Because the reality is that everyone wants to be treated ethically.
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Why Do We Teach Kids To Be Good?
- Thread starter Rival
- Start date
If you mean decently, my rule has that covered without the need to resort to the golden rule.
Just treat folks decently, unnecessary to add anything after that.
Obviously you haven't stated any "rule" of your own. And if you were able to state your own "rule," it seems unlikely you would be able to understand the words you used.
If you accept the Christian perspective, your purpose is to stroke the ego a black hole of need for eternity. I assume that the Muslim perspective is similar. I find zero meaning to such an existence, less even than reproducing, staying warm, and feeding oneself. One would have even less purpose than that as an immortal, disembodied consciousness.
I define my purpose in terms of my values and what matters to me and those around me, not in terms of existing forever as some kind of audience member where the applause sign stays on forever.
There is no known morality that exists outside of the heads of sentient earthlings, including all of those attributed to deities by such people. Everybody has to pick or create a moral code, meaning that each individual's choice is subjective, even those that choose moral systems that they have been told exist objectively.
Alright, obviously you're going to champion the golden rule and there ain't nothing going to going to get you to question it.
And anyone who'd think to question it obviously doesn't understand it cause that's just the way it is.
Again, children can understand the simple sentence that states the Golden Rule; why can't you?
Isn't that just what I said? I've just accepted your argument to stand as the extent of your argument. I'd think you'd be happy with that.
Does it bother you so much to have the basis of your morals questioned that you feel it's necessary to continue to argue about it?
You've explained why you can't understand what the Golden Rule means? Explain it again.
FunctionalAtheist
Hammer of Reason
Evolution! We teach our children to be accepted by society and the culture they are raised in. In so doing, we are teaching our children the things that make them successful in culture and in leaving behind their own genes. Do we not also teach our children not to be fools, not to be good to a fault?
We don't teach our children to "BE GOOD!" We teach our children to be successful. In evolutionary terms, being "good" means they will not be ostracized, they will find a suitable mate and they will leave behind children of their own.
Roll with the Confucian version. Don't do to others what you don't want done to you.
We try to teach them to be the best versions of ourselves. But teaching doesn't work that way. Everything you do and say, as well as everything everyone else does and says has incremental impacts.
So I'd see this as a massive overstatement on what even well-raised kids are 'taught'.
That's just not my experience.
In fact, honesty has served me very well. Pragmatically it gives me the ability to build and trade off very long term relationships, and get assistance based on a simple request.
I don't think you can say society does or doesn't value morals. Both are true, and people vary. We wouldn't be friends if I thought you were dishonest. I value authenticity more than manners as I age.
You get to choose what you value. But speaking for myself, I do value it.
Yeah, it's just I don't worry about how other folks treat me. If I tell someone the truth, it's because I want to tell them the truth. Not because I expect them to tell me the truth in return. If I don't steal from someone else, I don't expect them to not steal from me. I expect them to act according to their purpose and I'll continue to act according to mine. IOW I don't act with the intention of trying to cause them to act a certain way. I don't feel a need to justify my actions as an attempt to influence someone else to act how I think they should be acting. Or in the case of Confucian, not act.
You've explain that it doesn't need to be explained. I can't really do much with that unless you've changed your mind?
I was asking for you to explain why you couldn't understand what the simple sentence that states the Golden Rule means.
However you also said it doesn't require explanation. If you can't explain it, why should I bother?
Unless you want to change you're argument, I don't see much of a need really.
It's like saying God exists and then saying that you can't explain that statement therefore it doesn't require an explanation.
It's your position, do you want me to argue your position for you? That'd be kind of silly for me to attempt since you don't feel an explanation is necessary. You've haven't given me anything to work with.
I don't know if I'd be interested in arguing your position anyway, it gotten pretty boring at this point.
osgart
Nothing my eye, Something for sure
to be cooperative is an important lesson but it's one tenth of what's out there. so with me I taught the good, bad, ugly, indifferent, and beware of evil.
I was taught to be good and I wasn't taught anything else and I was shell shocked by it all. it nearly killed me.
the worth of living is in the goodness of it. but I gave all the facts I could hoping they would choose good, and for the most part they all did.
so I partly agree, and disagree. the main thing is love, and than there is the other 80%.
so I used to challenge kids with what would you do if scenarios? and I put it to my loved ones, what would you like for yourself in life? love or lies.
the worst thing you could do is paint a rose picture of life, and than not the rest of the picture.
I was taught to be good and I wasn't taught anything else and I was shell shocked by it all. it nearly killed me.
the worth of living is in the goodness of it. but I gave all the facts I could hoping they would choose good, and for the most part they all did.
so I partly agree, and disagree. the main thing is love, and than there is the other 80%.
so I used to challenge kids with what would you do if scenarios? and I put it to my loved ones, what would you like for yourself in life? love or lies.
the worst thing you could do is paint a rose picture of life, and than not the rest of the picture.
I agree totally, actually. But I still like the rule, I just see it as a guide for my actions only. I have no ability to control the actions of others, and I don't want to put myself in a position of changing my approach to life based on how others act.
Why would I give them that power over me?
So I act in a way consistent with the 'rule' without presupposing others will do the same.
My wife, on the other hand, tends to treat people how they treat her, which is quite different.
gnomon
Well-Known Member
Do you realize you asked a question loaded with so many assumptions that there is no proper answer?
Jesus I'm so loaded and I can recognize a bull**** question at it's start.
Here's a suggestion. Stop asking loaded questions.
Curious George
Veteran Member
Not sure what you are about what you are talking. Good is a valuation. We teach children what we value. What you are discussing is a product of placing value on multiple things. If one places value on multiple things you will necessarily find contradiction.
But in no sense do we teach children anything we do not value.
Karl R
Active Member
I had a moving company cheat me once. (Moving companies are notorious for this.) I reported them to the Better Business Bureau, steered people away from that company, refuse to use them again.
Since then, I've used a moving company that has a good reputation for ethical behavior. They've always done a great job. I recommend them to people whenever they're moving.
The company that cheated me is no longer in business. The other company has been seeing slow and steady growth.
That's not theft. Nobody is forcing you to buy an iPhone, iPad, or any other Apple product. I just checked Amazon, and I found a variety of unlocked 4G smartphones starting under $50. They have fewer bells and whistles, but they serve the same basic functions.
People choose to pay more for the Apple brand and the most recent model.
They're paid approximately $1.50 per hour. The average factory worker in China earns $0.50 to $3.00 per hour. Generally speaking, the higher end will correspond to higher skill work or more dangerous work. (Massive hydraulic presses are dangerous. Circuit boards aren't.) Are you blaming Apple for the wages in the entire country of China? They employ less than 0.1% of the working population.
Comparison with the company I work for:
The company I work for sells services, not products. They bill out my time (and my coworkers' time). We get about 20% of what they charge. Some of the rest goes towards operating costs (offices, computers, administrative staff). Most becomes profit.
Who is getting robbed? The employees? Our pay starts at upper middle class and goes up from there. If we're unhappy with the pay, we can easily move to a competitor.
Are the customers getting robbed? They're beating down our door (figuratively). We turn down more work than we accept. If they become unhappy with the cost, they can easily move to a competitor.
Rival,
You don't seem to understand the fundamentals of economics. If you want to improve the pay of Chinese workers (or people in any western nation), educate them, so they can do better paying jobs. I get paid relatively high amounts of money because there are few people who can do my job. (Just ask the headhunters who keep trying to recruit me.) You could offer me 20 times what those Apple factory workers get, and I would refuse to do their job. I like my job better, the workload is easier, and the pay is better.
And if you want to attack unethical behavior toward the poor, start with the politicians who are cutting funding for public education.