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I definitely never meant "hard wired" nor good. I said desire. Desire to be socially acceptable might make sense for me, I am not sure.
I DO think that there is an objective good to which we strive, that we seek to understand.
I think 'good' is entirely subjective. What is 'good' depends on what your society has deemed so at the time, and what is considered 'good' changes.
If there was any objective rule for what consists being 'good', I would say it would be 'do unto others' But I think what we're born with is a desire to understand the given rules of our society so that we can fit in and get along with our social group- just like any other social animal. The thing is, our social group doesn't mean the whole of society. It's much smaller than that, which is why we're so influenced by close friends.
I almost think it's a mistake to assume that kids or people in general just naturally want to be good. It clouds the issue that pressure from their society is much stronger than it seems.
(again, just my opinion, I'm not saying you're wrong and I'm right)
I think 'good' is entirely subjective. What is 'good' depends on what your society has deemed so at the time, and what is considered 'good' changes.
(again, just my opinion, I'm not saying you're wrong and I'm right)
You're wrong! JK.
This topic has come up before. I completely disagree that society defines right. Japanese internment, slavery, gay marriage illegal, lack of women's rights... All at one time deemed right by society.
This topic has come up before. I completely disagree that society defines right. Japanese internment, slavery, gay marriage illegal, lack of women's rights... All at one time deemed right by society.
I'm a firm believer that culture, upbringing, beliefs do not determine right or wrong, in the sense that just because a culture says its right, doesn't make it right.
Slavery, genders not being equal, people not being equal due to differences etc, its not right, even if a religion/culture says it is.
Some things are just not right no matter what.
Hurting others, forcing something upon others, not treating others equally etc is not right and just because a religion or culture makes it part of their practice doesn't just automatically make it right.
There needs to be an across the board ideal of what is right and what is wrong.
This topic has come up before. I completely disagree that society defines right. Japanese internment, slavery, gay marriage illegal, lack of women's rights... All at one time deemed right by society.
Agreed. The best way to define "right" is by consideration of how it affects humankind. Naturally, this still means that many people will argue over whose side is right on any given controversy. But that people disagree on the right answer doesn't mean there isn't one.
This topic has come up before. I completely disagree that society defines right. Japanese internment, slavery, gay marriage illegal, lack of women's rights... All at one time deemed right by society.
From my POV right now, in this place in this society, I can say all of that is bad, full stop. But when you were in those places, at those times...when your society is telling you that those things are right, it isn't that simple. I know we want it to be, and to say that every slave owner or guard knew on some level that what they were doing was wrong, but that simply isn't so.
Right now it is accepted by our society to eat the flesh of animals. Fast forward a hundred years, and in the future they may look down upon the barbarians who feasted on their fellow animals.
(And I am NOT comparing slavery or anything above to eating animals...I'm really not, they aren't anywhere on the same level.)
Moreover, all of those things kind of prove my point. If every person was born with a desire to work toward some objective measure of good, then none of that would have happened. People would have risen up and stopped it. Instead they went along with the direction of society at the time. By assuming every person really wants to be good, we leave the door open for such things. If we kept in mind that people are just social animals and like all social animals will attack outsiders, maybe we could rise above such instincts.
From my POV right now, in this place in this society, I can say all of that is bad, full stop. But when you were in those places, at those times...when your society is telling you that those things are right, it isn't that simple. I know we want it to be, and to say that every slave owner or guard knew on some level that what they were doing was wrong, but that simply isn't so.
Right now it is accepted by our society to eat the flesh of animals. Fast forward a hundred years, and in the future they may look down upon the barbarians who feasted on their fellow animals.
(And I am NOT comparing slavery or anything above to eating animals...I'm really not, they aren't anywhere on the same level.)
Moreover, all of those things kind of prove my point. If every person was born with a desire to work toward some objective measure of good, then none of that would have happened. People would have risen up and stopped it. Instead they went along with the direction of society at the time. By assuming every person really wants to be good, we leave the door open for such things. If we kept in mind that people are just social animals and like all social animals will attack outsiders, maybe we could rise above such instincts.
I think there is a natural law that determines right. How much we understand of that natural law is the variance. What society says is completely irrelevant IMO.
Just as time is required for us to work out scientific discovery, time is required to work out philosophical discovery.
From my POV right now, in this place in this society, I can say all of that is bad, full stop. But when you were in those places, at those times...when your society is telling you that those things are right, it isn't that simple. I know we want it to be, and to say that every slave owner or guard knew on some level that what they were doing was wrong, but that simply isn't so.
Right now it is accepted by our society to eat the flesh of animals. Fast forward a hundred years, and in the future they may look down upon the barbarians who feasted on their fellow animals.
(And I am NOT comparing slavery or anything above to eating animals...I'm really not, they aren't anywhere on the same level.)
Moreover, all of those things kind of prove my point. If every person was born with a desire to work toward some objective measure of good, then none of that would have happened. People would have risen up and stopped it. Instead they went along with the direction of society at the time. By assuming every person really wants to be good, we leave the door open for such things. If we kept in mind that people are just social animals and like all social animals will attack outsiders, maybe we could rise above such instincts.
But look at what happened when people spoke out against their governments.
I'm rusty on my history but weren't there some slave owners who actually tried to help their slaves?
People were persecuted for going against their government and were probably afraid to speak out, which is why uprisings happen, because you can't kill everyone at once and if people band together they can change it. We just have to not allow things to get so bad before we band together to change things.
But look at what happened when people spoke out against their governments.
I'm rusty on my history but weren't there some slave owners who actually tried to help their slaves?
People were persecuted for going against their government and were probably afraid to speak out, which is why uprisings happen, because you can't kill everyone at once and if people band together they can change it. We just have to not allow things to get so bad before we band together to change things.
Some did, yes. But many more believed that it was good and natural to own slaves. And when the uprising did happen, it wasn't really about freeing the slaves...it was more about resources. If everyone had the desire to be good AND 'good' was an objective thing, then no one ever would have owned slaves, or at the very least every slave owner would have been uncomfortable with it on some innate level.
Have you heard of the Milgram experiment or the Stanford Prison Experiment? In the Milgram experiment, people are told to administer painful shocks to someone they can't see on the direction of a doctor. In the Stanford experiment, people were randomly assigned the roles of guard or prisoner. The guards quickly began to humiliate and hurt the prisoners. Together, they illustrate that people want to obey authority and when given authority quickly begin to abuse it.
This isn't even a cause of evolving morals- we know that you shouldn't give shocks to people who are screaming at you to stop, and that you shouldn't torture prisoners. These people were ordinary folks and many were devastated by their own behavior. They couldn't explain why they acted as they did. Assuming people just naturally want to be good goes against much evidence and again, I believe it can be dangerous.
It is problematic when they view themselves as crappy without.
NEEDING those trappings to feel self identity is immature IMO.
I know women who must always have their hair combed and always are seen with make up who are perfectly nice people and don't seem to have any self-image problem and I know men who always dress nicely and like to look attractive who are also good sincere people. In fact, I know women who wear a whole lot of make up who are sweet, good to their children, hard working, kind to everyone, pay their bills and really don't seem all that immature.
I think not all slovenly dressed men, and women with no make up and ragged clothes are nice inside either. Some may be, some may not be good people.
I don't think you can really judge by the exterior at all. You can't look at someone in nice clothes and decide that's a shallow person, or at a woman with a lot of makeup and know for sure she's shallow and immature and empty inside. You can't look at a person dressed sloppily in tattered clothes and messy hair and know that person is self-confident, mature and good.
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JK.
