted by: XZeroII
Right, everyone, but lets say someone robs you and takes your TV and stereo (combined worth, $3000). Would that be good or bad? Can you really say that it is one or the other?

no b/c the day you went to buy another TV or stereo was the day you found a dollar in the parking lot at CC that you used to buy a lottery ticket and won $250,000,000. you wouldnt have found the dollar that day if you didnt have to go to the CC to buy a new TV and stereo.

or the day your stuff got stolen you started reading & writing more and end up writing the next Harry Potter.

you cannot say. sure right after your stuff gets stolen, it would be 'bad'.
but if those two situations i presented materialize, it still doesnt make getting ripped off 'good' in the first place.

 

[glen]

"Why be moral" is the question.

Typically, it becomes absurd to talk about morality without a higher being.
This does not mean God exists, but it does mean that with out a God of some sort, morality is almost an absurd issue. Might makes Right.
When an animal kills and eats another animal we generally don't think of it as murder or apply some moral standard to it.

 

[jagr10]

Originally posted by: XZeroII

Originally posted by: conjur

Originally posted by: XZeroII
Right, everyone, but lets say someone robs you and takes your TV and stereo (combined worth, $3000). Would that be good or bad? Can you really say that it is one or the other?

If someone willfully inflicts injury (or death) upon another person (and it's not self-defense) or takes something that belongs to another person without permission, then, yeah, that's bad.


mmmmkay?

But what if there were some sort of wiring flaw in your TV and in one week, it's starts on fire and burns down the criminal's house. It would have happened to you, but it happened to the criminal instead. Was him stealing your stuff good or bad?

Ohhh, but what if you had Fire insurance, but not theft insurance? That means had it burnt down your house you'd be able to get a better TV, but because you didn't have theft insurance you get nothing. So now, was him stealing your stuff good or bad?

 

[MAME]

good and bad is 100% subjective, thus there is no real good or bad. Therefore, it all depends on who you ask. Thread over.

 

[StageLeft]

Originally posted by: glen
"Why be moral" is the question.

Typically, it becomes absurd to talk about morality without a higher being.
This does not mean God exists, but it does mean that with out a God of some sort, morality is almost an absurd issue. Might makes Right.
When an animal kills and eats another animal we generally don't think of it as murder or apply some moral standard to it.

You're absolutely right. Without a higher power morality is meaningless. In fact, if you believe in morality you're in essense saying that you believe in something higher.

There is a huge overlap across all societies - even though separated - about what is right and wrong. Incest, murder, theft, are frowned upon in almost every society on the globe. They've all come to similar moralities. This is why you can visit the US, or Brazil, or Saudi Arabia (why would you want to visit there?), and in most cases you know what will get you in trouble and what won't, without having to have been brought up there or read any books.

 

[XZeroII]

Originally posted by: MAME
good and bad is 100% subjective, thus there is no real good or bad. Therefore, it all depends on who you ask. Thread over.

That is a big point that I am trying to make, but if I were to just say it, people wouldn't believe it. They have to see it for themselves.

It makes you think. The next time something 'bad' happens to you, will you just jump to the conclusion that it was bad?

 

[StageLeft]

Originally posted by: XZeroII

Originally posted by: MAME
good and bad is 100% subjective, thus there is no real good or bad. Therefore, it all depends on who you ask. Thread over.

That is a big point that I am trying to make, but if I were to just say it, people wouldn't believe it. They have to see it for themselves.

It makes you think. The next time something 'bad' happens to you, will you just jump to the conclusion that it was bad?

Attacking it from a pure philosophical standpoint like Mame has done isn't easy. Any one of us here can see somebody being victimized in a terrible way and we'll all have an innate visceral repulsion to it.

 

[glen]

Originally posted by: XZeroII

Originally posted by: MAME
good and bad is 100% subjective, thus there is no real good or bad. Therefore, it all depends on who you ask. Thread over.

That is a big point that I am trying to make, but if I were to just say it, people wouldn't believe it. They have to see it for themselves.

It makes you think. The next time something 'bad' happens to you, will you just jump to the conclusion that it was bad?

It is subjective, unless a higher power exists.

 

[Zysoclaplem]

There is no right nor is there a wrong, there is only perception. It's like asking which way is up, and which way is down in space. Well naturally up is whatever your eyes see when you look up. But that's not truely up, only up to you. There is a force like gravity when it comes to right and wrong. That force is morality. May'be not yours, but within the social structure, morality is gravity. And just like gravity, it is not 100% correct when deciding what's up and down, or is it?
May'be I am wrong and may'be I am right. Either which way, it's about an hour from lunchtime, and I am hungry. Or am I?

 

[eigen]

It is still subjective whether or not god exists. Morality just becomes subjective for god.
I forget the name of this philosophical problem. It concerns whether what god says is right because it is right or what god says is right because he says it is.In the first case god becomes irrelevant because you don't need him say what is right and wrong, on the other hand if what is right is right just because god says so then god becomes an arbitrary tyrant.

 

[marquee]

Originally posted by: MAME
good and bad is 100% subjective, thus there is no real good or bad. Therefore, it all depends on who you ask. Thread over.

Simply because we don't know of a formula for determining whether an action is good or bad, doesn't mean there isn't one.

 

[Wuffsunie]

Originally posted by: Skoorb
There is a huge overlap across all societies - even though separated - about what is right and wrong. Incest, murder, theft, are frowned upon in almost every society on the globe. They've all come to similar moralities. This is why you can visit the US, or Brazil, or Saudi Arabia (why would you want to visit there?), and in most cases you know what will get you in trouble and what won't, without having to have been brought up there or read any books.

You see, that could be argued as simple pragmatism. Murder and theft, especially on a large scale, is highly disruptive to any society. For there to be any kind of progress stablility has to exist. These are disruptive and thus discouraged. Incest follows as being disruptive to the biological good, as emperical evidence will clearly bear out in a handful of generations. Thus, "bad" in a lot of sense when discussing things on a large scale is that which disrupts the status quo and orderly flow of a society.

Damn, wish I had time to go into that more, but gotta run :|

 

[StageLeft]

Originally posted by: Zysoclaplem
There is no right nor is there a wrong, there is only perception. It's like asking which way is up, and which way is down in space. Well naturally up is whatever your eyes see when you look up. But that's not truely up, only up to you. There is a force like gravity when it comes to right and wrong. That force is morality. May'be not yours, but within the social structure, morality is gravity. And just like gravity, it is not 100% correct when deciding what's up and down, or is it?
May'be I am wrong and may'be I am right. Either which way, it's about an hour from lunchtime, and I am hungry. Or am I?

That would be a good analogy if gravity was the same thing as morality, which it isn't Asking what is up and down is a bad question, since gravity which clearly changes, dictates the answer.

It is still subjective whether or not god exists.

Well, that isn't true. Either God does exist or doesn't. Subjective is one's belief of the fact. In regards to the rest of your post if you truly believe in God it's probably a good idea to defer to him on what's right and wrong.

 

[PlatinumGold]

where to begin.

absolutism vs relativism

hedonism vs utilitarianism

and the list is much longer but i can't come up with it all off the top of my head.

until you have decided what the basis for good is you cannot have a discussion about what is good or bad.

next, after you decide on the basis of good, you next have to decide on HOW it should be implemented.