The right thing to do

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When it comes down to it, what is 'the right thing to do'? We all have notions of morals and values and whatnot, but deep down, do we really just want to please ourselves?
Even the people who are examples of the great, loving person, in the end, maybe they do it because it makes them look better, or feel better. What do you all think?

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I believe we do what pleases ourselves.

Giving joy to other people is a way of pleasing oneself.

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I agree completely with you. I have an example, not necessarily of this type of situation, but one in general. Everyone knows how when you realllly love someone you say how you only want them to be happy no matter what, but what you really mean is you want them to be happy, and have you be part of it. It's part of the satisfaction you seek. Can anybody argue against that point?

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Take a look at these threads:

Altruism

and

Greed

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I was at a stoplight yesterday and saw a woman fall on the ground not once but twice from slippery icy snowy conditions - 2 people passed her by - it was aweful to watch - i thought for about 5 seconds I should put it in park and go help but didn't cause it was on a busy street and I was in the wrong lane.

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Re: The right thing to do

CarbonSystem wrote:

Even the people who are examples of the great, loving person, in the end, maybe they do it because it makes them look better, or feel better.

Assuming that you believe that that all actions are motivated by self-interest ie. one attains, at minimum, an emotional benefit from their altruistic actions; does this somehow invalidate the action or its morality? I'm just wondering out of curiousity where you are leading with this line of questioning.

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Everyone knows how when you realllly love someone you say how you only want them to be happy no matter what, but what you really mean is you want them to be happy, and have you be part of it. It's part of the satisfaction you seek. Can anybody argue against that point?

We're talking love in the dialectic of romantic love right? What about the person that knows that their partner will be happier with someone else? I think you can want someone to be happy without the imposed condition that they be with you. I suppose, you could argue that you're acting out of some self-interest as you couldn't possibly be happy with someone who wants to be with someone else. But then again, are altruism and self-interest, two mutually-exclusive concepts?

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C.S., Peter Jennings' person of the week was an Irishman who donated $100,000.00 to a young and penniless Hispanic man who needed a kidney transplant. The money was what he had saved to buy a townhouse. I believe we can classify this as giving without expecting. As for what is right and what is wrong, we all know that deep inside our hearts and souls.

Also, check out the life of George Eastman sometimes.

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My personal opinion is that it is profoundly cynical to think that no one ever acts selflessly, or that there are selfish motives in every apparently selfless act.

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evolutionary forces dictate that each animal should operate to its own benefit, in order to maximize the individual's chances of survival - this is built into our hard wiring (instinct - inate 'morality'; NOT 'ethics').

humanity/civilization is the ability of an individual to realize that the survival of the species is more important than that of the individual.

wisdom is the ability to abstract a situation to basics, in order to assess the importance of an action to the whole, and to the self.

deciding what to do is a declaration of 'philosophy".

[we can do much more together, than any of us can attain alone; and there is nothing wrong with feeling good about it!]

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Excellent synopsis, Bo. Do you mind if I use this on WA2K radio?

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Letty wrote:

C.S., Peter Jennings' person of the week was an Irishman who donated $100,000.00 to a young and penniless Hispanic man who needed a kidney transplant. The money was what he had saved to buy a townhouse. I believe we can classify this as giving without expecting. As for what is right and what is wrong, we all know that deep inside our hearts and souls.

Also, check out the life of George Eastman sometimes.

Just wanted to say there's a difference between giving without expecting and giving to make yourself feel good.

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Yeah there is.

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Hmmm. Joe and C.S., I think we may be splitting hairs, here. I hardly think the Irishman gave away his town house to make himself feel good. He could have found other ways to do that.

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Here is the full story:

http://abcnews.go.com/WNT/PersonOfWeek/story?id=412651&page=1

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Quote:

I believe that one does everything in order to make oneself happier, even the most selfless act. There are some people who are the happiest when they give, and that's the kind of person Jerry Quinn is.

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Well, Joe, you are a young man and perhaps haven't seen the things that I have, and then, perhaps the golden rule is more than we ever thought it to be. I also thought that Jesus was a marvelous psychologist, and I wrote a paper on the very thing when I was in college.

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Are you suggesting that the right thing to do is what pleases you?

I disagree completely.

Pleasure may come after a selfless act is done, but that does not mean that the pleasure is what motivates people to act a certain way.

Process before a good deed:
1) sees person in pain
2) "knows" what "pain" is
3) understands that it's not right for the person to feel pain
4) feels bad about the situation because of the understanding of the
situation
5) motivates himself to help the person
6) helps the person
7) may or may not feel good afterwards

The super-ego and the ID are two aspects in psychology. The pleasure after helping person thing probably normally occurs because the ID are made to be "in accordance" with the super-ego.

A person does not need to help others and will still gain pleasure from calmness, but the person chooses to help another whereas he could have totally ignored the whole situation. E.g. A person sees someone in dire need of help, he could have not helped the person and gain pleasure from going about his normal days, but he sees the person and sees that it would be right for him to help the person, he could totally ignore the whole situation but he doesn't.

More arguments later.

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I didn't say that the right thing to do is what pleases oneself, at least, I didn't intend to.

The topic has deviated from the initial question to "Can there be a truly selfless act?"

I answer the latter with a no.

ray wrote:

4) feels bad about the situation because of the understanding of the situation

If the person feels bad and helps, it's because he/she would've felt bad afterwards if he/she didn't help. The action is motivated from his/her own state of being and the act is a way to improve it.

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Quote:

I didn't say that the right thing to do is what pleases oneself, at least, I didn't intend to.

The topic has deviated from the initial question to "Can there be a truly selfless act?"

I answer the latter with a no.

oh, sorry. I say yes. However, this extreme and its extreme counterpart would not be what I would consider a truly moral standpoint.
The right thing to do would not consider one self more important than another but would be toward an underlying universal.

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If the person feels bad and helps, it's because he/she would've felt bad afterwards if he/she didn't help. The action is motivated from his/her own state of being and the act is a way to improve it.

No, the person can choose to ignore it completely and not care about it, but he/she chooses to. There's a reason for someone to feel bad about something. It'd be more "pleasurable" for a person to not have a care in the world about another person, but we do because it's right to care for people and with this knowledge we shape what we feel pleasure to, at least some of us do. This, and also that you don't need to feel bad about something to do set things right.

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Ray wrote:

oh, sorry. I say yes. However, this extreme and its extreme counterpart would not be what I would consider a truly moral standpoint.

I agree.

The right thing to do is something I do not know of so I can't talk about it.

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The right thing to do

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