New Morality Test

[Rhinoqulous]

baconeatingatheistjew wrote

OK, reading Rhino's post over again, I have to say that I reject his definition as my definition of moral.

So, what's your definition?

I do not have a concept of good only bad.

No, you only have a definition of bad. To have the concept of bad requires the concept of good (I mean for fucks sake, Plato demonstrated this 2600 years ago, you'd think it would be common sense by now). You've gotten as far as defining good as "not-bad", which is pretty good if you're five years old.

I don't buy into altruism,

Don't care, didn't bring it up, not relevant to the conversation.

I think people do good acts out of selfishness....to make themselves feel better, or to make themselves look better, or to stay away from a harm.

So, you have no concept of good, yet you have a concept of why people do good acts. Yeah.

But I do think that one can choose to do a bad act or immoral act, knowing it is a bad act.

You could have a fine career in the field of "no shit sherlock".

So, again, what's your definition of "morality", and what would you consider to be "the good" (not why someone would do good, what good is).

There is no true good. There is only neutral and bad. There is no such thing as a moral act. And yes, it does have to do with my theory that there is no such thing as altruism.

What is an act that you consider moral?

[Rhinoqulous]

baconeatingatheistjew wrote

There is no true good. There is only neutral and bad.

Do you really not understand this? Tall and short. Hot and cold. Big and small. Good and Bad. One does not have meaning without the other (if there where no short things, how would you have a concept of tall?).

There is no such thing as a moral act.

Yet there are immoral acts. Are you starting to see how incoherent your position is?

And yes, it does have to do with my theory that there is no such thing as altruism.

Oh, I get it. You're emo. eww.

Ok, let me try to explain this way. Remember when you were a kid a tried to color within the lines.
Coloring within the lines isn't what I would consider good, especially scribbling, even though your mommy might have thought so.
But coloring outside the lines is bad.

[Rhinoqulous]

baconeatingatheistjew wrote

Ok, let me try to explain this way. Remember when you were a kid a tried to color within the lines.
Coloring within the lines isn't what I would consider good, especially scribbling, even though your mommy might have thought so.
But coloring outside the lines is bad.

So you sit down with your crayons and coloring book with the intention of making a pretty picture for your mommy. If you color outside the lines you did a bad job. If you color in the lines you did a good job. Hoo-ray! You colored within the lines! Your Mommy thinks you did a good job!

To bad mommy raised a retard.

No, I wouldn't consider drawing within the lines a good job. That is the difference between me and you.

I'll try another example to show what I mean.

Lets say you have a choice of smoking or not smoking and you don't want to help yourself prematurely die.

Smoking would be a bad choice, where NOT smoking would be a good choice, even though NOT SMOKING according to you, could not be considered a good choice, because you haven't defined what the concept of good is.

[Rhinoqulous]

baconeatingatheistjew wrote

No, I wouldn't consider drawing within the lines a good job. That is the difference between me and you.

Are you saying that when you were 5 you didn't think you did a good job when you colored within the lines, or are you saying that right now you don't think you did good when you colored within the lines?

Lets say you have a choice of smoking or not smoking and you don't want to help yourself prematurely die.

Smoking would be a bad choice, where NOT smoking would be a good choice, even though NOT SMOKING according to you, could not be considered a good choice, because you haven't defined what the concept of good is.

First off, I would have no problem with this scenario, as I do have a concept of morality. You're the one I'm trying to pound the basics into.

So you give yourself the goal of having a healthy life (or at least not prematurely dieing). One aspect of achieving this goal would be to not smoke. If you start smoking, in relation to your goal, you would be doing bad. But simply "not-smoking" would not be enough to say you're doing good. "Not-smoking" includes injecting heroin through the eye and drinking a fifth of whiskey a day, both of which would be detrimental to your goal of "not dieing prematurely". So no, "not-smoking" is not enough for you to claim you understand and that you are doing "good".

OK, my goal in life is to try not to do immoral things because I think immoral things will cause me grief, or guilt, or worse. My goal is to have a guiltless, griefless, stay out of jail life. So by not doing immoral things I am doing good by your standards in the smoking scenario.

[Rhinoqulous]

baconeatingatheistjew wrote

OK, my goal in life is to try not to do immoral things because I think immoral things will cause me grief, or guilt, or worse. My goal is to have a guiltless, griefless, stay out of jail life. So by not doing immoral things I am doing good by your standards in the smoking scenario.

So by not doing immoral things, and not causing grief, guilt, etc., will you find yourself happy? Or would be a "mellow content" be enough?

Why are yous so adverse to admitting you understand the concept of good? Your "good" is happiness. There's nothing wrong with admitting that, it even has a fancy name, "hedonism".

Only because there doesn't have to be anything satisfying about not doing bad. But doing bad will lead to sadness.

Is there satisfaction in not smoking.....if you don't even think about it when you aren't smoking?

I'm not saying happiness doesn't exist, but it doesn't have anything with being moral in my life. I'm happy when my gives me oral.....twice a year. Morality and immorality has nothing to do with it.

[Rhinoqulous]

If "not being sad" is your goal of "not being immoral", is watching a sad movie immoral? Or will you fucking admit that you can have aspects of a moral system (happy/sad) outside of the system.

Can "not sad" be "happy"? If it can, why can't you fucking get it through you fucking head that you set your "good" as "promoting happiness", but not all instances of "happiness" are moral instances?

Not being sad by doing something bad to someone else is my goal.

Can we stop this now? In my head I know what I'm talking about and I am happy with my answers to you, and in your head you have defeated me.
I can't take this anymore.

[Rhinoqulous]

baconeatingatheistjew wrote

Not being sad by doing something bad to someone else is my goal.

Can we stop this now? In my head I know what I'm talking about and I am happy with my answers to you, and in your head you have defeated me.
I can't take this anymore.

I never took this as "beating" you. I never even presented an alternate to your theory, just claimed that your own theory of morality doesn't make any sense when put under the lens of basic logic. I'm very confused why you are unable to admit that you even have a concept of good, but this is going nowhere. I thought I'd be able to get a few basic philosophical concepts across to you, but I've failed.

[Choobus]

Aaaaaarrrggghhh!