Origin of "Good and Evil" - Page 2 - OG Myth-Weavers

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Origin of "Good and Evil"

 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Dark_Azrael
I see good an evil effectively compare a persons willingness to allow others to be happy. A "Good" person is someone who tries to be happy while allowing others around him/her to be happy. An Evil person will take advantage of other causing them unhappiness to fuel the persons happiness.
I would say that would be manipulative, no?

Quote:
But ticattack, by your logic, that same situation, if the sadist stops them, he probably thinks he is right, and the woman thinks he is right, but the men think he is wrong...so what is the resolution? Who is in the right in this situation? Or is everyone in the right?
Everyone is wrong and everyone is right, because good/bad is subjective.

The woman's idea of good/evil is different from the guys', and theirs is probably different from the sadist's. Hence, no one is wrong, no one is right, everyone is wrong and everyone is right.

Everything is on Wikipedia...

According to Nietzsche, morality comes from “the good themselves, that is to say the noble, mighty, highly placed and high-minded who decreed themselves and their actions to be good… in contradistinction to all that was base, low-minded and plebian.”

Important quotation - “political supremacy always gives rise to notions of spiritual supremacy.” (p. 160, 165)

In the first essay, Nietzsche examines the origin of the concepts of good and evil. He does this by contrasting the noble races ("master morality"), such as the Greeks and ancient Germans, from the priestly races ("slave morality"), namely Christianity and Judaism.

For the noble societies, good is defined in terms of a reflexive mentality, that is, a noble man asserts his own goodness on the basis of his own authority. "Bad" is defined as the opposite of the good. In contrast the priestly societies, out of ressentiment, "evil" is defined first, and good is defined as the opposite of the evil.

Ressentiment (French for resentment), more specifically, is a feeling of resentment or hatred towards the masters. Out of this develops the spirit of Christianity, and the desire to see one's enemies punished. This culminates in the idea of a vengeful God, Hell, and of God's self-sacrifice through Jesus. (This is elaborated on in the second essay.) Out of this disdain for the current reality and a focus on the afterlife develops nihilism, which Nietzsche sees as the chief problem of the present day.

Nietzsche condemns the slave morality because its values are values of weakness, whereas the master morality has values of strength and power. Nevertheless, it is in the priestly existence, which he says is "essentially dangerous," that man acquires depth and becomes evil, and thus is interesting.

You can take a stance on good and evil through explaining what is good and what is bad. In other words, evil would be defined as something arising from actual or imputed bad character or conduct. Now in order to be able to create a good action one has to justify it. Not morally but logically. For example steeling cannot be justified as a good thing through logic. It can be justified to be good for the person, but not to be good as a good action. One could approach it by imagining that everyone would be stealing. This would of course be bad and therefore stealing is bad. Going back to our definition, we can conclude that stealing is evil.

What if the act of stealing could be justified. I.E. you were stealing to feed hungry children.

You don't have to look at stealing only as stealing in all instances but you can look at specific reasons of stealing separately.

Quote:
Originally Posted by ticattack
Everyone is wrong and everyone is right, because good/bad is subjective.

The woman's idea of good/evil is different from the guys', and theirs is probably different from the sadist's. Hence, no one is wrong, no one is right, everyone is wrong and everyone is right.
So, everyone is wrong and everyone is right. I walk down the street and see three men beeting up one old woman who is crying for help. I think to myself, is that right? The old woman obviously doesn't think so...but three men do. So i can safely say, well, it's not a problem, there's nothing wrong with that?

D & D's previous discussion on 'Good' and 'Evil' summarised

Evil and Good are both abstract concepts, crafted by man to justify is how actions. Still there are certain levels of Evil. Morality. Each Action can have moral out come, either for better or worse. Ethics and Morality can be absolute and still allow for understanding. Ethics, and ethic within cultures, society, law, and criminal actions all have their unique universal definition on what evil is.

Often than not Evil and good are referred to as colours. Evil is an abstract concept. Also Morality can be absolute and still allow understanding. The shading, and tones relate to the crossing of wrong being right and right being wrong. It is not possible to have evil without good, similar to; there cannot be darkness without light. There is an abundant amount of colour, there are also opposite colours. Good and evil are two of these colours, simply referred to as black and white, to aragonite to describe them.

‘Am I seeing the same colour as you? That is, if I were to see using your eyes, would the colour I see on a given object math the colour I see with your eyes?’ This relates to personal morals. The way someone views good and evil determines ones belief on ethics.

The view in society today is a blur of ethics. Evil arises from a specific environment. Taking the statement, Evil and Good are both abstract concepts, crafted by man to justify his own actions, evil arises, among people at least, from the suffering of others. Another perspective is…‘ Our desires are the cause of our suffering and pain in life.’ If a poor man steals a loaf of bread, because he has to feed his family in moral is right. Except in another perspective it is wrong. This also proves a good person is capable of misdeeds. The man in question is a good man; he was driven to do a wrong action and deserves understanding and forgiveness. Accepting the fact, the man in question, should also take responsibility for his own actions.

But if a man cant take responsiblity for his own action, one must question. Does mankind have free will? Of course... ‘Every head is a world.’ meaning everyone is capable of his or her own free will, unless this freedom is taken away. A situation where this comes into play is when a bank robber places a gun to a individuals head and forces them to drive a getaway car. Does this portray the act of the driver as evil? Yes. That individual is assisting in a robbery, aiding the escape of the criminals. Except the victim is being fuelled by fear to partake in Evil.

Some views on Society have labelled criminals as victims themselves. Portraying them as simple machines incapable of controlling their actions in acts of evil. One perspective on this maybe walking into and bank and murdering innocent by standers in cold is going to provide the killer with pleasure. Then in his mind he has done a good thing. If stealing, raping, killing or any of the other acts, which makes ones stomach churn is that which gives a person pleasure, that is what is the most good for them to do.

It’s astonishing - everything is evil to a certain degree.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Felix
But if a man cant take responsiblity for his own action, one must question. Does mankind have free will? Of course... ‘Every head is a world.’ meaning everyone is capable of his or her own free will, unless this freedom is taken away. A situation where this comes into play is when a bank robber places a gun to a individuals head and forces them to drive a getaway car. Does this portray the act of the driver as evil? Yes. That individual is assisting in a robbery, aiding the escape of the criminals. Except the victim is being fuelled by fear to partake in Evil.
It’s astonishing - everything is evil to a certain degree.
But the victim had no intent upon harming another and therefore would not be considered evil.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Felix
If stealing, raping, killing or any of the other acts, which makes ones stomach churn is that which gives a person pleasure, that is what is the most good for them to do.
Heh - a modern view: 'good' is what gives pleasure.

Quote:
But the victim had no intent upon harming another and therefore would not be considered evil.
True. People in our society are considered to be good or evil based on their intent, rather than their actions, per se.




 

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