Who Defines Good Or Bad?

[Zythus]

Re: Who Defines Good Or Bad?

Subjectivism and Empiricism is your friend.

[Flaming_Dingleberry]

Re: Who Defines Good Or Bad?

Here's something to stimulate your thinking; A long time ago everyone thought the world was flat. Only those who'd seen the world and knew it to be round believed it to be round.

If only a select few have seen what great music is, are they right to say what's good and what's bad? (this isn't to say I think my taste in music is ultimate)

The world is a lot bigger and a lot more difficult to understand than music. Every song has someone who doesn't like it, I think a songs quality depends on the ratio between how many like it and dislike it. Since we are the ones who create opinions, we should be the ones who decide what the general opinion should be, and since that's impossible to keep track of, it's not important.

[GamerShadow]

Re: Who Defines Good Or Bad?

"Good and Bad" Is completely based upon one thing, perspective. What one individual thinks is rotten, awful, and terrible could be worshipped by another. (This should remind you of the saying which goes "One man's trash is another man's treasure.)

This can also be applied to good vs evil. There is no good, and there is no evil. They are merely two perspectives which oppose one another.

Take for example a young child and their parents. If the parents create tons of rules which restricts the child's behavior, they might go off and say that their parents are "evil." However, the parents believe that what they are doing for their child is "good", as it promotes more rigid behavior and thus, you have two conflicting views.

The same thing applies to the innumerable fantasy tales where the great "villian" is attempting to conquer the world for their own gain, and the others are trying to stop them. The "villian" sees what they are doing as "good" (at least, for themselves), while everybody else dislikes the "villian's" actions, thus they claim that they are "evil."

Edit: To actually answer the thread question, it is the individual which decides for themselves only what is "good or bad". Other individuals decide for themselves as well.

[Frozen Beat]

Re: Who Defines Good Or Bad?

But some parents will beat their child and call it "discipline" from simple things such as grades while their child is in first grade, or maybe they didn't do their homework fast enough.

Trust me it happens.

[Zythus]

Re: Who Defines Good Or Bad?

Trust me it happens.

From the parents' perspective, it is intrinsically beneficial regardless of age or whatever attribute you happen to empathize with.

Seeing the redundancy of this thread, I wish to add a more realistic boundary to the subjectiveness we debate in circles.

a horrible song that everyone loves.

There are two parts to this statement. "A horrible song" is the conception you, the individual, ascribe to the song because of the elements that do not fit your particular taste. Despite your preference as the lone individual, the majority of the audience constitutes a rating of a positive preference for the exact same song;"that everyone loves" . You can argue the song is tasteless due to your empirical preference, but it is also substantially valid that the song is a good song to have enticed the larger majority of the audience. This can be said to be an objective evaluation of good and bad, based on consensus and statistics. Your subjective perspective may apply and prevail to yourself, but majority's perspective is equally moving.

Is something ultimately advantageous? Then it is good.
Is it ultimately disadvantageous? Then it is bad.

As to who defines good/bad depends on if there are absolute values for them. If there are, and I believe this to be the case, then there will be absolute correct answers for the good/badness of anything though it may be incalculable for humans. If there aren't, there is no absolute objective measure for it, which makes the question itself less important.

Consequentialism is one way to subjectively distinct between "good" and "bad".
However, I don't see why it would be less important just because there is no "objective measure". If that was the case, I can say that morality does not matter because priorities may be different.

[Verruckter]

Re: Who Defines Good Or Bad?

Subjectivism and Objectivism is your friend.

Fixed.

Empirism has nothing to do with good or bad.

[Zythus]

Re: Who Defines Good Or Bad?

Fixed.

Empirism has nothing to do with good or bad.

No.
To be empirical is a common perquisite to be subjective. You feel and experience to conclude your perspective.
On the other hand, objectivism is irrelevant. There would not be a contradistinction between Good and Bad if an objectiveness existed. There is only perspective when there is choice and duality that provide many avenues. To be objective is to be subjected to only one avenue.

Please don't edit posts again, especially in Critical Thinking. There are rarely any "wrong" answers that need to be "fixed" provided that there is a appropriate and distinct justification for your post.

[Verruckter]

Re: Who Defines Good Or Bad?

No.
To be empirical is a common perquisite to be subjective. You feel and experience to conclude your perspective.
On the other hand, objectivism is irrelevant. There would not be a contradistinction between Good and Bad if an objectiveness existed. There is only perspective when there is choice and duality that provide many avenues. To be objective is to be subjected to only one avenue.

Please don't edit posts again, especially in Critical Thinking. There are rarely any "wrong" answers that need to be "fixed" provided that there is a appropriate and distinct justification for your post.

Sorry for poking your ego.

As you said it yourself, emprisim is implied into subjectivism.

[chained_to_a_pipe]

Re: Who Defines Good Or Bad?

Each individual has their own belief of what's "good" or "bad." I personally believe there's no such thing as a universal good or bad. It all depends on each person's beliefs.

[tsugomaru]

Re: Who Defines Good Or Bad?

It really depends on the scope of things. If you are looking at the entire universe, there is no good and bad. If you look down to a scale of one person, there will be a good and bad in his universe. If you look at an entire population, there can be a "universal" good and bad. Although I may not have thought so a year ago, there are some universal feelings shared by all human beings, one of which is killing and murder. The human population as a whole has agreed that killing and murder is bad and a lot of people believe it is so. After all, who likes it whenever they see a loved one being killed?

~Tsugomaru

[chained_to_a_pipe]

Re: Who Defines Good Or Bad?

That is a good point, but while most people see murder as bad, do all murderers think so? No. Many of them enjoy it and feel no remorse. Some see nothing wrong with what they've done. Therefore, it isn't necessarily a universal belief.

[tsugomaru]

Re: Who Defines Good Or Bad?

A "universal" good and bad will never be a belief shared by everyone. The point is, a large group such as the entire world can agree on one thing in general. Before each civilization met each other, it was probably already established that murder and death were bad things and these groups came to that conclusion by themselves. The British didn't have to teach the Native Americans that murder was a bad thing. If these individuals and groups can come to the same conclusions by themselves without the influence of the rest of the world, some kind of "universal" good and bad exists.

EDIT: I've decided that what we should call this is an "accepted" good or bad rather than a "universal".

~Tsugomaru

[blindreper1179]

Re: Who Defines Good Or Bad?

i think sacrificing a goat for satan is a good thing, and worshiping jesus is a sin. but you probably don't agree.

[tsugomaru]

Re: Who Defines Good Or Bad?

Look, I don't have to agree with what an entire population thinks if I don't want to. The point is, there will be an accepted belief that most people can agree on and until anther belief knocks that one off its metaphorical pedestal, that will be the definition of good and bad for society.

~Tsugomaru

[Patashu]

Re: Who Defines Good Or Bad?

Good and bad are socially defined and motivated. If you were a member of a solitary species, good would be anything that benefitted you and bad anything that didn't. But when you're a social creature like humans and you band together with other humans, a new rule arises and is in fact the reason why society can exist; it's a rule formed by induction, as follows. If I harmed others they'd similarly want to harm them back, so harming others is a bad thing for me AND for society. Repeat for every other crime or percieved 'badness' and an unwritten law has arisen through empathy.
The people who can't follow this induction to its finish are sociopaths, btw.