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10.2.5
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10.2.6
I just realized......Grey Morality Doesn't Exist
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Post by
588688
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Post by
pezz
Alternatively, I can define perfect good and perfect evil, point out that no one is either one of those, and deduce that there is
only
morally grey.
Post by
hatman555
To be honest I found it all a bit ramble-ly with out much evidence except from what you believe.
The onion example its a little flat, because conversely someone could just say: "Lets say I take and onion and peel away a layer. Its white, and i peel away another layer and its black. I keep peeling layers until I get to the center and find that it is a uniform grey. Its grey."
When reading this post. DnD comes to mind and the several Alignment that people can have. Ofcourse there are the Goods and Evils, but there is also neutral alignment.
Neutral alignment,
also referred to as True Neutral or Neutral Neutral
, is called the "Undecided" or "Nature's" alignment. This alignment represents Neutral on both axes, and tends not to feel strongly towards any alignment.
A farmer whose primary overriding concern is to feed his family is of this alignment. Most animals, lacking the capacity for moral judgment, are of this alignment. Many roguish characters who play all sides to suit themselves are also of this alignment.
Good, Evil, Grey are very strong words. Do examples of all three exist? Sure, very hard to come by, but they are there. In my opinion off white and off black personalities are the norm because its incredible hard to be pure white or black; good or evil.
If you are looking for a good series of books to read. I really REALLY REALLLLLYY recommend "
The Saga of Recluce
" books by L. E. Modesitt, Jr.
Black and White as apposing forces of Good and Evil are the center of this world. Where Order (Black) and Chaos (White) are in a ever balancing battle over a small world. btw....there is GREY! My favorite book of the series "Colors of Chaos" deals with a Grey mage, person who can weird the forces of Chaos (white) but also see the nature of Order (black) and can control both with out being torn apart by the opposing forces.
Cheers,
Hat
Post by
ElhonnaDS
Ok- where would a person fit who, in their own moral code, were willing to engage in certain activities that hurt others, but not all activities that hurt others? For example, I linked an article the other week about 2 teenage boys who broke into a man's house and stole a bunch of CD's and DVD's. Not to feed their family, not because they were forced to by peer pressure, ect. Not for any morally "ambiguous" reason. They were just being delinquents.
However, those same two boys, when they saw that those CD's had child pornography on them, decided it was worth getting in trouble for the breaking and entering to go to the police and admit what they'd done, so that they could turn in the guy for being a pedophile.
Wouldn't this be a morally gray person? They're fine with stealing, burglary, random mayhem, etc., but when it comes to protecting children from predators, they're willing to make a personal sacrifice in order to do so.
EDIT: (Since I have more time)
Your argument hinges on the idea that someone is either a "bad person" or a "good person," and that in order to believe in moral ambiguity you have to not believe that there is some degree of absolute morality. Both ideas are incorrect, and kind of simplistic.
In order to have a morally grey character, you need to have decided that certain actions are good and certain actions are bad. Some things might be debatable, like social welfare programs, forgiveness vs. making someone accountable, stealing to save a life, etc. However, most people would have a pretty harsh view on whether it's right to murder a child, commit rape, commit genocide, steal for fun or because you don't want to get a job, etc. (not all, but most). Similarly, most people would agree it's a good action to be willing to sacrifice yourself for the good of other people, to be generous, to be helpful to people who need help.
The morally grey person isn't necessarily grey just because they have understandable or sympathetic reasons to do bad actions, or because they perform good works with the idea that they'll benefit themselves in some way. Much more often, they're grey because they're own personal code has developed in such a way that they will do both good and bad things. They're the type of people who will commit certain selfish or nasty acts, which other people would consider bad, but would also take a stand against people who do things that they would consider "worse".
Post by
204878
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Post by
203406
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Post by
Adamsm
Really not sure why you didn't just bump up your old topic here...
Post by
Jubilee
Don't confuse morality with a person's adherence to a moral code.
Gray morality means that the morality of most actions is impossible to determine, while black and white morality means that moral weight of most actions can be determined. A morally gray person is someone who does not adhere to a black and white morality, whether it really exists or not, and a black and white person is someone who does adhere to a black and white morality, whether it really exists or not.
ElhonnaDS's CD-stealing teenagers aren't necessarily morally gray characters at all. We cannot know for certain, but it might very well be true that they do believe that stealing is not wrong and child pornography is wrong (black and white). The other side might be true as well, they might not bother with or care about the moral weight of either action, but instead only turned the man in because they were personally repulsed and wanted to do him in. This is all apart from the question of whether there actually exists black and white morality.
So Soldrethar, is morality black and white? That's a religious or philosophy question that I doubt anyone will come to accord on. Are people morally black and white? I think they can be.
Post by
ElhonnaDS
The thing with the argument of "They must not think it's wrong if they do it," is that most people who do steal from, murder, beat, etc. other people would think it was wrong if someone did it to them. Very few people who steal, if they came home and found that someone had broken into their homes, would say "I guess that's just the way it goes, since stealing is a perfectly fine and natural thing to do." Very few rapists, if they were sodomized in prison, would say "Well, I guess it's my turn" and think it's fine. Most murderers on death row fight tooth and nail not to be murdered back.
I'll agree that many areas of morality can be subjective, but I'd also argue that for some thing that are especially "bad", even the people who do them would think that the act itself was wrong if it was inflicted upon them. They just don't care about doing the wrong thing in regards to others.
Post by
Jubilee
To not like something is not quite the same as thinking it's morally wrong. A person can very well not like getting stolen from, but at the same could believe that there is no moral wrong being committed. I don't like people holding things back from me and not telling me them, but I don't think there is anything morally wrong with that, and there have been times when I've held things back from other people. I still dislike it when it happens to me.
Post by
124027
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Post by
Adamsm
Look at the thread by him I linked for a 'good' idea on how he sees it....
Post by
91278
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Post by
gamerunknown
This is unfortunately a false dichotomy: and I believe there are certain moral absolutes and that an objective standard of morality can be reached.
Unfortunately not all behaviour can fall under that. For example, if the policeman that kept a busfull of hostages in the Philippines was disarmed, that'd be the ideal moral situation (actually, I think his demands may have been reasonable but his methods weren't: if his demands were acquiesced to and he served time in jail for kidnapping and threat of assault, that'd be truly ideal). However, I personally believe that sniping him would have been preferable than him killing a bus full of innocent hostages: the worst situation for the health of society. I'd say resolving his issues and punishing him for his crimes would be the "white" situation, killing him and keeping police wages low (what he was protesting) would be the "grey" situation, having him kill the bus full of people due to incompetence is "black".
Post by
588688
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Post by
gamerunknown
He was holding them hostage, he probably didn't intend to murder them. Unfortunately he had access to live TV and the TV presenter announced that the SWAT team was going to attempt to infiltrate and kill him and his demands were not going to be announced: so he opened fire, killing all hostages.
I've seen a guy have a gun sniped out of his hand. Do you think the sniper that sniped the gun without injuring the guy at all did a worse thing than just shooting him in the head?
Post by
588688
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Post by
Orranis
Analogies about onions do nothing to prove your point. What if I find an onion that's gray in the center? Will you concede defeat?
A gray morality is the concept that good and evil and subjective, the problem with your definitions is that you're already assuming there's such thing as a purely 'good' and 'evil' person, which means that there must be black and white morals. I can personally guarantee that I could make a case of why any nonfiction or vaguely realistic character could be good.
In before the Godwin.
Post by
Monday
Alternatively, I can define perfect good and perfect evil, point out that no one is either one of those, and deduce that there is
only
morally grey.
^
Post by
530888
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