Being vunlerable in the right circumstances is food for the soul. It is time to regain our innocence! I want to Cherish my blessings!!

Categorization by characteristics can be a good thing, for instance without categorization we could not have cultural sensitivity and we could easily offend someone if we acted inappropriately.  Furthermore, from an economic standpoint categorization helps us to produce the right amounts of products for the right number of people.  Everyone is not the same and for people to treat everyone the same is to ignore their cultural and personal interest.  Categorization (or racism in this case) is not harmful as long as our intentions towards others are good and we do not use it to assume something about another person's personality.

I still laugh when I hear someone call a black person in Africa an African American, or when people say "Happy Thanksgiving!" to people in China that have never celebrated the holiday.  Who could fault them, their intentions are good and they mean no harm and should not be faulted for it. 

Ultimately, all the trouble with racism, or cultural conflict, comes about in two ways.  The first cause of cultural conflict is when a person or group's intent is to physically or verbally harm a person or people by offending a group that they belong to.  The second is when people misperceive the cultural ignorance of others as having bad intentions.  Although both of these circumstances come about often, when someone's motives are to cause harm is the only time people should take offense.

We on bigthink like to debate everything. I wrote this with that in mind. I hope not to attempt to invoke anyone's belief's. Whether it be religious or not. I want the tangible ideas that deal with real morality that is four dimensional and is debate able. I can't argue with your God or the idea of nothingness after death. This paper is just about the good and evil concept that we deal with here. On this earth, in this realm. What are your guy's thoughts on good/evil? First a quote.....   

"Why do you see the speck in your neighbor's eye, but do not notice the log in your own?"

Luke 6:41

            The connection with good and evil has been sought through history and just like Bigfoot never comes to fruition. Which side is good and which is evil, is commonly worried about. What is interesting to ponder are how both sides of two conflicting beliefs, believe they are good and their adversaries are evil. Since humanity first conceived of God, the question has been what will be God's adversary? This is an example of a flawed concept that creeps into the very heart of humanities self-deceit.

First, the reason for good and evil is touched on with the concept behind William Blake's Tyger poem (My favorite poem ever btw). In The Tyger, Blake wonders: "Did he who made the Lamb make thee?" (The Tyger line 20)  This question is proof that questions can instruct. This question illuminates the position that one can't create the diversity that is in nature, hence, making the divide of good and evil. Rolling Stone's song, Sympathy for the Devil states, that the Devil is watching kings and queens war, "for the Gods they made."  More importantly than the Gods they made, humanity wars because they believe in good and evil and consequently which ever person is in opposition of their individual self is evil.

            Life does have some limited objectivity and with those brief moments of clarity, humanity can learn how to not be self-deceitful. The fact that humanity deserves to be equal is an objective truth. Women, minorities and sometimes majorities, are subjected to rantings of those in power who can only see their side. It is apparent to them that since they are who they are, they deserve the unquestioned reality that they know. When in reality, there is very little that is wrong or right.  

There is love or hate and those who already know everything, hate anything different. Love builds humans and builds understanding, whereas, hate laments over its misfortune to have to face any adversary. In any individual both lies hate and love. In any individual, there is that dichotomy and to excuse their feelings of hate, they turn to evil. Those moments of love that are felt are those times where humanity subscribes the concept of good.

What is most contradictory, and another form of humanities self-deceit is the abused that turns to become the abuser. Those women, minorities or majorities that see themselves as oppressed don't learn from their oppressors anything but oppression and seek to dominate those, different than them, in the same way they were dominated. With this some state evil exists, but evil is just a man-made adversary from the truth that evil exists only in oneself.

Only oneself has the ability to say what is right or wrong and only oneself can truly imprison one's own mind. It matters not if some outside force does things to imprison the body as Dr. King's letter in Birmingham illustrates. Dr. King who because he was opposed to unjust laws peacefully assembled and was imprisoned for his accurate observation of injustice chose not to turn to hate. In prison Dr. King had the choice to truly be imprisoned and lament over his "evil" oppressors or he could write one of the most eloquent works ever for the protection of minorities' rights. He chose the latter and for that choice, chose his good over his evil.

As life moves forward and information is constant. The one thing humanity can learn that will advance its collective information is that life simply isn't good and evil. Life simply isn't anything ever, except for individuals making individual choices where some other individuals look at actions and deem them as good or evil, when it should be judged just as something you would or wouldn't do. In the words of Voltaire, from his book Candide: "We must cultivate our garden."

Transcript:  My advice, my counsel, is that people learn some moral psychology.  We’re discovering a lot these days.  Learn about the basic software of your mind, of your social brain.  And if you do that, you should develop some moral humility.  You will realize that despite our constant feeling that we are right, and there’s pure evil out there, and there are stupid people and ignorant people and enemies who are making things terrible, you’ll discover the truth is a lot more complicated.  And once you do that, I think you’ll be a least more open to talking to people on the other side.  And that’s the crucial first step.  Expose yourself to people, not just to ideas on the other side, but actually to people.  We have an enormous capacity to like people when we meet them face to face.  Once we like people, we can take their ideas seriously.  To the extent that we only hear about people through their ideas, it’s just too easy to hate and to dismiss them. 

Recorded on: 5/9/08