Ways of being immoral

[The Voice of Time]

Create value!!

Or to say it the right way, create conditions that perpetuate an ability for happiness across members of a happiness creating society.

[Arising_uk]

Or to say it the right way, create conditions that perpetuate an ability for happiness across members of a happiness creating society.

What happens if one member's happiness is another's misery?

[The Voice of Time]

You know you'll get a page full of technical answers if I try to answer that xD I was trying to avoid getting into my usual list of technical terms and complex web of explanations. Basically my term "Tren" explains it, which has been substituted for "society" to simplify.

[Lev Muishkin]

Create value!!

Or to say it the right way, create conditions that perpetuate an ability for happiness across members of a happiness creating society.

Only when it comes to a utilitarian view of morality.

For others it si more important to do duty to the rules, regardless of happiness; that there are some things more important.

[The Voice of Time]

For others it si more important to do duty to the rules, regardless of happiness; that there are some things more important.

Yup, and those are the wrong people, those we try to get rid of so that people can be happy.

[Lev Muishkin]

For others it si more important to do duty to the rules, regardless of happiness; that there are some things more important.

Yup, and those are the wrong people, those we try to get rid of so that people can be happy.

Why not just exterminate them all?

But I don't think you really mean it.
Sometimes it is more important to do what is right, than to seek the maximum happiness.
Consider the question asked by Dostoyevski when he asks; "If the world's happiness could be guaranteed by the torture of a small girl would you do it?" Or wouls you allow the world to suffer and allow the child one smile?

And if Hitler believed that the world would be a happier place were their no Jews, would that make the Holocaust okay?

[Arising_uk]

Yup, and those are the wrong people, those we try to get rid of so that people can be happy.

So you don't think it a rule or duty to "... create conditions that perpetuate an ability for happiness across members of a happiness creating society."?

[Lev Muishkin]

Yup, and those are the wrong people, those we try to get rid of so that people can be happy.

So you don't think it a rule or duty to "... create conditions that perpetuate an ability for happiness across members of a happiness creating society."?

Nice try.

You might also like to confuse utilitarianism with virtue ethics, by asking him the question; "Do you think it an act of personal virtue to make people happy"

[The Voice of Time]

Why not just exterminate them all?

Because the knowledge that one can be killed brings about a basic inherent fear and uncertainty in all individuals. And all individuals who are part of the world are ultimately responsible for that same world, and a neglect of such a deep responsibility is unreasonable for someone who takes part in reason. Therefore, the argument that "what you don't know, doesn't hurt you" doesn't work in this logic. Happiness is something everyone creates from their own standpoint, collectively creating a mass of socialized happiness.

Sometimes it is more important to do what is right, than to seek the maximum happiness.

No. Only when they accidentally coincide. You can do something now that is costly to your welfare to get a brighter future, but you can't sacrifice a brighter future. Because of this, dilemmas where one has to choose who will live and who will die and you are favoured for death, makes no sense. Where deep emotions are threatened to be uprooted by extreme situations the only reasonable choice is resistance to the choice, as the higher the loss the greater the value of hope, or in other words: the more you have to loose by making any choice, the more valuable any tiny trace of opportunity for something different becomes, up until it takes on heroic proportions. If you have no emotions regarding the situation you can only choose yourself, but then you are not really part of the society of happy people (which is not defined as people being happy but by an ability to integrate with a collective of people working towards happiness), and as such you can't really be considered a reasonable person. You become a weirdo, and to weirdos different rules may apply... like duty, but you are kinda on a list for people that needs changing, so it's not satisfactory to conclude that the person should follow a duty. Because really the person should change, first and foremost. Following duty is just a necessary enforcement of good circumstances in an extreme situation, it's not representative of normality in this case.

Consider the question asked by Dostoyevski when he asks; "If the world's happiness could be guaranteed by the torture of a small girl would you do it?" Or wouls you allow the world to suffer and allow the child one smile?

The world is not static. Because of this, questions like those have no basis in reality. In reality there may have been an all-powerful dictator who happened to have the power to give everybody happiness but only did it if you tortured some random little girl. However, the people living on that happiness wouldn't be truly happy, because the world wouldn't be a happy situation, they would have to be drugged or become pray to illusion. Real happiness doesn't come from bad things, that's just a happy feel. Real happiness comes from reason, from the power of intellect and influence over the world. If people were subjected to such a tyrant, reason would dictate they should find a way to eventually overthrow him.

Because such an all-powerful dictator would likely be immensely difficult to fight, yes, people would torture that girl. Because they would exhaust themselves if not. Torturing that girl would be an investment in resistance. Reasonable people pick bad things not because they choose between things, but because they invest to get better choices.

[The Voice of Time]

Yup, and those are the wrong people, those we try to get rid of so that people can be happy.

So you don't think it a rule or duty to "... create conditions that perpetuate an ability for happiness across members of a happiness creating society."?

It wouldn't give justice to the idea to mix it with duty or think of it as a rule. Think of it as an inherent fundamental consequence of reason.

[prof]

greetings, VOT

Would you be so kind as to elaborate on what you mean by "an ability to integrate with a collective of people working towards happiness"?

As you may be aware, that phrase is not clear. Could you, in plain talk rather than in your technical terminology, elucidate exactly what is involved: how is that ability measured? Why is a happy society not one with happy people in it? When is the integration completed? How do we know?

I feel you are onto something important, but the structure of it needs to be spelled out more, and some details as to how to implement this kind of society.



Thanks in advance!

[The Voice of Time]

greetings, VOT

Would you be so kind as to elaborate on what you mean by "an ability to integrate with a collective of people working towards happiness"?

As you may be aware, that phrase is not clear. Could you, in plain talk rather than in your technical terminology, elucidate exactly what is involved: how is that ability measured?

You measure whether the individual is willing (has the ability of will) and able to make progress in integration. It's not the ability that is measured per se, but the integration process. The integration process requires a lot of explanation, it has to do with the space of needs, the Tren and so forth.

Why is a happy society not one with happy people in it?

The one who dwells in emotion and feeling alone does not live a long life, and an idea of dying for nothing is not a happy one so we do not have a natural imperative to pursue it. That's why we're not all just taking the drugs that blissfully kill us. It's about being able to have the maximum time of happiness. A society can be emotionally happy, but not everyone at the same time, as there are always going to be people who have to oversee the party... administrate the situation so to speak.

Everyone can be emotionally happy, but in turns. The rest have to rely on more passive satisfactions while they labour, like peace of mind, comfort, energy, and avoiding disturbances to such things, like making sure to eat well, nourishing and tasty, to invest in environmental factors of comfort from ergonomics to regulations of room temperature to air quality to odour-control and so forth.

When is the integration completed?

Integration is a never-ending process. You can be satisfied with the pace of the process, but not the process finalization, as that would, given first a long elaboration on the nature of needs, be hugely speculative and improbable.

How do we know?

You don't. But you don't have to. We live in a non-absolutistic world, and we can be quite good at that if we want to.

I feel you are onto something important, but the structure of it needs to be spelled out more, and some details as to how to implement this kind of society.

Talking about it all the time from different angles. See my tons of posts constantly exploring ethics and dealing with dilemmas, either as threads themselves or mere answers to others' posts.



Thanks in advance![/quote]

[Lev Muishkin]

Why not just exterminate them all?

Because the knowledge that one can be killed brings about a basic inherent fear and uncertainty in all individuals. And all individuals who are part of the world are ultimately responsible for that same world, and a neglect of such a deep responsibility is unreasonable for someone who takes part in reason. Therefore, the argument that "what you don't know, doesn't hurt you" doesn't work in this logic. Happiness is something everyone creates from their own standpoint, collectively creating a mass of socialized happiness.

Sometimes it is more important to do what is right, than to seek the maximum happiness.

No. Only when they accidentally coincide. You can do something now that is costly to your welfare to get a brighter future, but you can't sacrifice a brighter future. Because of this, dilemmas where one has to choose who will live and who will die and you are favoured for death, makes no sense. Where deep emotions are threatened to be uprooted by extreme situations the only reasonable choice is resistance to the choice, as the higher the loss the greater the value of hope, or in other words: the more you have to loose by making any choice, the more valuable any tiny trace of opportunity for something different becomes, up until it takes on heroic proportions. If you have no emotions regarding the situation you can only choose yourself, but then you are not really part of the society of happy people (which is not defined as people being happy but by an ability to integrate with a collective of people working towards happiness), and as such you can't really be considered a reasonable person. You become a weirdo, and to weirdos different rules may apply... like duty, but you are kinda on a list for people that needs changing, so it's not satisfactory to conclude that the person should follow a duty. Because really the person should change, first and foremost. Following duty is just a necessary enforcement of good circumstances in an extreme situation, it's not representative of normality in this case.

Consider the question asked by Dostoyevski when he asks; "If the world's happiness could be guaranteed by the torture of a small girl would you do it?" Or wouls you allow the world to suffer and allow the child one smile?

The world is not static. Because of this, questions like those have no basis in reality. In reality there may have been an all-powerful dictator who happened to have the power to give everybody happiness but only did it if you tortured some random little girl. However, the people living on that happiness wouldn't be truly happy, because the world wouldn't be a happy situation, they would have to be drugged or become pray to illusion. Real happiness doesn't come from bad things, that's just a happy feel. Real happiness comes from reason, from the power of intellect and influence over the world. If people were subjected to such a tyrant, reason would dictate they should find a way to eventually overthrow him.

Because such an all-powerful dictator would likely be immensely difficult to fight, yes, people would torture that girl. Because they would exhaust themselves if not. Torturing that girl would be an investment in resistance. Reasonable people pick bad things not because they choose between things, but because they invest to get better choices.

Your philosophy of morals is bankrupt. Everyday you live your life you are potentially acting for your own happiness and not the happiness of future generations that will suffer from your profligate use of fossil fuels. Potentially you are not only causing pollution and global warming, but you are shortening the life of the ecosystem of the earth and have no way of knowing what you are able to do to maximise the happiness of others.
The little girl is a metaphor for the cheap tea and coffee that you drink whilst exploiting and causing the suffering of the third world. You support the world capitalist conspiracy just by existing, which enslaves whole countries with crippling debt that they have no hope of ever paying off, whilst controlling the prices of exports from their countries, and creaming off billions in profits to pay for the infrastructure of the cold, resourceless countries of the North. So white people can sit on their comfy chairs in their centrally heated houses tapping away on their computers and doing no useful work.
Whilst countless masses huddle over meagre hearths breaking twigs to build tiny fires to cook a handful of rice, fat whites muse on how wonderful their lives must be to live so close to nature.

In short you are a hypocrite. The best you can do for global happiness is the act like a counter-Brevik and start to slaughter the fat overfed greedy, and powerful white race.

Your moral aim is impossible and your actions are contradictory.

What makes a person happy? I'm looking at the people marching on the streets in Ferguson as I write. The vast majority of the townsfolk would be much happier of the policeman who shot that boy, were to be hung in the street. By your rubric that is what should happen.

But more important is the law of the land which needs to be applied even-handedly regardless of "happiness" (whatever that fatuous idea might be).

[The Voice of Time]

Your philosophy of morals is bankrupt.

You shouldn't start an answer with nonsense. This doesn't mean anything. Moral philosophies can't go bankrupt. It's vague and open to interpretation, bad start.

Everyday you live your life you are potentially acting for your own happiness and not the happiness of future generations that will suffer from your profligate use of fossil fuels. Potentially you are not only causing pollution and global warming, but you are shortening the life of the ecosystem of the earth and have no way of knowing what you are able to do to maximise the happiness of others.

The world that is to come is integrated with the world that is now. As I said, the world is not static. Time doesn't move in just one direction, it is interweaved and the state of relations that are today, the state of things, will through chains of causality make the future actual. The kids of today, heck I'm a recent adult, and we, are connected with the lives of those who live today and have lived for a long time. That human relation matters in the collective socialization of happiness, and because we care about people that come after us, we choose to base our ideas on the development of world that is the best for all times that are, and that are to come.

You didn't catch the essence of what I said, or else you might've realized this by now.

The little girl is a metaphor for the cheap tea and coffee that you drink whilst exploiting and causing the suffering of the third world. You support the world capitalist conspiracy just by existing

When you say "conspiracy" I am rolling my eyes, just as you know. Any sentence that contains the word "conspiracy" is almost entirely likely to make me think you're a lunatic. Just saying, you might want to use different words if you want to be taken seriously.

, which enslaves whole countries with crippling debt that they have no hope of ever paying off, whilst controlling the prices of exports from their countries, and creaming off billions in profits to pay for the infrastructure of the cold, resourceless countries of the North. So white people can sit on their comfy chairs in their centrally heated houses tapping away on their computers and doing no useful work. Whilst countless masses huddle over meagre hearths breaking twigs to build tiny fires to cook a handful of rice, fat whites muse on how wonderful their lives must be to live so close to nature.

My country of Norway is very resourceful, so you might have gotten me mixed up in the bunch. That aside, this is a derail from the topic, so I don't know what it is supposed to mean. Seems to me you are only wasting my time with a character attack on my place of origin, as if my colour or my nationality offends you.

In short you are a hypocrite.

No. I've said nothing of which I do not believe in and live by myself. I'm a great proponent of 3rd world development and green tech, not that it really matters that much, I just don't want you to confuse me with some image you might have and which you've attributed my character to.

The best you can do for global happiness is the act like a counter-Brevik and start to slaughter the fat overfed greedy, and powerful white race.

This is a flame. Please act with some dignity, do not flame people.

Your moral aim is impossible and your actions are contradictory.

And what is my aim? I can't seem to have found myself ever expressing an aim?

What makes a person happy? I'm looking at the people marching on the streets in Ferguson as I write. The vast majority of the townsfolk would be much happier of the policeman who shot that boy, were to be hung in the street. By your rubric that is what should happen.

No they wouldn't. There is no such thing as happiness from hatred, that is twisted.

But more important is the law of the land which needs to be applied even-handedly regardless of "happiness" (whatever that fatuous idea might be).

Laws are only as legitimate as the benefits they can appear to provide. Laws work because they hinder anarchy. But reason works better: it hinders tragedy. (I said that to rhyme xD)

[Lev Muishkin]

Your philosophy of morals is bankrupt.

You shouldn't start an answer with nonsense. This doesn't mean anything. Moral philosophies can't go bankrupt. It's vague and open to interpretation, bad start.

The only bad start is you, offering a defence of utilitarianism. Bankrupt is a perfectly good metaphor for that philosophy.

Everyday you live your life you are potentially acting for your own happiness and not the happiness of future generations that will suffer from your profligate use of fossil fuels. Potentially you are not only causing pollution and global warming, but you are shortening the life of the ecosystem of the earth and have no way of knowing what you are able to do to maximise the happiness of others.

The world that is to come is integrated with the world that is now.
Tautological flim-flam. Meaningless.
As I said, the world is not static. Time doesn't move in just one direction, it is interweaved and the state of relations that are today, the state of things, will through chains of causality make the future actual. The kids of today, heck I'm a recent adult, and we, are connected with the lives of those who live today and have lived for a long time. That human relation matters in the collective socialization of happiness, and because we care about people that come after us, we choose to base our ideas on the development of world that is the best for all times that are, and that are to come.
Utterly irrelevant.

You didn't catch the essence of what I said, or else you might've realized this by now.
Is this all you got?

The little girl is a metaphor for the cheap tea and coffee that you drink whilst exploiting and causing the suffering of the third world. You support the world capitalist conspiracy just by existing

When you say "conspiracy" I am rolling my eyes, just as you know. Any sentence that contains the word "conspiracy" is almost entirely likely to make me think you're a lunatic. Just saying, you might want to use different words if you want to be taken seriously.
I take it you are not a native speaker. A conspiracy is not a gang of Dr. Evils gathered together plotting the suffering of coffee pickers. We all conspire in our own interests and give scant consideration to others. WHilst we might pay lip-service to suffering, we cannot really know it, as it is. As ultimate knowledge of the consequences of your actions to bring about 'maximal happiness' can not be known, the philosophy which you seek to enact is an impossible aim; bankrupt.

, which enslaves whole countries with crippling debt that they have no hope of ever paying off, whilst controlling the prices of exports from their countries, and creaming off billions in profits to pay for the infrastructure of the cold, resourceless countries of the North. So white people can sit on their comfy chairs in their centrally heated houses tapping away on their computers and doing no useful work. Whilst countless masses huddle over meagre hearths breaking twigs to build tiny fires to cook a handful of rice, fat whites muse on how wonderful their lives must be to live so close to nature.

My country of Norway is very resourceful, so you might have gotten me mixed up in the bunch. That aside, this is a derail from the topic, so I don't know what it is supposed to mean. Seems to me you are only wasting my time with a character attack on my place of origin, as if my colour or my nationality offends you.

Your country is a net importer of most of what it uses. It acquires what it needs from poor countries at prices that are shameful. It does this by association with its Western/Northern allies which specifically exclude the "South" and the trade deals it does with it's friends places tariffs and trade barriers on foreign countries outside the G20, and G8. ( I imagine you have heard of these). If you want the conspiracy then look no further.

I don't give a rat's arse about you being Norwegian. And I resent the cheap trick of protesting that I am some sort of racist.
I don't care if you are a Martian. But of you are living in luxury and trying to support utilitarianism that makes you a hypocrite.

In short you are a hypocrite.

No. I've said nothing of which I do not believe in and live by myself. I'm a great proponent of 3rd world development and green tech, not that it really matters that much, I just don't want you to confuse me with some image you might have and which you've attributed my character to.

The best you can do for global happiness is the act like a counter-Brevik and start to slaughter the fat overfed greedy, and powerful white race.

This is a flame. Please act with some dignity, do not flame people.

Your moral aim is impossible and your actions are contradictory.

And what is my aim? I can't seem to have found myself ever expressing an aim?

What makes a person happy? I'm looking at the people marching on the streets in Ferguson as I write. The vast majority of the townsfolk would be much happier of the policeman who shot that boy, were to be hung in the street. By your rubric that is what should happen.

No they wouldn't. There is no such thing as happiness from hatred, that is twisted.

Of course there is happiness from hatred! You are surely naive. The policeman that killed the black boy enjoyed it; probably thought he was doing a great job too; may well have been a utilitarian. And those with the righteous anger at that act, will feel good that having hung that "pig" from the next lamp-post knowing justice is done and can laugh and cheer, just like the crowds did when they killed Osama Bin Laden.
Living in christian moral-bubble in Norway does not make you qualified to judge what happiness is to most people. And given your country's suicide rate I don't think that the current moral system is compatible with utilitarian ideals.
The fact is that it is simply not possible to reach a valuable judgement on happiness, and how to get it.

But more important is the law of the land which needs to be applied even-handedly regardless of "happiness" (whatever that fatuous idea might be).

Laws are only as legitimate as the benefits they can appear to provide. Laws work because they hinder anarchy. But reason works better: it hinders tragedy. (I said that to rhyme xD)

So it seems when it comes down to brass tacks you are not an utilitarian at all.