I personally accept an action done if it was with the greater good in mind, even if the end did not result so, because I believe something done intending for good can not be wrong.
That's... An interesting stance.
It is, isn't it?
Yes I realise the implications. They were instrumental in the origin of the belief. When I asked myself, what if I lived in a society which dealt in ethnic cleansing, I considered that, if I were to discuss with a member of this society whether this was right or not, and they truly believed that it was, why would my morality be superior to there's?
Because human life has value perhaps?
But then I considered that perhaps to this person, it does not. I place value in human life, but why should that HAVE to be right? If this person was committing an atrocity as far as I was concerned, but to them it was something good, why should my stance take precedence?
Then I flipped it around.
What if I did something I considered good that they considered wrong?
I realised that if we are both doing good as far as we are concerned, then why should one be right over the other? They shouldn't. Because good is relative to in what we place value. Just because one thing is valuable to one, does not mean they have the right to assume it HAS to be valuable to all.
As a disclaimer, not advocating for ethnic cleansing. Just rationalising how it could be possible for others to to believe it is the correct course of action, and accepting that from a moral standpoint, I am not inherently superior to them, even if because I viewed it as wrong I would act to prevent it. I feel this was poorly explained and people will assume the worse...
That was the basis for it anyway.
Yeah, I don't know man. If you accept doing wrong for the greater good and then don't deliver on the good, only wrong remains.
I'm not even sure about the whole "greater good justifies the wrong" thing either. If your options are hurting some people to make more people happy than you're hurting and not doing anything to keep both parties moderatly happy, the second one kinda does sound better,
Also, this discussion has gone waaaay off track.
But the intention was good. People can make mistakes. That's all that was accepting for. Greater good also assumes that their suffering has been considered, and usually you will find that suffering without compensation does not classify as greater good.
Greater good is a scale. Good and bad must be considered for the greater good.
Also, yeah, way off track, but this took a while to write and I didn't see your post until I had. I'll drop it know.
last edited at Apr 28, 2015 6:48PM