similarminds.com

meta · Advanced Member Joined: 30 Dec 2003 Posts: 455

a crappy moral code is absolutism. total relativism or absolute grayness which you seem to be advocating is hardly any more sensible, it's the opposite extreme. is a car that gets 10mph and kills people when it has an accident the same as a car that gets 60mph and is less likely to kill someone in your world view?

Archangel · Advanced Member Joined: 30 May 2005 Posts: 102

tnv · Posted: Thu Jun 23, 2005 7:59 pm Post subject:

"a crappy moral code is absolutism?" I trust you jest? Absolutism, by definition, is a singular attitude towards everything else. A monolithic view at it's worst! Absolutism is belief in one's superiority about everything, not just a solitary subject (i.e. "a crappy moral code.") So for a "crappy moral code" to be absolutism, it would have to encompass all ideas, all thoughts and all beliefs. The French tried that several hundred years ago, and it was doomed to failure from the beginning. They couldn't qualify their position without proving themselves wrong. It's the olde "...I think, therefore I am" all over again. If you think you are, that doesn't prove you exist, just that you're very narrow minded. One has to think outside of the box, so to speak. Your idea of a "crappy moral code" is only correct from your perspective. If we stand along side each other, and you are on my LEFT, then I am on your RIGHT. We both have a different perspective of who is on the left or right side...yet both of us a correct when we say where you are... RELATIVE only to ourselves. My "crappy moral code" is only "crappy" from your position. Likewise, I may feel you have a "crappy moral code" as I see it.
So one has to ask: which is worse...a "crappy moral code" or no moral code at all? Unless one is a plant or an animal, one has a moral code whether they admit to it or not. You can't have a total lack of a moral code. One could not exist in a moral vacuum...nor could one exist when a slave to all moral codes. You have to adopt a moral code, one can't be "created" to justify one's position. Some may like to think they have "created" something new, but it's just a retelling of an olde story. All thoughts have already been thought...we just claim to think up new ones.

SIO · Advanced Member Joined: 29 May 2005 Posts: 166

This whole conversation is so incredibly, totally sick in my mind. About the moral codes, I mean. I get this feeling of utter revulsion when I reread these posts over and over.

Meta, what is your goal in life?

I believe that the highest achievement of any person is to be truly happy. How many people look back on their childhood as the best years of their life? All a childhood is is a period of blissful ignorance. To reclaim this ignorance would be an incredible thing. Some idealists say that their point in the world is to make it a better place, to improve it for humanity. Why? In my opinion, all conscious human behaviour is goverened by what would (unconsciously) give them the most happiness/comfort. Rules, past experiences, and people all unconsciously contribute to this pool. By the time a person is past an age, they have so much information stored up that they have a definable personality, habits, traits, etc. How blissful would it be to discard all these barriers and conditions and just be truly happy?