The Russian Empire is a bit special in that regard. I don't know what percentage of Russian nobility got executed after the communist takeover. — Tarskian

85%. The rest went west and became paid companions to rich old men and women in Paris or taxi drivers in New York.

If you ever meet European nobility, you will quickly understand that they think exactly the same. — Tarskian

You mean we left some with their heads still on? A serious oversight, that.
Everyone should be a well-off foreign man in a non-democratic, patriarchal country with a corrupt government, and then the world would be a happy place.

I guess it's just very, very good to be you!

Even supposedly communist hellholes such as China or Vietnam are more pleasant places to live in. — Tarskian

For some....

You will invariably end up having to fend off the tax collector and the divorce-rape judge. — Tarskian

If you've been in a position to owe - and fail to pay - taxes, to cheat on your wife and rape someone. Not if you're the imported serf who was raped.

I agree with you. Whenever the state is weak, incompetent, or otherwise cannot reach, one can live relatively free. — NOS4A2

If that one is young, strong, male and economically privileged, yes. Until he gets up the nose of a war-lord, drug lord, or gang.

Now we come with the question what happens in countries where there are no dominant cultures and apart from abiding to state laws, no traditions and no values are taken to be the norm. — Eros1982

Nothing. There are no such countries. In theory, if all cultures and ethnicities were considered equal, without animosities, long-standing rivalries or opposing religions, all you need is a fair and well-articulated constitution on which to build a legal system. A country can be democratic even if the population prefers to live in like-to-like communities. What happens is, the most commonly spoken language becomes the preferred language of trade and commerce. As long as the laws are applied without bias to protect everyone, why should anyone want to curtail other people's freedom?

Danger to democracy is more likely in countries where there has been a dominant culture for a long time, and it's suddenly challenged by an influx of people from a different culture. Especially if that different culture had previously been under the rule of the dominant one and the people have been regarded as inferior. Usually, this is fine, as long as the economy is strong and people feel secure. But should there be any kind of threat from outside - economic downturn, climate events, international hostility, a change in the dynamics of alliances and trade - people become insecure, anxious: it is then easy for ideological extremists to manipulate public opinion. Scapegoating is almost as popular a human pastime as sloganeering.
Even then, democracy may prevail, if the constitution, election process and law-enforcement are sound to begin with and maintained conscientiously.

In short, if you live in a country where everyone might look strange or distant to you (you have neither bad feelings nor good feelings toward someone, since the only thing you were taught in your life is that insofar as you don't violate the state laws, you can assume that you are the center of the universe and you definitely do not need to take advise from anyone on what is good and desirable), how are you supposed to be a part of the same "demos" with these (distant to you) people? — Eros1982

People can't help but interact in transactions, in work situations, in public places. They don't stay distant or very long in the marketplace, the workplace, the public amenities and entertainments. Even if they begin by forming separate communities, curiosity will drive people to see what the other is like, look at the costumes, enjoy the music, sample the food. And then, of course, you can't keep the young from being attracted to one another, even if their parents are 'distant'.

How is democracy supposed to work in such a scenario — Eros1982

Exactly the same way it works in any other country: the people in a district choose a representative, and give that representative a mandate for the interest of that community. If the rights are already equal, the political interest is most likely to be about economic regulations, infrastructure, public and social services - things that don't vary by ethnicity or culture.

In my opinion, the best places to live, are the ones where the government simply does not have the means to micromanage people's lives. — Tarskian
What are some places in the world that fit this bill? — RogueAI

Wiki sez https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_of_World_Liberty_Index

I agree we're in an oligarchy in practice, but that's what the voters want. — RogueAI

What the voters want is a fair and free election. With the rigid two-party system, the electoral college, campaign financing, voter suppression, disinformation and trolling, and much amplified lying, a great many voters have already given up on the system.

After all, when they honestly answer a poll on gun control, say, or health insurance , their opinion is overridden by a powerful lobby and nothing is done. Legislation originating in the public interest is loaded down with amendments that serve the opposite purpose. So, what's the point?

How could we be a failed democracy with free and fair elections every two years? — RogueAI

Fair and free...

Do you see that going away? — RogueAI

If T***p is fairly and freely elected, he'll declare himself emperor and have his name in huge neon letters affixed to the White house roof, have all the late-night talk show hosts shipped off to GTMO and shut down all news networks but his own and maybe FOX, if he's in a good mood.

Arguably, while we do elect our officials, the stream of information and who ultimately selects the candidates we vote on makes the USA more like an oligarchy. — Philosophim

It's 36th on the world democracy rating; a deficient democracy, though not yet a failed one. That might be next year.

I don't know what you mean by "middle class". Most people throw the term around with zero precision. — BC

There used to be three layers: the upper - burghers, bankers, owners of enterprise, traders; the middle - professionals, salaried executives, shopkeepers, civil servants; the lower middle class - skilled workers, tradesmen, crafters, office workers. Similarly, the upper class had at least two layers - high clergy and landed gentry below the aristocracy - in modern terms, the top richest 0.01%. At the bottom, labourers, peasants, then serfs or slaves.
If anything, today's complex societies are are even more stratified, but the lines are blurred and there is more vertical mobility, because the classification is by income alone, rather than education, occupation, manners and mores.

Politically, it's been expedient to call pretty much everybody middle class: it flatters the proletariat and shields the ruling classes from criticism. If the tradesmen, small shopkeepers and clerical secretaries are burdened by heavy taxation, the bankers and factory owners can howl that 'the middle class' is being squeezed, and demand relief, while teachers and factory foremen get neither the platform to complain nor the legal apparatus to wiggle out of paying their levy. But the main purpose of this obfuscation is to eliminate the working class as an identifiable and self-aware interest group. That way, trade unions and mutual support fraternities are nullified; even more importantly, working class pride and solidarity was eroded. The working class was powerful and potentially dangerous, so it had to be eliminated.

The army officers were the nobility. — Tarskian

Generals, yes.

The clergy was also quite privileged and the higher ranks were also part of the societal elite. — Tarskian

Yes, some of them became upper middle class, and a few were gentry.

That is not the "middle class". — Tarskian

What is?

Besides, you seem to be concerned only with Europe. The rising Muslim empires had a stratified class structure, as well, and of course China had a considerable civil service, police and and judiciary, as well as artisans, builders and traders.

The middle class became inexistent at the end of the Roman empire and it was mostly gone for almost a millennium. — Tarskian

No, it was doing fine, as clerics, crafters and army officers.

There was barely any international trade in the Middle Ages. — Tarskian

it declined for a short time. But local trade continued, and soon international commerce was back, mainly by water while the roads were in disrepair.

The Vikings were indeed arguable also traders but that is not what they became notorious for. — Tarskian

Doesn't matter what they were notorious for. They did trade, build boats, make beer and weapons, craft gold and silver ornaments. Those are middle-class occupations and every civilization has them.

One more point: many people say that currently the rich people become richer, the poor become poorer, and the middle class dissapears. — Linkey

It started long before Reagan. Try 4000BCE.
And, no, the middle does not disappear; it usually prospers. Gets bigger and smaller, mostly due to the volume of commerce and definition.

smart people are not allowed to participate in the elections, because a smart president can become a threat fot these 1% richest. — Linkey

Another little byproduct of capitalism: elections cost money.

We could say "How is it that it only rains when there are clouds" but it's unnatural. — bert1

That's because it's a rephrasing of the 'why' question. The 'how' question is more practical.
"How are rain and clouds related?" "How do clouds affect rain?"

NO
and it never can be, but we could be fair to one another is we wanted to.

The key, in this as elsewhere, is balance. Doing what is 'correct' (?) goes only so far to ensure a fulfilling life. Achieving goals has its reward. So does social status and approval. But the emotions also need to be nourished: we need security, affection, trust, amusement and physical pleasure.

Emotional thinking craves that standard for itself. It hates that it isn't at that level. — Philosophim

I think you're attributing a separate consciousness and thought process to feelings. There is no 'emotional thinking', but emotions do prompt thought and affect the thought process. And only one emotion can hate - and that one doesn't require a great deal of reasoning.

If you're reasoning to obtain the satisfaction of a certain emotional desire, you're going to reject anything that goes against that emotional desire as 'wrong'. — Philosophim

It's never that simple. The only time we have only a single desire in extremes of physical need or arousal, and those are also the occasions on which the reasoning mind is shouted down.
Most desires result from a mix of emotions, and most desires are tempered by counter-desires. For example, one might feel a strong urge to hit another person but also desire the respect of one's peers. Usually, it's more complicated than that. And in any of those situations, the reasoning mind keeps doing its work, instructing, directing, restraining and judging.

Emotions are snap judgements with what we perceive at the time, and nothing more. — Philosophim

They're not judgments at all; they're primitive mental responses to sensory input from the environment and the body. It takes reason to name and describe them.
Judgment is cerebral. Emotion is visceral. Both are necessary to do anything: a computer isn't motivated to act. To a degree we don't usually consider, we are motivated in everything we do by a desire. Desire is felt, but it takes thought to articulate it and formulate a strategy for its attainment.

Are either of you familiar with the affective turn in the social sciences and philosophy that took place a few decades ago — Joshs

No, I wasn't. But then, I'm not opposing emotion to reason on principle. In fact, that's more or less what I've been arguing: that someone can make a reasoned decision, one that appears rational to an impartial observer, without turning off their emotions. I'm perfectly aware that people can greatly fear what is about to happen to their body and mind (e.g. if they're about to be tortured - and, no, that isn't a far-fetched example ), and reasonably seek a way out. That people can be so bereft by the loss of their home, their sight and their spouse that they reasonably prefer to curtail their own descent into a lonely decrepitude.

My POV of that of elderly persons of sound mind, with debilitating, painful and progressive health issues - a short, miserable future. Most families are content to let their parents go without a fight, but oppose any form of assistance. (mainly on religious grounds) But I have witnessed situations in which much younger people were facing a long and very bleak future, were appalled by the prospect, and yet prevented by the spouse or family from making their own decision.
Both reason and emotion can be in conflict between two people, but only one of those people is condemned to live that life.

Ah, no worry! Numbers 2 and 3 are my reasons then. Feel free to comment further or end the conversation then. I don't think you had any issue with what I considered rationally viable, only in how to approach it. — Philosophim

I have no argument with your reasoning; I just don't see it applied in real-world situations.
Different perspectives here: I've worked in health care, seen and read many case studies. In not one instance did it go the way you prescribe.

The topic was how to rationally approach suicide. — Philosophim

No, actually. It was an unfortunate choice of the critical word in the OP: I failed to consider all the ways it might be interpreted. Entirely my fault.
What I asked was not how the potential suicide himself ought to consider the issue, but whether you consider anyreasons for suicide to be rational - as distinct from moral or legal.

Whether or not a person chooses to be rational is in their power. — Philosophim

I very much doubt that.

This is always a possibility when trust is involved. That is a risk you have to take, and once again, why you involve multiple people to handle if one goes rogue. — Philosophim

Not if that one has power of attorney. That's not a rational risk to take; you only get one shot at escape.

If there were a pure-reason explanation for the existence of the universe, why would anyone be interested in addressing the question by means of spiritual belief? — Tarskian

Conclusion: What you don't know can't exist.

If there is no reason for it, then the very existence of the universe is meaningless. — Tarskian

To one who demands that everything have a meaning that he can understand, and doesn't know the reason for the universe, the universe is meaningless. For everyone else, it's a futile question with no available answer.

If life is deemed meaningless, — Tarskian

by that same teeny little mannikin who expects to know everything, but can't,

then the absurdist philosophy predicts that the struggle with the absurd will culminate in suicide,

That's surely an issue only for the absurdist philosopher and his next of kin, not for sensible people.

In terms of pure reason, the very existence of the universe is irrational and meaningless. — Tarskian

How do you know? Where is the evidence?

Hence, I underwrite the main idea in the absurdist philosophy, which is that the pure rationalist will first fail to struggle with the absurd and then end up contemplating suicide. — Tarskian

Now, that's what I call a silly and frivolous reason!

And all of this has exactly what relevance to the universe being absurd and meaningless?

To the unspiritual rationalist, the foundations of our universe are irrational and meaningless. — Tarskian

Unknown. Judging the unknown irrational and meaningless is irrational. We can only apply reason to that which we know, or think we know.

Hence, atheism comes at an important long-term probabilistic cost. — Tarskian

According to what observable reality?

Explain how your scenarios explicitly are not covered by the three points I posted. You have not done that. — Philosophim

I have done that. Real people, in pain and fear, cannot be unemotional about their situation. Rule 1. bites the dust at the diagnosis of cancer or the repossession of someone's house.

That being said, these are decisions you really cannot make on your own, and need other rational people to analyze the situation with you. If you don't want to tell anyone that you're thinking of doing it for example, then you shouldn't do it. — Philosophim

That is the most difficult piece of advice, and I have told you why, several times. Other people are also emotional. They can't turn it off just because you tell them to.
Sometimes even people who have discussed end-of-life care go back on their promises when the death of a parent or spouse is imminent. They don't want to let go. If you leave the conversation until decisions actually have to be made, it's even more likely that you're at a physical disadvantage due to illness or injury, and it's not discussion among equals.
Many family members and friends, if you tell them you're contemplating suicide, go ballistic, get religious and righteous on your ass, plead and cry and maunder on about the sanctity of life, then confiscate your meds and have you put in a locked ward, where you are deprived of all means of ending your own pain: you no longer have a choice, freedom or autonomy. I know this from having witnessed it. (One patient was so desperate, she stuffed her bedsheet down her throat.)
So, quite a few of the people trying to figure out when and how dare not tell anyone what they're thinking, can't trust the very people they love.
You may prescribe otherwise, but that's the way it is.

And upgrades to apps that just make them more cumbersome and stupid. Fixing what ain’t broken (or its cousin, upgrades to software.). Annoys the s out of me. Just leave some shit alone for a few years once in a while. — Fire Ologist

YESSS!!!

First try to see if the rational rules I gave can adapt to the situation. If they don't, show me why they don't. — Philosophim

That is what I have been attempting to do. Your rules apply in some cases, but do not cover many of the likely scenarios that real people in the real world have to face.

Show me you're thinking about the discussion instead of peppering me with questions you haven't tried to solve on your own first. — Philosophim

I have solved them for myself. I cannot; nor can you, for anyone else. We can have opinions about their situation, we can even judge them, but we can't persuade them to think as we do.

No, I think your posting random scenarios without thinking about how they play in what has been discussed so far is silly. — Philosophim

Point is, they're not random. They are all too real and too common.

Apply what I've noted to your scenarios, then point out why they do not work. — Philosophim

Did that, too. I've been in your perspective, but that was a long time ago.

Ignoring what I've said and just bulldozing ahead to specific scenarios without analysis to what's already been said is disorganized, and ignores what I've stated so far. — Philosophim

You keep stating the same thing over and over. I didn't ignore it; I pointed out where it doesn't apply.

Sure, it would be nice to think everyone can contemplate their own debility, suffering and death unemotionally, and that everyone has many friends and relatives, all available for consultation, all able to assess the situation and think clearly.
This may sometimes be the case; it is not the norm.

Look, are you just going to keep inventing scenarios for every answer I give? — Philosophim

Nope. Just mentioning the realities you didn't take into account.

A. My friends and family care about me.
Therefore they cannot think rationally about me. — Philosophim

Not what I said. I said not all families are able to think clearly or unemotionally when it comes to the potential death of a loved one. Nor are they always in agreement. Families vary.

A fierce, highly public battle took place between her parents....and her husband... Terri's husband argued that his wife would not have wanted her life artificially prolonged, with no hope of recovery.

It's rarely a news item, but this happens quite a lot in families, whether the patient is able to participate or not.

I'm going to one up your silliness. — Philosophim

You think old age, illness, disability and despair are silly? Implausible? I hope you have a long wait to find out.

"Too hard" is an emotion. — Philosophim

Ever have bone cancer?
Most people cannot abide by your rules.

The problem is that your question fundamentally makes no sense when taken as a whole: if it is just a question on "purely pragmatic" grounds, then there is no right answer — Bob Ross

That would be true, if that had been my question.
If what I did ask makes no sense to you, I'm sorry, but I can't change that.

In terms of a legal question, all legalities stem back to morality; unless you are asking just for what particular legal systems (that currently exist) consider a legally permissible form of suicide (and not what people think should be legally permissible). — Bob Ross

The Christian-based law is a whole other can of brainworms. Starting with : Where does a judge or legislator get off telling an autonomous adult what is permissible to do with his own life?
That's why I left consideration of the law out of individual opinion. There are and have been many different legal determinations on this subject. In some countries, and some states, the law has recently been changed, because of what the majority of voters think should be permissible.

If these people are not invested in your well being, don't rely on them. — Philosophim

Only, they are invested. Deeply. They just have very different points of view and beliefs. I've come across relatives with the power of attorney who absolutely forbade measures the patient herself requested. In that case, the medical staff is bound by the law.

again, this is an irrational response. Of course there are people who can't think rationally. Don't rely on those people. But don't shun your family and friends and think they can't be rational because they care about you. That's foolish. — Philosophim

No, it's a factual response. If the people who don't think the same way you do are your family, with the power to decide your fate - as in a life-support situation - consulting them is foolish. Friends may be a different story, assuming you have friends who are still ambulatory and compos - many old people have run out of friends through attrition.
Yes, it's a good idea to discuss your end-of-life decisions with reasonable people who are on your side. Sometimes that's down to professional caregivers.

You go to multiple people. — Philosophim

You're in a wheelchair or hospital bed, housebound. You go no place. Maybe you can use a computer and have one; maybe you can still see the screen and keyboard. Or not.
People come to you, if they're willing, or they shun you because you smell bad and remind them of their own mortality.

You have a clear grasp of best-case hypothetical, but not so much of the practical reality of people close to death.

An isolated mind is not smart or a genius. — Philosophim

Some are. But it doesn't take genius to decide whether your own life, or the anticipated future, is worth your continued attendance.

Then lets leave the physical capabilities out of it. — Philosophim

Can't. They - or rather the lack of them - are the most common of rational reasons. They're not part of the question; they're part of the answer.

Rationally you want people who are invested in your well being in the picture. — Philosophim

For some people, that's fine. Some families discuss end-of-life decisions long before the situation arises; they have time to prepare mentally and emotionally.
Other people are, unfortunately, stuck with religious, volatile, sentimental, emotion-driven relatives, with whom you can't discuss anything serious.
Your parents are smart and lucky. Do were we, with my mother. But everybody isn't us.

Thinking everyone who cares about you means they can't think clearly, is not rational. — Philosophim

Not everyone, but many.

A rational mind understands that an isolated mind is much less capable then a good group of people with a common purpose. — Philosophim

Maybe so. But who says all the minds in a given situation are rational? Or that the person who has a rational reason for one particular decision isn't emotional about his relationships? He might want to protect his wife from the stigma, or his children from the guilt, or his family's reputation in a religious community. Every person has a different set of circumstance and a different mind-set.

f you don't have the capability to ask your doctor, then you're not being rational in a decision to commit suicide. — Philosophim

What? If your throat is blocked by a feeding tube, you can't think?

You can kill yourself but can't ask a doctor? — Philosophim

All you need is a finger on the button that controls the morphine feed and permission to use it.

But my question wasn't about physical capabilities. It was only about reasons.

That being said, these are decisions you really cannot make on your own, and need other rational people to analyze the situation with you. — Philosophim

Where do you find these rational people in this situation? Not family members: they're emotional and have their own self-interest to consider - from both sides. If you talk about the burden your continued incapacity will place on them, they feel pressured to demur, say they'd rather have you than the money or free time or use of the living room, even though they secretly wish you had died in the accident and feel guilty as hell about that.
Then, too, family has the power to put you in a mental institution, just for thinking about it. Of course, that can't happen if you're already in hospital on life support; the worst they can do is send a psychiatric resident to come and talk to you. And he's not an impartial consultant.
Friends may also be too emotionally involved.
You could take a chance on your doctor, I guess. If you have the ability to speak intelligibly.

How can anyone answer this if you are precluding ethics from the discussion? Isn't this fundamentally an ethical question? — Bob Ross

I was asking it as pragmatic question. Or a legal one, if one were to make an argument in court.

If you objection is about your own ethical beliefs, you can simply say: "My belief system doesn't acknowledge any valid reasons for suicide." or "It's just wrong." or "I can't deal with this issue rationally." or nothing at all.
If it's about the potential suicide's ethics, he or she has to contend with them alone, while contemplating their options. We, onlookers, however, can be more objective.

"are there sound, logical reasons to commit suicide?
This is vacuously true. That the cookie monster created the universe is a logically sound argument. — Bob Ross

My question was not an argument. Neither is the vacuous postulation about the universe.

I would say it is only silly or frivolous relative to what is actually good; which you precluded from the discussion. — Bob Ross

"What is actually good" in your book is unknown to me. I don't have the capacity to take all points of view on good and evil into account.
By frivolous, I simply mean something like a teenager in a snit slitting his wrists to make his parents sorry for treating him as they did. By silly I mean another teenager who jumps off the balcony because her schoolmates posted embarrassing photos of her in the internet.

Should other people intervene?
This is a moral question. — Bob Ross

Yes, if you like. It's a question about your opinion.

If I just know what is right and make observations and experience then where does asking questions for advice come in? Why deliberate about what is right if I just know what is right? — Moliere

I meant that I am speaking from observation and experience, not according to what some guy wrote in 400BC or 1642AD. It's okay to quote philosophers - I just choose not to. This a matter of personal taste.
You don't 'just know'. You learn, reflect, consider, weigh one doctrine against another, advice against your own inclination, loyalties against self-interest, negotiate with others, the environment, the culture and yourself. At any point in your life, you hold some beliefs and convictions about what's right. you act on them. Later, you may question those beliefs and adjust those convictions according to new things you learn.

Seems a bit much to me. I like to know why other people do things. Sometimes they have a point. — Moliere

So, ask them. Every time you get a coherent answer, you learn something about motivation. Every time you get an incoherent answer, you learn something about human nature. Every time you get a punch in the nose, you learn when not to ask questions.

These are ways of reflecting on choices, not answers to choices. — Moliere

Bingo!

Sounds to me like there's no philosophy to be had at all in your view, then. Follow your heart and do your best between the competing desires until you no longer have to or can. — Moliere

Well there was that little bit about principles, convictions and knowing what's right. But no philosophy - just observations and experience.

So, what do you do if you suspect your child of having committed a crime?

Act against your fellow man's right to expression, — Outlander

Nobody has! Bitching infringes on on no fellow's right to expression - it is expression.

'preciate it!

The devil in the details I see here will be "OK, but when are we stupid, destruct, or spiteful? — Moliere

Only you know your own emotions.

It's never going to boil down to one simple rule. It's all very well for the ubermensch to do whatever he wants and assume it will always be morally right, but the rest of us are all the time having to conduct these messy negotiations between how we feel and what we think, what we believe and what the law says, what's good for us and what's good for someone we care about, what we've accepted and begun to doubt, what's ideal and what's practical, what we want and what we ought, what we aspire to and what we're capable of.

You just work your way through it, case by case, day by day.
Then you die.

So follow our heart? — Moliere

When it's not being stupid, destructive or spiteful.

Suicide is not always irrational. That's the only point I was making. — creativesoul

You don't have to convince me! While I would not want to live in a culture that values 'honour' -whatever they think that means - over life and happiness, I have my own exit strategy in case of certain foreseeable eventualities.

I suppose the part I'm missing here is: where is the adult?
We are influenced by what we grow up around. — Moliere

We are influenced by the adults who guide us through youth, by our peers, by the media which present us with a sense of our culture, by our academic and religious education, by our own aspirations and what's required to attain them, by role models and heroes, and in adulthood, by a spouse, if we're lucky enough to get one who engages our intellect.
The more clever among us are also greatly influenced by books, especially in the formative first two decades, but later, too. As I mentioned, that begins with fairy tales in early childhood and progresses to adult literature. Why, some young people even read philosophy! I myself was impressed with Kierkegaard and Nietzsche in my late teens. (I got over it.)

So, what ought we to do? Whatever our mother told us?

In some cases, that's not a bad idea. What we ought to do is whatever we believe to be right at the time of decision. On most of those occasions, we'll chicken out or compromise or fudge, because the principled action is too dangerous, difficult, expensive, uncomfortable, unpleasant or inconvenient.
If we live up to our highest expectations once in ten tries, we're doing pretty well.

If I'm antagonistically related to this or that ethical principle and am both at once then I'd prefer to either let go of the emotion or the ethical principle or rectify it in some manner. — Moliere

You know from experience that the antagonism is not the usual state of affairs. Most of the time, your heart tells you the same thing your head knows is right.
We have a great many emotions. Some of them are antisocial, and therefore urge us to commit acts we know to be wrong. Also, there are some rules of social behaviour that are inconsistent and self-contradictory. (Because everybody has a lot of different feelings about a lot of different things and they can't always be categorized neatly.) Sometimes you have to pick your way through a dark labyrinth of desires, impulses, injunctions, principles, sentiments and conscience.

You may be very angry at someone, but you know you should not kill them. That's the extreme example, where ethics generally triumphs over emotion, and we're all a little safer because of that.