Good and Evil

**rez** · May 07, 2006, 08:38 PM

Greetings Ladies and gentlemen.... or more accurately - Greetings gentlemen!

I have lived my life by this tenet, or at least tried to, for a couple of years. However i wish to see if i have been right by testing my philosophy in the fires of the TWC!

I have in fact seperated everything that is good in this world and everything that is bad into two seperate camps.

Every good deed in this world has a basic grounding in being selfless.

Every bad deed in this world has a basic ground in being selfish.

What i want to know is - can anyone disagree with this point?

I for one hate making generalisations like the above, but i can't actually prove myself that wrong this time. So please folks - have at you!

**Zacheria** · May 07, 2006, 10:15 PM

What about if you kill someone for some one else and it dosnt help you in any way? That is being selfless...

**MaximiIian** · May 07, 2006, 11:37 PM

There is no good, and there is no evil. Nothing is clear-cut and black-and-white. Everything is a two-edged sword. If you kill someone who was trying to kill your loved one, well you and the person you are trying to protect might be fine and dandy, but what about the family and loved ones of the person you just killed? To them, what you thought was a selfless act was an evil and violent deed, no matter what the provocation.

**Fenris** · May 07, 2006, 11:40 PM

Originally Posted by Hapsburg

There is no good, and there is no evil. Nothing is clear-cut and black-and-white. Everything is a two-edged sword. If you kill someone who was trying to kill your loved one, well you are the person you are trying to protect might be fine and dandy, but what about the family and loved ones of the person you just killed? To them, what you thought was a selfless act was an evil and violent deed, no matter what the provocation.

Exactly.

Good and evil is all about morality, which is subjective.

**rez** · May 08, 2006, 06:06 AM

What im trying to get at here is a simple cataloguing of good and bad.

For instance can you name a good deed that does not involve being selfless?

Can you name a bad deed that does not involve greed/selfishness?

but interesting points nonetheless

**Turnus** · May 08, 2006, 06:12 AM

But rez, the definitions of 'good' and 'bad' are entirely subjective, so each person would have their own specific notions of good and bad deeds (although in many points they would be similar).

EDIT: Wow, my 666th post is in a thread entitled 'Good and Evil'...

**rez** · May 08, 2006, 06:22 AM

Nice - 666

hmmmm, damn moral relativism...

ok then i guess this principle applies only to my set of morals. But i would have thought the obvious ones would have been fairly universal.

okay lets take the premise and apply it to christian morals. Their fairly universal

**Tiwaz** · May 08, 2006, 07:27 AM

How do you define selfless? When you do what you consider a good deed you DO get your reward from your own psyche if nothing else. In short, you do it and subconciously await some kind of recognisation from others or from yourself (if someone tells me they have done good deeds without feeling good about themselves I will point to you a liar)

**Gwendylyn** · May 08, 2006, 08:01 AM

I dislike moral relativism because the idea is flawed. Morals are just different interpretations of ethical principles (i.e. do unto others as you would have them do unto you). We as a society just haven't perfected the practical application of certain universal principles yet.

Originally Posted by rez

Every good deed in this world has a basic grounding in being selfless.

I'd actually change that to "Every good deed in this world has a basic grounding in self-interest."

It's different from selfishness because it takes into account much larger horizons. Acting good is in your self interest for many reasons. Easy example: protecting the environment is in our self interest, but selfishness causes us to destroy it.

**Tacticalwithdrawal** · May 08, 2006, 08:45 AM

Originally Posted by rez

Every good deed in this world has a basic grounding in being selfless.

Every bad deed in this world has a basic ground in being selfish.

What i want to know is - can anyone disagree with this point?

oh yes, easily 'cos the world is shades of grey not black and white.

Easy (if contived example) is:

Tribe A & Tribe B live in next door valleys. Both are expanding and both need the resources the other tribe has to survive.

The leader of Tribe A realises first and launches a surprise attack on Tribe B, wiping out all the males and capturing all the females and children and using them as slaves.

Now what tribe A did is evil from the point of view of Tribe B, and probably from a neutral's point of view (murder, slavery, enforced prostitution/rape) but from Tribe A's point of view the actions are good as they ensured the tribe's survival.

Ok, as i said above, very contrived but still valid

**master of puppets** · May 08, 2006, 10:24 AM

Philsophy after Engineering or Medical studies, is want i want to do when i get to university (unfortunatly UWA doesn't do astrophysics to my knowledge).

Good and bad is all a mttar of perspective and relativity. And in the end, does it matter if what we do? all we are is a tiny spec of dust on the infinite desert of the universe....wow im depressed *slits wrists*

**Spiff** · May 08, 2006, 10:33 AM

natural law doesnt hold much water if you ask me, divine, law things which are universaly good or bad, they dont really amount to much when put under scrutiny - there will always be an exception. Which doesnt make sense when talking about things which are by that theory self evident. Maybe youre best to look at the utility of an action when deciding its moral value, the greatest good for the greatest number etc

**Xiaodun** · May 08, 2006, 10:30 AM

I do not believe that describing Good as selfless and Evil as Selfish is pausable.

Is there such a thing as a purely selfless act?

Do good Christians/Muslims/Jews do "moral" things so they can get into heaven?

Don't volunteers work to gain some sort of self satisfaction?

Where exactly do you cut the line?

**Habelo** · May 08, 2006, 12:33 PM

i think i wrote exactly the same thing on this forum not so long ago. so yes thats exactly how my philosophy goes.
got it from rpg game btw

**rez** · May 08, 2006, 12:56 PM

I for one do not believe a deed has to be utterly selfless to embody the virtues of attempted selflessness. Putting someone's wants ahead of yours is a prime example of the base good deed. Putting your wants ahead of those around you is a prime example of the base bad deed.

However these arguments have shown me that this line of thought can only really be contained in my own sense of ethics as the application into the wider world has too many shades of grey.

thanks guys!