Calling evil "good" and good "evil"

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Excuse me for returning to the original question. It means that whoever called good good and evil evil has a different point of view to contend with. Going by the rhetoric of the speaker in Isaiah, the existence of this contrary opinion is going to be somewhat hard for this speaker to accept.

Care to elaborate on your plain and obvious meaning of the statement?

Woe (distress, grief, regret) unto them who call good (right) "evil" ("wrong") and who call evil (wrong) "good" ("right").

Some of them might actually be happy about it, or have a different perspective about right and wrong.

But, weren't we supposed to discuss the last section of the verse, concerning how I like my morning cocoa?

Sweet and bitter r both gooood 4 us foodies

But I thought Nietzsche proved that 'good' is actually evil and 'evil' is actually good-??!_ _ _

I thought about it too.

That's interesting. Was there a basis to this argument of his that you can articulate?

A little cyanide goes a long way.

Heck, if you're into drugs that will give you "trips", that will sure do it. The ultimate journey, right there. (No, I'm not advocating you actually use cyanide, but if you really want to hijack the thread, then I will make such facetious yet morbid suggestions.)

Nietzsche's? No, I'm not that smart. Can anyone tell us what he said?

But what is considered as good - for example obedience, can be bad for you. The rules of what's good and bad are cultural, it's not part of the nature of humans or animals or the world. That's just my own view, philosophy isn't my territory.

Such is just wishy washiness based on flimsy pretexts in order to wordsmith away from what is self evident. Yes, there is good and bad, and it's not just revolving around how individuals are treated individually. However, for those who do such wordsmithing I would imagine that they'd only recognize, however momentarily before they dismiss it from their minds, the existence of evil when they are treated wrongly.

I didn't say it revolves around how one is treated individually, my argument is much simpler than that. Would you trust others to determine what is good? What interest does someone who wants to influence your views - for example a religion merchant - have to tell you what's good for you? If you let someone influence you, they'd want to f**k you over.

Last edited by Bun on 11 Jan 2012, 8:16 pm, edited 1 time in total.

How about parents influencing children. Do they mean to harm the children?

ruveyn

A loving parent wouldn't mean harm on his/her child, no. But actually, parents do harm their kids while trying to influence them and teach them things. You can't expect a child to learn by themselves, but parenting can be stifling, and the child WILL experience frustration and pain. I think you only get a choice on who you even are and what your moral choices are when your parents don't have a grip on you.

Yes - The preservation of the weak by 'good' leads to the draining of scarce resources without payback, as well as to the legal and even self-imposed restraint of the strong in their creativity; successful societies can normally only be nurtured by brutal millitarism, however 'soft' they have become (remember that Vikings were Scandinavians!) since.

In addition, Darwin had already demonstrated that successfully-adapted species can, self-evidently, only arise as a result of the death before reproductive age of all individuals who lack a high net level of mutations conferring selective advantage (over 'deleterious' ones). While evolution is less called-for when the environment becomes less challenging, the progress of humanity - in which 'good' has been effectively nationalised, as Nietzsche foresaw - has created its own challenges even in alleviating others. It is hard to see how humanity cannot be on track for 'devolution' at such times as when, for example, a Welfare State was created in postwar - supposedly 'austerity' - Britain.

Having 'good' done to one - and I'm not sure if Nietzsche worked his argument through to this point - is often, on balance, a neutral or even negative experience in its end result for onesself as well as for the world. For example, if I'd never known that I lived in a society (the UK) that offers welfare payments and never been preached to by parents who supported them even as I tried to rail against them, I'm sure I'd have become hardened to the idea of my probable premature death, as well as to knowing I'd have to rely on my talents if I was to survive. One result would probably have been that I'd never have allowed myself to be 'put off' music (which I'd become damn good, for a boy, at composing) at University.

There are abvious counter-arguments - For example, autists are by definition the weakest members of society in the sense of personal 'social power', but when nurtured, can occasionally and unpredictably produce inventions etc. that not only secure their own and others' success but also enhance the adaptability of Humanity as a whole.

Also, Nietzsche's instinct to favour quality, i.e. strength and complexity, of positive life experiences over their quantity - along with his dismissal of negative ones as irrelevent - is arbitrary; he admits as much where he claims that the only possible value in life is aesthetic. -Take it or leave it-

He is also dismissive of any upside, such as community spirit and so on, that may come from living in a society in which unmourned death (by starvation, sickness, or the natural instinct of the stong to destroy the weak during adolescence) is no longer the immediate natural consequence of weakness or failure. Spirituality, a hardier plant, is also, ofcourse, given short shrift. {Oddly, though, I was drawn to Nietzsche because his angle on life reminded me of what I'd just been taught at my Christian secondary/high school!}

Do you take 'good' and 'bad' to mean individuals' gains and losses from situations? That's the only sense in which 'good' and 'bad' can be self-evident to anyone with their head screwed on_

What about the crucifixion of Jesus: was it evil, or was it good?