[Tactical Panda]

For instance, using a terrible means to create a terrible means under good intentions.

As an opening example to help desribe the sort of problem in this issue: a child who disobeys others warning to feed his or her pet dog chicken bones for the sake of the dog's happiness, which results in the dog choking and dying.

Now up the initial ante perhaps from dog to people in some similarly bad means, bad ends situation and let the discussion begin.

[sommers71]

How about continuously placing greater and greater demands on a continuously smaller and smaller portion of society with the justification being that older generations have done the same to them? The good intentions in this situation is that a larger amount of the populace survives. Who is this terrible to?

[Joonas]

Good intentions can never justify actions themselves, they're only talked about to place value on the person making those actions. So a good person can act in very bad ways, and still be a good person etc. The question you're asking is when good intentions don't lead to a person being good, and I believe it's when they're willfully ignorant or indifferent towards the harm their actions have.

	Originally Posted by sommers71 To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
	How about continuously placing greater and greater demands on a continuously smaller and smaller portion of society with the justification being that older generations have done the same to them? The good intentions in this situation is that a larger amount of the populace survives. Who is this terrible to?

The small portion of people you speak of, obviously.

[thod]

	How about continuously placing greater and greater demands on a continuously smaller and smaller portion of society

The demands placed on the ruler of the city are greater than those placed on the peasant. This is just, for with great power comes great responsibility. One cannot have the benefits without taking on the burdens.

[vampyroteuthis]

To the extent that one cares and before the point where self respect is compromised or abuse seems imminent.

The issue of institutionalised justice is a separate question. What do you mean by 'justify'? Are we talking about blame, prevention, or law?

[Pika]

As my pappy used to say: "The road to hell is paved with good intentions."

[RBM]

	Originally Posted by Pika To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
	As my pappy used to say: "The road to hell is paved with good intentions."

Pappy would have been a Consequentialist, then:

	Originally Posted by Wiki
	Consequentialism is the class of normative ethical theories holding that the consequences of one's conduct are the ultimate basis for any judgment about the rightness of that conduct. Thus, from a consequentialist standpoint, a morally right act (or omission) is one that will produce a good outcome, or consequence

That perspective is severely limited.

For example, if person A does something nice for person B, just cause person A wanted to, no strings attached, and person B reacts with anger, for no apparent reason, to person A.

While there is a reason for person B's reaction, it may be totally unrelated to the actual gesture of person A, but person A's the target.

[sunitaishot]

It depends. the effects of actions are things that can be observed and measured, intentions cannot be. I think deontology vs. consequentialism is a false dichotomy, but even then I lean towards consequentialism. No human has total knowledge, so consequentialism makes no sense. Intentions cannot be foreseen to hold their prescription.

[Tactical Panda]

	Originally Posted by thod To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
	The demands placed on the ruler of the city are greater than those placed on the peasant. This is just, for with great power comes great responsibility. One cannot have the benefits without taking on the burdens.

Yet the ruler has the choice of neglecting or abusing responsibility.
The ruler, simply being a mere ruler, has no merit.
Merit is based on the character of that ruler.

And not all burdens are equal.
The burdens created from the self destructiveness of a fool are less moving than the burdens of the selfless.
One is a lesson of consequence, the other is something noble.

[painfulltruf]

It's hard argue against doing the right thing, even harder, when you succeed at it.

[wolfyx]

	Originally Posted by sunitaishot To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
	It depends. the effects of actions are things that can be observed and measured, intentions cannot be. I think deontology vs. consequentialism is a false dichotomy, but even then I lean towards consequentialism. No human has total knowledge, so consequentialism makes no sense. Intentions cannot be foreseen to hold their prescription.

Deontology = Ni / Consequentialism = Ne

I personally prefer consequentialism to any sort of rigid moral theory.

Any moral theory that does not produce a good outcome on consistent basis is to be ignored and replaced.

The very purpose of a moral theory must be to lead to a happy and efficient human society.

I prefer to regard moral theories as I would regard a scientific theory. I desire a “good outcome“ so I will use my intuition to construct a moral theory that will lead to (predict) that “good outcome”. If confirmed by facts (experiments) the theory is right, otherwise the theory is wrong.

[Seablue]

Originally Posted by Tactical Panda To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

For instance, using a terrible means to create a terrible means under good intentions. As an opening example to help desribe the sort of problem in this issue: a child who disobeys others warning to feed his or her pet dog chicken bones for the sake of the dog's happiness, which results in the dog choking and dying. Now up the initial ante perhaps from dog to people in some similarly bad means, bad ends situation and let the discussion begin.

Let me start by saying that I'll maybe talk more about the lack of bad intentions than about good intentions.

I think it matters a lot, if what you want to know is "is that person good" ? For instance that child is not a bad person. He wanted to make the dog happy and didn't understand the harm in it. Maybe the parents didn't explain why the bones were dangerous. Maybe it was explained but the kid forgot about it or didn't really understand it.

On another level, you can think another person is "good" because the harm wasn't intentional, and still punish that person. In your example, it's only an animal, and it's only a kid, so the death of his beloved dog is punishment enough. But if, for instance, we were talking about a father killing his baby because he gave it an inappropriate amount of an inappropriate medication, the harm is so great that it becomes a matter of justice. Then the line to draw (and it's awfully hard) is between "unintentional murder" and "accidental death" - in any case, the intention isn't there and you have to judge the amount of responsibility in what happened. Even if you, or the judge, or the rest of the family, don't think that man is a bad person (maybe careless, or ignorant, or maybe he was only tired and sleepy), he might be punished "to pay his debt to society".

Also, until now we've only been talking about unintentional murders. The kid and the dog, the father and his baby. What I find more interesting are intentional crimes committed with good intentions. In this case I can picture myself saying: "yes, I know, you had good intentions when you gave the orders to commit that massacre, you're a good man - now please kindly step into that cell, because society needs to see you gone". Morals are a private thing and you can forgive even a mass murderer - but the crime was intentional and needs to be dealt with accordingly.

----

If we're talking about personal matters, like conflicts in a family, intentions matter a lot more in whether or not punishment is warranted. Maybe punishment isn't the right word. Rather, if getting away from that person (not being as close as before, or even cutting all contact) is warranted. Intentions are pretty much all you have, since society's welfare isn't the matter.

I guess the biggest limit I find to "good intentions" is that I have difficulty forgiving people who meddle in other people's lives. If someone (usually a parent) makes your life hell, even with good intentions ("Son, I told your girlfriend you have aids so she would leave you, because you deserved better than her"), I think getting away from that person becomes a matter of comfort for you, if not of morals.

[AlfredSchnittke]

Originally Posted by wolfyx To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

Deontology = Ni / Consequentialism = Ne I personally prefer consequentialism to any sort of rigid moral theory. Any moral theory that does not produce a good outcome on consistent basis is to be ignored and replaced. The very purpose of a moral theory must be to lead to a happy and efficient human society. I prefer to regard moral theories as I would regard a scientific theory. I desire a “good outcome“ so I will use my intuition to construct a moral theory that will lead to (predict) that “good outcome”. If confirmed by facts (experiments) the theory is right, otherwise the theory is wrong.

How do you (or who gets to) define what "good outcomes" are?

To what extent are you limited by consequences? Consequences are technically infinite...

[Joonas]

Originally Posted by Seablue To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

Let me start by saying that I'll maybe talk more about the lack of bad intentions than about good intentions. I think it matters a lot, if what you want to know is "is that person good" ? For instance that child is not a bad person. He wanted to make the dog happy and didn't understand the harm in it. Maybe the parents didn't explain why the bones were dangerous. Maybe it was explained but the kid forgot about it or didn't really understand it. On another level, you can think another person is "good" because the harm wasn't intentional, and still punish that person. In your example, it's only an animal, and it's only a kid, so the death of his beloved dog is punishment enough. But if, for instance, we were talking about a father killing his baby because he gave it an inappropriate amount of an inappropriate medication, the harm is so great that it becomes a matter of justice. Then the line to draw (and it's awfully hard) is between "unintentional murder" and "accidental death" - in any case, the intention isn't there and you have to judge the amount of responsibility in what happened. Even if you, or the judge, or the rest of the family, don't think that man is a bad person (maybe careless, or ignorant, or maybe he was only tired and sleepy), he might be punished "to pay his debt to society". Also, until now we've only been talking about unintentional murders. The kid and the dog, the father and his baby. What I find more interesting are intentional crimes committed with good intentions. In this case I can picture myself saying: "yes, I know, you had good intentions when you gave the orders to commit that massacre, you're a good man - now please kindly step into that cell, because society needs to see you gone". Morals are a private thing and you can forgive even a mass murderer - but the crime was intentional and needs to be dealt with accordingly. ---- If we're talking about personal matters, like conflicts in a family, intentions matter a lot more in whether or not punishment is warranted. Maybe punishment isn't the right word. Rather, if getting away from that person (not being as close as before, or even cutting all contact) is warranted. Intentions are pretty much all you have, since society's welfare isn't the matter. I guess the biggest limit I find to "good intentions" is that I have difficulty forgiving people who meddle in other people's lives. If someone (usually a parent) makes your life hell, even with good intentions ("Son, I told your girlfriend you have aids so she would leave you, because you deserved better than her"), I think getting away from that person becomes a matter of comfort for you, if not of morals.

I like your posts. I think that these unintended deaths are fairly telling of the persons values, and a person who accidentally gets his child killed by feeding something inappropriate didn't have the right mindset towards his childs safety. Even if he didn't mean to kill the baby, his lazy mindset towards the stuff that eventually made the child die could have been avoided if he had valued the child more, to remember that he can't take such chances when dealing with other people.

Laws are usually made to prevent these things from happening, and so it doesn't really matter whether the person is a good guy or not if his current mindset can lead to something like that happening. If it wasn't his fault, like if the prescription fooled him into it, then he's not responsible at all, and the law will strike the guy who made the prescription instead.

Another issue with handing out punishments is that ideally, nobody would need to get punished for things, because everyone'd just learn their lesson the moment bad stuff happens and then never redo them. So assigning punishments will always have a bad ring to it, but they're needed because I guess we still haven't figured out a better way of keeping people in check, because some people still cause harm and go against systems completely intentionally.


Then these intended killings, these people who intentionally kill others are ignorant towards the pain it causes to the victims families, and they don't give a chance to the victims to change either for that matter. They can argue that they had a good cause, but if their indifference is real, there's no way that they're level headed people doing the right things, they're most likely just good at making excuses. The ones who are truly doing stuff for a good cause, need plenty of alone time or counceling to figure the wrongness of their past actions out, so a jail sentence is clearly needed, although I'm thinking about a jail sentence without other inmates.

The best, most ideal path one should take involves only good consequences, and a truly good person will value that path more than the one with many negative consequences. People who intentionally kill others, and who truly are good people, haven't figured out a better way to handle those situations, so their sentencing can be seen as a way to give them another chance to figure things out. It doesn't make sense to let them continue with such a flawed mindset.

[Tactical Panda]

	Originally Posted by wolfyx To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
	Deontology = Ni / Consequentialism = Ne I personally prefer consequentialism to any sort of rigid moral theory.

Thats one perspective and your inclination.

My experience suggests something closer to:
Deontology = Si
Consequentialism = Te

Personally I regard moral theory and consequentialism as linked when done correctly - in terms of consistency both inwardly and outwardly in both a liveable and abstract sense. Unity to all fronts, but effective and intelligent rather than diluted.

[UltraIncredible]

Originally Posted by Tactical Panda To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

For instance, using a terrible means to create a terrible means under good intentions. As an opening example to help desribe the sort of problem in this issue: a child who disobeys others warning to feed his or her pet dog chicken bones for the sake of the dog's happiness, which results in the dog choking and dying. Now up the initial ante perhaps from dog to people in some similarly bad means, bad ends situation and let the discussion begin.

Intentions refer to the goal you are aiming at. In your example the child's goal of making the dog happy is reasonable in theory because no harm comes from it. However, the means used to attain the goal ineffective and harmful. The child doesn't know that due to lack of experience and a weak ability to reason, so s/he is not as responsible for the negative outcome as the adults that should be teaching and watching him/her, as they have way more knowledge and power.

Anyway, the means or strategy for attaining the goal are the problem, not the goal (or "intentions") itself.

[Seablue]

Originally Posted by Joonas To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

I like your posts. I think that these unintended deaths are fairly telling of the persons values, and a person who accidentally gets his child killed by feeding something inappropriate didn't have the right mindset towards his childs safety. Even if he didn't mean to kill the baby, his lazy mindset towards the stuff that eventually made the child die could have been avoided if he had valued the child more, to remember that he can't take such chances when dealing with other people.

Thanks ; but remember, I mentioned "tired and sleepy" as a possibility to explain the father's action in my story, and I really didn't choose these words by accident.

Picture it : the father worked all day, then went home to a sick baby who cried all evening. The father gets half an hour of sleep before the baby's cries wake him up again. Still half asleep, he goes to grab the medication bottle but doesn't realize he took the wrong one. He gives the medication to the baby and doesn't notice he's giving a little too much. He goes back to sleep, wakes up the following morning, finds the baby dead.

Actually I've never heard of such a case, but I was reading about something close: babies dying because they're left in a car in the sun. It's a terrible death, and sometimes the parent knew the baby was at risk, or had mistreated the baby before. But in most cases, the parent wasn't lazy, or careless, and loved the child ; but he/she was also under stress, tired, had a change in its routine, was dealing with lots of things at once, and somehow gets mixed up, thinks he left the child to daycare already, the baby is asleep so it doesn't make any noise that could get the parent to notice him, and there you go. (
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on this, and
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the person who is the most outspoken about this.) In such cases, these people will suffer all their lives for what is only an accident. I don't think it's necessary to punish them as if they were dangerous for other people, or even for their other kids.

[Joonas]

I didn't think about the correct situations, and I'd stand by what you said. I hate the idea that mistakes are sometimes punished by law, or that those people are looked down on by others, because the 'offender' is most likely the one who's most devastated by the situation.

The situation I was thinking of when I wrote that was of a parent who didn't love his children, which was a huge flaw in my reasoning. My point was that a parent who doesn't love his children is more prone to get their children killed like that somehow, simply because they aren't as motivated to put the effort in, and in those cases I believe that there's a good chance that they really are at fault, even though they didn't intend to kill. To blame a loving parent for such a mistake is definitely out of the question for me.

[wolfyx]

	Originally Posted by Tactical Panda To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
	Thats one perspective and your inclination. My experience suggests something closer to: Deontology = Si Consequentialism = Te Personally I regard moral theory and consequentialism as linked when done correctly - in terms of consistency both inwardly and outwardly in both a liveable and abstract sense. Unity to all fronts, but effective and intelligent rather than diluted.

Your perspective (Si/Te) is also correct but by my analogy (Ni/Ne) was point out that Ne are a likely to be a lot more flexible in their views, therefore a rigid ideology is a lot less appealing to an Ne then to an Ni.

Ni will construct a system and when he believes it is right, he will follow it no matter what. He will follow their "perfect system" in any circumstances and even disregard all clues that point out that the system if far from perfect and it is leading to possibly catastrophic consequences.

Ne is a lot more "flexible". He will see a lot more the possibilities and consider them all. A Ne will have no desire to create a "perfect system" and he will hate strict and obtuse rules. The system of an Ne is "self adjusting" as new possibilities are perceived

In conclusion the focus of an Ni will be on the system (aka Deontology), while focus of an Ne will be on the consequences and the system is seen only as a "tool" (aka Consequantialism).

[Tactical Panda]

	Originally Posted by wolfyx To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
	Ni will construct a system and when he believes it is right, he will follow it no matter what. He will follow their "perfect system" in any circumstances and even disregard all clues that point out that the system if far from perfect and it is leading to possibly catastrophic consequences.

The possibility of catastrophe is inescapable as long as risk and a notion of what is good exists. Lets assume you mean that the possibility of catastrophe is higher than normal.

Except Ni users I have met usually meet success and rarely catastrophe, at least for INTJs and INFJs. They live quiet, relatively good lives with an occasional punctuation of success and relatively few slip ups with very rare magnitude.

Thus your observation doesn't extend to Ni users.
It may only extent to some of the ones you know.

Perhaps the people you know are weird.

One may ask how you account for the clues that point out that your idea is far from perfect?

- - -

As for INTJs and INFJs, they are not perfect nor is what they do. But that goes the same for everyone else. I have no idea why you think the criteria of perfection is relevant to the complexity of human lives and management in a world of uncertainty.

One may ask how you account for the clues that point out that your idea again is far from perfect?

- - -

Your claim of what Ni focuses on isn't how I experience it. Perhaps you should look into the issue more if you care about it.

[scorpiomover]

Good intentions do not completely obviate accountability. One has to take into account what one's actions would cause. However, humans generally accept that humans make mistakes, because humans have limited brains, and can only be reasonably expected to calculate so much of the potential consequences. So the harm caused by good intentions is considered a responsibility according to what would be have been reasonable to calculate would be the consequences of that action, and to thus decide not to take such an action. Anything more than reasonable calculations is unreasonable to hold anyone to account for.

As a consequence, if a person feeds bones to someone else's dog, and those bones would likely have caused the dog to die, and the dog dies, then that is the fault of the one feeding the bones to the dog. But if the bones are normally eaten by the dog, and the dog normally has no problem eating those bones, but in that situation, happens to choke and die, the feeder could have been reasonably expected to take that into account. However, if the dog has a pre-existing condition, that many dogs have, that would have caused it to choke, and the person didn't check with the owner first, then the feeder is responsible.

Likewise, if a doctor gives a drug like penicillin, that is known to often have adverse reactions in some patients, and didn't check first for a penicillin allergy bracelet, then that would be the responsiblity of the doctor. But if the doctor gives another drug, that normally doesn't cause any reactions in any humans, and that person's allergy is unknown, then it would not have been reasonable for anyone to be concerned about possible allergic reactions, and then if the patient dies, and the doctor was reasonably unable to stop the allergic reaction before death, then it is not the doctor's responsibility.

We have to be practical about good intentions. We can't just hold everyone to account for every little thing that goes wrong, or we couldn't afford to attempt anything. That too would be dangerous, because lack of action often also causes many problems. So we have to judge things by what was reasonable to expect and to guard against.

[Disillusioned]

	Originally Posted by Joonas To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
	Good intentions can never justify actions themselves, they're only talked about to place value on the person making those actions.

Basically what Joonas said. Intentions don't justify actions. Reasons justify actions. An intention is not a reason, it's an aim. Intentions reflect the moral character of an individual. If an individual has good intentions then they are a good person because their nature is one of willing for a good outcome. This does not mean that a good outcome will always pertain. We cannot see the future after all, or know all the consequences our actions will have. This is why consequentialism doesn't make sense as a proper reflection of the moral character of an individual. If an individual intends to do good then they are a good person. If that is their aim then this reflects that person's nature or character. Since we cannot know the future, intention is the only thing relevant from the standpoint of the individual when deciding to act. You cannot act based on what the consequences actually are because you do not know what the consequences are until after you have acted and witnessed the effects of that act. So it doesn't make sense to judge someone based on the consequence when that consequence was impossible to know with %100 certainty before it occurred.

What can be known with %100 certainty is your own intention. It can be known by you. Is your intention good or bad? You will be good or bad because of it.

Take this example called the sick grandmother example:

Say Jack and Jill's grandmother is in the hospital. Jack loves his grandmother and wants to come visit her and bring her flowers because he knows that she likes flowers and it will make her happy. Jill doesn't care for her grandmother and is only interested in getting in her will so she also visits her in the hospital and brings flowers but not out of concern for her grandmother but out of her own selfish desire to get in her will. Would you say that both Jack and Jill are equally moral individuals?

According to Kantian deontology the answer is no. According to consequentialism the answer is yes, because their actions were the same. They both visited their grandmother in the hospital and brought her flowers. People can have different intuitions about this. However, it is my intuition that Jack is a morally better person than Jill and this is based soley on his intention and not the consequence of his act, which was the same as Jill's.

Now, justification is an important topic as well. Some moral theorists believe that what is morally right is merely what you can justify to others (see,
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). However, justification is not something addressed by intention.

[Tactical Panda]

Hmm. What of reasonable mistakes and unreasonable mistakes?

[ppu6502]

intent is nothing without effort

[Vermillion]

Originally Posted by Tactical Panda To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

For instance, using a terrible means to create a terrible means under good intentions. As an opening example to help desribe the sort of problem in this issue: a child who disobeys others warning to feed his or her pet dog chicken bones for the sake of the dog's happiness, which results in the dog choking and dying. Now up the initial ante perhaps from dog to people in some similarly bad means, bad ends situation and let the discussion begin.

Intent is rarely needed to cause harm to others. I've hurt others and have been hurt by others in situations in which there was no intention of harm by either party.

That being said, "good intentions" mean nothing. If a person makes a mistake and harms someone or something, they should be analyzed and the probability of a repetition of such actions in the future determined. Appropriate countermeasures should be taken to prevent such a repetition if necessary. The nature of such countermeasures are entirely dependent on the nature of the situation.

It should also be noted that malicious intent is entirely different. If someone causes problems on purpose the likelihood of a repeat incident is much greater in most cases. The appropriate countermeasures taken to prevent a repeat incident in this case may need to be more extreme than in the case of someone who had good intentions.