Yes, with a quick verbal "boom." You take a man's peko, you deny him his dab, all that is left is to rise up and tear down the walls of Jericho with a ".....not!" -TexiKen
Are we really coming out at "It's never wrong for your spouse to sit around all day thinking about nothing but cheating on you, and only doesn't because she thinks you would divorce you, as long as she never actually cheats?"
Yes. It might not be advisable or wise, but the thoughts are not immoral.
I don't think cheating is particularly immoral either, so let's go with general breach of contract.
Fuck off and die.
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VanguardBut now the dream is over. And the insect is awake.Registered User, __BANNED USERSregular
edited November 2012
I will do my best to sum this up in a quick post.
This conversation almost always deals with one half of the binary. In the the OP, Person A, presumably the "moral thinker", is not entertaining these thoughts at all. Is that moral? What if, instead, they think, "I'll never kill anyone," all day? Is that moral?
To me, these questions miss the point. To start, if person A never thinks about murder, it doesn't mean they won't commit murder (see: crimes of passion). One does not have to entertain an idea to commit an action.
But since we're dealing with thoughts let's stay within that realm. In the OP, there is no thought pattern. You can't call person A's thoughts moral because there are no thoughts to be qualified. If you argue that it is the absence of those thoughts that is moral, then the presence of any is automatically immoral, which isn't very useful.
Let's add these parameters:
-We must deal with the presence (as opposed to the absence) of thoughts
-We must deal with the frequency of thoughts
So:
-Person Y thinks about murdering people all day
-Person Z thinks about not murdering people all day
In both cases there is still going to be some sort of mental duress by this preoccupation that is harmful. Calling either of these moral or immoral does not address the real issue: there is a constant preoccupation with something that will never lead to anything productive. It can only lead to harm. But we don't need to speak of morality to realize this is harmful.
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TL DRNot at all confident in his reflexive opinions of thingsRegistered Userregular
Thoughts, like anything else, are moral or immoral as a function of intent and consequence.
An 'immoral thought', therefore, is immoral because it either increases the likelihood of an immoral action or is harmful to the thinker. For example, dwelling on fantasies of violently attacking your boss both makes you more likely to lash out (physically or in a more subdued but still harmful way) and increases your own stress level.
This is obviously an analysis that would require nuance in any practical setting, since you're getting into questions of 'is it immoral to engage in self-destructive behaviors?' and 'to what degree is a person able (and ergo expected) to recognize and address harmful thought patterns?'
Why are these thoughts immoral though? I agree with everything else in this post, I'm just curious about what makes them immoral.
What do you mean? I'm basing my judgment on the principle of minimizing harm. As I said, fantasies or beliefs are themselves actions with external consequences.
It seems to me that if we spend enough time thinking about a certain subject it could probably be detrimental regardless of what we are thinking about. The obsessive nature of thoughts and not the content would be the harmful thing in this scenario.
I generally find the mind and the company of good friends to be a good arena to entertain the outrageous, immoral and ridiculous. It's like a private fiction.
Fuck off and die.
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VanguardBut now the dream is over. And the insect is awake.Registered User, __BANNED USERSregular
It seems to me that if we spend enough time thinking about a certain subject it could probably be detrimental regardless of what we are thinking about. The obsessive nature of thoughts and not the content would be the harmful thing in this scenario.
I generally find the mind and the company of good friends to be a good arena to entertain the outrageous, immoral and ridiculous. It's like a private fiction.
This is a much simpler way of demonstrating what I wanted to say.
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spacekungfumanPoor and minority-filledRegistered User, __BANNED USERSregular
Are we really coming out at "It's never wrong for your spouse to sit around all day thinking about nothing but cheating on you, and only doesn't because she thinks you would divorce you, as long as she never actually cheats?"
Yes. It might not be advisable or wise, but the thoughts are not immoral.
I don't think cheating is particularly immoral either, so let's go with general breach of contract.
And I don't believe in objective morality at all, just consensus and personal morality, but that isn't really what this is about. When you have a relationship of trust and someone is thinking thoughts which would violate that trust, I think that is problematic. When they would act on those thoughts but for the consequences, then I don't think there is any trust at all.
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VanguardBut now the dream is over. And the insect is awake.Registered User, __BANNED USERSregular
Are we really coming out at "It's never wrong for your spouse to sit around all day thinking about nothing but cheating on you, and only doesn't because she thinks you would divorce you, as long as she never actually cheats?"
Yes. It might not be advisable or wise, but the thoughts are not immoral.
I don't think cheating is particularly immoral either, so let's go with general breach of contract.
And I don't believe in objective morality at all, just consensus and personal morality, but that isn't really what this is about. When you have a relationship of trust and someone is thinking thoughts which would violate that trust, I think that is problematic. When they would act on those thoughts but for the consequences, then I don't think there is any trust at all.
I agree with you, but I think you're interpreting my "thoughts do not have moral qualities" as "thoughts are not harmful", which is not what I'm saying at all.
Here's a simple question - is fantasizing or (willful) thinking an action or not?
I would say that it is. An action is causing of a willful body movement, and thoughts themselves - while somewhat nebulous, are definitely a physical action in the sense of electrical and chemical impulses within the brain.
A thought that is not willful and not acted on, such as an involuntary and impulsive thought (think the n word, grab cops gun, etc) isn't immoral (or moral).
People say a thought that's not acted upon can't be immoral, but by fantasizing, creating scenarios, etc a person IS acting on that thought. They are turning that 'impulse' into 'action'.
EDIT - would fantasizing about doing good work or 'the right thing' be considered moral? I would think so...moral acts / work is BETTER than thoughts, but thoughts do count for something.
spacekungfuman, we pretty much agree on acting moral out of fear for personal consequences. It's much better to act out of a desire to not cause harm to others, as an example.
But it seems to me that in this case you're talking more about desires than thoughts. I think these two are different and I think that we should not judge people on thought content.
Fuck off and die.
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VanguardBut now the dream is over. And the insect is awake.Registered User, __BANNED USERSregular
Here's a simple question - is fantasizing or (willful) thinking an action or not?
I would say that it is. An action is causing of a willful body movement, and thoughts themselves - while somewhat nebulous, are definitely a physical action in the sense of electrical and chemical impulses within the brain.
A thought that is not willful and not acted on, such as an involuntary and impulsive thought (think the n word, grab cops gun, etc) isn't immoral (or moral).
People say a thought that's not acted upon can't be immoral, but by fantasizing, creating scenarios, etc a person IS acting on that thought. They are turning that 'impulse' into 'action'.
EDIT - would fantasizing about doing good work or 'the right thing' be considered moral? I would think so...moral acts / work is BETTER than thoughts, but thoughts do count for something.
I like this post, though I disagree with much of it.
The most immediate counterexample is nearly all of the art we as a civilization have produced. Is Elmore Leonard (a crime novelist, if you don't know) immoral for writing his books? How about Stephen King?
When Picasso painted Guernica, was that immoral?
What about violent video games?
Again, I don't see what's useful about this distinction, and, more importantly, if we do accept this premise, who is by definition not immoral?
Here's a simple question - is fantasizing or (willful) thinking an action or not?
I would say that it is. An action is causing of a willful body movement, and thoughts themselves - while somewhat nebulous, are definitely a physical action in the sense of electrical and chemical impulses within the brain.
A thought that is not willful and not acted on, such as an involuntary and impulsive thought (think the n word, grab cops gun, etc) isn't immoral (or moral).
People say a thought that's not acted upon can't be immoral, but by fantasizing, creating scenarios, etc a person IS acting on that thought. They are turning that 'impulse' into 'action'.
EDIT - would fantasizing about doing good work or 'the right thing' be considered moral? I would think so...moral acts / work is BETTER than thoughts, but thoughts do count for something.
I have to disagree with you, not because of your idea on the subject per se, but because it opens the door to a lot of backwards thinking.
We are talking about situations where thoughts REMAIN in the realm of thought only, the OP made a distinction between thought and action, and there is another big distinctions between thoughts that are just that, and thoughts that lead to actions.( I only imagined pure non-action-inducing thoughts so far)
A thought, inside the infinite vaccum of theory, can NEVER be bad, inmoral, harmfull (only to myself).
An action NOT made is not an action, regardless of the reason, be it fear of consecuences, personal beliefs, etc. when the idea of the thought is isolated from the world of actions, and tangible objects, a thought cannot be "bad" or "good", since it creates no manifestation, and doesnt affects reality in any way.
Short version: We separated thought and action to make the discussion more fluid with clear concepts, saying that a thought IS an action, only will delay the discussion untill we find a new word to describe the diference between tangible an abstract.
Yes, with a quick verbal "boom." You take a man's peko, you deny him his dab, all that is left is to rise up and tear down the walls of Jericho with a ".....not!" -TexiKen
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Silas AdamsI know certainty freaks you guys out, but it's 100.Registered Userregular
edited November 2012
One of the major themes of Eyes Wide Shut was about how ultimately pointless and damaging telling loved ones thoughts best kept to yourself is. I can't tell what SKFM and some others are getting at aside from instituting a thought police. Going on and on like this to a loved one about how horrible it would be to even think of fucking another man would just make your wife more scared to not think that rather than genuinely not think it.
Silas Adams on
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TL DRNot at all confident in his reflexive opinions of thingsRegistered Userregular
Thoughts, like anything else, are moral or immoral as a function of intent and consequence.
An 'immoral thought', therefore, is immoral because it either increases the likelihood of an immoral action or is harmful to the thinker. For example, dwelling on fantasies of violently attacking your boss both makes you more likely to lash out (physically or in a more subdued but still harmful way) and increases your own stress level.
This is obviously an analysis that would require nuance in any practical setting, since you're getting into questions of 'is it immoral to engage in self-destructive behaviors?' and 'to what degree is a person able (and ergo expected) to recognize and address harmful thought patterns?'
Why are these thoughts immoral though? I agree with everything else in this post, I'm just curious about what makes them immoral.
This conversation almost always deals with one half of the binary. In the the OP, Person A, presumably the "moral thinker", is not entertaining these thoughts at all. Is that moral? What if, instead, they think, "I'll never kill anyone," all day? Is that moral?
To me, these questions miss the point. To start, if person A never thinks about murder, it doesn't mean they won't commit murder (see: crimes of passion). One does not have to entertain an idea to commit an action.
But since we're dealing with thoughts let's stay within that realm. In the OP, there is no thought pattern. You can't call person A's thoughts moral because there are no thoughts to be qualified. If you argue that it is the absence of thoughts that is moral, then the presence of any is automatically immoral. I just don't see this as being useful.
Let's look at two different examples:
-Person Y thinks about murdering people all day
-Person Z thinks about not murdering people all day
I wouldn't call either of these moral or immoral. What I would do is highlight the preoccupation with murder. If you're devoting that much headspace to doing/not doing something, your chances of it happening are likely going to increase (though it's hard to say where the threshold is).
Or, to address SKFMs example, this preoccupation would speak to a level of trust that just isn't there in the relationship.
More later.
I think this is an interesting line of thinking, but I would rephrase it slightly. So instead of there being a dichotomy between "thinks about murdering" and "thinks about not murdering", we can take a step back and simplify it to "thinks negatively" vs "thinks positively".
This can be as simple as perception ("this is hard and shitty" vs "this is challenging and good"). Negativity contributes to stress, lack of patience, etc; basically negative thought -> negative physical expression. Conversely, positive or useful thoughts such as experiencing gratitude or meditation or leveraging cognitive resources to plan constructive goals will contribute to positive outcomes.
Here's a simple question - is fantasizing or (willful) thinking an action or not?
I would say that it is. An action is causing of a willful body movement, and thoughts themselves - while somewhat nebulous, are definitely a physical action in the sense of electrical and chemical impulses within the brain.
A thought that is not willful and not acted on, such as an involuntary and impulsive thought (think the n word, grab cops gun, etc) isn't immoral (or moral).
People say a thought that's not acted upon can't be immoral, but by fantasizing, creating scenarios, etc a person IS acting on that thought. They are turning that 'impulse' into 'action'.
EDIT - would fantasizing about doing good work or 'the right thing' be considered moral? I would think so...moral acts / work is BETTER than thoughts, but thoughts do count for something.
I like this post, though I disagree with much of it.
The most immediate counterexample is nearly all of the art we as a civilization have produced. Is Elmore Leonard (a crime novelist, if you don't know) immoral for writing his books? How about Stephen King?
When Picasso painted Guernica, was that immoral?
What about violent video games?
Again, I don't see what's useful about this distinction, and, more importantly, if we do accept this premise, who is by definition not immoral?
So, I think that I was a little too general in relating thoughts and actions.
When I think of someone 'fantasizing' about something, I think of someone thinking about a situation and desiring it. Not just academically creating a scenario but actually putting themselves in that scenario because they want to be there. The student who sits in class thinking about how they would love to burst in and shoot everyone and how they would do it. The person who fantasizes about molesting their neighbor because they desire it, but would never act on it because it's wrong or because of consequences. Those kind of things.
I think there is a clear distinction between someone fantasizing about causing their own Columbine, and someone writing a novel that has a Columbine-like scenario in it. Your comments on video games did make me think though. In most video games you are (somewhat) the protagonist and a 'good guy', or the scenario is too abstract to really qualify as a 'fantasy'. More along the lines of reading a book or watching a movie.
In some cases, media does create morally questionable circumstances for plot or for impact, but I think I really need to reflect on this more before really getting into it.
As for the statement 'who is by definition not immoral', I think that's a bit too general. People, overall, are neutral. It's our actions that are moral or immoral, not our self. Everyone is shades of grey, and everyone has done things that are immoral. Everyone has done things that are moral too.
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VanguardBut now the dream is over. And the insect is awake.Registered User, __BANNED USERSregular
Thoughts, like anything else, are moral or immoral as a function of intent and consequence.
An 'immoral thought', therefore, is immoral because it either increases the likelihood of an immoral action or is harmful to the thinker. For example, dwelling on fantasies of violently attacking your boss both makes you more likely to lash out (physically or in a more subdued but still harmful way) and increases your own stress level.
This is obviously an analysis that would require nuance in any practical setting, since you're getting into questions of 'is it immoral to engage in self-destructive behaviors?' and 'to what degree is a person able (and ergo expected) to recognize and address harmful thought patterns?'
Why are these thoughts immoral though? I agree with everything else in this post, I'm just curious about what makes them immoral.
This conversation almost always deals with one half of the binary. In the the OP, Person A, presumably the "moral thinker", is not entertaining these thoughts at all. Is that moral? What if, instead, they think, "I'll never kill anyone," all day? Is that moral?
To me, these questions miss the point. To start, if person A never thinks about murder, it doesn't mean they won't commit murder (see: crimes of passion). One does not have to entertain an idea to commit an action.
But since we're dealing with thoughts let's stay within that realm. In the OP, there is no thought pattern. You can't call person A's thoughts moral because there are no thoughts to be qualified. If you argue that it is the absence of thoughts that is moral, then the presence of any is automatically immoral. I just don't see this as being useful.
Let's look at two different examples:
-Person Y thinks about murdering people all day
-Person Z thinks about not murdering people all day
I wouldn't call either of these moral or immoral. What I would do is highlight the preoccupation with murder. If you're devoting that much headspace to doing/not doing something, your chances of it happening are likely going to increase (though it's hard to say where the threshold is).
Or, to address SKFMs example, this preoccupation would speak to a level of trust that just isn't there in the relationship.
More later.
I think this is an interesting line of thinking, but I would rephrase it slightly. So instead of there being a dichotomy between "thinks about murdering" and "thinks about not murdering", we can take a step back and simplify it to "thinks negatively" vs "thinks positively".
This can be as simple as perception ("this is hard and shitty" vs "this is challenging and good"). Negativity contributes to stress, lack of patience, etc; basically negative thought -> negative physical expression. Conversely, positive or useful thoughts such as experiencing gratitude or meditation or leveraging cognitive resources to plan constructive goals will contribute to positive outcomes.
I edited my post a little, but yes, this is it.
We don't need to get into morality to recognize the harm of thinking negative thoughts vs. thinking positive thoughts. It's pretty obvious.
I would say that entertaining, say, extensive sexual fantasies about other women when you're married can be bad, but not just because you're having "bad thoughts". Rather, because it indicates some sort of problem with your spousal relationship. Also, presumably, it would result in at least some deceit, which is an actual immoral act. But even absent that, a serious relationship generally involves a promise of emotional exclusivity. If you really really want to bang that hot accounting chick at work, and you spend all your time fantasizing about it, you're probably not fulfilling your promise to your wife that she's the only one you want, that you find her attractive, or something else. You are perpetuating a false impression of what your relationship with your wife really is, and pretending to be someone you're not. That sort of chicanery is unhealthy in a relationship, and unfair to your significant other. Still, though, it's not the thought that is bad, but rather the dishonesty inherent in the thought. (Note that if your wife doesn't care, then the thoughts stop being bad. And if you're single, they're also not bad.)
As to bad thoughts being bad because they can lead to actions? Maybe, to a point. In my last post, I tried to establish a case in which the thoughts were guaranteed not to drive you to action. If we want, we can establish a hypothetical in which I fantasize about murdering leprechauns. Clearly I am not going to actually murder a leprechaun, because leprechauns don't exist, and so the fantasy is harmless.
Beyond that, though, I concede that thoughts can be bad to the extent that they might drive you to action. It may be the case that any bad thought can ultimately drive you to action (though I'm skeptical), in which case I guess that means bad thoughts are immoral to a point. Regardless, I would point out that it's still not the thought that is immoral, it is the action, and the problem comes from driving yourself closer to such action. Thoughts, in and of themselves, cannot be immoral because thoughts, in and of themselves, cannot hurt anyone else.
ElJeffe on
I submitted an entry to Lego Ideas, and if 10,000 people support me, it'll be turned into an actual Lego set!If you'd like to see and support my submission, follow this link.
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VanguardBut now the dream is over. And the insect is awake.Registered User, __BANNED USERSregular
edited November 2012
@ElJeffe, I agree with your post up until the last sentence. I think thoughts can be harmful, on a psychological level, to the person having them.
Edit: unless you mean hurt in an exclusively physical sense.
I edited to clarify I meant hurting someone else. Thoughts can certainly be self-destructive.
I submitted an entry to Lego Ideas, and if 10,000 people support me, it'll be turned into an actual Lego set!If you'd like to see and support my submission, follow this link.
To deliberately alter one's thought patterns requires a level of willpower and perhaps, discipline. What of those gripped by a negative obsession greater than they can control? Are they immoral for their failure, or are they victims of imperfect biology?
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VanguardBut now the dream is over. And the insect is awake.Registered User, __BANNED USERSregular
To deliberately alter one's thought patterns requires a level of willpower and perhaps, discipline. What of those gripped by a negative obsession greater than they can control? Are they immoral for their failure, or are they victims of imperfect biology?
This is outside the purview of the topic, and likely belongs in Js discussion, but if you want to sit around calling people with addictions and behavioral disorders immoral, count me out.
Not that I think you're intentionally trying to steer the conversation this way, but I do think that is the end result.
Here's a simple question - is fantasizing or (willful) thinking an action or not?
That's an interesting question and I think it's an unresolved one.
You're asking a question about sapience; whether you want to call it "consciousness" or "the self." When we quote Descartes' "I think, therefore I am," what do we mean by "I" and "think?"
So this gets into some pretty deep philosophy of mind territory, not to mention neurobiology.
There's some interesting evidence that the self, the 'executive function' of the brain that oversees all other thoughts and actions - does not actually initiate thought or action, but instead checks it and lets certain things pass into awareness or action. If this sounds an awful lot like a Freudian unconscious/subconscious/consciousness, it is a very similar concept.
It is one interpretation of the famous Ben Libet experiments, which I won't reiterate in detail but you can read about them here and here. Basically, through brain imaging, we now know that your brain makes a decision before you are aware of it. You experience it as your "self" making a decision, but that decision precedes the experience of deciding.
I almost said "Lisak" instead of "Libet." That's what happens when you talk to people about rape all the damn time.
The idea that your actions and thoughts are initiated unconsciously but sometimes inhibited consciously is winkingly called "free won't".
Now, I don't know that this is a complete picture or an airtight explanation. It's certainly controversial, and even though the Libet experiments are old, this discussion is still edgy stuff.
But I just wanted to bring up the possibility that thoughts as we typically experience them are not "willful thinking" but rather "willful not-doing."
Feral on
every person who doesn't like an acquired taste always seems to think everyone who likes it is faking it. it should be an official fallacy.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
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VanguardBut now the dream is over. And the insect is awake.Registered User, __BANNED USERSregular
I'd love to be able to access that subconscious 'hind brain' that makes my choices for me. It would would probably send anyone nuts to do so but would be a great insight into how thought before sentience and sapience formed.
I'd visualise it as the typical room-full-of-monkeys-with-typewriters, with a forum of editor monkeys that pass on only the more sane and socially apropriate thoughts into the conscious mind.
I am guessing that even the most balanced and right thinking of us has a seething mass of murder and sex going on with each thought process before it's filtered through the 'We don't do that shit now-ometer'.
Muddypaws on
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MorninglordI'm tired of being Batman,so today I'll be Owl.Registered Userregular
Here's a simple question - is fantasizing or (willful) thinking an action or not?
That's an interesting question and I think it's an unresolved one.
You're asking a question about sapience; whether you want to call it "consciousness" or "the self." When we quote Descartes' "I think, therefore I am," what do we mean by "I" and "think?"
So this gets into some pretty deep philosophy of mind territory, not to mention neurobiology.
There's some interesting evidence that the self, the 'executive function' of the brain that oversees all other thoughts and actions - does not actually initiate thought or action, but instead checks it and lets certain things pass into awareness or action. If this sounds an awful lot like a Freudian unconscious/subconscious/consciousness, it is a very similar concept.
It is one interpretation of the famous Ben Libet experiments, which I won't reiterate in detail but you can read about them here and here. Basically, through brain imaging, we now know that your brain makes a decision before you are aware of it. You experience it as your "self" making a decision, but that decision precedes the experience of deciding.
I almost said "Lisak" instead of "Libet." That's what happens when you talk to people about rape all the damn time.
The idea that your actions and thoughts are initiated unconsciously but sometimes inhibited consciously is winkingly called "free won't".
Now, I don't know that this is a complete picture or an airtight explanation. It's certainly controversial, and even though the Libet experiments are old, this discussion is still edgy stuff.
But I just wanted to bring up the possibility that thoughts as we typically experience them are not "willful thinking" but rather "willful not-doing."
I've been looking for an excuse to bring that stuff up for ages.
You just stole it.
Soooooo I can't awesome your post.
Although I'm glad you presented it.
But still.
Ages.
The immediately relevant thing to me when I found out about that research was the way it explained my daily struggle, as someone diagnosed with ADHD, with impulse control. ie that lacking impulse control might mean that you have less time or ability to inhibit your decisions before they occur. I really would like to see some experiments done on individuals with adhd.
Morninglord on
(PSN: Morninglord) (Steam: Morninglord) (WiiU: Morninglord22) I like to record and toss up a lot of random gaming videos here.
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Clown ShoesGive me hay or give me death.Registered Userregular
I would say that entertaining, say, extensive sexual fantasies about other women when you're married can be bad, but not just because you're having "bad thoughts". Rather, because it indicates some sort of problem with your spousal relationship.
Doesn't that somewhat depend on the object of your fantasy?
Fantasising about Salma Hayek and Angelina Jolie is a lot different to fantasising about your wife's sister (unless you're married to Salma Hayek's or Angelina Jolie's sister, obviously).
I would say that entertaining, say, extensive sexual fantasies about other women when you're married can be bad, but not just because you're having "bad thoughts". Rather, because it indicates some sort of problem with your spousal relationship.
Doesn't that somewhat depend on the object of your fantasy?
Fantasising about Salma Hayek and Angelina Jolie is a lot different to fantasising about your wife's sister (unless you're married to Salma Hayek's or Angelina Jolie's sister, obviously).
It depends on a lot of things specific to your particular spousal relationship. Also to what is reasonably attainable given that humans are what they are.
I submitted an entry to Lego Ideas, and if 10,000 people support me, it'll be turned into an actual Lego set!If you'd like to see and support my submission, follow this link.
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spacekungfumanPoor and minority-filledRegistered User, __BANNED USERSregular
I think we have pretty much put this topic to bed, honestly. I agree completely with @Vanguard and @ElJeffe that it is not the thoughts themselves that are problematic but what those thoughts may reveal about a relationship that is meant to be built on trust.
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MorninglordI'm tired of being Batman,so today I'll be Owl.Registered Userregular
edited November 2012
I see that feral agreed to having stolen away from me this opportunity.
Possibly he meant to only agree with my more reasonable comments regarding ADHD.
But that is not how the agree function works! There is no discrimination!
I have you now sir! "A-hah" I say to you! "A-hah!"
Morninglord on
(PSN: Morninglord) (Steam: Morninglord) (WiiU: Morninglord22) I like to record and toss up a lot of random gaming videos here.
I would say that entertaining, say, extensive sexual fantasies about other women when you're married can be bad, but not just because you're having "bad thoughts". Rather, because it indicates some sort of problem with your spousal relationship.
Doesn't that somewhat depend on the object of your fantasy?
Fantasising about Salma Hayek and Angelina Jolie is a lot different to fantasising about your wife's sister (unless you're married to Salma Hayek's or Angelina Jolie's sister, obviously).
That goes back to his point about murdering leprechauns or being racist against purple people - just like your chances of bedding a world-famous starlett in real life, they don't exist.
Unless you're burning the effigy in your mind. Then go ahead.
I submitted an entry to Lego Ideas, and if 10,000 people support me, it'll be turned into an actual Lego set!If you'd like to see and support my submission, follow this link.
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spacekungfumanPoor and minority-filledRegistered User, __BANNED USERSregular
Who would have thought there would be a topic on which @vanguard and I would be in lock-step?
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MorninglordI'm tired of being Batman,so today I'll be Owl.Registered Userregular
If you say you are burning an effigy in your mind, you have committed an action.
(PSN: Morninglord) (Steam: Morninglord) (WiiU: Morninglord22) I like to record and toss up a lot of random gaming videos here.
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Clown ShoesGive me hay or give me death.Registered Userregular
I would say that entertaining, say, extensive sexual fantasies about other women when you're married can be bad, but not just because you're having "bad thoughts". Rather, because it indicates some sort of problem with your spousal relationship.
Doesn't that somewhat depend on the object of your fantasy?
Fantasising about Salma Hayek and Angelina Jolie is a lot different to fantasising about your wife's sister (unless you're married to Salma Hayek's or Angelina Jolie's sister, obviously).
That goes back to his point about murdering leprechauns or being racist against purple people - just like your chances of bedding a world-famous starlett in real life, they don't exist.
I would say that entertaining, say, extensive sexual fantasies about other women when you're married can be bad, but not just because you're having "bad thoughts". Rather, because it indicates some sort of problem with your spousal relationship.
Doesn't that somewhat depend on the object of your fantasy?
Fantasising about Salma Hayek and Angelina Jolie is a lot different to fantasising about your wife's sister (unless you're married to Salma Hayek's or Angelina Jolie's sister, obviously).
That goes back to his point about murdering leprechauns or being racist against purple people - just like your chances of bedding a world-famous starlett in real life, they don't exist.
I would say that entertaining, say, extensive sexual fantasies about other women when you're married can be bad, but not just because you're having "bad thoughts". Rather, because it indicates some sort of problem with your spousal relationship.
Doesn't that somewhat depend on the object of your fantasy?
Fantasising about Salma Hayek and Angelina Jolie is a lot different to fantasising about your wife's sister (unless you're married to Salma Hayek's or Angelina Jolie's sister, obviously).
That goes back to his point about murdering leprechauns or being racist against purple people - just like your chances of bedding a world-famous starlett in real life, they don't exist.
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Yes. It might not be advisable or wise, but the thoughts are not immoral.
I don't think cheating is particularly immoral either, so let's go with general breach of contract.
This conversation almost always deals with one half of the binary. In the the OP, Person A, presumably the "moral thinker", is not entertaining these thoughts at all. Is that moral? What if, instead, they think, "I'll never kill anyone," all day? Is that moral?
To me, these questions miss the point. To start, if person A never thinks about murder, it doesn't mean they won't commit murder (see: crimes of passion). One does not have to entertain an idea to commit an action.
But since we're dealing with thoughts let's stay within that realm. In the OP, there is no thought pattern. You can't call person A's thoughts moral because there are no thoughts to be qualified. If you argue that it is the absence of those thoughts that is moral, then the presence of any is automatically immoral, which isn't very useful.
Let's add these parameters:
-We must deal with the presence (as opposed to the absence) of thoughts
-We must deal with the frequency of thoughts
So:
-Person Y thinks about murdering people all day
-Person Z thinks about not murdering people all day
In both cases there is still going to be some sort of mental duress by this preoccupation that is harmful. Calling either of these moral or immoral does not address the real issue: there is a constant preoccupation with something that will never lead to anything productive. It can only lead to harm. But we don't need to speak of morality to realize this is harmful.
I generally find the mind and the company of good friends to be a good arena to entertain the outrageous, immoral and ridiculous. It's like a private fiction.
This is a much simpler way of demonstrating what I wanted to say.
And I don't believe in objective morality at all, just consensus and personal morality, but that isn't really what this is about. When you have a relationship of trust and someone is thinking thoughts which would violate that trust, I think that is problematic. When they would act on those thoughts but for the consequences, then I don't think there is any trust at all.
I agree with you, but I think you're interpreting my "thoughts do not have moral qualities" as "thoughts are not harmful", which is not what I'm saying at all.
I would say that it is. An action is causing of a willful body movement, and thoughts themselves - while somewhat nebulous, are definitely a physical action in the sense of electrical and chemical impulses within the brain.
A thought that is not willful and not acted on, such as an involuntary and impulsive thought (think the n word, grab cops gun, etc) isn't immoral (or moral).
People say a thought that's not acted upon can't be immoral, but by fantasizing, creating scenarios, etc a person IS acting on that thought. They are turning that 'impulse' into 'action'.
EDIT - would fantasizing about doing good work or 'the right thing' be considered moral? I would think so...moral acts / work is BETTER than thoughts, but thoughts do count for something.
But it seems to me that in this case you're talking more about desires than thoughts. I think these two are different and I think that we should not judge people on thought content.
I like this post, though I disagree with much of it.
The most immediate counterexample is nearly all of the art we as a civilization have produced. Is Elmore Leonard (a crime novelist, if you don't know) immoral for writing his books? How about Stephen King?
When Picasso painted Guernica, was that immoral?
What about violent video games?
Again, I don't see what's useful about this distinction, and, more importantly, if we do accept this premise, who is by definition not immoral?
I have to disagree with you, not because of your idea on the subject per se, but because it opens the door to a lot of backwards thinking.
We are talking about situations where thoughts REMAIN in the realm of thought only, the OP made a distinction between thought and action, and there is another big distinctions between thoughts that are just that, and thoughts that lead to actions.( I only imagined pure non-action-inducing thoughts so far)
A thought, inside the infinite vaccum of theory, can NEVER be bad, inmoral, harmfull (only to myself).
An action NOT made is not an action, regardless of the reason, be it fear of consecuences, personal beliefs, etc. when the idea of the thought is isolated from the world of actions, and tangible objects, a thought cannot be "bad" or "good", since it creates no manifestation, and doesnt affects reality in any way.
Short version: We separated thought and action to make the discussion more fluid with clear concepts, saying that a thought IS an action, only will delay the discussion untill we find a new word to describe the diference between tangible an abstract.
I think this is an interesting line of thinking, but I would rephrase it slightly. So instead of there being a dichotomy between "thinks about murdering" and "thinks about not murdering", we can take a step back and simplify it to "thinks negatively" vs "thinks positively".
This can be as simple as perception ("this is hard and shitty" vs "this is challenging and good"). Negativity contributes to stress, lack of patience, etc; basically negative thought -> negative physical expression. Conversely, positive or useful thoughts such as experiencing gratitude or meditation or leveraging cognitive resources to plan constructive goals will contribute to positive outcomes.
So, I think that I was a little too general in relating thoughts and actions.
When I think of someone 'fantasizing' about something, I think of someone thinking about a situation and desiring it. Not just academically creating a scenario but actually putting themselves in that scenario because they want to be there. The student who sits in class thinking about how they would love to burst in and shoot everyone and how they would do it. The person who fantasizes about molesting their neighbor because they desire it, but would never act on it because it's wrong or because of consequences. Those kind of things.
I think there is a clear distinction between someone fantasizing about causing their own Columbine, and someone writing a novel that has a Columbine-like scenario in it. Your comments on video games did make me think though. In most video games you are (somewhat) the protagonist and a 'good guy', or the scenario is too abstract to really qualify as a 'fantasy'. More along the lines of reading a book or watching a movie.
In some cases, media does create morally questionable circumstances for plot or for impact, but I think I really need to reflect on this more before really getting into it.
As for the statement 'who is by definition not immoral', I think that's a bit too general. People, overall, are neutral. It's our actions that are moral or immoral, not our self. Everyone is shades of grey, and everyone has done things that are immoral. Everyone has done things that are moral too.
I edited my post a little, but yes, this is it.
We don't need to get into morality to recognize the harm of thinking negative thoughts vs. thinking positive thoughts. It's pretty obvious.
As to bad thoughts being bad because they can lead to actions? Maybe, to a point. In my last post, I tried to establish a case in which the thoughts were guaranteed not to drive you to action. If we want, we can establish a hypothetical in which I fantasize about murdering leprechauns. Clearly I am not going to actually murder a leprechaun, because leprechauns don't exist, and so the fantasy is harmless.
Beyond that, though, I concede that thoughts can be bad to the extent that they might drive you to action. It may be the case that any bad thought can ultimately drive you to action (though I'm skeptical), in which case I guess that means bad thoughts are immoral to a point. Regardless, I would point out that it's still not the thought that is immoral, it is the action, and the problem comes from driving yourself closer to such action. Thoughts, in and of themselves, cannot be immoral because thoughts, in and of themselves, cannot hurt anyone else.
Edit: unless you mean hurt in an exclusively physical sense.
This is outside the purview of the topic, and likely belongs in Js discussion, but if you want to sit around calling people with addictions and behavioral disorders immoral, count me out.
Not that I think you're intentionally trying to steer the conversation this way, but I do think that is the end result.
That's an interesting question and I think it's an unresolved one.
You're asking a question about sapience; whether you want to call it "consciousness" or "the self." When we quote Descartes' "I think, therefore I am," what do we mean by "I" and "think?"
So this gets into some pretty deep philosophy of mind territory, not to mention neurobiology.
There's some interesting evidence that the self, the 'executive function' of the brain that oversees all other thoughts and actions - does not actually initiate thought or action, but instead checks it and lets certain things pass into awareness or action. If this sounds an awful lot like a Freudian unconscious/subconscious/consciousness, it is a very similar concept.
It is one interpretation of the famous Ben Libet experiments, which I won't reiterate in detail but you can read about them here and here. Basically, through brain imaging, we now know that your brain makes a decision before you are aware of it. You experience it as your "self" making a decision, but that decision precedes the experience of deciding.
The idea that your actions and thoughts are initiated unconsciously but sometimes inhibited consciously is winkingly called "free won't".
Now, I don't know that this is a complete picture or an airtight explanation. It's certainly controversial, and even though the Libet experiments are old, this discussion is still edgy stuff.
But I just wanted to bring up the possibility that thoughts as we typically experience them are not "willful thinking" but rather "willful not-doing."
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
I'd visualise it as the typical room-full-of-monkeys-with-typewriters, with a forum of editor monkeys that pass on only the more sane and socially apropriate thoughts into the conscious mind.
I am guessing that even the most balanced and right thinking of us has a seething mass of murder and sex going on with each thought process before it's filtered through the 'We don't do that shit now-ometer'.
I've been looking for an excuse to bring that stuff up for ages.
You just stole it.
Soooooo I can't awesome your post.
Although I'm glad you presented it.
But still.
Ages.
The immediately relevant thing to me when I found out about that research was the way it explained my daily struggle, as someone diagnosed with ADHD, with impulse control. ie that lacking impulse control might mean that you have less time or ability to inhibit your decisions before they occur. I really would like to see some experiments done on individuals with adhd.
Doesn't that somewhat depend on the object of your fantasy?
Fantasising about Salma Hayek and Angelina Jolie is a lot different to fantasising about your wife's sister (unless you're married to Salma Hayek's or Angelina Jolie's sister, obviously).
It depends on a lot of things specific to your particular spousal relationship. Also to what is reasonably attainable given that humans are what they are.
Possibly he meant to only agree with my more reasonable comments regarding ADHD.
But that is not how the agree function works! There is no discrimination!
I have you now sir! "A-hah" I say to you! "A-hah!"
That goes back to his point about murdering leprechauns or being racist against purple people - just like your chances of bedding a world-famous starlett in real life, they don't exist.
What about purple people eaters?
Are those purple eaters of people, or eaters of purple people?
Perhaps even eaters of flying purple people?
Or flying eaters of purple people?
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
And why are they discriminating against green people?
Sorry ElJeffe [/derail]
In reality I just post on SE++.