b9 wrote:
kraftiekortie wrote:
You become a "better you" if you are able to make other people happy as well as yourself.
If all you think about is yourself, you become pretty useless to other people.
You're richer if you think about the happiness of others.
you often sound to me as if you always try to say what you determine to be correct, but it sometimes seems to me to be like a string of platitudes. almost "slick" in a way.
Interesting.
My thought when I read that was that I agreed in general with the main idea that kraftiekortie was expressing, but not with particular details of how he said it, but not to such a degree that I would think it through and point that out.
But since you commented on this, I'll express a bit of that:
The first thing that seemed off or "hit a false note" to me was the statement about being useless to people if you only think about yourself. The idea that relationships should be based on the utility of others or one's utility in the eyes of others seems very off, to me -- against my ethics.
The "richer" and "better you" ideas seem closer to the mark, but are so vague that they convey little.
It's difficult to think through a more precise expression of the idea that I think kraftie was getting at, and that I am in sympathy with, but it's more or less along these lines:
I recognize that other people have a sense of being, a consciousness, somewhat like my own. Like me, they feel pain and pleasure, engagement and disinterest, fear and contentment. I assume that their inner lives are similar in general detail to my own. I take this assumption of similarity as the basis for my version of the golden rule: do things to others that you would like them to do to you and don't do things to them that you would not like them to do to you.
Taking just that principle as a basis for personal ethics goes a long way, but it's only part of my system. The second thing is utilitarian. Do the sort of things that are consistent with creating the kind of environment you would like to live in and try to convince others to do the same. If enough people do the same, then the environment will be more like the one you desire. This idea is tempered by the golden rule: only try to impose your ideals on the environment to the extent that you are not making others miserable.
But another thing is recognizing the intense pleasure that comes from sharing positive experiences with others, or observing others doing something in a particularly beautiful or excellent way. This is something like the idea expressed by the ancient Greek concept of Arete. To revel in some aspect of life and to know that others experience that same thing is delightful to me.
Do you find no sympathy for others, no parallels in your feelings and enthusiasms and what you can see of theirs? I think it is that sense of shared experience that is enriching.
It seems to me that recognizing one's own humanity and the humanity of others is one of the actions that one can engage in with excellence and beauty and living that way and recognizing it is one of the best things in life. This can be from small things like enjoying the taste of a piece of fruit, or the infinite pattern of a fractal, to large things like a completing a complex project, writing a symphony or building a house.
I often go for walks with my son and we share jokes, wordplay and construct absurd alternative histories or situations as we walk, but also stop to admire moments of natural beauty such as the light on the trees or in the clouds, or the quality of the moon or starry sky. When I think back over the last four months of my life, it is those walks that stand out as the best moments.
That is the sort of thing that I imagine kraftie was trying to express, though very obliquely. Perhaps I am wrong.
28 Aug 2015, 12:55 pm
