Why be moral?
Moral belief, opinion, and judgement are nothing without action.
Consider if something is the right thing to do. Does that make it good for me to do?
Haiti had an earthquake. 300,000 died. A lot of deaths happened after the actual quake, as the already-poor infrastructure was rendered much worse. What was the right thing to do? Give and give and give... don't eat lunch today and send your lunch to Haiti maybe. Charter a cruise to bring over water. What is your motive, what motive can there be?
This raises the question "Why be moral?" Well, it's satisfying. It makes me feel good. If it's right for you to do it, then you have a reason do it.
Well, that's silly. Or so would Plato's Glaucon would say. He'd say there are three kinds of ways something can be good:
1. Good for good's sake (Joy. I like fucking. That moment where I'm so involved I can't even think- that's joy. Can't help it, it feels good.)
2. Good for good's sake, and for it's resulting sakes (I like fucking, and I like that it means we're closer. I might like that it'll make us a child, I might like it because it will piss off my mother.)
3. Good for its resulting sakes. (I don't like fucking you, I don'e even want to, but I will, because it will save the world) (Glaucon likes this one as the point of justice- if good is only contingently good, it's justice.)
The Ring of Guiges is this ring (in the end of the Lord of the Rings that an old Professor, McConnell, liked to talk about) that you can use to be invisible. If you have it, you're unlikely to use it within reigns of justice.
Would you rather be good and seen as bad, or bad and seen as good? Glaucon thinks the last one is what we want. Plato thinks that we should be moral because it's good for us.
It makes us feel good to give to Haiti. It might make me
Psychological egoism:
pe- we're only motivated by our own self interest
pe- We're only motivated by our concern for pleasure
pe- we're only motivated by a desire to feel good
We're only going to get pleasure if we're motivated to do the things that give us the pleasure. Utilitarian- when I do pleasure through sympathy I feel good by the pleasure I'd create.
