Immoral Quantity Question

Is the quantity of negative effects from an immoral action, relevant to someone's morality?

In my previous post; Moral Quantity Question, I determined that moral actions do not seem to be in equal ratio to someones perceived “morality”. Rather, someone's intentions seem to be the fundamentals for their morality. This seems to apply to credit, for performing an action perceived as positive, or blame for performing an intended negative action. But what about when someone performs an action with positive intentions, and a negative outcome is only an unintended side effect?

If the unintended negative side effect is outside of the individuals knowledge or awareness, then it seems they are not to be blamed. But, when the individual is aware of the negative side-effects, and performs the action anyway, is the degree of effect from the negative side-effect in equal ratio to their immorality? The difference in this scenario, from an intentional moral action, is that the individual is not performing the action in order to cause the negative result. The negative result is likely circumstantial. For eg, if someone pollutes carbon dioxide for 1km of driving, as a negative side-effect that they’re aware of, would that be in equal ratio to their immorality, compared to if they drove 100km? In both cases, they had positive intentions of transportation to somewhere useful.

Perhaps it comes back to their estimate of probability, as it often seems to. If they estimate that the positive effects for their actions outweigh the negative, to a reasonable degree, then maybe they are being less immoral. It seems that in this scenario, there is an extra step involved in the equation for morality. In order to determine someone’s intentions (which seem to be the basis of morality), they must 1st compare their perceived positive outcome for their actions, to their perceived negative side-effects from the action. If they perceive that the negative side-effect is miniscule, compared to the positive outcome, then they are being immoral only to a low degree. If they estimate the positive outcome to be minimal, but the negative side-effect to be significant, then they are being immoral to higher degree.

The quantity, or degree, of the negative side-effect itself, does not seem to be the determinant for immorality, but rather, the comparison of that side-effect, to the overall positive gain, caused by their action. The person might be immoral to a lower degree, for polluting the 100km, compared to 1km, as long as their intended positive outcome for that longer drive, outweighed that negative side-effect of pollution, more significantly than their intended positive outcome for the 1km drive outweighed that smaller portion of negative side-effect. 

In another scenario, if someone performed an action with an intended positive result, and a small negative side-effect, then later, in other circumstances, they avoided causing that same positive result, because it would cause more significant negative side-effects, it seems they should be less to blame. Their calculation of positive compared to negative side-effect changed, even though the particular positive effect would be equivalent. 

It seems that when an individual performs a positive action, with negative side-effects which they are aware of, there is that extra step involved to calculate their intentions, of their perceived comparison between the positive and negative effects. The quantity of negative effects still does not seem to be a direct measurement of how immoral someone is, even though it will often reflect the fundamentals of the degree of immorality. Intentions (with a bit more complexity to determine), again seem to be the real quantity to be questioned for immorality. 

Moral Quantity Question

Moral Quantity Question

Is the morality of an individual, relative to the quantity of their moral actions?

By moral, I mean; that which the individual believes is good or bad. Morals can be subjective and difficult to distinguish, as I further explained in my recent posts; Moral Mess, and Mutual Morality. But regardless of what is agreed to be moral by others, if the context is taken of a certain individuals perceived morals, the question can arise of; how important is the quantity of moral actions that the individual performs? By “quantity”, I mean the amount of times that they perform a moral action, or the amount of effect that a moral action causes. Is this quantity relative to the degree the individual should be considered moral, from the perspective of themselves or others?

If someone performs 1 small action which is positive from their perspective of morals, is that less credible than performing 1 large positive action? Or should the good intention be credited equally, for terms of morality? For eg. if someone donates 1$ to charity, is that necessarily less credible than donating $100? The differences between the 2 situations, would be, effort put into causing the action, and effects resulting from the action. Effects resulting from the action would be an important difference, from the perspective of overall objective practical accomplishment. But practical effect seems as though it is not so important, when it comes to morality degree. Morality of an individual seems it should be based on their intentions, just as it seems logical that credit or blame for any action, should be based.

If someone has the intention to do good, but the action turns out to cause bad, because of fluke circumstances or a misunderstanding by the individual, logically, it seems they should not be blamed for something occuring which was outside of their knowledge. For eg, if someone helps a starving child survive, by giving them food, and that child turns out to be a murderer later on in their life, the person helping the starving child, should not be blamed, as they had no knowledge of the future, and their intentions were good. I further explained blamability based on intentions and the individuals estimate of outcome, in a previous post; Blame by Consciousness.

So if resulting effects from someone's actions are not significant for their credit, but intentions are significant, perhaps quantity of action is not so important in the equation. But how significant is effort put into the action? If someone puts more effort into performing an action, it seems to follow, that they should deserve more credit. But, usually the cause of someone using more effort, is their intentions, which is perhaps the core credibility. If someone intends to do more good, they will automatically use more effort. But, if 2 people intend to cause the same amount of good, and by fluke circumstances, 1 person has to use less time or resources, it seems that person should not be credited less because of their circumstances. 

Intentions seem to be the significant factor involved in credit for morality. When it comes to blamability for someone performing a negative action, intentions should be relative, just as it is for a positive action. If they intend to, or are aware of more negative results, it seems they should be blamed more. Effort may be circumstantial, for someone putting more time and resources into performing a negative action, so not necessarily relative to blamability. 

It seems that quantity of a moral action, whether positive or negative, is not directly relative to credit or blame. Intentions can often show morality, based on quantity or effort put into an action, but the core source for credit or blame, seems to depend on the individuals intention to cause a result. When it comes to estimating morality, it seems intentions should be in question, rather than quantity.

Love

What is love?

What types and distinctions are there?

Some dictionary definitions:

1. “an intense feeling of deep affection.”
2. “a deep romantic or sexual attachment to someone.”
3. “a great interest and pleasure in something.”

It seems as though there are 3 basic types of meanings for the word “love”. 

1. Affection, would be applicable from 1 individual to another. The word “affection” implicates it should perhaps not be applicable towards an object or activity, only towards an individual, since “affection” is usually intended to mean, towards another living thing. The root cause of this likely developed instinctually, for groups of similar animals to stay together, and help one another, being beneficial for their survival. Even though the root cause seems to be instinctual, just like other emotions, the post-perception of this positive feedback trigger, requires a state of mind resulting from the initial trigger. I explained more of the perception required for emotion, in a recent post; Emotional Perception. If “deep affection” is part of this emotion, this indicates that this type of love would likely mostly only be used by humans, whom have sufficient ability for a deep comprehensive perspective. 

2. Romantic attachment, would also only be applicable from 1 individual to another. The difference from the 1st type, would be the romantic aspect. The root cause of this, likely developed from instinctual triggers causing attraction for the benefit of reproduction of the species. Affection would be more applicable to multiple members of a group, whereas attraction would usually be more focused on fewer members for means of reproduction. If “deep” is considered for romantic attachment, as well as the definition including the term “someone”, then it also seems to require in depth perception, and indicate mostly only humans, for this emotion. The post-perception also seems to commonly include passionate caring and valuing of the other person, by our typical interpretation of this type. The short technical definition which I used, is missing this portion, but that seems to often be a relevant component in the meaning of this type of love, and is often specified with the term “in love”. This would require additional comprehension of concepts, for the person in love, rather than only deep romantic attraction.

3. Interest and pleasure, should be applicable to mostly anything which an individual enjoys. It could be felt towards objects or activities, besides other individuals. This seems like the most basic and widely applicable type of love. As it doesn't seem to involve “deep” perception or comprehension of factors, it should have good potential for any animals to feel this type of love. The root instinctive cause of this trigger, would likely be basic positive reinforcement, to cause an individual to pursue something beneficial.
   

So, with these 3 types, the 1st 2 (Affection & Romantic attachment), seem to indicate love from an individual to another, and if this emotion of love is considered to be an in depth perception, would likely mostly be exclusive to humans. The 3rd type (Pleasure), seems to be a more basic and general result of instinctual reinforcement triggers, to pursue the factors involved in the situation. As it seems to have a lot of varying meanings and interpretations for the word, it should be helpful to understand some of these distinctions, of Love. 

Motivation Direction

What constructs of comprehension and the mental feedback system, cause motivation?

Are feedback triggers the core cause of any and all motivations?

Motivation can be considered to be basically; a drive to attempt to perform an action. By “feedback triggers”, I mean instinctual genetic neurochemical positive or negative reinforcement, for a specimen to pursue or avoid a circumstance. In my last post; Emotional Perception, I explained more of this, and how the state of mind (which we call “emotion”), resulting from feedback triggers, seems to be limited in its adaptability, based on comprehension of potential links, from the factors at hand, to alternate reinforcement triggers. If any emotional perception is limited to positive or negative feedback triggers, which are linked to the situation, does that mean motivation is as well?

Any actions taken by an individual, seem as though they should logically be driven by instinctual feedback triggers. Otherwise, there would be no incentive to perform the action. If the root cause of motivation is feedback triggers (just as any emotion), then the only adaptability for someone to change that motivation intentionally, seems to be dependant on alternate feedback triggers, which can be comprehended as being affected by the circumstances involved in the original motivation.

For eg, if Gary has the instinctual motivational positive reinforcement trigger, to gain as much money as possible (which is a subconscious adaption of an instinctive trigger), in order for him to intentionally alter that motivation, he requires an alternate positive feedback trigger to focus on. Through comprehension of the factors involved in making money, he can determine that it may not be as rationally important to him, as perhaps the positive feedback trigger to pursue a family.

These instinctive feedback triggers do adapt naturally throughout a lifetime, as subconscious influence on the individual, causes them to avoid or pursue new factors, which have been saved in memory from new experiences. This causes motivation to change naturally, through experience, but it is still the same root instinctive feedback trigger causing new factors to be saved in memory subconsciously, for the variance of factors, to be pursued. But, this is natural subconscious adaptability, rather than intentional redirection of motivation

Intentional redirection, requires conscious comprehension. And conscious comprehension requires knowledge of cause and effect of relevant factors. Therefore, to intentionally redirect motivation, there must be that knowledgeable cause and effect of the involved factors, in order to make a connection to an alternate motivation. But since motivation, or drive to pursue an achievement, seems to require a positive feedback trigger, intentional redirection of motivation seems to be limited to available connections, from present factors, to alternate positive feedback triggers.

Basically, within a situation, someone cannot simply choose to redirect their motivation to anything they want. They must rely on a perspective, resulting from comprehension of factors involved, being connected to some positive feedback trigger. For eg, Sally cannot alter her motivation toward doing her meaningless boring job, if she gets paid no money, since there is no positive feedback trigger, linked with those factors.

As positive feedback triggers seem to be the root cause of all motivation, the direction of motivation is limited to available triggers. Motivation can adapt naturally, as a result of experiences subconsciously altering the positive feedback of factors. But through conscious comprehension of positives, there can also be effective manual Motivation Direction.   

Emotional Perception

Is there a difference between emotion and instinctual reinforcement triggers?

Can reinforcement triggers be manually driven?

The term “emotion” seems to have a different insinuation, than basic reinforcement triggers. By “reinforcement triggers”, I mean instinctive, neurochemical reinforcement triggers. I explained more about this, in a previous post; The Notion of Emotion, in how emotions seem to have the root cause of reinforcement triggers, which developed for the benefit of any species. But the very basic function of a reinforcement trigger seems as though it does not include all the required components to be considered, what we call “emotion”.

For eg, if an ant sees a luscious tasty green leaf, and receives instinctual positive reinforcement to pursue that leaf, is that emotion? If a mountain biker gets a minor scrape from a twig, as they are making a turn through trees, but they are so focused on the next turn on, that the small prick of pain, as negative reinforcement, goes unnoticed, is that emotion?

The technical definition of “emotion”, is; “a natural instinctive state of mind deriving from one's circumstances…”. This includes a state of mind, which seems to be a required component in what we tend to consider emotion. The state of mind, or perception, caused by the instinctive trigger, seems to be the missing portion from the basic function of a reinforcement trigger. Whether an ant has the capability of a “state of mind” might be debatable, but it seems as though insects may not have the complexity involved, in their neural functions, to have a state of mind or perception of their circumstances, sufficient for the complicated function which we call emotion. The biker does have the capability, but when the trigger stimulant of pain, is so insignificant, relative to his focus, that he is inattentive of it, it seems there would likely be an insufficient mind reaction, for it to be considered a state of mind, resulting from the trigger.

So, relevant perception of a reinforcement trigger, seems to be required as a factor of emotion. If perception is a significant factor, then to what degree can someone's perception, manually steer emotion? Perhaps someone could intentionally significantly alter their resulting state of mind, causing varying emotional results, even to the degree of being contrary reinforcement to the instinctual reaction. Pain is instinctive negative reinforcement, but it seems plausible that someone can redirect their resulting perception, to cause pain to be a positive emotion. This could happen subconsciously, if perhaps a lion feels pain from muscle strain while chasing a zebra. But with enough results of post-positive reinforcement, caused by catching and eating the zebra, in the future, the muscle strain pain within those circumstances, could be overpowered by subconscious influence, to cause a positive perception (assuming the lion is capable of the sufficient state of mind). But this is not so much manual steering of emotion.

Manual (by my intended meaning) redirection of a state of mind, would require comprehension of the factors, for it to be intentional. Conscious comprehension should allow more effective alterations of a state of mind. Someone could hypothetically choose to access memories involved in comprehending differing aspects of the circumstances, to alter their perception of any given resulting instinctual reinforcement trigger. If perhaps someone receives instinctual positive reinforcement from eating a big mac, they could intentionally contradict that reinforcement, by accessing memories of the long term cause and effect of resulting negative health. This would cause the state of mind and emotion from the instinctual positive trigger, to become negative.

In order to allow a contradictory resulting perception, it seems to require the opposing reinforcement trigger linked within the circumstances. Perception of negative reinforcement being positive, requires comprehension of that negative, causing an alternate positive (or vice versa). If there is no comprehension of any alternate positive, being caused by the factors within the circumstances in some way, the manual redirection doesn’t seem to be plausible. Perhaps a maximum degree for the manual steering of emotional perception, is relevant to potential alternate positive or negative reinforcement triggers, which can be comprehended as a connected cause of the factors within the circumstances.

Overall, there seems to be a minor distinction between emotion and reinforcement trigger. Emotion requires a state of mind, resulting from the function of the reinforcement trigger. Redirecting that resulting state of mind, seems to be limited to other applicable positives or negatives, in order to allow comprehension of the association of them to the situation. But there does seem to be a lot of potential benefit, for the manual steering of emotional perception.

The con, in Conform

What does it mean to conform?

What are the pro’s and con’s for the individual, and for society?

A basic definition of “conform”, is; “comply with rules, standards, or laws.”

This can apply to any particular set of rules or standards, so there can be numerous sub-groups of people within a large group, each with their own set of standards.

I my previous post; “Mutual Morality”, I described how agreements of sets of rules within a society, can help increase order, and allow guidelines to be more objective, within the context of the agreements. Does this mean more people should conform to preset rules, to create more order?

It depends on how the particular set of rules, is determined, to be conformed to. Agreements of sets of rules may cause more order, but that doesn’t mean it’s beneficial for the individual or society, for someone to just conform to whichever set of rules happen to be pressured upon them. It seems it would be unbeneficial for everyone to conform to sets of rules which are encouraged by the fluke of their upbringing. This would cause everyone to blindly follow whatever rules happen to be in place in their location, which could allow any ineffective set of rules to control masses. For eg, a lot of ancient Egyptians blindly followed the sets of rules in place, which caused slaves to work in horrible conditions, to serve the pharaoh. This would be unbeneficial for the slaves in their horrible living conditions, and hypothetically unbeneficial for the society, as the Pharaoh would often have mainly self-interest motivations, rather than societally progressive motivations.

If a set of standards is decided upon, rather than followed circumstantially, then conformity might be effectively applicable. If every rule or standard within a set, is agreed upon by an individual, based on their rational comprehension, then it seems obvious to conform to that set. This should be beneficial for any individual, as it would allow them to determine which rule set is effective. This would be minorly beneficial for society, in that it creates order of distinction of peoples sets of agreements, or basically, categorizes groups of people and their agreements of standards/ rules. But it should be more significantly beneficial for society, if individuals are using rational comprehension to determine the rule-sets to conform to, in that it would cause more effective and efficient rule sets to be followed, steering overall society in that beneficial direction.

For eg, if leader #1 has a set of rules with a general focus on superficial appearances, and leader #2 has a general focus of production efficiency, then more people would likely follow leader #2, if they determine their conformity based on comprehension. This would likely significantly benefit this society in terms of practical progression, and functionality. Whereas the con in blind conformity, might allow leader #1 to steer society towards non-genuine displays, causing inaccuracy of depiction (and therein general calculations), while disregarding practical wastefulness or consequential negative effects.

It still seems unlikely that conformity, without comprehension of the rule-set, would be effective, unless a determination has been made, that the one(s) that set the rules, have knowledge or comprehension beyond the individual's current efficient capability. If the individual determines that someone has more effective knowledge or comprehension, then it may be effective for them to choose to conform to that setter of rules, rather than attempting to comprehend the particular rule sets.

It seems to generally be a pro, for individuals to comprehend sets of rules, of which to conform to, as it allows a more effective direction, rather than fluke-following of circumstantial rules. Conforming without comprehension seems, it may be the con, in Conform.

Mutual Morality

What morals should be followed?

I determined in my last post; Moral Mess, that morals seem to be basically rooted from instinctual, neurochemical reinforcement triggers. It also seems that people can have significant variances in their particular instinctual reinforcement, in the degree of positivity or negativity, and even more variances caused by subconscious influence. This, combined with the potential complexity of combination of factors involved in circumstances, within modern day life, makes distinguishing that which is moral, a bit of a mess. So how can a best estimate, be made, of morality?

Consistency of common positive or negative feedback triggers, can be a decent gauge for highest probability. Even though everyone may have variances, there is still a range of consistency. This range of consistent perspectives, can allow for agreements. Agreements of preferable and dis-preferable results of reinforcement triggers, allows for a range of preferable, or not, actions, which cause those results. This is basically the stem concept, of most of any societies’ rules and laws. For eg, freedom is a fairly consistent positive reinforcement trigger. So abducting someone, and keeping them locked in a dungeon, tends to be an agreeable dis-preferable action, which causes neurochemical negative reinforcement on the 1 that was abducted.

Even though morals can seem subjective, within the context of agreement, they can be objective. Groups of people within any society, typically agree upon a set of preferable actions, which would cause consistent results of positive or negative reinforcement. It is basically an agreement of intended goal, to cause the maximum enjoyment of everyone within that group. Anyone that agrees to the set of preferable actions, has an objective outline, for what is “moral” or not. The mutual agreement, is key for objectivity. But, disagreements can make this complex, and a potential mess, yet again.

Individuals will typically, always disagree with certain preferable results, or the method of implementation of rules intended to cause those results. There are some rules set out, with an agreeable intent, but which are disagreeable in the implemented restrictions, intended to cause that result. For eg, I agree with the intent of avoiding drowning, but personally, disagree that a restriction against swimming in public quarries, should be the implementation, to cause that result. I explain more detail on that concept, in a previous post; Reduction by Regulation. For those people that disagree with intended results (or method), guidelines on preferable actions become less distinct, or less clearly distinguishable. The argument might be made, that by living in a society, you are agreeing to the rules. But, someone can disagree with that assumption in itself, or may have few options for living where they would agree.

Beyond disagreeing with details of what is a preferable result of reinforcement triggers; what if someone disagrees with causing positive reinforcement in the 1st place? Perhaps psychopaths and sociopaths could be an example of this. I suppose majority can be the best guideline to follow, when it comes to fundamental morals. If the majority agree that happiness is preferable, then it is more probable that it is a preferable goal. Just like in scientific experiments, if 99.9% result a certain way, it can be assumed that the 0.1% of counter-result, had a minor varying factor influence, which is not applicable to the rest. Perhaps, the minorities’ counter-perspective, that happiness for most, is not preferable, should not be applicable for the rest. If that particular influencing factor, is causing counter-results for the majority, that factor can potentially be altered or removed.

Though it seems there can be many minor variances in results of reinforcement triggers, consistency, probability, and agreeability, seem to allow much more order and less subjectivity, in morals. It seems the best gauge for range of preferable actions, might be Mutual Morality.