The point is that too much happiness is a bad thing. Happiness in itself cannot be good. It depends on the consequences, and causes. If eating orphans makes you happy, then that is wrong. If happiness is drug induced, then it is shallow. One can say that "happiness is always good" only in a hedonic, shallow sense that it is always pleasurable, or feels good. Not that it is always good regardless of cause or effect, because that clearly isn't so. One doesn't do bad things even if they make you happy, nor refrain from good things, even if they don't. If you mean that happiness is always good, only in the sense that it always feels good, then sure, but I don't consider that a very significant good.

I thought that I showed that it clearly doesn't follow that commending something implies any active involvement at all. Whether something is possible or not is difficult to say before hand, and affecting the success or flourishing of commendable traits beyond a shallow sense can only possible be reasonable for people that are close to you, even if merely possible for anyone. We have to manage our time practically, logical possibility has little to do with that.

I still don't understand why an obligation to oneself isn't as significant, and can be waived by one to someone else can't be. I mean, clearly physically, and behaviorally they both can be waived. There are consequences for both as well, just of different kinds.

Happiness in itself cannot be good. It depends on the consequences, and causes. If eating orphans makes you happy, then that is wrong. If happiness is drug induced, then it is shallow. One can say that "happiness is always good" only in a hedonic, shallow sense that it is always pleasurable, or feels good. Not that it is always good regardless of cause or effect, because that clearly isn't so. One doesn't do bad things even if they make you happy, nor refrain from good things, even if they don't. — Wosret

What you're saying, I think, is that there's something wrong with saying that a bad or wrong action can have a good component. I can't see anything wrong with this. Actions and situations are complex, and their complexity makes them philosophically opaque. I think it is philosophically imperative to analyse them into their consitituent parts in order to make them less opaque and more understandable. We do this as a matter of course in many situations. For example, if the dentist hurts you but makes your tooth better, we are quite willing to say that the pain is bad but the overall result is good. This is decomposing a complex into its parts. I think that's all I'm suggesting we do. The happiness got from eating orphans is good, but is outweighed by the bad effects of eating orphans (the orphans die). The happiness got from drugs is good, but is outweighed by the effects of taking drugs (your life falls apart and your family suffer).

I thought that I showed that it clearly doesn't follow that commending something implies any active involvement at all. — Wosret

Well, I don't think you have.

Suppose we try it from the opposite direction. Suppose someone said to you, 'Something very bad is going to happen, and I can prevent it, but I don't feel any obligation to do so.' Wouldn't you think there was something illogical about this? I think there is, and I think this shows that badness is morally compelling.

I think you could take up one of three positions about this, which are:
1. There is no moral obligation to prevent bad things where we can.
2. There is a moral obligation to prevent bad things where we can, but not to promote good things where we can.
3. There is a moral obligation both to prevent bad things where we can and promote good things where we can.

If yoiu agree with this analysis, which do you support? I support 3.

I still don't understand why an obligation to oneself isn't as significant, and can be waived by one to someone else can't be. I mean, clearly physically, and behaviorally they both can be waived. — Wosret

They can be waived, but not by the person obligated if the obligation is to someone else. If you don't accept that then I don't know what further I can say. To me it seems obvious. Imagine telling someone 'I know I borrowed this money from you, but I'm waiving my obligation to you so I don't have to pay it back'? What do you think they would say?

Your original claim was that everyone wants happiness, and doesn't want unhappiness, without qualification, I only desired to show that this isn't quite true, that both there are things far more valuable than happiness, and that happiness isn't desirable if brought about by certain causes.

Your point now is also simplistic, and takes an unqualified position on pain. You know if you take a bunch of pain killers for long enough, then it will greatly reduce your pain tolerance thresholds. Without experiencing any pain, we will become less and less able to tolerate pain. What doesn't kill you makes you stronger, and all that. Taking an unqualified position on pain can also lead to unhealthy circumstances. Even "too much health" is bad, in the sense that the immune system grows and matures, and if completely sheltered from germs, dirt, or sickness, then it cannot develop, and you will become much more susceptible to sickness in later life.

You don't go into why they wish not to prevent it? A proper evaluation requires efforts, risks, involvements, and costs. Just that it is possible for them to prevent it doesn't cover what preventing it may entail. The trolley thought experiment could be worded just as "something bad going to happen" that you could prevent, but since what it is, how you'd prevent it, and all of the variables, the implied obviousness of not doing so being unreasonable is not justified. We live in a complex world is my very point, even if doing something takes five seconds, that's still a cost, and five seconds you could have been doing something else.

As for if I owed someone something, and they didn't feel like paying it, so was like, "nah son, I ain't paying" then they wouldn't like it, and there may be consequences like them not helping you, or speaking to you again, trying to attack you or some shit, but you can still do it.

As for yourself, if say, I spend extra money out of the budget, this pay check, obliging future me to contribute more to the bills out of the next one, I can say "nah fuck that". Or if you don't like that, then if I make a promise to myself to change a habit or some such, but then don't follow through, I'm not only going to feel bad about it, but I'm going to take myself less seriously the next time I proclaim such a obligation to myself, and develop a sense of myself as untrustworthy, and unreliable when speaking about such things.

Your original claim was that everyone wants happiness, and doesn't want unhappiness, without qualification, I only desired to show that this isn't quite true, that both there are things far more valuable than happiness, and that happiness isn't desirable if brought about by certain causes. — Wosret

I'm an uncomplicated hedonist. I take the view that happiness and pleasure are always, and the only, intrinsically good things, and unhappiness and pain are always, and the only, intrinsically bad things. Other things that people think of as good or bad are only instrumentally good or bad, i.e. only good or bad insofar as they promote or prevent happiness/pleasure or unhappiness/pain. So I do not accept that there are things more valuable than happiness, nor that happiness can be undesirable.

Your point now is also simplistic, and takes an unqualified position on pain. You know if you take a bunch of pain killers for long enough, then it will greatly reduce your pain tolerance thresholds. Without experiencing any pain, we will become less and less able to tolerate pain. What doesn't kill you makes you stronger, and all that. Taking an unqualified position on pain can also lead to unhealthy circumstances. Even "too much health" is bad, in the sense that the immune system grows and matures, and if completely sheltered from germs, dirt, or sickness, then it cannot develop, and you will become much more susceptible to sickness in later life. — Wosret

If you take pain killers for a long time so that it reduces your pain threshold, then whether that is good or bad can only be worked out by estimating A = the total amount of pain over your lifetime if you take the pain killers, and B = the total if you don't; if A > B, then taking the pain killers is bad, if A < B it is good.

My view is that health is only instrumentally good, not intrinsically good, and ill-health is only instrumentally bad. Health is only good insofar as it makes you (and those around you) happy, and ill-health is only bad insofar as it makes you (and those around you) unhappy.

You don't go into why they wish not to prevent it? A proper evaluation requires efforts, risks, involvements, and costs. Just that it is possible for them to prevent it doesn't cover what preventing it may entail. — Wosret

A proper evaluation in principle means doing the hedonistic calculus, i.e. working out the total happiness/unhappiness to people if you prevent it versus the total if you don't. In practice this can't be done to the nth degree, so the moral requirement is to do it to the best of your ability.

As for if I owed someone something, and they didn't feel like paying it, so was like, "nah son, I ain't paying" then they wouldn't like it, and there may be consequences like them not helping you, or speaking to you again, trying to attack you or some shit, but you can still do it. — Wosret

Of course you can not pay, but not paying is not the same as waiving the obligation to pay, which is what you can't do if you're the one with the obligation.

if I make a promise to myself to change a habit or some such, but then don't follow through, I'm not only going to feel bad about it, but I'm going to take myself less seriously the next time I proclaim such a obligation to myself, and develop a sense of myself as untrustworthy, and unreliable when speaking about such things. — Wosret

What that would probably mean is that because you are less reliable, you are less able to meet your obligations to other people. That would be the main reason why it would be bad. The fact that it would make you less able to meet future obligations to yourself would also make it bad, but that would count for less than the other.

I just find that childish, and also in direct contradiction to obligation, and other people's happiness. Since happiness is all that matters, and the only good, one ought to only honor obligations that make them happy, and when making others happy conflicts with my happiness, they can die in a ditch.

You either have to make exceptions that put happiness into a second order below another value, without admitting that you hold other values higher, or simply say fuck the world, and everyone else when it conflicts with my happiness, in complete support of my OP, that you should just do whatever the fuck you want as long as you can get away with it, and suffer no consequences.

Obviously, as we all know, there are people who live in exactly that way. They tend to rise to the top, of course.

Why shouldn't you be like that?

Well, some people just aren't like that. I'm not like that, and I don't need a reason.

Ironically, many, most or nearly all of the people who behave in that manner claim to be devout Christians.

.But, if someone needs a reason, then howabout the fact (or call it a "claim" if you prefer) that this physical world and this brief worldly life aren't everything. Are you sure that anyone really, ultimately gets away with what they do?

Maybe that consideration does deter some people from doing their worst Obviously there are lot of people who aren't being deterred. Are a lot of professed Christians really closet Atheist Materialists?

Michael Ossipoff

I just find that childish, — Wosret

Wow. Powerful philosophical argument! ;)

Since happiness is all that matters, and the only good, one ought to only honor obligations that make them happy, — Wosret

You have moral obligations only insofar as your actions are likely to promote happiness, or relieve or prevent unhappiness. Other obligations, such as the obligation to keep promises, have to be assessed in line with your moral obligations. If keeping the promise would tend to promote happiness or relieve or prevent unhappiness, you should keep the promise. If it would not, you don't have to. It could even be that keeping the promise would cause a lot of unhappiness, in which case you should break the promise.

when making others happy conflicts with my happiness, they can die in a ditch. — Wosret

The second half of my original argument disposes of this.

You either have to make exceptions that put happiness into a second order below another value, without admitting that you hold other values higher, or simply say fuck the world, and everyone else when it conflicts with my happiness, — Wosret

No. As I keep pointing out, you can waive an obligation to yourself but not others, which means you should put others before yourself.

We are recycling arguments now. I think the discussion has run its course.

This is true in one sense, and false in another. A lot of business is predicated on superfluous, and damaging exchanges, in our deals, I'm getting profit, and you're getting stuff that you don't need, and may even be harming you. This becomes less and less true the closer to the top, or more direct involvement you have with them, then far more equitable profitable back-scratching exchanges are taking place. More like classist identity, than full on predator. If they were too impulsive, then they wouldn't be able to develop and maintain complex plans. If they were too lazy, then they wouldn't be able to do all of the work, and elbow rubbing that they would do to do. If they were too abrasive, or every man for themselves types, then they wouldn't be able to develop mutually beneficial networks of individuals, working together, all profiting, and towards the same goals.

Just like on every level, people need to not be too big of selfish assholes, or they'd never make it anywhere. The intelligence gap and strategic prowess of the individual that could fool everyone along the way, and into the longterm, and not just for short term benefits with high relationship turnover is an extreme rarity indeed.

The class that finds a way to make money off of the lower classes without having to put in as much effort, or with inequitable trades themselves are only able to pull it off because they actually do tend to be more intelligent, or really good people people. Most everyone would do it if they could, and don't refrain out of higher principles, but inability.

I'm not a fan of hell as a scare tactic, and heaven as a reward, as it sets up the whole televangelistic notion of "prosperity blessing", in that it implies that the wicked are punished, and the good rewarded, so that goodness itself is merely prudence.

The class that finds a way to make money off of the lower classes without having to put in as much effort, or with inequitable trades themselves are only able to pull it off because they actually do tend to be more intelligent, — Wosret

Like Dubya? Or Dan Quayle?

Maybe it just helps to be born in a rich family.

But yes, of course there's an evolutionarily-hereditary sheep-class, and an evolutionarily-hereditary herding-class.

Maybe you've noticed how the suckers are a perfect fit to their scammers. It's like the fit of a glove to a hand.

It's eerily reminiscent of Huxley's Brave New World, except that of course there's nothing new about it
The only difference is that, instead of being done with drugs, it happened via evolution.

Evidently that herders/sheep arrangement must have been adaptive at some time in our prehistory.

Anyone who thinks they can achieve change for the better is up against a million years of evolution.

As I often say:

P.T. Barnum pointed out that there's a sucker born every minute.

W.C. Fields said, "Never give a sucker an even break."

Those two great social scientists have explained why societal affairs are the way the are, and always will be.

...or really good people people.

Really good people? Well that's reassuring, that the it's being done by really good people.

You could have fooled me.

Most everyone would do it if they could, and don't refrain out of higher principles, but inability.

Sure, probably so.

Michael Ossipoff

I somehow lost the last paragraph of your post.

The fear of Hell, or goal of Heaven might deter some people from their worst. If so, then it's doing some good.

It doesn't seem to be working very well, though, does it.

Michael Ossipoff

I don't mean to imply that non-worldly consequences are only a possible deterrent. I think they're real.

Of course our rulers know what they're doing, at the material level, and that's why they'll always remain on top.

But isn't it obvious that, more fundamentally, they don't know what they're doing?

Michael Ossipoff

The OP and your recent post show very different tones as if one was a devil.

The only true dilemma is why shouldn't I act only in accordance with my whims? If truth and morality are man made, and not objective, but merely someone else's arbitrary impositions on me, for ultimately selfish, deceitful, and or antiquated values. If it's all motivated, power struggles, identity politics, and tribalistic allegiances, then why shouldn't I behave only in accordance with my own preferences and benefits? The only real objection to that could be that it wouldn't work, that no one is skilled enough in manipulation or deception to get away with it, but that can be reduced to the lack of certainty, and fear of
failure involved in any undertaking. It isn't obviously impossible. What could be holding them back other than fear, slavery, and attachment?

Why shouldn't I just take everything I want from everyone in every moment? — Wosret

The point is that too much happiness is a bad thing. — Wosret

but I don't consider that a very significant good. — Wosret

So happiness from a bad location doesn't amount to a lot of good. In OP there was no uncertainty, now we have a little added bonus. That actions in accordance with my preferences and benefits are only truly good with the right ruling principle behind it. The only thing your doing now is deciding which value is more important to you, this 'good', or happiness.

If there is such a thing as too much happiness, is there such a thing as too much 'good'. This magical property only achieved when helping people, or furthering good (this is a slippery slope). But the good feeling like warmth in your chest doesn't ever come from actions with no 'good' involved. So you like, I hope, much of everyone else here think 'something' is greater than happiness.

Complicity with your community's moral code is your choice. You are not even asking a question here.
It does not matter if you consider morality subjective or objective, you still make daily determination about your behaviour.