Goodness and forms

There is human confusion about what goodness is. As with anything important or true, religious and political forms of goodness are the main ones which bounce within the human mind. Now a H.A.S. will see this, and say, “since there is no common absolute good, good is not true, because true things are absolutely true, objects of nature, for all to see.” They make the assumption that somehow a bunch of people miss-representing something renders it all wrong. Even if a billion people miss-represented goodness itself, that would not mean actual goodness is wrong, false, evil, foolish, etc. But despite this, the H.A.S. is so half assed, that he misses this point entirely.

In nature there is much wisdom, much secrets. In nature, in fact, all is secret, and will not portray things or teach peoples. Nature is silent. It is highly foolish that a person should expect truth to be evident. Nature is quite different. It will not teach you a thing. You must teach yourself about nature, through and by yourself, for the most part, and even while being taught things, the human individual being taught must think and listen. They still must teach themself.

Now, with goodness, in nature, an animal is the perfect example of good form.
The body of the animal is symmetrical. The cells sort matter and chemical, in great and fine mass. The mind guides the actions. The being responds to its environment. It preserves and produces selfhood. It is capable of change. It lives and reacts to change. This is the essence of goodness. The virtue of the body. All evils begin as goodness, then only through miss-application do they become evil, for evil is the wrong quantity at the wrong time and place. Deadly wrongs are when there is too much or too little of something, whereas perfection relates to proper quantities.

I happen to think that goodness is a true thing.
The arguments against goodness are lame and offer little, whereas goodness itself is a reward, a means and an end. Such a concept is a grand thing.

But Dan~ - if we extended your thesis of goodness to, say, a moral theory, we’d have to leave out extremes, “logical conclusions”, and theoretical ideals. We’d be left with looking for something that… actually works well. It would have to be judged by how well it works, and not how well it matches a theoretical ideal. Hmmmm…

Let’s see. If we threw out all moral thinking aimed at ideals, we’d be left with very little. I mean, we’d probably have to work out moral arrangements amongst ourselves, without the help of a perfect god.

And yeah, for those who cannot tell - that’s sarcasm.

Human values have been all over the place in history. Some things seen as bad today were seen as good in some other place and time. It’s clear that people are confused. I believe, if I remember right, that I first learned this from one of Nietszche’s writings, where in he talked about inversions. Inversions do happen. That is how culture is. It’s a big mutating mass of crap. But also, there is nature in culture, and at times nature is quite good. So we are left with a moral system, which itself is made of both good and bad things, like a religion, and that very moral system talks about things like perfection, pure good, God’s desire, etc. Maybe even that is an inversion. Some of the most evil people in history were very religious. Why would an aztek worship some kind of angry blood thirsty god? Really? Would I want to worship that? Or why would jesus, supposedly a perfect man, go and submit himself to unjust death? There too is a religion, where crap somehow becomes holy.

Despite all that never ending confusion of good and bad, I see the body of a man or an animal, or a plant, as a great model for what goodness really is. The body is in essence, a will to power, cooperation, and live information. Most eutopias are based on ideals of cooperation, people being fully informed, and a strong will towards great goals. The eutopia of body has to do with success of what it naturally is and needs.

I happen to believe that you have seen the misuse of morality. Some of the finest things are the most misused things. For example, the power of the atom. There is so much energy, which could have been used to produce food, medicine and clean water, but what if some crazy assed humans decided to just use it for bombs. I am surprised we have not blown ourselves up yet, but I think in a short time that could possibly happen. Now although a bomb is usually bad, the actual power is good. The vast raw power, the force of it, is a very good thing, but once it has become miss-applied, it becomes a vice. Morality is miss-applied. We’ve got pacifism, we’ve got sexual chastity, we’ve got holy wars, we’ve got lawyers, etc. To the point where throwing out morality itself may appear good, just like throwing out nuclear science could appear good. Maybe it would be. Maybe it’s good to take a gun away from a toddler.

I agree, and this is pretty much what I’ve always said. The only thing I’d add, is that I think nature is a better teacher than you give it credit for. Think back to when you were in grade school… and you’d do your work because there was something that you wanted to get out of it----a sticker, a reward from the teacher or your parents, something like that. Nature is the same way. If you do something, and do it well enough, nature rewards you. It also punishes you if you’re lazy----nature has cruelly punished me for being lazy by saddling me with extra weight, such that I have to work even harder to be lazy now. It’s a clever teacher, if cruel as well.

In nature we can learn things, I was just trying to point out that the universe doesn’t try to protect us or teach us things, instead we have to make it protect us, and make ourselves learn things about it. I’m very much of the opinion that good must be forced into existence. It wont happen on its own. That is why we need creative power along with virtue. Virtue without power is like a light bulb with no electricity.

Dan~, The universe is, to me, very impersonal, as far as we know. I don’t think nature is, though–perhaps it’s ‘passive’, rather than impersonal. Nature retaliates when treated poorly and so it teaches through punishment. For example, there was a huge mudslide on an island in the Puget Sound the other day. People had been warned about building at the top of the slope because it was considered unstable. They did so anyway and 33 homes were either lost of severely damaged. We pour toxins into the air which affect not only the air, but also the oceans and rain. We disrupt or wipe out ecosystems without knowing what damage we’re doing. We’re always punished in some way.

Imm, nature is inherently good. But then, I believe humanity is inherently good–that it can “happen on its own.” We’re born with all the knowledge stored in our genes, including the earlier Homo species, that led us to where we are now. Doing good leads to survival; what we call evil is what changes within our total environment. That’s why I don’t think a “universal morality” is possible at this time. Cultures prevent that.

I also think there can be “truly evil” individuals–totally amoral and impersonal. God’s creations aren’t perfect. :open_mouth:

  Dan: your argument is right. I would like to think so too. And as an added historical fact to support your idea, look at the contrasts between Rosseau's social contract, and Humes'. A world of difference. And yes, it is based on an ideal embedded in a fact.  However, it's a pity, most modern theorists would argue against it.

Although I agree with the OP in principle, to me it seems to add up to a “okay, so what?”
:-k

It’s incoherent circular logic.

Many animals has become extinct because they couldn’t adapt, good constitution of the body has nothing to do with good ethics and morals, to make such correlations is absurd.

Maybe you’re prefer sesame street.
My latest posts are about the most basic perspectives. But to you it is somehow all illogical. Maybe you’d even disagree that 2+2 = 4?

What you say isn’t scientific, but purely made up spekulation and assumptions.

There are no confusion, it is your post that contradicts good knowledge in this area, and this post doesn’t make sense.

Please define H.A.S.

In this section you initially speak of morals and ethics, which has nothing to do with goodness in bodily form, there are no correlation.

We have geology, onitology, meteology, biology, etc all which unlocks secrets of nature, so “all is secret” is wrong to say.

Nature is not silent, all makes noise and give evidense, it is just people who won’t observe, and our scientists unlocks their secrets, we have endless of books and scriptures on this, havn’t you been to school where they teach us about nature? Havn’t you been to the libary where books exist about nature?

No, too many times animals become too specialized and can’t adapt and change.
Herbivores will starve if drought hits the lands, they can’t go to the ocean and fish, brids will often trek long distances and die in the process, hedge hogs doesn’t have a perfect defense and can be killed, etc, etc.
Only humans can be considerd perfect, as we have superior intellect to overcome most situations, we can form societies where we befit eachother, bakes makes bread, soldiers fight wars, pilots transport people, mechanics maintain and repair, etc. The human mind is flexible, we can change roles and jobs, we have complex commucation, etc unlike any other animal.

So, to say goodness about the animal body is wrong.

No, good intend can have catastrophic consequenses, medival doctors who gave bad medicine in the best of intend often made the patient even more ill, we all know about the miracle substance mercury, it would treat all kinds of illnesses, or blood letting preformed with unsterile instruments.

To claim that goodness is is a true thing doesn’t make sense, there are no properties in itself that makes it true, truth is a logica calculated outcome, depending on how one calculate things is very relative and subjective and not something that is automaticly true.