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Personal Values, Morality, Principles, and Practicality.

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figsfiggyfigs

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Do you find personal values, morality, principles deter or hinder practicality?

Does following these beliefs excuse the possible opportunity? What are the benefits does choosing personal values create? Does it outweigh the missed gain?

This just popped up in my head while I was on a phone call. Basically this person is choosing to follow what they view as "morally correct", and by doing so, they've closed many doors for potential growth and experience.
It got me thinking about how inconvenient and limiting having personal values/morals/ and principles can be. I almost wish that we didn't.

Do you think a world without these traits would be any good? Would it become an opportunistic society of backstabbing? Is it possible for such a society to even exist? How would that effect the core of our decision making? Is everything technically a persona value/principle?
 
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Randomnity

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"sometimes"? well obviously. It's not hard to think of a dozen hypothetical scenarios.

Is your real question how often it happens, or what?
 

rav3n

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Ideology is a limiting framework. Even being open is a form of ideology. So, absolutely, it can hinder from perceived excesses, perceived practicality and perceived enjoyment of life.
 

skylights

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definitely. there are some children who always walk across one of the streets i use to drive to work... if i didn't have any values/morality/principles, i'd smoosh them for the sake of gas efficiency and time.
 

chickpea

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yes, but you could say practicality is a personal value too.
 

Rasofy

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Definitely. Nonetheless, the big advantage is you get cooperation, as people trust trustworthy people more. In the end, not having personal values can easily be a disavantage. Sociopaths seem to get away with my rule, but it doesn't last much.
 
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figsfiggyfigs

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Alright. I edited it.

Sorry if it doesn't seem clear. My mind started wondering, and I just started typing down what it was spewing.
 

Randomnity

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Why would it be a case of keeping/treasuring "all values" vs none? I would say some values are far more important than others.

Like say I value not murdering people, and I also value being polite and holding the door open for strangers. If I'm running late I might break a lesser value like holding the door, but I'm still unlikely to intentionally run someone over on my way to work.

But from your edited OP it sounds more like your real question is "why does this person care about this silly thing X", which we can't know since we don't know what X is.
 
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Anew Leaf

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I would be interested in this, but I would prefer some more parameters... A bit too broad still. (My mind, it goes everywhere.) If you could pinpoint 2-3 values/beliefs/etc that you want to discuss the most that could be a great starting point to talk about even more ideas.
 

chickpea

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not having morals or values might get someone ahead short-term, but in the long run it's going to alienate people, and if nobody can trust or relate to you, you're not going to get very far. i think a lot of people without many morals fake them to blend in and adapt to their social situation.

apart from the backstabbing aspect, what about a pregnant teenage girl who chooses to keep the baby because of her morals despite having no way to support the child, and the child hindering her future. would that apply too?
 

rav3n

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Now that you've amended the opening post with perspective, there would be anarchy. And while there's anarchy in the animal kingdom, human beings without external or self-limiters are prone to destructive excesses. We even destroy with love and this is more often than not.

There would only be one left standing and since it most likely couldn't breed, our race would die. Now if the one left standing was a gravid female, inbreeding would occur and destroy our species. Oh wait...Noah...
 
F

figsfiggyfigs

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Why would it be a case of keeping/treasuring "all values" vs none? I would say some values are far more important than others.
It was a hypothetical question, what would an existence like that entail? I agree that keeping/treasuring some values would be a better alternative. But for out of curiosity sake, lets presume it was all or none.

But from your edited OP it sounds more like your real question is "why does this person care about this silly thing X", which we can't know since we don't know what X is.

It has nothing to do with X. X is just an example of what choosing to follow your ideology might lead too, in this case, it limited and closed the possibility of new, positive experiences. This person's dilemma was just a stepping stone to the concept; I wasn't questioning whether it was silly or not, nor do I have an opinion on that specific scenario, other than that it was restrictive.

Now that you've amended the opening post with perspective, there would be anarchy. And while there's anarchy in the animal kingdom, human beings without external or self-limiters are prone to destructive excesses. We even destroy with love and this is more often than not.

There would only be one left standing and since it most likely couldn't breed, our race would die. Now if the one left standing was a gravid female, inbreeding would occur and destroy our species. Oh wait...Noah...

Is it possible for us to be making decisions with the absences of values? if the action didn't fulfill some sort of desire within us, would we choose to take it? Aren't we driven by desire? How do morals/values and principles intertwined with our desires? Can they be exclusive? Or are they only two different branches of the same tree?
We make decisions to comfort ourselves, and fill our wants and needs. Those decisions are usually weighed by personal worth. If so, how are we to even choose our actions if they do not fulfill something with in us? How are we to know what decisions will be 'right' for us, since the ability to measure that is now gone?

I hope I don't sound like Victor :laugh:


not having morals or values might get someone ahead short-term, but in the long run it's going to alienate people, and if nobody can trust or relate to you, you're not going to get very far. i think a lot of people without many morals fake them to blend in and adapt to their social situation.

apart from the backstabbing aspect, what about a pregnant teenage girl who chooses to keep the baby because of her morals despite having no way to support the child, and the child hindering her future. would that apply too?

That's interesting. This whole idea reminds me of "Psychopaths"...

and re: pregnant teen: Personal morality,check. Practicality: Fail, unless she decided to put it up for adoption.
 
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Rasofy

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There would only be one left standing and since it most likely couldn't breed, our race would die. Now if the one left standing was a gravid female, inbreeding would occur and destroy our species. Oh wait...Noah...
You can't assume a male is gonna born, you are gonna get women offended.

Edit: Oops, sorry, let's not derail phylosophic matters. back to the topic. :cop:
 

rav3n

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Is it possible for us to be making decisions with the absences of values? if the action didn't fulfill some sort of desire within us, would we choose to take it? Aren't we driven by desire? How do morals/values and principles intertwined with our desires? Can they be exclusive? Or are they only two different branches of the same tree?
We make decisions to comfort ourselves, and fill our wants and needs. Those decisions are usually weighed by personal worth. If so, how are we to even choose our actions if they do not fulfill something with in us? How are we to know what decisions will be 'right' for us, since the ability to measure that is now gone?
Well, Victoria...

Absolutely we can make decisions without the absence of values. More likely, id driven biological imperative decisions and possibly some ego tamped ones.

In essence, your opening post sets up the premise of the destruction of the super-ego.
 

Lark

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Do you find personal values, morality, principles deter or hinder practicality?

Does following these beliefs excuse the possible opportunity? What are the benefits does choosing personal values create? Does it outweigh the missed gain?

This just popped up in my head while I was on a phone call. Basically this person is choosing to follow what they view as "morally correct", and by doing so, they've closed many doors for potential growth and experience.
It got me thinking about how inconvenient and limiting having personal values/morals/ and principles can be. I almost wish that we didn't.

Do you think a world without these traits would be any good? Would it become an opportunistic society of backstabbing? Is it possible for such a society to even exist? How would that effect the core of our decision making? Is everything technically a persona value/principle?

Any choice at all has a cost in terms of the choice not made, for instance if you spend your time reading you cant spend it doing Yoga, this dilemma is at the heart of some economic theory and at the heart of the thread on being thirty and sense of direction which was popular a while back.

The absence of a particular guiding perspective does not mean that there is no guiding perspective and it is often a better idea to have an identifiable perspective than to simply become congruent with fashions or vogues in public opinion or perspective unconsciously, the reason for being that they ARE fashions and vogues, there is no continuity and they are short lived, perhaps even resulting in you behaving in one manner at one time and in a completely different manner the next and heaping regrets or cognitive dissonance up.

Its the difference between possessing insight and judgement and behaving impulsively, compulsively and reactively those are all hibiting and limiting personal traits, whether you think that or not in the instance or present moment you're living in. While there's a lot of people imagine its freeing to revoke or renounce a creedo or guiding principles its a short cut to being taken advantage of by the more unscrupulous and calculating.

I've felt this way all my life but life experience has reinforced it.
 
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