Ethical scenarios, real and imagined

[Walker]

It helps to remember concepts until reality won’t allow them to be forgotten.

To this end, simple is better.

Gandhi buttoned it up.

- Remember ahimsa.
- Remember to be the desired change.

Is there any ethical conundrum that cannot be resolved with these two simple rules? If so, trot it out.

[yiostheoy]

It helps to remember concepts until reality won’t allow them to be forgotten.

To this end, simple is better.

Gandhi buttoned it up.

- Remember ahimsa.
- Remember to be the desired change.

Is there any ethical conundrum that cannot be resolved with these two simple rules? If so, trot it out.

You should probably provide some badly needed definitions first, in the executive summary format, as simply as you can manage it.

Remember too -- subject / verb / object / modifier.

Use complete English sentences -- just like your elementary school teachers all tried to teach you.

[Walker]

You should probably provide some badly needed definitions first, in the executive summary format, as simply as you can manage it.

Remember too -- subject / verb / object / modifier.

Use complete English sentences -- just like your elementary school teachers all tried to teach you.

Seems like folks just can’t get along these days without an instruction manual.

Ok, since I’m here I’ll do the first one, in case anyone is shy.

In the scenario that you have created with your words, I remember to do no harm, and I remember to be the change that I want to see, "in perfect harmony" (to quote some well-known conditioning that cost some folks millions and millions of dollars, recouped via conditioned thirst with the aid of chemistry).

In essence, you are saying, “feed me.”

I have fed you. Now you can grow and evolve. Discover the answers to what you do not know, and what you wish to know.

In the spirit of truth that Gandhi discovered and condensed for you to remember should you have the need for ethical direction in your search, I have both acted without intent to harm, and I have become the change I wish to see in the world. That change is to pursue one’s own curiosity rather than conceptually redefine the reality of a situation in terms of what I think is not.

[yiostheoy]

You should probably provide some badly needed definitions first, in the executive summary format, as simply as you can manage it.

Remember too -- subject / verb / object / modifier.

Use complete English sentences -- just like your elementary school teachers all tried to teach you.

Seems like folks just can’t get along these days without an instruction manual.

Ok, since I’m here I’ll do the first one, in case anyone is shy.

In the scenario that you have created with your words, I remember to do no harm, and I remember to be the change that I want to see, "in perfect harmony" (to quote some well-known conditioning that cost some folks millions and millions of dollars, recouped via conditioned thirst with the aid of chemistry).

In essence, you are saying, “feed me.”

I have fed you. Now you can grow and evolve. Discover the answers to what you do not know, and what you wish to know.

In the spirit of truth that Gandhi discovered and condensed for you to remember should you have the need for ethical direction in your search, I have both acted without intent to harm, and I have become the change I wish to see in the world. That change is to pursue one’s own curiosity rather than conceptually redefine the reality of a situation in terms of what I think is not.

This sounds like a re-encapsulation of the Buddhist notion of "right occupation".

Right Occupation makes perfect sense, depending on your perspective.

The Buddhists however define the following 5 things as the WRONG occupations:

- slave trading
- poison manufacturing and selling
- meat slaughtering
- alcohol manufacturing and selling
- arms manufacturing and selling.

For me I would have no problem with arms, alcohol, or meat. So from an overall ethical perspective this is all relative.

Thus a better definition for ethics is direly needed.

I like Immanuel Kant's definition the best: do not make others your objects of personal gain.

[Impenitent]

...
I like Immanuel Kant's definition the best: do not make others your objects of personal gain.

so much for socialism...

-Imp

[Dalek Prime]

...
I like Immanuel Kant's definition the best: do not make others your objects of personal gain.

so much for socialism...

-Imp

... and capitalism. Actually, Kant's statement fits perfectly with antinatalism, as people only have kids for their own reasons, not for the child's. 'Fix my loneliness, or marriage. Take care of me in old age. Pay into my pension fund. Make another one to keep the first child company, rinse, and repeat. Etc.'

Fact is, we define ethics, and no one sticks to them. They always have an excuse for the exception.

[Walker]

Fact is, we define ethics, and no one sticks to them. They always have an excuse for the exception.

Brilliant observation. Really. It goes to the crux of choice, and here’s why.

Ethics become self-generating and self-perpetuating at a level of thought closer to basal than closer to reasoning. Ethical conundrums popping up in reality like wack-a-moles need not be figured out at the higher levels of reasoning, where excuses are created. With the proper ethical foundation, right action is closer to instinct.

This frees up thought for the finer things of life.

Ethics are designed to emulate what is perceived to be true of spiritual leaders such as Christ, around which religions are formed. The basal-generated actions inspired by a spiritual leader such as Christ are first emulated through prescriptions of behavior for those not touched by divine presence, before those same prescriptions become descriptions of the internal workings. However this only applies to the emulators, as will reveal momentarily.

Since we are all of the same genetic material, thus of similar incarnated capacity, only a finite number of responses are possible under any given set of conditions, and the number may be surprisingly low. What does this mean?

This means that on the planet earth, independent inventors can independently and simultaneously manifest similar things from the infinite possibilities of infinite potentiality. (The independent part used to happen more often before the electronic web encased the planet in an invisible round box.)

Lacewing will be happy to know that this is also a reasoned trail of why Buddha can arise simultaneously within varied non-emulating forms and independent of varied non-emulating forms to create a sangha not limited to preconceptions of a Buddha-form encased within one biological entity.

[Sheepy]

Well if you want to know an ethical conundrum that you cant solve with these two principles, what about plain, common dilemma.
Two kids drowning on your right and 5 kids with muscular dystrophy (or another life-shortening disease) drowning on your left. If you have to choose, which ones do you save?

Or did you not mean this kind of conundrum?

[henry quirk]

"Two kids drowning on your right and 5 kids with muscular dystrophy (or another life-shortening disease) drowning on your left. If you have to choose, which ones do you save?"

If I can toss ropes (or life jackets) into the water, hey, I'm all over that...the risk to me is small.

But: me, throwin' myself into the water, potentially killin' myself, to save strangers, when folks I love depend on me, is stupid ('ethics' doesn't even come into it...why? cuz ethics is made up horse manure, shifty and shifting...it's the crap folks drum up to justify their acts, a stick wielded to beat others down with when they want the others to 'do as told').

[Walker]

Well if you want to know an ethical conundrum that you cant solve with these two principles, what about plain, common dilemma.
Two kids drowning on your right and 5 kids with muscular dystrophy (or another life-shortening disease) drowning on your left. If you have to choose, which ones do you save?

Or did you not mean this kind of conundrum?

Interesting example. Every time I uncoil the 100 foot electrical cord I practice throwing a lifeline to an imaginary drowner. The method lies in the proper coiling and the high, underhand throw. From a lifetime of practice I can land the line next to a drowning birdbath. Since you brought it up that’s a skill you may someday need.

*

You save the the two strongest children first.

You now number three and have a better chance of saving the other five.

Then you’re haunted for the rest of your life for those you could not save.

[Sheepy]

Well if you want to know an ethical conundrum that you cant solve with these two principles, what about plain, common dilemma.
Two kids drowning on your right and 5 kids with muscular dystrophy (or another life-shortening disease) drowning on your left. If you have to choose, which ones do you save?

Or did you not mean this kind of conundrum?

Interesting example. Every time I uncoil the 100 foot electrical cord I practice throwing a lifeline to an imaginary drowner. The method lies in the proper coiling and the high, underhand throw. From a lifetime of practice I can land the line next to a drowning birdbath. Since you brought it up that’s a skill you may someday need.

*

You save the the two strongest children first.

You now number three and have a better chance of saving the other five.

Then you’re haunted for the rest of your life for those you could not save.

Ahh wonderful! You seem to be very well qualified to answer this problem then! I must say I am too, I once saved my dumb-ass dog, who I wasn't even sure could swim, from a river. I agree with your answer, but what if the choice was between both 2 healthy kids, or all five disabled ones, like they were in two bags thrown into the sea and you could only pull out one bag.

I think principle 1 "do no harm" is an easy one to use here, you should definitely not throw rocks at the kids or make fun of their disability or something while they are drowning.
Principle 2 "be the change you want to see" is harder to follow because even if you'd like to see all of them saved, you might not have time. And if we change it to "be the realistically possible change you wan to see" then you might not know what the best possible change is 2 healthy kids or 5 disabled ones. I think this method doesn't solve much.

[Walker]

I think this method doesn't solve much.

Neither does the method you think.

But you know that.

[Dalek Prime]

Me? I watch everyone drown, and think them unfortunate for being born. Wouldn't have happened otherwise, and I wouldn't have been put in that ethical situation had I not been either. I caused no harm.

[Walker]

Depending on the situation, inaction causes harm.

[Dalek Prime]

Depending on the situation, inaction causes harm.

I wasn't the originator of harm. No harm is caused by not creating a consciousness. All harms are spared those not created.