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I don't believe there is, I believe that there is bad things that some people view as not so bad, and there is good things that people believe is bad or evil. For instance I myself am pro choice so I believe abortion is a fine if the female chooses it is. Also most people view things like smoking weed are bad. When in other cases smoking weed is good for people in need of it. That's my opinion on this subject.
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Interesting question. I think about this a lot actually. I think that there is a God and God has a kind of divine morality system. But, no one necessarily knows exactly what it is. So, humans do each have their own special opinions about such matters and when in large groups, these more or less common perceptions of morality form the status quo. That is one of the attractions The Baha'i Faith has for me. The philosophy seems right on every level and a large number of people also value it. That makes it a reality.
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Hamlet “…there is nothing either good or bad by thinking makes it so.”
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Hamlet “…there is nothing either good or bad by thinking makes it so.”
Nature is amoral and nonjudgmental – an event is simply an event – until we apply human judgment. And then opinions vary what is celebrated in one culture is an abomination in another.
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Hamlet “…there is nothing either good or bad by thinking makes it so.”
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Hamlet “…there is nothing either good or bad by thinking makes it so.”
Nature is amoral and nonjudgmental – an event is simply an event – until we apply human judgment. And then opinions vary what is celebrated in one culture is an abomination in another.
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I think society has labeled certain acts as good and bad and therefore we go along with what we've been told. But I honestly do not believe so. It'd be like saying everything is black and white when clearly there are some areas that happen to be gray. The gray area is differing opinions; and with how many people there are on this world now you're always going to have people that disagree between what is "right and wrong" or "good and bad".
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I think true good and evils are there. Hitler thought killing Jews was good but it is understood it was evil
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Good and Bad are distinct and objective.
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Good and Bad are distinct and objective.
Speaking in terms of morality:
No single act however can be said to be good, however, since even something that appears "nice" can be done out of selfishness or even hatred. An act is good or bad based on its Object, End and Circumstance. Object being the actual action within itself - picking up trash we'll say. The End is for what purpose we commit the action - well say, to throw it away. Circumstance is the setting or 'circumstance' in which the action is committed - we'll say a public sidewalk during the night.
With This particular action I would say the act is good. But lets say we change your End to throwing the trash at somebody. This now becomes a bad act, even though the object and circumstance remain the same.
In this way, there is actually no 'neutral' action, every act is either good or bad.
Note also that there are varying degrees of 'goodness' or 'badness'
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man is an emotional creature.. if a person doesn't feel that 1+1 should be 2 doesn't mean its right to say its 11.. so if a person strongly believes killing is right, doesn't mean its right because of their feeling, or opinion..
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it is relative, i believe.. you can do a good deed, but have a selfish reason for doing it.. that is not positive.. doing something from the heart will qualify it as good or bad.. what your heart says during the action is what matters.. thoughts?
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Universal I assume you referring to Universe, right?
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Universal I assume you referring to Universe, right?
If yes then there are such negatives and positives. For instance, if we able to traverse the universe and discover a race of humans less advanced, like Columbus found America, then we share the same character capacity to destroy there race, as the Europeans did to the Native Americans. That's not good, would you agree?
We can take another step further and go to the Christain ministries that pioneered lands where religions didn't exist. Once they've convinced people the LORD will save them, then only to find in their History that Sir Lord Charles Somerset landed at the shores which immediately gave him power over the people. Think about that for a while, out of the hope for good - bad became of it.
We can also go to the amazon and imagine we teach them about technology, in all good faith, only to find they eventually destroy themselves by building an A-Bomb. Out of the goodness you assist in their advancement - bad becomes of it.
So in my examples, how do we define good and bad in the universe...simply don't intervene in an evolving people.
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I believe in a universal good, but not a universal bad. Perfect goodness cannot know bad. If it could, it wouldn't be perfect good.
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I believe in a universal good, but not a universal bad. Perfect goodness cannot know bad. If it could, it wouldn't be perfect good.
That's where the god of Abraham fails. It says that God is perfect love, AND it judges evil. The two cannot coexist unless it judges that there is no evil, so evil is good, which kind of undermines christianity, don't you think?
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I believe that there is.
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I believe that there is.
Because personal opinions vary and are even wildly skewed. I think we be damned if we think the only thing that makes something good or bad is how we might personally feel about it.
"Good" is anything that is beneficial to life over the long term, and "evil" is anything that is not.
So there is some room for personal discernment there; but something like sacrificing children to any deity (including laziness or parental baggage) remains evil. And telling the truth in love, no matter how much it might hurt in the short-term, remains good. As does helping the less fortunate, even at great cost to self.
And trampling over others to get to the top, or valuing goods over people remains bad.
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I would argue that there is no 'good and bad,' a similar Philosophy of Nietzsche but, I think there are two thing thats are universally popular opinions on 'good and bad.' The first is if it has has a positive survival value. The second is (if the person has one) if the value align with a person's religious views.
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I think that there is. I mean, what about killing? I feel like the majority of people would believe it is bad, but not everyone. Can we really say that killing is okay for a different culture? And if it is okay for a different culture, why must I be so harshly punished If I choose to kill someone in America?
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I think that there is. I mean, what about killing? I feel like the majority of people would believe it is bad, but not everyone. Can we really say that killing is okay for a different culture? And if it is okay for a different culture, why must I be so harshly punished If I choose to kill someone in America?
Just because we can't define something, doesn't mean it doesn't exist.
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No, I don't believe so. We decide our own good and bad, and all too often we align that with the views of society.
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It has been said that the devils greatest trick is to make us believe that there is no devil. Don't feel too bad, it is after all the greatest trick and you are not the first to be fooled.
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How about ignoring an inevitable decline in favor of ignorance and greed. I guess ignorance isn't inherently bad, but the outcome might be if ignorance is promoted and rewarded. That's bad. It might be bliss for the time being, but results will crawl out of the soil like zombies... and perhaps share a few common traits with them as well.
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No. There is no morality inherent in the universe. We decide as a society what is right and wrong.
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Nope. Morality is subjective. It just so happens that we mostly agree on things like pedophilia, rape and murder, because we all (well, most of us, anyway) find those acts repulsive.
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While I don't believe that good and bad are universal (or more to the point, objective), I do not believe that they are arbitrary. What we, in general, find to be good and bad, has been selected for over the entirety of our evolution. Were we to reset the clock and try again, it might be that the consensus of good and bad would not be identical to what we have now, but it doesn't take a master strategist to figure out that not killing one another off is important for a species to survive.
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