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Thinking Makes It So
Jun. 21st, 2004 06:01 pmInspired by a tangent in the Four Noble Truths entry, I've decided to expand upon my comment about my attachment to morality.
Morality is the attachment to the idea that there are certain things that are "right" and certain things that are "wrong" and that doing those things that are right makes a person "good" and doing those things that are wrong makes a person "bad." It is usually paired with a belief that somewhere, somehow, something is keeping a giant repository of scorecards, one of which is associated with you. Every time you do something "right," your goodness score goes up by a number of points proportional to rightness of the thing you did added with your purity of intention, multiplied by the magnitude of your sacrifice. So doing something like picking up the check at lunch gets you one or two points, while devoting your life to saving people's souls will net you several kajillion points. On the other hand, every time you do something "wrong," your badness score is increased by a number that is proportionate to the wrongness of the thing you did multiplied by the twistedness of your intention, raised to a power that is representative of how directly it benefits you. I'm not saying that everybody believes in the same scoring formula, by the way, but they all are basically the same premise: If you do things right, goodness score goes up. If you do things wrong, badness score goes up (or goodness score goes down).
Okay, so now everyone (or nearly everyone) in the world believes that we've got these scorecards. How do we check them? Easy! Just look at how your life is going! If you're mainly doing things "right" and your goodness score outweighs your badness score, your life will be going well. If your life is not going well, then obviously it's because your badness score is ahead of your goodness score and you need to start racking up the goodness points, or else. Simple!
( By reading this, you've earned enough points to continue to the next Level. )
Morality is the attachment to the idea that there are certain things that are "right" and certain things that are "wrong" and that doing those things that are right makes a person "good" and doing those things that are wrong makes a person "bad." It is usually paired with a belief that somewhere, somehow, something is keeping a giant repository of scorecards, one of which is associated with you. Every time you do something "right," your goodness score goes up by a number of points proportional to rightness of the thing you did added with your purity of intention, multiplied by the magnitude of your sacrifice. So doing something like picking up the check at lunch gets you one or two points, while devoting your life to saving people's souls will net you several kajillion points. On the other hand, every time you do something "wrong," your badness score is increased by a number that is proportionate to the wrongness of the thing you did multiplied by the twistedness of your intention, raised to a power that is representative of how directly it benefits you. I'm not saying that everybody believes in the same scoring formula, by the way, but they all are basically the same premise: If you do things right, goodness score goes up. If you do things wrong, badness score goes up (or goodness score goes down).
Okay, so now everyone (or nearly everyone) in the world believes that we've got these scorecards. How do we check them? Easy! Just look at how your life is going! If you're mainly doing things "right" and your goodness score outweighs your badness score, your life will be going well. If your life is not going well, then obviously it's because your badness score is ahead of your goodness score and you need to start racking up the goodness points, or else. Simple!
( By reading this, you've earned enough points to continue to the next Level. )
