Why be ethical? who decides?

[fishfool]

why should a human being have ethics?


my ethics may not mix with your ethics.

so whose ethics are better?

why should I keep yours?

fishfool

[fishfool]

sorry, that's actually two questions . let's start with this one:

why should I hold by ethics that someone else deems acceptable and I don't?

like, say it's my ethic to go kill someone who makes me mad and society says no

why shouldn't i? isn't there free choice?

[harper]

Shouldnt you respect anothers ideas just as you would want someone to respect yours?

As far as keeping my ethics or standing by yours. You have your whole life to wonder so don't be in a hurry and enjoy the experience of wondering and understanding.

Owe and you shouldnt kill anybody.....

Because then they have no brain activity and they cannot respect your ideas or ethics just as you would theirs.

[Dewey]

Hi fishfool,

I don’t believe you are as naïve as your questions indicate. I suspect you already know that, to be a member of a community, an individual must accept limits on his freedom. I bet you already realize that, no matter his personal code of morality, the individual must comply with the moral standards of his community -- especially with those that have been formalized into laws. And, finally, I think you are already quite aware of the trouble that awaits the non-complying individual.

[Edward J. Bartek]

Morality is relative to time, place, circumsance, and degree. So why be moral or ethical? Why can't I just do what I think is right? You can if you lived alone on a mountain peak. Bur you live in society where there must be rules that enable mutual survival, security, freedoms, and harmony. So ideally, all social rules and legal laws are a denial of individual freedoms to enable social freedoms. It means suppressing the bad child to enable a good family. Would you have it otherwise?

Who decides social good? In the Medieval Age the moral church decided social good with universal black-white moral laws based on the spiritual faith. In the Renaissance Age the rational philosopher decided rational social good by the black-gray-white principles of ethical judgement, to harmonize the group. In the Modern Age sensual science decided hedonistic good for the individual by relative statistical quantity (Polls), by the most material good for the most.

As each morality system dominated, in balancing change it suppressed the other systems. As the scientific "morality" is being denied, it is replaced by the relativity of all values, to make an emotive Age of No-values, no common, unifying morals, ethics, or controlled hedonism.

The individual may live dominantly by one of thee systems, but he musdt conform to the morality system in which he lives.

[Akui]

Morals are merely what society says is acceptible. There is no reason you should follow anyone else's morals, as long as you ar prepared to accept whatever legal/social consequences may befall you.

[ontologic_conceptualist]

Ethics are a matter of socially acceptible behavior, but my "Ethics" can clash with yours, I think pre-marrital sex should be required during at the very least the "engagement" period, you can really get to know what a person is like out of bed, by riding the wild bull or siting on his face, sex for me is a great method of exercise & entertainment & I've never had a reason or "Need" to cheat on my partner in 10 years, she's slowed down, I have not, but since it's just sex, it's no big deal to chill for a while, where as my old aunt Emmy was raised different and (The 'S.E.X.' word) was so secretive and glorified that she and her hubby did not last the 7 years, to her, even after marraige, unless they were going for a baby, sex was a dirty, nasty thing & thoughts of such would get you a ticket to "H.E.L.L.", ethics have to be agreed upon in the social circles for them to be effective or...all hell breaks loose, why should you follow the ethics of the people around you, you're outnumbered, so go along "within reason", or go elsewhere, let me define "Within reason", you want to live and work in America, great, but don't make everybody else have to learn your language just to understand you. "beyond reason" being not allowing you to express your cultural heritage or religion as long as it does not conflict with violence or other base laws.
_________________
Who I Am Is What I Am
What I Am Is Why I Am
Why I Am IS Who I Am...

The question you should be asking is...who are you?

[Belinda]

I completely agree with Dewey about ethics. I think it also goes for practical morality that a good person is a person who complies with accepted rules for harmonious living in communities of mutual aid.

However, rules are not fixed for all time, and the best of human flowering is the rational and emotionally aware human who is able to initiate the breaking of rules, to be able to be in the vanguard.These are the bodhisattvas and true prophets, such as Buddha and Jesus, to name the two most famous ones.

[Nick_A]

[ontologic_conceptualist]

Then it is perfectly moral and acceptable for me to hunt down & kill molestors, because they are doing far more harm to the individual & society than just my killing does, mine would be for a "good cause" & ethically acceptable by much of society, mabey not law, but society yes...the lesser of two evils !!!


_________________
Who I Am Is What I Am
What I Am Is Why I Am
Why I Am IS Who I Am...

The question you should be asking is...who are you?

[ape]

[Nick_A]

[ape]

"You, yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection." BUDDHA

[whitetrshsoldier]

[ontologic_conceptualist]

Guess nobody saw my answer
_________________
Who I Am Is What I Am
What I Am Is Why I Am
Why I Am IS Who I Am...

The question you should be asking is...who are you?