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Most religions have a version of this idea...
#1

Most religions have a version of this idea...
As a standard for how to interact with others and to structure your ethics by, I especially like the idea of "treat others the way you want to be treated."  From what I've heard, many if not most religions have a version of this concept in their moral/ethical outlook.  Many other nonreligious philosophies gave also adopted a version of this concept, especially with regards to understanding empathy, and teaching it to our kids.

 

So with that in mind, go ahead and give your thoughts.  Do you agree with the idea, hate the idea?  See the benefits of it in society?  Ashamed at human nature that it even has to be taught and put effort in to act accordingly?  In general what are your thoughts on the concept of "treat others the way you want to be treated?"
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#2

Most religions have a version of this idea...
I think it's a great idea, or ideal, that most people have a very hard time living up to.

The problem with it is that it can be interpreted in different ways. People who want to be helped may help others if they can. People who want to be left alone will leave others alone. People who are polite will want others to be polite. People who are straightforward will want others to be straightforward. And so on. The religious use it as an excuse to try to convert others, since they see their religious beliefs as good for themselves.

I hate to think how the person who wants to kill himself might interpret it.
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#3

Most religions have a version of this idea...
Quote:"treat others the way you want to be treated."

That certainly explains the Crusades, the campaign against the Cathars, the Wars of the Reformation, the various ethnic cleansing activities of sunni and shia, the muslim-hindu massacres in india, etc., etc.


You could just as easily phrase your OP as "most religions are hypocritical bastards."
Robert G. Ingersoll : “No man with a sense of humor ever founded a religion.”
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#4

Most religions have a version of this idea...
I've heard theories of morals that suggest morality, right and wrong, arise out of the relationships implicit in being human, being conscious, being social, having shared interests, being able to imagine what the other is thinking, and so on. That right and wrong aren't some foreign substance removed from who we are, but that the basic structure of being human creates norms of behavior because we all share these things and because these things give rise to specific regularities that apply to us all. In that theory, the golden rule is not something that is debatable as to whether it is good or bad, but rather an invariant, a snapshot of the order inherent in the basic facts of human existence.
Mountain-high though the difficulties appear, terrible and gloomy though all things seem, they are but Mâyâ.
Fear not — it is banished. Crush it, and it vanishes. Stamp upon it, and it dies.


Vivekananda
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#5

Most religions have a version of this idea...
People had the idea before religions had the idea.
[Image: M-Spr20-Weapons-FEATURED-1-1200x350-c-default.jpg]
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#6

Most religions have a version of this idea...
I prefer:

Above all, do no harm.
[Image: color%5D%5Bcolor=#333333%5D%5Bsize=small%5D%5Bfont=T...ans-Serif%5D]
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#7

Most religions have a version of this idea...
(08-18-2021, 05:17 PM)Critic Wrote: As a standard for how to interact with others and to structure your ethics by, I especially like the idea of "treat others the way you want to be treated."  From what I've heard, many if not most religions have a version of this concept in their moral/ethical outlook.  Many other nonreligious philosophies gave also adopted a version of this concept, especially with regards to understanding empathy, and teaching it to our kids.

 

So with that in mind, go ahead and give your thoughts.  Do you agree with the idea, hate the idea?  See the benefits of it in society?  Ashamed at human nature that it even has to be taught and put effort in to act accordingly?  In general what are your thoughts on the concept of "treat others the way you want to be treated?"

In general, I think it's a good rule of thumb with some exceptions.  (eg, should someone who's suicidal treat others the way she wants to be treated?)

For the most part, it doesn't need to be taught.  In typical day-to-day affairs humans experience empathy on an instinctual level.  If we see someone injured and in pain, a subconscious part of our brains imagines feeling the same pain they're feeling, and we consequently will do what we can to ease or prevent injury to others.  But that instinct can be overridden in many ways, usually when dealing with perceived threats or rivals.  Sometimes these exceptions are justifiable (should this rule restrain reasonable self defense against someone who is actively trying to kill us?) and sometimes it very much isn't (see... well, pretty much every atrocity in human history).

Multiple civilizations had individuals explicating the idea over the span of about a millenium, seemingly independently.  My best guess (more armchair philosophizing than anything solid) is that this was necessitated by growing populations -- people were increasingly living in societies where they didn't know everyone in the society with them, and so had to think through the consequences of their actions when those consequences often wouldn't be visible enough to them for their empathy to kick in.  Societies that adopted this expanded instinct as a moral rule would thus tend to be more stable and healthier than those that didn't, and therefore tend to outcompete societies that didn't adopt it.  Alternatively, the most successful societies (in terms of growth and spread and advantages over their neighbors) which would most need it expressed as an explicit, abstract moral rule, rather than just getting by on innate and implicit instinctual empathy.  More abuses would create more people trying, for one reason or another, to explain why these abuses were wrong, creating more examples for people to generalize into an abstract rule and a larger audience eager to hear and spread that rule.  Either way, an increasing human population organized into increasingly large, complex, and expansive societies would create fertile ground for the idea to be spelled out explicitly and widely promulgated.

That some of the people abstracting and endorsing the rule should have been religious, or that religion should then have adopted the rule, suggests to me that the religions are at least as much products of their societies rather than products of any sort of divine encounters.  It's not as if the gods seem to think much of this rule in their own conduct... at least, not until the society worshiping that god adopts the rule, at which point the god often transforms, somehow, to obey it.  (As just one example, see the vicious old-testament god of the Pentateuch vs the self-sacrificing Jesus of... well, of some versions of Christianity.)

Many among the religious will then claim exclusive ownership of the idea on behalf of their particular religion, slander those not of their religion on the grounds that rejection of their religion overall constitutes rejection of the golden rule (or other simple, shared moral claims) specifically rather than say, rejection of the religion's supernatural claims and priestly authority.  On that basis of that slander they'll proceed to subject those dissenters to various forms of persecution, in horrific violation of the golden rule, without any comprehension of the irony inherent in that.  This, to my mind, says a great deal about religion.
"To surrender to ignorance and call it God has always been premature, and it remains premature today." - Isaac Asimov
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#8

Most religions have a version of this idea...
(08-18-2021, 06:19 PM)Dom Wrote: I prefer:

Above all, do no harm.

[Image: An_it_harm_none.jpg?1423695917]
Mountain-high though the difficulties appear, terrible and gloomy though all things seem, they are but Mâyâ.
Fear not — it is banished. Crush it, and it vanishes. Stamp upon it, and it dies.


Vivekananda
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#9

Most religions have a version of this idea...
Chimpanzees and other great apes frequently display "do unto others". They understand that if you don't treat other critters nice they will not want to be around you. This is the seeds of the ethics we have today, not a some ludicrous god in an unbelievable 'heaven'.
[Image: M-Spr20-Weapons-FEATURED-1-1200x350-c-default.jpg]
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#10

Most religions have a version of this idea...
I've treated my cat waaaaay better than I would want or expect to be treated.   However, as we all know, cats think they're a god and make slaves of us while dogs think we're a god and worship us.
                                                         T4618
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#11

Most religions have a version of this idea...
(08-18-2021, 05:17 PM)Critic Wrote: As a standard for how to interact with others and to structure your ethics by, I especially like the idea of "treat others the way you want to be treated."  From what I've heard, many if not most religions have a version of this concept in their moral/ethical outlook.  Many other nonreligious philosophies gave also adopted a version of this concept, especially with regards to understanding empathy, and teaching it to our kids.

 

So with that in mind, go ahead and give your thoughts.  Do you agree with the idea, hate the idea?  See the benefits of it in society?  Ashamed at human nature that it even has to be taught and put effort in to act accordingly?  In general what are your thoughts on the concept of "treat others the way you want to be treated?"

Reciprocity is one of the basis of all ethical system. You can hardly ask a group of people to cooperate and live together without such concept. The only ethical principle that managed to override it was purity and of course.
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#12

Most religions have a version of this idea...
“Religion is an insult to human dignity. With or without it, you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion.” (Steven Weinberg)  Consider
“I expect to pass this way but once; any good therefore that I can do, or any kindness that I can show to any fellow creature, let me do it now. Let me not defer or neglect it, for I shall not pass this way again.” (Etienne De Grellet)
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#13

Most religions have a version of this idea...
I think it's a bit of a deepity. Sounds great, hard to figure out what it's advocating beyond a basic sort of reciprocity. Share your cake, etc.

Not so great assumptions that seem implied would include that people have the same reactions and desire the same kind of treatment, and that people invariably treat themselves with kindness and care.
god, ugh
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#14

Most religions have a version of this idea...
(08-18-2021, 08:37 PM)julep Wrote: I think it's a bit of a deepity. Sounds great, hard to figure out what it's advocating beyond a basic sort of reciprocity. Share your cake, etc.

Not so great assumptions that seem implied would include that people have the same reactions and desire the same kind of treatment, and that people invariably treat themselves with kindness and care.

Simplistic "solutions" fail to quite cover the complexities of the world and the human experience? Who would've thunked it Deadpan Coffee Drinker

But hey, platitudes and nice-sounding sound bites are popular for a reason, I guess... they do seem appeal to... certain types of minds. Those which like reducing the complex to the basic or think in black and white, dualistic terms.
“We drift down time, clutching at straws. But what good's a brick to a drowning man?” 
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#15

Most religions have a version of this idea...
It's a decent concept but rarely followed, especially by the most fanatical religious types, which is partly what makes me so skeptical of religion.  Deadpan Coffee Drinker
“For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.” -Carl Sagan.
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#16

Most religions have a version of this idea...
I'm sure these scumbags are fine xtians.


[Image: ap335338568956_0.jpg]
Robert G. Ingersoll : “No man with a sense of humor ever founded a religion.”
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#17

Most religions have a version of this idea...
(08-18-2021, 05:17 PM)Critic Wrote: As a standard for how to interact with others and to structure your ethics by, I especially like the idea of "treat others the way you want to be treated."  From what I've heard, many if not most religions have a version of this concept in their moral/ethical outlook.  Many other nonreligious philosophies gave also adopted a version of this concept, especially with regards to understanding empathy, and teaching it to our kids.

 

So with that in mind, go ahead and give your thoughts.  Do you agree with the idea, hate the idea?  See the benefits of it in society?  Ashamed at human nature that it even has to be taught and put effort in to act accordingly?  In general what are your thoughts on the concept of "treat others the way you want to be treated?"

I agree this is a good concept especially to teach kids. It really just means "be kind and considerate". Be kind and considerate can be nebulous concepts to a 6 year old so it's easily boiled down to treat others the way you want to be treated. Nobody likes to be treated unkindly or to feel like they don't matter.

I've found that if adults need to be told this, oftentimes it means their their ability to get along in society is broken and somebody telling them the golden rule (especially a stranger online) won't make much difference.

-Teresa
There is in the universe only one true divide, one real binary, life and death. Either you are living or you are not. Everything else is molten, malleable.

-Susan Faludi, In the Darkroom
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#18

Most religions have a version of this idea...
(08-18-2021, 05:17 PM)Critic Wrote: As a standard for how to interact with others and to structure your ethics by, I especially like the idea of "treat others the way you want to be treated."  From what I've heard, many if not most religions have a version of this concept in their moral/ethical outlook.  Many other nonreligious philosophies gave also adopted a version of this concept, especially with regards to understanding empathy, and teaching it to our kids.

 

So with that in mind, go ahead and give your thoughts.  Do you agree with the idea, hate the idea?  See the benefits of it in society?  Ashamed at human nature that it even has to be taught and put effort in to act accordingly?  In general what are your thoughts on the concept of "treat others the way you want to be treated?"

Hardly surprising given that it's a basic requirement for a stable society. Equally unsurprising that every religion applies it only to the in group. A quick read through any scripture shows just how zealously almost every religion will do unto the infidels what no sane person would do to a rabid dog.
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#19

Most religions have a version of this idea...
It's a great idea, as long as one is not being sermonized/told by some pedantic patronizing critic that we need to be told how to act by someone who apparently needs to sermonize to stay alive, and prove to himself and everyone else, he holds the moral high-ground.

Looking at the gigantic failures we see publicly in the world of people who are supposed to be ethical, (ie religious leaders) maybe religions should be avoided if one wants to ethical.

I've studied Ethics a lot, and sit on the Ethics Committee where I work. The idea that Ethics as practiced practically, or the study of Ethics belongs somehow to the religious is false.
The gods are not necessary to lead an ethical life, and many, if not most of the prominent ethicists today are in no way related to any religious organization.
Test
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#20

Most religions have a version of this idea...
(08-18-2021, 11:16 PM)Minimalist Wrote: I'm sure these scumbags are fine xtians.


[Image: ap335338568956_0.jpg]

Looks like Westboro Baptist peoples.
[Image: M-Spr20-Weapons-FEATURED-1-1200x350-c-default.jpg]
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#21

Most religions have a version of this idea...
(08-18-2021, 05:17 PM)Critic Wrote: As a standard for how to interact with others and to structure your ethics by, I especially like the idea of treat others the way you want to be treated...

Islam is the second largest religion in the world, at 25%,  and it certainly doesn't
attest to that. It's all about stoning criminals, subjugating women and girls, oppressing
minorities, ethnic cleansing, social prohibitions, killing all religious infidels, destroying
Western society, brutally enforcing its laws etc.

Even the Abrahamic bible fails to always practice compassion towards others...

Leviticus 20:13  —If a man lies with a male as with a woman, both of them have
committed an abomination; they shall surely be put to death; their blood is upon them.

1 Samuel 15:3  —Now go and strike Amalek and devote to destruction all that they
have. Do not spare them, but kill both man and woman, child and infant, ox and sheep,
camel and donkey.

Exodus 21:12  —Whoever strikes a man so that he dies shall be put to death.

Leviticus 20:27  —A man or a woman who is a medium or a necromancer shall surely
be put to death. They shall be stoned with stones; their blood shall be upon them.

Exodus 22:19  —Whoever lies with an animal shall be put to death.

Leviticus 20:10  —If a man commits adultery with the wife of his neighbor, both the
adulterer and the adulteress shall surely be put to death.

Jeremiah 50:21-22 —Go up against the land of Merathaim, and against the inhabitants
of Pekod. Kill, and devote them to destruction, declares the Lord, and do all that I have
commanded you.

Matthew 10:34 —Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I have not
come to bring peace, but a sword.
I'm a creationist;   I believe that man created God.
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#22

Most religions have a version of this idea...
Islam says there's only one thing you can do with your left hand, that is to wipe one's ass. Traditional punishment for thieves was to cut off the right hand.
[Image: M-Spr20-Weapons-FEATURED-1-1200x350-c-default.jpg]
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#23

Most religions have a version of this idea...
(08-19-2021, 10:46 AM)SYZ Wrote:
(08-18-2021, 05:17 PM)Critic Wrote: As a standard for how to interact with others and to structure your ethics by, I especially like the idea of treat others the way you want to be treated...

Islam is the second largest religion in the world, at 25%,  and it certainly doesn't
attest to that. It's all about stoning criminals, subjugating women and girls, oppressing
minorities, ethnic cleansing, social prohibitions, killing all religious infidels, destroying
Western society, brutally enforcing its laws etc.

Even the Abrahamic bible fails to always practice compassion towards others...

Leviticus 20:13  —If a man lies with a male as with a woman, both of them have
committed an abomination; they shall surely be put to death; their blood is upon them.

1 Samuel 15:3  —Now go and strike Amalek and devote to destruction all that they
have. Do not spare them, but kill both man and woman, child and infant, ox and sheep,
camel and donkey.

Exodus 21:12  —Whoever strikes a man so that he dies shall be put to death.

Leviticus 20:27  —A man or a woman who is a medium or a necromancer shall surely
be put to death. They shall be stoned with stones; their blood shall be upon them.

Exodus 22:19  —Whoever lies with an animal shall be put to death.

Leviticus 20:10  —If a man commits adultery with the wife of his neighbor, both the
adulterer and the adulteress shall surely be put to death.

Jeremiah 50:21-22 —Go up against the land of Merathaim, and against the inhabitants
of Pekod. Kill, and devote them to destruction, declares the Lord, and do all that I have
commanded you.

Matthew 10:34 —Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I have not
come to bring peace, but a sword.

Islam has it's own version as well.  "Not one of you truly believe until you wish for others what you wish for yourself."  

As for the rest when it comes to justice in each religion or even divine judgement sort of thing, that is a counter point, but it us also explainable based on the outlook of the religion and it's set of rules/rational.
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#24

Most religions have a version of this idea...
I found an image that has a quote from several religions around the world with their phrasing of the golden rule.  Does anyone know how to post an image?
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#25

Most religions have a version of this idea...
(08-19-2021, 05:10 PM)Critic Wrote: Islam has it's own version as well.  "Not one of you truly believe until you wish for others what you wish for yourself."  

As for the rest when it comes to justice in each religion or even divine judgement sort of thing, that is a counter point, but it us also explainable based on the outlook of the religion and it's set of rules/rational.

Religions are full of contradictions and rationalizations.  It's human nature to try to make sense of such things, especially if you have something you think is divine to try to justify.
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