Are people basically good?

[ding]

GT believes that morals are subjective. Morals are effectively standards. Standards are not subjective, people are subjective. Standards exist in and of themselves and are determined by the outcomes they produce; namely peace, harmony and success. When we normalize our deviance to these standards, predictable surprises occur. So in effect, standards exist for a reason and that reason is to prevent negative outcomes.

 

[ding]

​

To translate this G.T.
YES the natural and universal laws are by definition INDEPENDENT of Western/Judeo-Christian expression.
Or else that is dependent on man made religious language and culture, which isn't universal and isn't the pure laws themselves.

But what is MEANT by the Western Civilization being dominant:
1. the Constitution made STATUTORY or PUT INTO WRITING
the universal principles of natural laws governing all humanity.
People USE American historic language for "due process" "equal protection of the laws"
"free exercise of religion" "separation and balance of powers" "no taxation without representation"
"Consent of the Governed" etc etc
to DESCRIBE the universal "DEMOCRATIC PROCESS"

NOTE: If you want other cultural terms for these things, YES you can look into
Native American sources of the Confederation of States concept that US govt is based on,
and even Muslim/Mohammad teachings of natural laws of democracy that predated the US laws
and Constitutional language for these.

What the dominance points to is that the Constitutional language is
more universally and commonly cited as the best way to express these concepts.
Perhaps more liberals would respond to the Muslim or Native American way
of defending democratic principles, but the US cultural language of the law
using the Constitution is historically and globally recognized worldwide
as established institution and principles.

2. The Bible PUT INTO WRITING the spiritual laws that
Jews Christians and Muslims commit to follow as their authority by conscience.

This is a dominant LANGUAGE and authority by which
these tribes rebuke and enforce common standards among their MEMBERS.

in short G.T.
we have church laws and we have state laws.
The Constitution serves as the standard for democratic principles
for the STATE, to CHECK AND BALANCE AGAINST ABUSES
using COMMON LANGUAGE that everyone can learn to defend their rights.

The Bible serves as the central authority for people of
faith to CHECK AND BALANCE and rebuke in cases
of abuses of church or religious authority.

And G.T. America has been dominating in public and global policy
because we are built on both church and state authority
and standards of checking BOTH religious and political authority
against abuses. The Bible is used to hold religious groups
members and leaders to their own policies and correct abuses.
The Constitution is used to hold political groups and govt
to their own policies to correct abuses.

So that's why these two STANDARDS OF LAWS
are predominant. One is to check the church functions
and institutions against religious abuses. One is to check
govt and public policies against abuses of political power.

The Constitution and the Bible happen to put into writing
what are universal principles, laws and process.

G.T. it is an important point that the process of democracy
to reach lasting Peace and Justice is independent of language
in the Bible and the Bill of Rights/Constitution. But these tools
happen to CAPTURE the language of the laws in ways that
more people are able to use to organize agreements in order to correct wrong
to establish "Equal Justice Under Law" or "Peace and Justice for All"
which is what the Bible teaches as the authority under Christ Jesus for all humanity.

Whichever LANGUAGE you use for these laws and Concepts,
they are still universal. But yes, the American tradition of invoking
the Constitution and the Bible is predominant in forging agreement on the laws.
and that is credited to "Western" civilization and culture.

The Biblical Laws are not uniquely good, and are in many cases bad.

Dear G.T. See Matthew 18:15-20
With both good and bad interpretations going on,
the good is used to check and correct the bad.
Christians are called to establish agreement in truth,
and the truth shall set us free from error and division,
and conflict and suffering that comes in cycles from that.

I'm not interested in debating Religious dogma at the moment, Emily. That could be, perhaps, for another time girl.

This is you being fake.

 

[Taz]

GT believes that morals are subjective. Morals are effectively standards. Standards are not subjective, people are subjective. Standards exist in and of themselves and are determined by the outcomes they produce; namely peace, harmony and success. When we normalize our deviance to these standards, predictable surprises occur. So in effect, standards exist for a reason and that reason is to prevent negative outcomes.

The same action can have a peaceful and successful outcome, and can have a bad outcome somewhere else in the world. Like for example, Russia invades and takes part of Ukraine, successful outcome. ISIS invades Iraq and gets their ass kicked, unsuccessful outcome. Please try again.

 

[G.T.]

You are obsessed, dude(ding). Give it a break, some time. I'm trying to do my morning reading, I need ding in my alerts about shit that I had to start ignoring last night and now you're still carrying on....are you the type of guy that can't take a hint or what? 21x, "ding, I dont wish to talk to you about any important topics."

but but but but but....

#sloganslogansloganslogan

Look, you're just autistic. That's not my problem, carry it onto someone who might give a shit about your disability.

 

[ding]

You spent your first two sentences here agreeing with my initial claim, which you proceeded to spend 15 non-sequitur posts attempting to debunk.

The last sentence is a question of subjective opinion, one which I've already answered: "people are BASICALLY" GOOD.

That means, that most of the time for most people, we go ahead and listen to the voice.

You fail to define what is good. How many times not listening to the voice do you become bad, or does it depend on the severity of their crime?

For example, is a pathological liar bad or a one time murderer?

I defined good in my first post in this thread.

To determine if someone, specifically, is a bad person, would be a completely subjective endeavor (an opinion), i.e. there is not transcendent "fact" of the matter but only opinions either subjectively supported using arbitrary criteria, or wholly unsupported.

Back to my definition of good, a "bad person" to me would be a person who causes needless suffering of others, in abundance of either frequency or scale.

So here was your definition of good.

I'd define good as that which causes the least amount of suffering. I'd say humans are basically good, and this is a result of bio & socio evolution

So what if the God of the Bible was doing the same? Who is to say that he did not cause the least amount of suffering?

Do you see the problem here? Who is to say what the least amount of suffering is?

In addition, when someone is hurting, do they really give a damn? No, they are just focused on the suffering.

There still is then the problem of defining good. It reminds me of Obama who said that we needed a stimulus package to stop the economic suffering. His predictions that so many jobs would be created fell short, but at the end of the day, he said that it would have been far worse had he not implemented the policy.

So who is to say?

I dont have to make any reference to supernatural hearsay to have this conversation. Your god comments are irrelevant to me.

"who is to say what the least amount of suffering is"

Well, there's ways to measure these things. Pain, for one, is measurable. Consequences, for two. There's observation, data collection, and reasoning. You take two scenarios and run them through analysis. This is not really a problem, we've done quite well going from being cave men to sending folks to the moon.

This isn't a problem for defining good, it's your inability to think critically.

You seem to be rather harsh regarding the cave men.

Tell me, who has the most capacity to cause human harm? Is it the cave man, or is it those who have learned to exploit fossil fuels, thus causing global warming? Is it the Neanderthal or Oppenheim that created the A-bomb?

In the Garden of Eden, we are told of man's down fall. It was eating of the forbidden fruit, which ironically, was the tree of knowledge.

Could it be that knowledge, devoid of wisdom, causes the greatest harm of all?

I would have to agree with you that knowledge devoid of wisdom causes the greatest harm.

 

[G.T.]

GT believes that morals are subjective. Morals are effectively standards. Standards are not subjective, people are subjective. Standards exist in and of themselves and are determined by the outcomes they produce; namely peace, harmony and success. When we normalize our deviance to these standards, predictable surprises occur. So in effect, standards exist for a reason and that reason is to prevent negative outcomes.

The same action can have a peaceful and successful outcome, and can have a bad outcome somewhere else in the world. Like for example, Russia invades and takes part of Ukraine, successful outcome. ISIS invades Iraq and gets their ass kicked, unsuccessful outcome. Please try again.

By the way, anything that Dingerred raises as a point of contention - - - anyone else worthy of respect that I'd talk to can raise same if they'd like to see how I'd address what he's had to say. Ding, though? A waste of my time.

 

[ding]

GT believes that morals are subjective. Morals are effectively standards. Standards are not subjective, people are subjective. Standards exist in and of themselves and are determined by the outcomes they produce; namely peace, harmony and success. When we normalize our deviance to these standards, predictable surprises occur. So in effect, standards exist for a reason and that reason is to prevent negative outcomes.

The same action can have a peaceful and successful outcome, and can have a bad outcome somewhere else in the world. Like for example, Russia invades and takes part of Ukraine, successful outcome. ISIS invades Iraq and gets their ass kicked, unsuccessful outcome. Please try again.

By the way, anything that Dingerred raises as a point of contention - - - anyone else worthy of respect that I'd talk to can raise same if they'd like to see how I'd address what he's had to say. Ding, though? A waste of my time.

That’s what you really wanted to tell Emily but were too much of a fake to say what you really believed. Of course we both know your beliefs are full of holes and can’t stand up to logic which is why you resort to name calling and run away.

 

[G.T.]

GT believes that morals are subjective. Morals are effectively standards. Standards are not subjective, people are subjective. Standards exist in and of themselves and are determined by the outcomes they produce; namely peace, harmony and success. When we normalize our deviance to these standards, predictable surprises occur. So in effect, standards exist for a reason and that reason is to prevent negative outcomes.

The same action can have a peaceful and successful outcome, and can have a bad outcome somewhere else in the world. Like for example, Russia invades and takes part of Ukraine, successful outcome. ISIS invades Iraq and gets their ass kicked, unsuccessful outcome. Please try again.

By the way, anything that Dingerred raises as a point of contention - - - anyone else worthy of respect that I'd talk to can raise same if they'd like to see how I'd address what he's had to say. Ding, though? A waste of my time.

That’s what you really wanted to tell Emily but were too much of a fake to say what you really believed. Of course we both know your beliefs are full of holes and can’t stand up to logic which is why you resort to name calling.

 

[ding]

You are obsessed, dude(ding). Give it a break, some time. I'm trying to do my morning reading, I need ding in my alerts about shit that I had to start ignoring last night and now you're still carrying on....are you the type of guy that can't take a hint or what? 21x, "ding, I dont wish to talk to you about any important topics."

but but but but but....

#sloganslogansloganslogan

Look, you're just autistic. That's not my problem, carry it onto someone who might give a shit about your disability.

Put me on ignore. Because I’m going to speak out when I disagree with what I read.

I’m not a fake like you.

 

[G.T.]

You are obsessed, dude(ding). Give it a break, some time. I'm trying to do my morning reading, I need ding in my alerts about shit that I had to start ignoring last night and now you're still carrying on....are you the type of guy that can't take a hint or what? 21x, "ding, I dont wish to talk to you about any important topics."

but but but but but....

#sloganslogansloganslogan

Look, you're just autistic. That's not my problem, carry it onto someone who might give a shit about your disability.

Put me on ignore. Because I’m going to speak out when I disagree with what I read.

That's good, dingerred. The little engine that could!~

Hey, maybe you'll get lucky and someone will really sit and ponder the magical profoundness of what you've got to say some time and by proxy, ask me what I think about it. You can flail all you wanna about me not answering you directly about your wishy-washy part tautological, part baseless assertion world-views. Call it a victory, little ding that could! Chooo--chooooo!

 

[Eugene]

Few days ago I swam around the island here in Vladivostok and there was a fisherman in a boat. He gave me 4 scallops just caught with the words "take it! you do need it now!"
After 5km swim it was exactly what I needed.
...nobody asked him about anything, I just swam..

And it us one of numerous cases.
People are very good but society sometimes make them act bad.

 

[ding]

You are obsessed, dude(ding). Give it a break, some time. I'm trying to do my morning reading, I need ding in my alerts about shit that I had to start ignoring last night and now you're still carrying on....are you the type of guy that can't take a hint or what? 21x, "ding, I dont wish to talk to you about any important topics."

but but but but but....

#sloganslogansloganslogan

Look, you're just autistic. That's not my problem, carry it onto someone who might give a shit about your disability.

Put me on ignore. Because I’m going to speak out when I disagree with what I read.

That's good, dingerred. The little engine that could!~

Hey, maybe you'll get lucky and someone will really sit and ponder the magical profoundness of what you've got to say some time and by proxy, ask me what I think about it. You can flail all you wanna about me not answering you directly about your wishy-washy part tautological, part baseless assertion world-views. Call it a victory, little ding that could! Chooo--chooooo!

My obligation is satisfied when I participate in the conflict and confusion process. Growth filled communities explore all sides of an issue to arrive at objective truth. Whether or not anyone else agrees with me is unimportant.

Apparently it is important to you. That’s why you behave the way you do. If you don’t engage people who have logical arguments then you can’t be proven wrong. That’s why you argue I am stupid and unworthy of your time.

 

[G.T.]

You are obsessed, dude(ding). Give it a break, some time. I'm trying to do my morning reading, I need ding in my alerts about shit that I had to start ignoring last night and now you're still carrying on....are you the type of guy that can't take a hint or what? 21x, "ding, I dont wish to talk to you about any important topics."

but but but but but....

#sloganslogansloganslogan

Look, you're just autistic. That's not my problem, carry it onto someone who might give a shit about your disability.

Put me on ignore. Because I’m going to speak out when I disagree with what I read.

That's good, dingerred. The little engine that could!~

Hey, maybe you'll get lucky and someone will really sit and ponder the magical profoundness of what you've got to say some time and by proxy, ask me what I think about it. You can flail all you wanna about me not answering you directly about your wishy-washy part tautological, part baseless assertion world-views. Call it a victory, little ding that could! Chooo--chooooo!

My obligation is satisfied when I participate in the conflict and confusion process. Growth filled communities explore all sides of an issue to arrive at objective truth. Whether or not anyone else agrees with me is unimportant.

Apparently it is important to you. That’s why you behave the way you do. If you don’t engage people who have logical arguments then you can’t be proven wrong. That’s why you argue I am stupid and unworthy of your time.

From where I sit, you're grossly ILLogical, which is why I consider a topical investment with you to be a waste of time. By the way, you just outright stated that everyone I've conversed with here is incapable of logical arguments. I know these are the roads you need to take to rationalize why I don't respect you, bro. Get it all out there.....feel better, obsess less

 

[Taz]

GT believes that morals are subjective. Morals are effectively standards. Standards are not subjective, people are subjective. Standards exist in and of themselves and are determined by the outcomes they produce; namely peace, harmony and success. When we normalize our deviance to these standards, predictable surprises occur. So in effect, standards exist for a reason and that reason is to prevent negative outcomes.

The same action can have a peaceful and successful outcome, and can have a bad outcome somewhere else in the world. Like for example, Russia invades and takes part of Ukraine, successful outcome. ISIS invades Iraq and gets their ass kicked, unsuccessful outcome. Please try again.

So dingbat, where's your excuse for an answer?

 

[ding]

You are obsessed, dude(ding). Give it a break, some time. I'm trying to do my morning reading, I need ding in my alerts about shit that I had to start ignoring last night and now you're still carrying on....are you the type of guy that can't take a hint or what? 21x, "ding, I dont wish to talk to you about any important topics."

but but but but but....

#sloganslogansloganslogan

Look, you're just autistic. That's not my problem, carry it onto someone who might give a shit about your disability.

Put me on ignore. Because I’m going to speak out when I disagree with what I read.

That's good, dingerred. The little engine that could!~

Hey, maybe you'll get lucky and someone will really sit and ponder the magical profoundness of what you've got to say some time and by proxy, ask me what I think about it. You can flail all you wanna about me not answering you directly about your wishy-washy part tautological, part baseless assertion world-views. Call it a victory, little ding that could! Chooo--chooooo!

My obligation is satisfied when I participate in the conflict and confusion process. Growth filled communities explore all sides of an issue to arrive at objective truth. Whether or not anyone else agrees with me is unimportant.

Apparently it is important to you. That’s why you behave the way you do. If you don’t engage people who have logical arguments then you can’t be proven wrong. That’s why you argue I am stupid and unworthy of your time.

From where I sit, you're grossly ILLogical, which is why I consider a topical investment with you to be a waste of time. By the way, you just outright stated that everyone I've conversed with here is incapable of logical arguments. I know these are the roads you need to take to rationalize why I don't respect you, bro. Get it all out there.....feel better, obsess less

There isn’t one post I have made in this thread that you can prove is illogical using facts and reason.

Instead you call me names and call what I write, slogans.

What is illogical is your dismissal of ideas without logic. People cannot be illogical. Ideas or beliefs can be illogical. Your only responses have been attacks on me, not my beliefs or ideas. It’s all in black and white.

 

[Taz]

There isn’t one post I have made in this thread that you can prove is illogical using facts and reason.

 

[G.T.]

You are obsessed, dude(ding). Give it a break, some time. I'm trying to do my morning reading, I need ding in my alerts about shit that I had to start ignoring last night and now you're still carrying on....are you the type of guy that can't take a hint or what? 21x, "ding, I dont wish to talk to you about any important topics."

but but but but but....

#sloganslogansloganslogan

Look, you're just autistic. That's not my problem, carry it onto someone who might give a shit about your disability.

Put me on ignore. Because I’m going to speak out when I disagree with what I read.

That's good, dingerred. The little engine that could!~

Hey, maybe you'll get lucky and someone will really sit and ponder the magical profoundness of what you've got to say some time and by proxy, ask me what I think about it. You can flail all you wanna about me not answering you directly about your wishy-washy part tautological, part baseless assertion world-views. Call it a victory, little ding that could! Chooo--chooooo!

My obligation is satisfied when I participate in the conflict and confusion process. Growth filled communities explore all sides of an issue to arrive at objective truth. Whether or not anyone else agrees with me is unimportant.

Apparently it is important to you. That’s why you behave the way you do. If you don’t engage people who have logical arguments then you can’t be proven wrong. That’s why you argue I am stupid and unworthy of your time.

From where I sit, you're grossly ILLogical, which is why I consider a topical investment with you to be a waste of time. By the way, you just outright stated that everyone I've conversed with here is incapable of logical arguments. I know these are the roads you need to take to rationalize why I don't respect you, bro. Get it all out there.....feel better, obsess less

There isn’t one post I have made in this thread that you can prove is illogical using facts and reason.

Instead you call me names and call what I write, slogans.

What is illogical is your dismissal of ideas without logic. People cannot be illogical. Ideas or beliefs can be illogical. Your only responses have been attacks on me, not my beliefs or ideas. It’s all in black and white.

Your first sentence remains up for debate, and you can ask someone to ask me for you where you've err'd and I'd be glad to oblige. You, personally, though? Not worth the time. You're a baseless assertion monster....you don't even understand what a syllogism is.

 

[Toro]

I don’t know about the rest of you but I’m awesome!

 

[Taz]

But I'm the goodest.

 

[G.T.]

I don’t know about the rest of you but I’m awesome!

I think you're pretty cool, your voice totally matches your posting persona as well which I thought was interesting because usually, people would surprise me.