posted
On another thread, a poster mentioned that the same behavior can stem from many different kinds of underlying motivations, and that an action can be good or bad depending on the motivations.
Do the motivations matter at all?
The first step is to ask to whom they matter. For the sake of argument, let's assume the people on whom they have an effect. Therefore, a kind action to a stranger has an effect primarily on the stranger, and secondarily on the societ in which the act took place. (This eliminates the God element, which is a whole different story.)
Secondly, what is the basis on which they are being judged? Do the people who are affected by an action have a right to pass worthiness on the person, or do they have the right to only judge the desirability of the results? For the sake of this argument, let's say the desirability of the results.
If two people perform the same action for two entirely different reasons, does it matter what those reasons were?
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A new person moves to an open but small community. She is welcomed by five people. Person A welcomes the stranger because A does not have any friends within the community, and figures the stranger is a fresh and therefore likely mark. Person B welcomes the stranger because he welcomes everyone and likes everyone to be comfortable. Person C welcomes the stranger because he's bored and likes to get to know people's stories. Person D welcomes the stranger because he is the center of social activity and co-opts strangers in case they turn out to be interesting. Person E welcomes the stranger he thinks she's hot.
The stranger was lost and a little nervous about coming to such a closed community. Being welcomed was delightful for her. Does it matter what the motivations were?
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posted
Motivations do not matter. Killing a murderer to protect society is just as bad as the murderer herself killing someone for the pleasure of it. The deaths from our weapons in the recent war(s) to liberate Iraq are just as morally wrong as those people whom Saddam killed for purposes of state.
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posted
And right after I was teasing someone for taking something I said sarcastically seriously. Serves me right! Posts: 32919 | Registered: Mar 2003
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posted
I don't know if I'm being sarcastic or not. Seriously. I want to elaborate on this a lot more, but I'm at work. Suffice to say that, in one sense, death and hurt are always absolutes. They are always going to be painful to those they directly effect and those people who care about them. This is why, for instance, I disagree to some degree with OSC when he talks about moral stupidity in one of his recent columns.
Motivation speaks to the utilitarian aspects of behavior, does it not?
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posted
I tend to agree with a psychologist called Kohlberg. His theory was that stages of moral development were indicated not by specific moral choices, but rather by the process of reasoning that individuals engaged in. So there aren't necessarily right or wrong answers as there are more or less developed reasons for those answers. Of the three basic stages, all of your examples, with the exception of Person B acted in the PreConventional stage for personal gain or to avoid personal punishment. Person B acted in the Conventional stage, which focuses on following social rules. Although rereading it her motive is a little ambiguous, so it could fit into the PostConventional level. If you had a Person F who welcomed her because everyone has a right to be welcomed, they would be using the PostConventional moral reasoning. For a more indepth look at the moral levels here's a link: Kohlberg's Theory of Moral DevelopmentPosts: 349 | Registered: May 2003
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posted
Motivations matter to the extent that they are an indication of future behavior. So take for example person E. Is the fact that he thinks you're hot likely to influence his future behavior toward you? If so will that future behavior be positive or negative? If two weeks from now you discover that he's married and he's been trying to get you in to his bed anyway -- will you still feel welcome or will you feel used.
The motivation of a killer matters to the extent that it indicates how likely they are to kill (or engage in some other destructive activity) again.
The motivation of a terrorist matters to the extent that it indicates who they are likely to attack next and how they can most readily be stopped.
The bottom line is that motivations don't really matter much because they rarely indicate much about our future actions.
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posted
Rabbit, what of someone who kills to protect their family? You know they'll kill again to protect their family, yet doesn't their motivation somehow make their behavior 'better' than someone who just kills for pleasure, or for money?
On another level, it doesn't matter to the person who has been killed what the killer's motivation was. Whether the killer's motivation could be deemed moral or amoral, the one who is killed is still just as dead.
I don't disagree with what you're saying. Motivation is important when trying to predict behaviors. I'd just like to point out that there are other measures to use when discussing the importance of motivation on either a personal or social scale.
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posted
If a person kills for money, they are likely to kill again to get money. This behavior is very disruptive to the orderly functioning of society and therefore serious.
If someone kills to protect their family, they are likely to kill again if their family is threatened again. If someone is a real threat to the lives of their families, then society is being disrupted. It could therefore be argued that defending anyone from an unjust attack, helped stabilize society rather than disrupt it.
If it is certain that person A will kill person B. Then my decision of whether or not to kill person A, is not a decision of whether or not someone will die but a decision of who will die. That makes it fundamentally different from me deciding to kill person A because he is taking my money or because I don't like the way he looks.
The whole problem with "self defense" or "defense of the innocent" is that we can never be certain that person A will kill unless we intervene and we can never be certain that killing person A is the only form of intervention that will save B's life. So we are never dealing with certainty, we are dealing with motivation.
Consider two cases:
case 1: Individual A enters my home and points a gun at my spouses head.
case 2: Individual A routinely sneers at my spouse and I believe he is planning to run him down with his SUV someday.
In either scenario, I have the same nominal motivation to kill person A. I want to protect my husband from him. But in any court of law, case 1 would be considered defense and case 2 would be considered either 1st degree murder of insanity.
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posted
What you're saying makes sense. I just want to point out that you didn't put
quote: This behavior is very disruptive to the orderly functioning of society and therefore serious.
this in in your last response. So, it's not *just* predictive abilities. We also factor in whether or not the behavior contributes to the 'stability' of 'society'. The utilitarian argument. It then only becomes a question of the individual deciding what the definitions of 'stability' and 'society' are.
To go back to the person pointing a gun at your spouse's head. When you kill them, do you care what their motivation is? No. It doesn't matter to *you*. On this level, the personal one, motivation is entirely irrelevant in both the moral and predictive senses.
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quote:To go back to the person pointing a gun at your spouse's head. When you kill them, do you care what their motivation is? No. It doesn't matter to *you*. On this level, the personal one, motivation is entirely irrelevant in both the moral and predictive senses.
But his motivation does matter once he communicates those motives.
If he says, "Your husband has threatened my family on several occasions." You have been placed in a moral dilemma.
If he says, "I just feel like killing someone today." Then your burden of self-guilt will be much less.
To me, motives are everything. In fact, I value them much more than the end result of the action. I believe that motive allows us the freedom to forgive ourselves and our neighbors. It is the source of hope in the face of repeated failure.
Motivation tells us that the surgeon who loses a patient is not a murderer and the firemen who died at the WTC did not commit suicide.
posted
I love the people that I love for who they are to me. If someone kills them, I will be just as heartbroken whether *that* person *believes* they are 'justified' or not. I doubt I would ever believe their justification, and even so, if I had to choose between having a dead loved one with an 'honorable' character or a dishonorable loved one with serious character flaws, I will choose the live person.
The point that I am trying to make is that I think some things are beyond rational feeling or choice. You speak of a moral dillema as if the heart can choose, yet I doubt this is the reality for most people. I think it would be a cold blooded, unfeeling person who would *believe* the killer of their mother or husband after they shot them that their beloved was a bad person that *needed* to die. Their love would be the confines in which they solved their 'moral dilema', not 'objective moral reality'.
posted
Acting on adrenaline and emotion, sure, you will choose the person you love over the immediate aggressor. But, when the aggressor is lying on the floor, what then?
Do you approve of the person you see in the mirror?
The motives of the aggressor will certainly have an effect on how you feel about your actions, yet you will forgive yourself because you know your own motives were to protect someone you love.
True, motive won't change the fact that someone is dead, but it will effect the quality of life for those who survive.
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posted
I'm not sure we're talking about the same thing. I'm speaking more of how people feel if either they or someone they love were to die. Perhaps I am misreading, but it seems like you are speaking of justification for killing someone.
I'm not saying motivation never matters. I'm only laying out occasions where it matters less, if at all. For instance, if I believe my loved one is innocent, and am not given proof otherwise, then it doesn't matter what other people believe the justification is for their death is, does it?
For myself, I will *always* love the people that I love, short of a revelation of some unspeakable character flaw on their behalf and even then, it would take footage of them engaged in that behavior for me to believe it, and even then, I would still love them on some level. I would still want them to be alive regardless of the justification that others used for their death. There might be some slight salve on my feelings in that I could say 'they died honorably' or 'their death was earned', but that is only on an intellectual level.
Let's just say that
quote: True, motive won't change the fact that someone is dead, but it will effect the quality of life for those who survive.
is more true for some people and not others (like me)?
Again, I'm not saying that justification isn't important. Far from it. I just want to point out that justification doesn't mean that there aren't other factors to consider before performing an action or judging something good or bad, or that it's even necessarily very relevant on a personal level. After all, it's pretty easy to justify pretty much anything, isn't it? You justify the death as needless. I justify it as needful. Who 'wins'? Does the person with the better justification really feel all that better? Who decides which justification is 'better'? The individual, that's who, and which way do you think *their* justification is going to go?
I hope I'm making sense in all of this. Posts: 13123 | Registered: Feb 2002
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posted
I don't think motivations matter, because motivations are so slippery and subjective anyway.
This sets up for a lot of hurt. If motivations don't matter, and people act like people always do (occasionally carelessly), then it means I see hurtful actions where none were intended. Since hurtful actions erode trust, it means there is a general level of trust in the world that dissapears.
On the other hand, how can you know someone's motivations? Isn't it better to take actions at face value, and work on that level.
Motivations are like theory. They only matter if you are working in the realm of theory, but in the realm of the practical, if you hurt someone, they are hurt no matter what the motivations were.
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posted
Kat- As I was falling asleep last night, my last thoughts were of motivations and Judas' kiss.
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And right after I was teasing someone for taking something I said sarcastically seriously. Serves me right! ![[Wink]](wink.gif)
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I want to elaborate on this a lot more, but I'm at work. Suffice to say that, in one sense, death and hurt are always absolutes. They are always going to be painful to those they directly effect and those people who care about them. This is why, for instance, I disagree to some degree with OSC when he talks about moral stupidity in one of his recent columns. 
