Are people inherently good, or inherently evil?

[Tr3n7]

I do not know if people are inherently good or evil for sure, but this is what I've gone with with over the past few years of reading and thinking:

My personal definition of "good" and "evil" is my own personal application of J.S. Mill's "Do No Harm" principle. Mill suggests (from my personal reading) that to live a good life is to act in whatever way you please, so long as no action you take is to the detriment (physical or mental) of any other person, any way you look at it. If you aren't sure about that Mill stuff, read 'On Liberty,' it's only like 110 pages, it'll explain everything.

So I end up concluding this:
If people are inherently good (inclined to not harming other people), what is the difficulty (conflict) in life? If you are inclined to good it would not make sense to harm others (obviously). Violent crime (which MUST correlate positively with the release of GTAIV...haha) would have to be a conscious decision against one's natural inclination for the sake of survival, personal gain, or malicious intent.

At this point, "Do No Harm" would be irrelevant, because no one would be inclined to hurt anyone else, and therefore it would not be necessary to ever design such a principle, and that means people cannot really be inclined to good based on the fact that Mill's principle exists, if you want to just break it into logically bound conclusions from this particular view.

If people are inherently evil (more or less self-interested) their natural inclinations will (at some juncture) lead them to harm (directly/indirectly) another person (mentally/physically) and have to face consequences. In this situation, it becomes difficult to follow the "Do No Harm" principle, because humans will be inclined to do as they prefer, regardless of the affects their actions have on others. They will have to make the conscious decision to oppose their egotistical desires (which can harm others) and instead take care to respect and avoid harming other people, and take care of yourself for the people who care about you. I think it gives the concept of "Do No Harm" a solid base from this angle, because you must take effort to avoid doing evil (harming others), which was something Mill recognized needed to be done in his own time, and is one of the reasons he wrote 'On Liberty'.

It seems more likely that people are inherently evil if the base of all evil acts is egotism. To be self-interested makes it difficult to not harm anyone, simply because you may not be aware of the emotional suffering you cause all the people who care about you.

I can only hope most people are capable of restraining themselves from physically harming others until it interfered with their survival instincts. I know that people fight, I've been in fights plenty of times (before I started smoking) and it's not fun at all. I haven't been in a fight in five years, however. Thank you Mary Jane!

[Jimmy Coonan]

People are inherently amoral. They want what they want--food, sleep, sex, intoxicants, all the good things that make us happy. Much of the time they can be satisfied without hurting others, but if others get in the way, people don't care without some kind of external deterrant or internal, societally-instilled force to stop them.

[adruffd]

Originally Posted by JcP

The question is not whether the bible is a historical document or not. The Koran is a historical document. The Magna Carta is a historical document.

The question is whether the bible speaks of true events, modernized mythological anthropomorphic fairy tales, complete fiction (new testament, at least), or anything else.

And that is completely unproveable which is why religion is based on faith, not fact.

edit: both of my posts sound a lot harsher when re-reading them than I intended when writing it. I totally respect your right to believe anything you want, I was just bringing up my opinions. Tone is hard to do with words on a page. Sorry if it comes off as such.

I see what you are saying, may I re-phrase myself as far as the historical document. The Bible is an "accurate historical document", that is to say that it is not a bunch of "fairy tails" but contains truth. For my purpouses I could label it an "academic" document but I feel that it would give it the wrong connotation.

I find it interesting that you say that that the new testament is complete fiction. From my prespective I find the new testament "more credable" than the old. My reasoning for this is we have a hard time understanding exactly what the authors of the Old are trying to say because they are speaking in terms of their time. For example it says (sorry I forgot where) it says that a man lived over 200 years old. The problem with this is that it was originally written thousands of years ago. But the "julian calendar" was created roughly around year 0. This means their use of "years" does not coincide with our understanding of the calandar year. This is why the Bible should not be taken word for word (and we must account for possible faulty translations), but understanding it as a whole. This is why "Adam" isnt some ass-hole who ate an apple from a tree and doomed humanity. Insted we are sapposed to rely on "our" reason (which is the figurative fruit of knowedge) to understand the meaning behind the story, not take it at face value. Now cant there be different interpretations of each story? How do we know if they are true? - This is where Catholics differ from other Christian denominations, to aviod this we have enacted upon Apostolic Tradition (Following the interpretations of the Apostles, those who were closest to Jesus) to ensure the accuracy our interpretations.


As far as "And that is completely unproveable which is why religion is based on faith, not fact."
I do not believe that religion is "completely unprovable". Plato, through his reason, came to the conclusion that there must be one God. This is amazing considering he is in a culture of Pegans and he did not have ANY outside influence to come to this decision. Now while that does not "prove" religion, it shows how logic and reason can point us in the right direction as far as religion is concerned. But there are some features of Religion that cannot be explained, therefore we have to go on Faith. I will use the ultimate to explain this. Jesus was Fully man and Fully God. This is somthing that our human minds cannot fathom. Thats kind of like saying I am 100% White and 100% black. This single act of Faith is the cornerstone upon which the entire Caothlic Religion is based. Without it we do not have a foot to stand on.

I know all these concepts may be a little hard to understand, sorry. I am trying to fit thousands of pages of writing into a few mere sentences. There are bound to be some holes in my arguments presented simply because I do not have the time to delve into each of them

[adruffd]

Originally Posted by Jimmy Coonan

People are inherently amoral. They want what they want--food, sleep, sex, intoxicants, all the good things that make us happy. Much of the time they can be satisfied without hurting others, but if others get in the way, people don't care without some kind of external deterrant or internal, societally-instilled force to stop them.

If what you say is true, then why in the world would we do a self-less act? Acts of pure selflessness are when we put whats best for others ahead of ourselves, this will make us less happy than if we acted for our own ends. Example- If someone dies that would not "make them happy", but why do some give their lives up and accept death inorder to save others and ensure that they live?

[Praise Jah]

We live on a spectrum. We can immerse ourselves fully in either or live in either/both to whatever degree we want.

[Jimmy Coonan]

Originally Posted by adruffd

If what you say is true, then why in the world would we do a self-less act? Acts of pure selflessness are when we put whats best for others ahead of ourselves, this will make us less happy than if we acted for our own ends. Example- If someone dies that would not "make them happy", but why do some give their lives up and accept death inorder to save others and ensure that they live?

People get praised for acts of pure selflessness, or they are encouraged to do so by the rules of their society, or by protecting someone they love and receive some satisfaction from protecting.

People die for their families, friends, countries, etc., all the time and that makes them feel good. It's not often people die for a stranger. And if they do, they get lauded as heroes posthumously or at least have the satisfaction of doing something they think is "right," if they didn't I doubt they would.

[JcP]

Originally Posted by adruffd

I see what you are saying, may I re-phrase myself as far as the historical document. The Bible is an "accurate historical document", that is to say that it is not a bunch of "fairy tails" but contains truth. For my purpouses I could label it an "academic" document but I feel that it would give it the wrong connotation.

"accurate historical document" is a faith-based statement. If we're in agreement that this is true, I'm happy to let the rest of your argument lie as such as well.

If you are insisting upon the belief that somehow the Christian God is proveable/proven or the logical conclusion, I'll be happy to reply in full.

[spicoli]

i think we are born pure, yes.
i think we learn by what we see in life as we experience it, and that we become what we decide to be.