Blood Money

[JermCool]

That said, define 'better'. As in, what actions one takes when one is 'better'.

I could slap you silly right now.

[adciv]

What? I want to know how he defines acting 'better' than other animals.

[Deacon]

I imagine it's a "Don't feed the trolls" thing.

[bagheadinc]

"Afar"? I don't think that word means what you think it means...

Wasn't that the villain from Aladdin?

[Seir]

"Afar"? I don't think that word means what you think it means...

Wasn't that the villain from Aladdin?

And thus the thread was brought to "A Whole New World".

[JermCool]

"Afar"? I don't think that word means what you think it means...

Wasn't that the villain from Aladdin?

And thus the thread was brought to "A Whole New World".

I never had a friend like you.

[Arc Orion]

Damn it. You're always one jump ahead of me.

[Sophira]

He's strong as ten regular men, definitely!



I voted no. I would probably not do it. It is not because the person is random and therefore might be the next mother theresa or einstein or my mother's best friend's son's wife. It isn't even because I'm especially moral and it would essentially amount to little more than murder. It's because I wholeheartedly believe that it is never my place to decide if a person lives or dies, especially not for selfish gain. I would rather be poor for the rest of my life than be responsible for having taken a life so that my circumstances improve.

This would CHANGE if the random person was instead an appalling criminal, like a serial killer or a child rapist. Then the balance changes.

[StruckingFuggle]

This would CHANGE if the random person was instead an appalling criminal, like a serial killer or a child rapist. Then the balance changes.

It's amazing how quickly

It's because I wholeheartedly believe that it is never my place to decide if a person lives or dies

Can evaporate within a person, isn't it? At one moment they might 'wholeheartedly' cling to an idea, and in another moment show that, really, we're quite mentally capable of at least the impulse to murder, likely mostly all capable of following through if we had the means, and we don't believe that murder is wrong - murdering certain kinds of people is wrong.

---

And to answer the question of 'better', i've been trying with little success to think of a way to explain it without a rambling, convoluted, pages-long thesis that requires multiple points to begin from and progresses fairly nonlinearly through a lot of tangents that all curve back around where they came from and tie back together in the center.

In short, though, 'better' is actually exercising your capabilities of humanity that set you apart from the other animals, to be more than just another animal. To act different, to act 'better'. Action, instead of reaction - to take a stimulus and consider sapiently the situation and decide on a course of response, instead of acting upon ingrained instinct and automation. It is about freedom, rather than slavery - the actions of men should be a choice, a decision, rather than the 'inevitable' mechanisms of 'natural' karma. THINK, and let your thinking guide deliberate actions. Choose to do everything you do. This is what providence has graced us with, what sets us apart the other animals, what has led us to rise above them - reason, understanding, and even art. What makes us unique is our capacity to think things through, and to create for no reasons beyond the creative impulse to create or the need to communicate. To learn to make better choices and build a better world.

And yes, for all the advancement we've blundered into, for all the rare visionaries who've thought of a better world and worked and managed to bring a glimmer of it about, all too often all too many of us fall back into being nothing more than intelligent (but not bright) animals, reacting instead of acting, fueled by instinct rather than by thought, a cog in a great chain of simple cause and effect.

Pathetic. Wretched. Short-sighted.

[adciv]

And to answer the question of 'better'
.....
Pathetic. Wretched. Short-sighted.

Kill one random person who you do not know, and is in some way indirectly a competitor, and receive in exchange enough resources to make the rest of your life much easier. Not ethical, but since when has that stopped anyone? So far as I know, it's only the consequences that have ever stopped someone.

*edit* quote added for some clarity

[StruckingFuggle]

Kill one random person who you do not know, and is in some way indirectly a competitor, and receive in exchange enough resources to make the rest of your life much easier. Not ethical, but since when has that stopped anyone? So far as I know, it's only the consequences that have ever stopped someone.

I'm aware of that. :p All morality is chains, that exist to keep a monster in check - there is goodness in man, but the goodness is, at the moment, consumed by predatory greeds and lusts that generally drive the average person. People are motivated to be good not because it is in their nature to be good, but because the systems function to an extent to check, chain, and direct that beast and force it to either manifest in constructive ways that can superficially pass for good or shame it into enough submission that the Good is taunted and bullied into coming out.

I wasn't disagreeing, I was merely calling Sophira a hypocrite and showing how amusingly quickly she evidences this in her own single post.

[adciv]

That was in response to the 'what is good' answer, not the part directed to Soph. It seems more plausible to me that there is no good, but that we merely keep the beast in check so that the other beasts will not devour us, and that we designed a system to support this.

[StruckingFuggle]

Aha. When you didn't quote anything else, I assumed that your post was in reply to mine.

[adciv]

It was, the second half of what you said. Just edited it a little, take a 2nd look to make sure.

[Sophira]

This would CHANGE if the random person was instead an appalling criminal, like a serial killer or a child rapist. Then the balance changes.

It's amazing how quickly

It's because I wholeheartedly believe that it is never my place to decide if a person lives or dies

Can evaporate within a person, isn't it? At one moment they might 'wholeheartedly' cling to an idea, and in another moment show that, really, we're quite mentally capable of at least the impulse to murder, likely mostly all capable of following through if we had the means, and we don't believe that murder is wrong - murdering certain kinds of people is wrong.

Oh right. By "person" I mean a member of society. A working part of the machine, if you will. A human being. Pretty sure child rapists don't count as people.