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politicophile · 02-22-2007, 10:31 AM

This question essentially boils down to semantics. It is certainly the case that we (as a society) would not refer to good things as "good" in the absence of the things we now consider to be evil. The terms are relative, as Roachboy said. Even so, I don't understand why good actions would cease to be good actions simply because we no longer recognized them as such, unless...

The second consideration is how it would come to be possible for only good actions to be performed. This could become the state of affairs if human action became determined and we had no choice but to perform "good" acts. In the absence of meaningful choice, the good acts accomplish no less good than before, but the agent deserves no moral praise for his "good" action, so it looks like the label of goodness might itself be misplaced in this example.

The other possibility is that humans might always freely choose to do good. But again, this requires that at least the possibility of evil exists, even if evil itself does not. In this scenerio, good actions would still be morally praiseworthy because the agent could have chosen otherwise.

In sum, linguistic terms do not generally refer to properties possessed by everything, as these terms would essentially be useless. If every existent thing is voon, the term voon is a useless descriptor. Likewise, if everything in the world is good, the linguistic terms of good and evil would no longer be used. Whether that entails the demise of "Goodness Itself" is another question, and not a particularly well-defined one at that.

02-22-2007, 10:31 AM	#15 (permalink)
politicophile Addict	This question essentially boils down to semantics. It is certainly the case that we (as a society) would not refer to good things as "good" in the absence of the things we now consider to be evil. The terms are relative, as Roachboy said. Even so, I don't understand why good actions would cease to be good actions simply because we no longer recognized them as such, unless... The second consideration is how it would come to be possible for only good actions to be performed. This could become the state of affairs if human action became determined and we had no choice but to perform "good" acts. In the absence of meaningful choice, the good acts accomplish no less good than before, but the agent deserves no moral praise for his "good" action, so it looks like the label of goodness might itself be misplaced in this example. The other possibility is that humans might always freely choose to do good. But again, this requires that at least the possibility of evil exists, even if evil itself does not. In this scenerio, good actions would still be morally praiseworthy because the agent could have chosen otherwise. In sum, linguistic terms do not generally refer to properties possessed by everything, as these terms would essentially be useless. If every existent thing is voon, the term voon is a useless descriptor. Likewise, if everything in the world is good, the linguistic terms of good and evil would no longer be used. Whether that entails the demise of "Goodness Itself" is another question, and not a particularly well-defined one at that. __________________ The peculiar evil of silencing the expression of an opinion is, that it is robbing the human race; posterity as well as the existing generation; those who dissent from the opinion, still more than those who hold it. If the opinion is right, they are deprived of the opportunity of exchanging error for truth: if wrong, they lose, what is almost as great a benefit, the clearer perception and livelier impression of truth, produced by its collision with error. ~John Stuart Mill, On Liberty