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Regarding labels, whether one believes humans are innately good or evil I have found more telling than the more popular labels people like to assign to themselv

Regarding labels, whether one believes humans are innately good or evil I have found more telling than the more popular labels people like to assign to themselves.

madaxe_again 10y ago
I actually reject the concepts of good and evil, and instead see the axis as selfish/altruistic - and I think humans are generally selfish.
- barrkel 10y ago
  I think altruism is selfish. That is, I think people seek pleasurable feelings through altruistic acts. Sometimes the feelings come from the act itself, of having done a good thing. More usually, it comes from other people, whether it's the gratitude of those to whom the thing has been done, or the admiration of those who observed the act, or - probably the most dubious - from feeling morally superior to other people. Feeling morally superior can lead to moral self-licencing, whereupon you can feel free to act more selfishly or immorally because of a previous morally virtuous or selfless / altruistic act. My axis for judgement would be closer to fair vs unfair, from a Rawlsian veil of ignorance perspective, which lends the notion of fairness a wider social dimension rather than restricting it to the fairness of individual acts, and enables more consequentialist reasoning for the outcomes of universal rules, rather than deontological reasoning.
  - chimprich 10y ago
    I think that's a very limited, not to mention deeply cynical, viewpoint. You're discounting the possibility that someone may perform an altruistic act for logical reasons - for example, because they have calculated the cost of the act they are performing is small to them but of great benefit to the other person, or have decided from a dispassionate perspective that living in a better world is better for everyone and a good reason to perform altruistic acts occasionally. Even if we only consider altruistic acts that are performed because of emotion, I think it is far more common for acts to be performed to avoid negative emotions such as guilt or empathetic pain.
  - madaxe_again 10y ago
    I actually agre with you but wasn't going to go there - everything is fundamentally a selfish act, as self gratification is the motivator. Even apparently selfless acts are selfishly motivated - if irrationally so - if I jump in front of this bullet I'll be a hero. Fair vs unfair works too, and to peel back Kant's rehash of the golden rule, "do as you would be done by" appears to still be the best maxim we have come up with.

Regarding labels, whether one believes humans are innately good or evil I have found more telling than the more popular labels people like to assign to themselves.

madaxe_again 10y ago

I actually reject the concepts of good and evil, and instead see the axis as selfish/altruistic - and I think humans are generally selfish.

barrkel 10y ago
I think altruism is selfish. That is, I think people seek pleasurable feelings through altruistic acts. Sometimes the feelings come from the act itself, of having done a good thing. More usually, it comes from other people, whether it's the gratitude of those to whom the thing has been done, or the admiration of those who observed the act, or - probably the most dubious - from feeling morally superior to other people. Feeling morally superior can lead to moral self-licencing, whereupon you can feel free to act more selfishly or immorally because of a previous morally virtuous or selfless / altruistic act. My axis for judgement would be closer to fair vs unfair, from a Rawlsian veil of ignorance perspective, which lends the notion of fairness a wider social dimension rather than restricting it to the fairness of individual acts, and enables more consequentialist reasoning for the outcomes of universal rules, rather than deontological reasoning.
- chimprich 10y ago
  I think that's a very limited, not to mention deeply cynical, viewpoint. You're discounting the possibility that someone may perform an altruistic act for logical reasons - for example, because they have calculated the cost of the act they are performing is small to them but of great benefit to the other person, or have decided from a dispassionate perspective that living in a better world is better for everyone and a good reason to perform altruistic acts occasionally. Even if we only consider altruistic acts that are performed because of emotion, I think it is far more common for acts to be performed to avoid negative emotions such as guilt or empathetic pain.
- madaxe_again 10y ago
  I actually agre with you but wasn't going to go there - everything is fundamentally a selfish act, as self gratification is the motivator. Even apparently selfless acts are selfishly motivated - if irrationally so - if I jump in front of this bullet I'll be a hero. Fair vs unfair works too, and to peel back Kant's rehash of the golden rule, "do as you would be done by" appears to still be the best maxim we have come up with.