Money? Helpfulness? Wisdom? Raw intelligence? Fame? and which people does our society value the most? Is it justified?
In my opinion, value should be determined in relation to freedom. Increasing the freedom of a society is adding value by increasing human potential. I can think of no greater value than each of us being free and able to pursue our potential. If we view peoples freedom as value, we have the incentive to unlock the potential of others, and not to operate as selfish individuals. As soon as someone inhibits the potential of another person, the are devaluing humanity as a whole.
Why does society dictate someone's value? If a man/woman loves of grid and only provides for themselves, do they not have value? Does society need to get something for a person to just have value? Sent from my iPhone using Grasscity Forum
It doesnt, its an arbitrary value. Value lies in each of us, as parts of a whole. We decide our value, the more free we are the more value we have to ourselves and to the whole. (My opinion)
2 Factors: #1- How many Spongebob quotes you can throw out in one conversation #2- See #1 Sent from my iPhone using Grasscity Forum
Whose freedom has more value? Mine, or yours? How about between two ten year olds? What about between fifty ten year olds? Which one is most valuable? Maybe we should wait until development has finished. How do you determine when development ends? 18, 19, 21, and 24 are arbitrary numbers. I've even heard brains continue to develop until 40 years old. Is brain development the sole factor? What about social development? How much impact does the brain's growth have on social growth? Can further brain growth impede social growth? Can it increase it? Value is a completely arbitrary concept. Even if you decide a value within a society, good luck finding a set-in-stone cutoff for the age/maturity/responsible/attractiveness value responsible for continuing social growth and/or importance. Hell, good fucking luck finding contenders willing to compete for society as the most important value to fight for.
The freedom of a rapist is equivalent to the freedom of a newborn child? So the individual who was raised to take, take, take, and has received and come to expect as much, is as valuable within the society as the society which values any other individual within that society? Or did you mean to clarify the value of the individual within a society? Because it's kind of ambiguous, so I may have it confused.
An individual should be valued as highly by society as they in turn value individuals within the society. As an axiom of a society, the person who takes without giving, wants indiscriminately without truly needing, violates said axiom as the amassing of resources or material things puts ones self-view of their own autonomy more highly than that of other individuals. In essence it's the distilled value within the adage about how people eat in heaven and hell, both have 3 foot spoons but in hell everyone tries to feed themselves and as such all go hungry, in heaven everyone feeds each other and thus all are satisfied.
Say the rapist 'repents' by being a successful therapist for rape victims. If the rapist helps more victims overcome their problems and live happily than he rapes, is he then more valuable? Does it matter if he was sexually abused as a child and never helped? Does it matter if he has a mental defect? Is the freedom of a mentally healthy individual greater than the freedom of a mentally handicapped person? Is the freedom of an eighty year old really equal to that of an infant?
Decide an individual's value??? Maybe the real question should be, how should an individual determine a society's value?
If he repents but continues raping then he is still devaluing freedom. Yes mental defects and childhood abuse plays a part. This individual needs help to be free himself, and so he stops violating others. Mental handicap is a hinderance to the persons own freedom. Society should want to help this person. I dont understand why you ask about the infant and elderly, why would the freedom of one be more or less important?
Equality is bullshit. Some people are plain cunts while others are fucking saints. Individual value is determined by how other individuals percieve an individual. e.g. it's pretty standard that Hitler was cunt-of-the-century and Ghandi was a pretty cool dude. All you political correct arseholes saying that all human lives are of equal value are just wrong and too afraid to offend anyone. I, myself am a total cunt and am able to accept that I am just as worthless as most of you. Not everyone can be like Mother Theresa or whatever.
I don't think that decision should be left up to society at all. Society is bias, different places have different values and what may be totally unacceptable in one place may be completely normal in another. I live in the bible belt (I technically live in a 'hole' in the bible belt where open minded non-christians and non-bigoted christians go to escape) and I refuse to conform to traditional southern christian values and in the eyes of our society here I am an outcast, yet if I were to go somewhere that is more open minded it wouldn't be a problem. I think the only true determining factor of our 'value' as a human being is how we perceive ourselves and If we are happy with ourselves than there is no real need to give a single fuck what society thinks. People will always judge other people, it is just how life works. Somebody, or even an entire culture, may have a negative view on something that you do yet somebody else is probably judging them just as harshly. Nobody is right, nobody is wrong.
I am a sadistic sociopath. I have abducted an 80 year old and a baby from the same family. I am going to kill one, and let the other go. It is your choice who dies and who goes free. If you choose neither, or excessively procrastinate, I will kill both. Who should I kill?
I am trying to figure out what you are getting at and how this question logically follows from my claim that freedom should be the value in society. To play your game, id tell you to kill yourself then the other two.
You should of said for him to kill himself and let the other two go free.. cause now they're probably hooked up to some Saw type shit that rips them to pieces after his death. So I guess the point is moot since you still got them both killed anyway? If telling him to kill himself and let the other two go doesn't work, I'd pick the 80 year old and I'd even bet the 80 year old would want picked.. not because they have less value or anything, just a different value for different circumstances.
Lol yea thats a likely revision he will make. I agree the older person would likely pefer they die, if they are human.