this post was submitted on 13 Apr 2025
50 points (96.3% liked)
collapse of the old society
1229 readers
2 users here now
to discuss news and stuff of the old world dying
founded 3 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
I'd say we have the general duty to help those in need since we're living on the same planet. This idea of escapism, that I can build a bunker and hide from the poor destitute masses until they die off, is morally reprehensible. We have a duty to 1) not do that and 2) work together to limit, mitigate, and possibly reverse the damages of climate change so life is alright for the maximum number of people.
How's that sound to you?
I don't follow. Why does the fact that we're living on the same planet mean that we have a general duty to help those in need?
Why?
Why?
Oh you must be new to Earth. Welcome! So humans have been doing this thing called reciprocity, which is a mutual or cooperative interchange of favors or privileges. That means if you help someone, they're likely to help you when you're in need.
What you're talking about doesn't sound like duty.
Regardless, you haven't explained why you believe reciprocity is a duty.
These are not easy questions for the average person to answer, and I'm woefully average. I'm going to take the lazy approach and refer you to a real philosopher. Look up Peter Singer. If you have further questions, then I'd recommend starting from the ground up in a philosophy 101 course, maybe sprinkle some religious studies in there, and don't forget eastern philosophy/religion. That should bring you up to speed.
Pfft.
LOL that's very presumptuous.
Sooo... do you think you don't have any duty to your fellow humans?
You didn't answer my question.
Why?
Survival of the human species.
Which should be an extention of your own personal will to survive if you are not a sociopath, narciccist, or suicidally depressed.
The entire history of human civilization has pretty much only moved forward when we worked together with like minded goals.
This is because the power and skill one person can obtain will always be dwarfed by the power and skill obtainable by hundreds or thousands. Even the most impossible problems to solve, like landing on the Moon without computers, has been conquered through the collective will and skill of our species. But rarely, if ever, by an individual.
During the industrial age, the goal of working together was the improvement of our livelihoods and well being. Now in the information age, it's about survival.
No Billionaire has the skill or power to stop climate change.
But enough of us together do. Unquestionably.
Unless you only care about yourself and can't see the benefits of what working towards a goal that isn't your own can bring.
No offense, but your argument is that of a rich white liberal that's too insulated by money to bother reading about the overwhelming economic benefits of things like taxes, and regulations.
Basically, in case you didn't know - as someone else mentioned - you live in the same world as everyone else.
And what that means is that this world very much has an effect on your day to day life in what opportunities and options it provides you. All of which are not at all decided by you.
The quality of institutions, education, healthcare, and security you have access to are directly related to the skills and efforts of the hundreds of people running them. Not yours.
You will be better educated, have a better job, and have better health in these communities because these are things ONLY others can provide YOU.
So working towards improving these jobs, and the people doing them, also allows you access to that improvement. When a communities environment improves for all in it, that certainly includes you.
That's the short of it - but unfortunately we live in a world where billionaires have decided that's just all bullshit instead of accepted science with hundreds of years of validated experiments in sociology, economics, and anthropology to confirm.
So now because of the actions of billionaires who have been taking from all our communities for the benefit of themselves - we are now ALL in the same prisoners dillema. They have created an environment for us all where we only have the following choices:
A) Be too distracted by the firehouse of social media bullshit to do anything. B) Be a coward and convince yourself to do nothing. C) Work together to combine resources and prevent our own extinction.
Billionaires are actively working towards our own existential demise, so you are either choosing to fight against that or do nothing to let them kill us all.
So to answer WHY:
It's so the future is one where your kids are happy instead of living as slaves in a dying world. Your inaction guarantees the later result.
Bonus: everyone becomes happier when working towards a better future if you ever decide to try.
I love your answer, but I think you just overfed the troll.
Thanks! And appreciate it.
I'm more trying to trap the troll with bait than just feed it.
While I was honest about what I said, it leaves the troll with no place to go that isn't morally reprehensible.
So they'll either stop, or continue on with some shallow belief that the value of human life can be quantified. The conversation ends there eitherway 👍
I haven't made an argument.
The statement that I responded to was about all humans, regardless of whether they are parents. Your answer is limited to parents only. You haven't answered why non-parents have a duty.
Then why are you saying I'm wrong? About what? What point are you defending if you never made one?
These are not rhetorical questions.
Playing pin the tail on your point isn't a game others should be playing for you. Say what you're thinking out loud, or it isn't worth saying.
Because this:
Is completely wrong.
My answer is limited to family. Children of which were the best example. However, any human can be your family. Adoption, Friendship, and close relationships all form the bonds that can make up a family. And helping better our families helps better their own environment which in turns helps others. No human relationship requires a biological componant for you to be in their family.
So my answer is indeed for all humans.
You're either a troll or an edge lord that's too young to understand their own Temu version of nihilism.
Literally open any book on morality, read it, then ask yourself why humans are compelled to feel "right" about what they are doing.
They want to feel that way because we are social animals who are biologically compelled to help each other. Which strengthens our communities, and therefore our lives in them. We even evolved to release dopamine in our brains when what we are doing for that community feels "right" aka morality.
This works for all humans (except sociopaths.)
Helping other humans literally makes you feel good, and improves the quality of the community you live in for a better future. The closer you feel to that community (family) the better you feel when helping them.
There you go. All humans.
And why we should treat each other well due to our basic biology (it makes you feel good) and improves of our own futures and that of our families.
Looking forward to hearing about how this is still wrong when compared to the point you've never made.
I haven't said that.
You said "your kids".
You didn't say any of that. In fact, your comment didn't contain the word "family" once. You've changed your tune.
Regardless:
Why does one have a duty to improve one's own future or the future of one's family?
That's what my second comment saying just that was for.
You didn't understand my original point (and still don't).
Which is why I made a second comment explaining that you can ctrl+F for "children" and replace it with "family" to better understand my point.
The answer to your question can be found in multitudes of philosophy, ethics, and biology books. I encourage you to read them instead of trolling here for the sake of your own ego.
Because this question of yours:
Has an obvious answer. One that you can reach by asking similarly obvious questions.
"Why does one have a duty to eat?"
Or breath?
Or sleep?
Survival. That's why. Without eating, sleeping, or breathing you die. Without a community to help provide security for these things, you also die. (Unless you want to tell me humans aged 0-8 are expected to survive if yeeted into the wild? I sincerely doubt you would too despite being older)
Survival is a BIOS level operating function of everything living.
And the same point I first made along with everyone else that you will continue to ignore.
So it's not so much a "duty," as a biological compulsion similar to being hungry. Making us all want to survive, and eventually thrive for a happy life. And the only way that happens is if we work to maintain or improve our environment. (Like eating when you're hungry). Our own biology pushes us to do that through internal reward mechanisms that spiral out into a feedback loop of prosperity. Like when you body tells you something tastes good, and you want to share that taste with a friend.
Your question implies an unsaid argument that is essentially the fast food equivalent of nihilism. That humans don't matter, and our lives are meaningless.
No offense, but you are either too young or too far up your own ass if you think you're on to anything new with your question. It's been answered hundreds of times throughout history by people far smarter than us, and I'm not going to hold your hand through understanding something you are clearing saying just because you want to feel special when saying it rather than learn an actual answer.
If you want to feel that life is meaningless, go right ahead. But stop pretending that you can't give it meaning yourself. I've given you the basic biological one, you're gonna have to open a book if you want the rest.
All of:
were about duty.
Whatever you're talking about, it isn't an answer to any of my questions because you're not talking about duty.
The definition of "duty" fits my point perfectly, unless you want to explain it how it doesn't.
Firstly, you haven't given a definition of "duty".
Secondly, you just said it's not a duty, now you're saying it is a duty. Please sort your shit out.
Second definition from Google / dictionary:
Duty - a task or action that someone is required to perform.
"the queen's official duties"
Or in the way I used it:
The "human biological duties" we all have specifically required for human survival.
You brought up the importance of "duty" and how it's something my point didn't fit, but the responsibility of defining it was up to you. Yet you failed to provide a definition, just like you've failed to say literally anything this whole conversation.
I knew you'd fail to define "duty" which would allow me to provide it in turn and fully prove my point. Which I just did.
So now you're fucked.
You're clearly incapable of admitting fault, listening, or forming a coherent concept that isn't just your opinion disguised as questions.
All you can do now is split hairs (look that one up yourself) so your next response will be to move the goalposts of your question somewhere else you feel you can still be right.
Lemme guess - another definition of duty? Maybe a weaker one you will claim you really meant, but clearly just failed to provide in the first place and now are just scrambling back to?
Or, you really are just a boring troll who gives zero fucks and will now say your question has nothing to do with duty after forgetting how hard you just really went in on that being the key part of the argument you never made.
There's another option you could take: Your question has been answered in full.
Which is very much what a reasonable person would do at this point. But it's pretty clear that's not what this conversation is actually about for you anymore.
This I can understand.
This, which you've made up, I don't understand. It doesn't make sense to me. "Biological duties" seems like a contradiction in terms. In fact it sounds ridiculous. And there's no logical connection between the definition of "duty" you gave above and this undefined term "human biological duties" which you've introduced. If it's in line with your previous expositions about family, then it is in fact distinct from the definition of "duty" you gave and incoherent.
Regardless, whatever it is you're talking about doesn't seem like what the authors of the article were talking about or what I was asking about. So again, consistently, it seems like we're talking about different things. In fact it's looking more and more like you're just reaching and trying to shoe-horn the subject that you want to talk about into this discussion.
My first attempt at explaining "biological duty" was through an analogy.
Breathing. Shitting. Pretty obvious tasks your body has a "biological duty" to perform without your consent if you are to survive.
If your heart stops beating, you die If you don't breath, you die.
Are you personally choosing to make your body do these things at all times?
No. Your body is doing it for you (regrettably).
Why is your body doing that?
My answer: It's because our genetic code evolved to have a duty to preserve our existence.
You answer: shrug emoji
If you want to insist that you can't understand what I mean when I say "biological duty" then you're gonna have to explain how your heart beats without you thinking about it.
Because frankly, at this point, I'd love for you to be right about me making up "biological duty" when it comes to your body and the heart that keeps it going.
Whether you want it to or not, your body is forcing you to preserve yourself. Which is a basic concept in biology, and readily observable in all living things if you ever bothered to go outside.
First result from Google:
So to put it all back in context for you to obstinately refuse to consider:
You aren't the reason your heart beats. You aren't the reason you get hungry. You aren't the reason you feel lonely.
That's your body.
It does its own thing to guarantee your survival. Whether you want it to or not. Which is why it's considered a "duty." In the biology books I previously mentioned you need to read, this is defined as your bodies "biological duty" of self preservation.
All humans have it. Whether you understand it or not, you have it too.
It forces you to eat. It forces you to breath. It forces you to sleep. But more importantly, it forces you to build an environment where you can obtain these things in the future too.
Birds build nests. Beavers build dams. Humans build small familial communities.
These provide you with food when your body can't. These provide you with a place to sleep if you have none.
Ever feel lonely? Yeah, that's your bodies way of telling you you're "hungry" for socialization. Socialization that when developed enough, can provide you reproductive options, and food / shelter security.
Your body wants you to meet other humans to guarantee your survival. Your body wants you to help these people as that both increase your chances they will help you survive, and bonus, releases a fuck load of dopamine to make you feel good.
So:
Everyones bodies, regardless of their control over it, compels them to survive and to help other humans due the same - which over time, creates groups of people helping each other mutually beyond what they are capable of providing themselves. This grouping can be a family, or any other grouping of humans as I previously mentioned.
At scale, this means all humans are working to benefit themselves and others. Which in turn benefits the species as a whole.
So if you are human, your DNA is literally programmed with an unavoidable duty to preserve you and other humans as far as it possibly can.
If you occupy a human body, then that body is programmed with a biological duty to preserve you and other humans.
Unless you are:
A) Depressed B) Sociopath C) Sourrounded by wealth C) Not human
This is the same answer I've always provided. It is a very simple and widely accepted answer to the questions you have asked.
If you want an answer, you now have one.
But you don't want an answer. You just want to feel special about something ignorant you thought of, never defined, never researched, and now clearly can't back down from.
Right so this is a different concept to the definition of "duty" you gave previously. So again, we're talking about different things.
Which isn't an answer to my question. I asked about duty, not about "biological duty".
It isn't.
Please explain the difference between both to prove it.
I provided an analogy. Which doesn't contradict anything.
I also already provided the definition of what an analogy is so I could mention it now.
Because your ignorance is very predictable.
I also accurately guessed you'd be backpedaling to saying there's a seperate concept of duty.
And here we are.
Next up - you refusing to explain your own claimed differences between the concepts of duty.
The problem isn't my answer. It's your willful ignorance to understand it.
Simply put:
Explain how these are different. Otherwise they aren't.
ROFL
ROFL: Retarded Or Fucking Lonely. In your case, I think it's both.
LOL
Clowns like you are pretty funny. Especially when they laugh at themselves being the punchline. Really curious how long it's gonna take you to realize it.
NO U!
Still waiting.
I love how you're essentially "just asking questions" the concept of helping other people. This is where we're at in the year of our lord 2025.
My question isn't about helping other people. My question is about duty.
Are you taking specific fault with the idea of "duty" or do you genuinely just not think that moral obligations are real?
Either way, "why should we be motivated to act ethically" is a pretty mammoth question for a PHD thesis to answer, let alone a comment on lemmy.
I think it seems fair, that even if you don't accept ethical obligations to each other exist, then it's at least a widespread enough and accepted notion, that it's hardly controversial to include it in the article as assumed.
I want to understand why someone believes that I have a duty. To anyone. Or anything.
Surely you'll trolling? You must get that people are here to talk about some politicial commentary, and you're saying "well, I'm not convinced in the concept of duty". It's like turning up to an astrinomy club and saying "you can't prove these stars aren't a dream of mine!".
If you're genuinely interested, then there's a bumch of philosophy under the category "meta-ethics". Would massively recommend J L Mackie's "Ethics: Inventing Right and Wrong".
You seem to be a bit off on one. Your analogy doesn't make sense. Someone posted an opinion article which contained a statement that I questioned. Other people responded to my questioning. Discussion ensued. Seems pretty normal and expected to me. It seems like the misunderstanding is on your part.