Showing posts with label good. Show all posts
Showing posts with label good. Show all posts

Wednesday, September 2, 2015

Good and Evil and One God.

beliefnet
If they are athiest murders they are clearly INSANE.

If they are christian murders its the religion's fault, - RCCU

With or without religion, good people can behave well and bad people can do evil; but for good people to do evil — that takes religion. - Steven Weinberg

  Good people which are the overwhelming majority of humans will behave well that is they will conform to the prevailing ethos of their community.  There will be a few sociopaths sane or insane that will violate the norms of the community, but normally they will be removed quickly by the good people in the community. 

It takes a strong belief in the doctrines of a "god" to change the prevailing ethos of the community to promote or tolerate evil.  The religion may be secular in that the "god" is human but it takes a well buttressed belief system in something or someone promoting that something to allow good people to partition off the evil in their minds.  

Miniver Cheevy

A group of people no matter how committed can never accomplish anything.  History shows that on any scale, large or small it is always a single committed individual that for good or usually for not so good can feel the prevailing needs of a large group of followers and provide a focus for their beliefs. Whether it is a genetic imperative as some argue, or a conditioned belief like the major religions, without a committed leader nothing happens.  The leader may be supernatural, which is the power of religions, or human, but H. Sap. need to believe in something or someone to do anything.

Wednesday, September 15, 2010

Selfish or Social

Life after death? - Beliefnet:

There's no such thing as a selfless act. When people do good to others they only do this to benefit themselves.
Timothy

"Not only a wrong opinion but scientifically wrong. Humans are highly evolved social animals. Until recently anti-social acts were a death sentence, including acts that benefited the individual only, that is, a selfish act. There is no such thing in a social animal herd as a 'good' that only benefits the adult that performed the act. Maturing animals certainly, they must be selfish as infants to stay alive, but maturing is learning the rules of the herd, pack, or tribe, and violating those rules is banishment at least and a even a lone wolf is a dead wolf.

Even evil acts by adults must be done in the context of a social good, usually but not always blessed by God. Torquemada and Hitler were both protecting their chosen societies, and the benefit was not to self, but to the ideal of the betterment of the local Catholic or Aryan society."

Saturday, August 28, 2010

Good and Evil

Epicurus? - Beliefnet:

A personal view of good and evil is "Perhaps an Epicurean POV, or a caricature of a theist's view of atheism. Or both.

It has no basis in reality. Good and evil are determined by the effects of the action on the society of the person. The effect on the yenta. If she shakes her finger it is evil. If she perchance smiles it is good. We all have yentas in our lives. It usually starts with mom and ripples out from there to the yenta on her stoop. Some people replace the yenta with God but God usually devolves into that little vuvuzela in the fancy dress in the overdecorated balcony. If hesh blows the vuvuzela better not do it again. Hesh never smiles."

Tuesday, August 24, 2010

Good and Evil

Epicurus? - Beliefnet:

"Human social structures originally tribes and later villages and parishes decided definitively what was good and what was evil. Basically what was good was what created trust and cooperation within the tribe and what was evil was that which weakened the tribe by causing divisiveness and intra-tribal strife. Shamans quickly discovered that using God as a super cop not only gave them power as the interpreter for the super cop, but allowed them to add control rules to the natural good and evil recognized intuitively by the tribe.

As societies got larger the God interpreted good and evil was no longer effective as inter-tribal warfare was the norm for God, and the society needed to control this with secular laws and punishments for transgressions in this life not the next.

Good and evil were still defined by what created trust and cooperation and evil was still that which created divisiveness and strife. One important advancement in larger societies was recognizing that God inspired intra-tribal strife was an important evil and must be controlled."

Friday, July 2, 2010

Absolute good

Valid Criticism or Projection? - Discuss Atheism - Beliefnet Community

The absolute standard for "good" is that which facilitates social living for all people. Which definitely excludes God. By any definition God facilitates only for believers, and frequently only for some of them.

Sunday, June 28, 2009

Of Good

Beliefnet Community > Thread - Question about atheism: In a discussion of good and evil the question of personal pleasure came up as related to good.

"It is important to note that both physical and psychological pleasures usually involve other people. Those we love and care about, but also those we may be only incidentally involved with. An accidental encounter with a stranger on the street where we recognize each other’s humanity and worth can be a powerful reminder of the ideals we wish to identify with as good. But in any event if we are going to consider ourselves to be good, how we treat other people is going to be the most important and perhaps the only consideration."

Which leads to the next question can purely personal pleasure be considered to be good. I think we can dispense with the Biblical answer as that was a different time and culture where conservation of good genes in fetuses was a critical social requirement. BTW how did you know I was discussing masturbation? Get your mind out of the gutter, there are other personal pleasures that can be much more pleasurable and meaningful.

One of the most intense and pleasurable personal experiences I enjoyed was rounding a corner from an alley in Firenze and being assaulted by the facade of the Cathedral across the plaza.
There were no words just awe and wonder at what people had made. Perhaps their awe and wonder related to God was part of what I was experiencing but it was second hand at best. What the artisans had created was enough.

I frequently hike alone, not by choice, but due to differing tastes of those who I might like to share the experience with. The love of my life has a deep seated distaste for rocks. Once out of sheer devotion she accompanied me to Yosemite. Hating every minute she had to look out the window at Half Dome and the valley walls on the other side. Can anyone imagine pulling the drapes on a huge bay window overlooking half dome on a beautiful day! Nor can I. But the same devotion allowed her to do so. We spent most of our time indoors, or on the veranda overlooking the meadow and the forest which for the most part screened the rock walls that I had to go elsewhere to appreciate. So now my trips to Yosemite are solo, and the hikes are shared with random strangers who appreciate the mistbows and the vistas I point out to them after enjoying them myself first. Is the initial personal experience good? I think so. Is the sharing with a random stranger even better? Since they have chosen the same trail, of course.