Who Defines Good Or Bad?

[stargroup]

Re: Who Defines Good Or Bad?

Okay, I thought about this for a while, and looked at it from an outer perspective.

Ultimately, everything humans do is for survival. Although there are exceptions this is generally the case for pretty much all life.

Something should be defined as good if it benefits survival, whether it's indirectly or directly. For example, take music. Listening to trashy pop doesn't benefit survival obviously, you can do with or without it. But listening to it may cause people to act differently or create images or ideas in someone's head that may not be beneficial to society, one example being media violence. Listening to, let's say calming classical music, would ultimately soothe the mind and soul, and since classical music generally incorporates more advanced musical elements than most pop, it will also open people to newer musical perspectives.

I haven't thought this completely through but that's my argument for now: how much it ultimately benefits survival.

[Zythus]

Re: Who Defines Good Or Bad?

Who's survival do you benefit?

[devonin]

Re: Who Defines Good Or Bad?

His own, clearly. As well as any current or future dependants.

[Zythus]

Re: Who Defines Good Or Bad?

And that is exactly why it would not qualify to be an "outer perspective" or objectiveness.
As long as survival benefits you, you can violate the same right in the other adherents of this idea, because it may potentially benefit you and your survival. Two people stuck on an island with one coconut. Obviously, you'd snatch it and consume it. What happens to the person who didn't receive the only item of food? Would it be fair to kill the other person for the coconut because it does benefit their only chance of survival?

I feel creating a universal standard/objective/Or a rule that applies to everyone, as these three terms are the same thing, is strictly impossible. Even objective is subjective. The only pseudo-objectiveness is the conformities that we whimsically label as "right and wrong".

[Redsky139]

Re: Who Defines Good Or Bad?

Animals do not have a concept of quality and yet they are defined by evolutionary maxims as stargroup suggests. More importantly, many things survive that are not as good as others simply by chance (a meteor falls on the fastest running dinosaur in the herd). A number of other things that promote survival are intuitively not good, as well, including a number of genetic diseases which in some way promote survival of the species, are certainly not 'good'; i.e., although one can a priori define all things that promote survival as good and all that do not as bad, intuition and evidence would challenge the construct validity of this definition of quality.

#1, if you want a real discussion of quality, read "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance." I'm going to give my own thoughts here, but I can't help but realize they are heavily influenced by this book and so I am referencing it.

There are actually two types of quality being discussed here. General consensus is a measure of quality, but it is not quality itself. I'd call it an inaccurate measure of what I'd call Subjective Quality, which is related to beauty, art, and music. Objective Quality, in contrast, has to do with precision, logic, accuracy, and skill. FFR players can be assigned objective qualities, based on their measurable ability to tap keyboard keys accurately corresponding to the arrows they see. The number of bpm they can do stream is measurable and can define them as a 'good' player. This is intuitive - most would agree that individuals who can play faster songs with more complicated patterns are of greater skill.

Subjective quality, the definition of which is essentially the question being asked in this post, is a little tougher to put in a box everyone feels comfortable with. Yet, we know intuitively that some pieces of art are more inspiring and more beautiful than others. The difficulty is that value in subjective quality is both not quantifiable and indefinable (and yet it exists!). In our FFR player example, objective quality is determined by the measurable values of accuracy (hitting the correct arrow and hitting it within the time window.) Yet, for music, we cannot define a set of values or they end up being artificial and meaningless (many have tried).

The phrase that comes to mind is one I've already used multiple times: intuition. Although many people do not listen to it when assessing whether they like something or not (e.g., 12-15 year old girls, for whom 90% of music from major record labels is designed these days because they have no sense of quality), it is really what guides our sense of good and bad in subjective matters. An inability to, or conscious choice not to, listen to intuition is the reason why many bad songs become popular, along with herd mentality and the effect of overexposure.

Although I've used different terms and slightly altered definitions than the above referenced book, an example used therein may be helpful in illustrating my point. In science, which is so often considered an objective field, there is an acute problem in determining the skill of a scientist objectively: namely, in hypothesis generation. There are an infinite number of hypotheses that can be tested in order to explain any given aspect of nature, and the breadth and scope of work (and money) necessary to test even a small amount of them is astronomical. In fact, for every study that we do that comes out with a positive result, it generally creates more questions, for which an infinite number of possible hypotheses can be postulated. A 'good' scientist, though, intuitively determines the correct question to ask and a reasonable hypothesis that will give meaningful results. He or she cuts through the fog of infinite incorrect answers and grabs the correct one. This is subjective quality - there are certainly better hypotheses than others and research questions that will more meaningfully affect our understanding of the world, and the determination of what a good question or hypotheses is is made through subjective intuition.

Yes, one can apply a definition to both subjective quality and intuition, but they would be artificial and merely descriptive rather than defining.

[Zythus]

Re: Who Defines Good Or Bad?

There are actually two types of quality being discussed here. General consensus is a measure of quality, but it is not quality itself. I'd call it an inaccurate measure of what I'd call Subjective Quality, which is related to beauty, art, and music. Objective Quality, in contrast, has to do with precision, logic, accuracy, and skill. FFR players can be assigned objective qualities, based on their measurable ability to tap keyboard keys accurately corresponding to the arrows they see. The number of bpm they can do stream is measurable and can define them as a 'good' player. This is intuitive - most would agree that individuals who can play faster songs with more complicated patterns are of greater skill.

By who's criterion is this measuring ability validated and put into effect? Is it not by the subjectiveness of Tass that a FMO or VC is what it is? You seem to argue that there are intrinsic values in the measurement of objective. However, it is only given subjective value by the person in power.

Objective Quality, in contrast, has to do with precision, logic, accuracy, and skill.

You speak as if Subjective quality is a whimsical and baseless judgment. I can give you infinite number of examples of why subjective quality is just as profound as your objective quality. After reading your argument, the conclusion for subjective quality is "This person is a good player." The conclusion for objective quality is "This person is a good player because Tass said so." You are basing Objective on the Subjective.

Intuition is based on experience. I doubt you'd go into a haunted house expecting fairies or elves because one Halloween or the other, you've been to a haunted housed or have seen it in a movie or have heard it by word of mouth. So now that you visit a haunted house again, you would be tense and fearful due to the past experience that you have.

[Shaygr]

Re: Who Defines Good Or Bad?

Ah.. when you use music as an example, the only answer you can expect to your question is "you do." :P
But, isn't that the truth?
See - in forms of art (such as music), individuals have the chance to creatively interpret what's good or bad for themselves, 'cause it defines the free personality you're allowed to have in the world today.

As for why you'd decide if it's good or bad, I'm pretty sure it's one of those "you live what you learn" deals. For example, a person who was brought up to be accepting and as open-minded as possible would most likely be more relaxed with more than one genre of music - as opposed to someone who grew up isolated.. with only one radio station!

However!
I think you were meaning to get at who and what decides what's morally right and wrong. D:
And the depressing answer is society. Individuals have only a tiny bit of room for creative interpretation in this area. (or else you'd have half the population thinking murder was a good sport..) I agree with stargroup in believing these decisions are made for our survival and health benefits. Religions also have a huuuge effect on these decisions!

Mm, tl;dr: It depends on what you're measuring when it comes to who decides what's good or bad.

[Spif]

Re: Who Defines Good Or Bad?

Good or bad as terms are defined by a heavy, dull book we call a dictionary.

But in all seriousness, society's general opinions or morals defines whether something is good or bad. In a case such as music, only yourself can decide whether it's a good song or a bad song. Even if 99% of the population loves it, it could be, in your opinion, not too great. Same goes with taste in clothing, taste in food, your favourite colour even. It can't really be determined by any other means aside from your own personal stand-point.

[Kilroy_x]

Re: Who Defines Good Or Bad?

Doesn't matter who defines it. Hell, it doesn't even matter that it's subjective. In the search for objective truth, we always expect some sort of ceiling, so we refine our theories with the implicit idea that they'll eventually lead us into full, direct contact with the objective world. With subjective truth, we still have to keep looking for something comparatively better, the process of selection just goes on forever. Subjectivity does not imply impermeability. The subjectivity of morality imposes our first moral duty upon us; the duty to always think.