Humans: Mostly good, or mostly bad?

[Schrödinger's Name]

No one is born good or bad. Why would we have to be good or bad anyway?

 

[Julius_Van_Der_Beak]

Goddammit fellas! I came here to make a salt and pepper joke but I see that I've been beat.

Indeed. Looks like my superior sense of comic timing whipped you into shape.

 

[Mind Maverick]

No one is born good or bad. Why would we have to be good or bad anyway?

The word "mostly" was chosen deliberately.

 

[Schrödinger's Name]

The word "mostly" was chosen deliberately.

They're not born mostly good or bad either then.

Shht alright. I will read the book my dad gave me and respond later, with actual arguments. See y'all over a year.

 

[Indigo Rodent]

5% are mostly good;
30% are neither good nor bad;
65% are mostly bad.

Thinking/perceiving similarly. Though depending on situation, not good, may be indistinguishable from evil.

 

[The Cat]

Half are simple who secretly yearn for the perceived bliss that comes from complexity.
Half are complex who secretly yearn for the perceived bliss that comes from simplicity.
All are envious...

 

[SD45T-2]

Mostly water.

 

[Lexicon]

Mostly water.

And water can be both good and bad. It’s all about context.

/thread

you brought this terrible clip to mind, for some reason:

 

[Tellenbach]

Given the opportunity, the vast majority of humanity would participate in evil acts like the holocaust. See, if people were mostly good, great evil such as wars, slavery, and mass murders wouldn't happen. You couldn't pay me to own a slave or put a bullet in an innocent person but like Dr. Cox says "people are bastard- coated bastards with a bastard filling" or something along those lines.

 

[The Cat]

Given the opportunity, the vast majority of humanity would participate in evil acts like the holocaust. See, if people were mostly good, great evil such as wars, slavery, and mass murders wouldn't happen. You couldn't pay me to own a slave or put a bullet in an innocent person but like Dr. Cox says "people are bastard- coated bastards with a bastard filling" or something along those lines.

Don't let a Dr. Molly Clock hear you say that...

 

[FemMecha]

Given the opportunity, the vast majority of humanity would participate in evil acts like the holocaust. See, if people were mostly good, great evil such as wars, slavery, and mass murders wouldn't happen. You couldn't pay me to own a slave or put a bullet in an innocent person but like Dr. Cox says "people are bastard- coated bastards with a bastard filling" or something along those lines.

I agree with you. One counterpoint to this truth is that masses of people can sometimes get on the wagon to do something good like when an entire community helps to sandbag a flooding river. It is true that my example still has a great deal of self-interest motivating it, and it happens less often than groups gathering to cause harm. I don't trust humans and even myself I watch with a close eye because I don't want to fall into the same paths of justified cruelty.

That is something important about the "bastard- coated bastards with a bastard filling" mindset. It looks at others as deplorable, but always feels justified in its own actions. Also, it can use the negative view of everyone else as a justification for one's own bad behavior. I've noticed this way back when I was involved in religion. The little church group would concoct such a negative view of "sinners" or "the lost", that they assumed the bar was quite low in the world for good behavior and as a result acted horrifically and shamefully themselves never realizing that the people they condemned were actually a helluva lot nicer than they are.

So I use that observation as a cautionary tale for myself. If I look the world over and condemn it, that is not a license to lower my own bar, or to think I'm justified punishing the people for being so horrible. It's also not proof that if I were subjected to their same environments and genetics, that I would not be exactly as they are. Keeping that in mind holds off the temptation towards arrogance in rejecting the cruelty of others. It can help dissuade that feeling of entitlement to punish other people, which is the justification for nearly all cruelty. So if I think the world is evil, in order to not become yet another example of the cruelty of humanity, I do have to withhold from exacting any of my "justified" punishments.

 

[The Cat]

Ime the majority of the humans I've encountered lack any kind of sense of enlightened self interest.

 

[FemMecha]

Ime the majority of the humans I've encountered lack any kind of sense of enlightened self interest.

What is enlightened self interest? Is it what I was describing? What I was describing can even apply to people who tailgate in their big trucks to punish people for driving slower than they want to drive. It can be applied in very low level, minimally conscious ways.

 

[The Cat]

What is enlightened self interest? Is it what I was describing? What I was describing can even apply to people who tailgate in their big trucks to punish people for driving slower than they want to drive. It can be applied in very low level, minimally conscious ways.

Enlightened self-interest is a philosophy in ethics which states that persons who act to further the interests of others (or the interests of the group or groups to which they belong), ultimately serve their own self-interest.

 

[Mind Maverick]

I guess I'll write a response to my own question.

This was mostly just me emerging from 25 years of being told, "the heart is desperately wicked" which was used to convey, "even if people don't know they are out to get you, they are still out to get you." Somehow, trusting others is coming more easily than it used to, more easily than I thought it would. I guess that's because no one is manipulatively isolating me from everyone else now. I'm getting to know the world all over again, and although at first I wasn't sure how to see it, I'm learning to trust some people enough to be close to them. I would say I have seen most of the population in a negative light: untrustworthy, ill-intentioned, selfish, etc. but these days I'm learning to see those who are different sprinkled about. It's nice to see some light in the world...when the world seems like too dark of a place it's very isolating and makes you wonder what the point in being here is when you really value love above all material things.