Morality: ennie-minnie-minie-moe

Coberst, you're funny.
But how does intent play into immorality? And by that I mean to ask whether you think the intent behind an action can make it moral or immoral-or is it the end result of an action that makes it moral or immoral-despite what the intent was (either good or bad)?

I personally think ridicule, in and of itself, is probably immoral in that the intent behind it is usually to harm- and the fact that an idea is deflated is ancillary to that.
Although, as a cyberfriend of mine pointed out to me, much of the psychology of humor is based on ridicule-so either most humans don't agree that it's immoral or they choose to ignore that fact so they can continue to enjoy the benefits to their funny bones, even at the expense of others.

Can you expand on the "right" versus "good" concept? My instinct is to view it opposite to how you have stated it, but I want to be sure I understand your concept before I solidify mine. Thanks.

By this definition, I'd consider myself to be a liberal, but I'm confused as to how this fits in:


That sounds more like conservatism to me.
Anyway, I find this part of what you wrote really interesting. I'm going to the library today, so I'll look for the Rawls book.

The whole Catholocism angle is interesting to me as well. Having not been raised a Catholic, a lot of the doctrine seems strange and mystical, and ethereal (as all religions are-but Catholocism seem to have even more of an element of that-to me anyway). But then at the same time, they take these incredibly rigid stances on issues. It's puzzling to me, but incredibly interesting.
I'm also really interested in the psychology of the personality who is not born into the Catholic faith, and so is not subject to those rigid strictures by birth or family pressures, but who then chooses to convert and make him or herself subject to them, while at the same time, there are huge numbers of people who were born into it, and for whom the control and rigidity and guilt inducing qualities are absolutely repellent and so they reject it, at risk as you said, to their mortal souls (in the eyes of other believers- and most likely their families).
Can you speak to your experience with this?

I guess practicing Catholics would be more like Captain Dave than Captain Jim.


I agree with this


I'm not so sure I agree with this-I would like to believe it, but experience has taught me otherwise. I think a lot of people are energized and secretly happy to see another person's misfortune. As it somehow serves to boost their own egos.

Religion is an ideoogy and we are all a complex matrix of various ideologies thus we all carry large contradictions I think. Catholics certainly do. One would think that Catholics would be liberal in that they are taught about the universal nature of human nature but nevertheless Catholics can be and are very conservative in that they move in ideological blocks rather than in universal truths at times.

Perhaps I should have not intoduced th political categories, it tends to cause confision and ill will. Forget my political categories.

I was raised as a Catholic but I am an agnostic now. I never was an adult Catholic because I could not tolerate the dogmatic system. However, the Catholic religion is based upon a strong understanding of human nature and that is probably why it has been the most successful institution in human history.