I talking about morality.
What is it that makes an action or person good or evil? And since this isn’t in Great Debates, I don’t want this to become one. Just say what you think.
I believe that happiness is good. An action that causes happiness is good and an action that causes unhappiness is evil. Although, if you unintenionally cause unhappiness and it was unforseeable, that is not evil.
What about actions that make one group happy while making another group unhappy?
Oh right, forgot to mention that part.
Sum total happiness. If somethings makes me a little unhappy and you very happy, it’s good. If something makes me very unhappy and makes you a little happy it’s bad.
I try always to think in terms of Ethics, not Morality.
According both to Linguistics and to my Philosophy teacher,
Morality comes from “more”, meaning “custom”, so “morally correct” is something relative, which changes from time to time and place to place. Think of the “lawful/unlawful” axis for align in DnD, or simply of the differences between what a Spaniard and a Moroccan see as “decent dress”.
Ethics seeks the Ultimate Good and Ultimate Evil, that is, the absolutes that do not change no matter what. We can make murdering little old ladies legal and we can become accustomed to it, but would that make it good?
Of course my morality will always tint my notions about what is “good for the whole species/planet/etc”, but…
to me “good” is “something that affects the group in a positive way, increasing physical and psychological health, with better chances for survival in both the short and long term”. And I believe very much in “creation of wealth” (and well being, health, etc), that is, if We can get better without hurting Others, we definitely ought to - those Others are part of our group, too, it just happens to be a bigger group.
Have I managed to confuse everybody yet?
Define:
a) Very Unhappy
b) A Little Happy
Plus, you might want to address the relative value of the thing that causes this great “unhappiness” to you and a “little happiness” to me with respect to how others may feel about it.
I’m going to suggest (and I won’t be the first) that “good” is a non-zero sum game. There must be net “good” for each of us or one of us will be very unhappy. Of course that also means that neither one of us will acheive “maximum” happiness at the expense of the other. Which is good too.
Happiness is feeling good, unhappiness is feeling bad. The adjectives state to what degree.
Of course, everyone should be taken into account. If happiness can be on a scale of -10 to 10 then everyone’s change in happiness caused by the action in question is added up and if it is less than 0 it is bad. If it is more than 0 it’s good.
I believe that “that which is good” is intrinsically something that cannot be nailed down definitionally. No description that can be rendered in language will be (entirely) accurate.
This is a very important point, incidentally. Entire legal and religious systems have been founded on the notion that such a definition or codification can be created, and to say (as I did) that it can’t is to relegate all such attempts to inexact art at best.
And I shall go further: I will say that it is actively wrong, in the sense of “evil in this world”, to enshrine anything as the definition of good and to elevate it above people’s private personal assessments of “that which is good”. It is blasphemy. It is idolatry. It is bad.
The Good can only be shown, not spoken. Oops! I’ve already said too much.
The motives behind the action are what makes an action good or evil.
A person is good or evil based on what motivates them to do things. If people do things so that they will look better, that’s evil. If they’re motivated to do things so that others will be uplifted, that’s good.
I think any action that causes happiness without causing harm or being motivated by the wish to cause harm is good. For things that cause some harm or where harm is the intention (even if harm does not actually arrise) it is usually a judgement call, which must take into account the amount of harm and hapiness caused, and the motives of the person doing the act.
I agree with Immanuel Kant: