Are people fundamentally good or not?

[Blastoise Fortooate]

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Started because I noticed this debate starting in another thread.

Me, I try to take the positive outlook. Pschology is complicated, but I think that people mostly learn by example, so we're basically neutral until we're taught one way or the other.

 

[Notoriously Unknown]

It depends on the person. Like Blastoise said, we remain neurtral untill a person we spend a lot of time with changes this. A pesimist will make more pessimists. An optimist will make more optimists.
I do think we are born to be bad though. Nobody has to teach us how to do wrong, but we have to be taught how to be good by our locations standards. BAD TO THE BONE. >:D

 

[Zoltea]

They're good usually, Most of them are just lazy, don't give a care about anyone else, etc.

 

[Departure Song]

People are inherently focused on themselves.

 

[ultraviolet]

well as beings I don't think humans are fundamentally good or bad, they're who they are and what consititutes as 'good' or 'bad' is totally relative depending on your own personal values. For example, western culture perceives confidence and assertiveness as a good trait (mostly), while in eastern culture it's seen as threatening to be particularly assertive and straight-to-the-point. There are completely different moral codes that everybody follows, whether that's personally or culture-wise, and even if you do come up with ideas for what's good and bad it's probably going to conflict with someone else's views.

Then there's the fact that while you are biologically born with hereditary traits like mental illnesses, you're still raised by Role Model X, whether that's mums, dads, grandparents, etc and their attitudes are probably going to be learned and accepted by you until you're pre-pubescent, when you start forming and questioning your own identity.
I mean any actual reasonable testing into this whole 'your parents form your ideals/personality' thing is at best unethical; all the cool psychological research just doesn't get done any more, so we have to rely on stuff pre-1960's.

but I think that people mostly learn by example, so we're basically neutral until we're taught one way or the other.

This has some truth; Bandura's social learning theory basically goes that you behaviours that are perceived as beneficial to you from other people.

 

[Jetx]

People are inherently focused on themselves.

This.

People do what makes them feel good, or what stops them feeling bad. I think that pretty much covers it. You can't really say whether people are fundamentally good or bad, but they are selfish.

 

[Tarvos]

I think people are genetically inclined to be selfish but because we are sentient human beings can eventually become morally altruistic. Though even altruism is self-beneficial in some ways.

 

[Dannichu]

Adding to what uv said, "good" and "evil" are not only culturally relative but also completely abstract (and very human) ideas. Can we actually define "good"? I think "Are people fundamentally selfish/altruistic?" might be a better topic name, although I think it wouldn't be much of debate, given how it's almost universally agreed-upon that human nature is, well, pretty self-serving.

 

[Espeon]

I don't believe people are what we would define as "good". They're not "bad" as such but I generally see most people with qualities we would consider "bad" than "good". Marginally, but one still outweighs the other.

I believe that people in modern societies are selfish but only because that's the way society operates. If the human race as a whole were to operate with less focus on personal gain, whether it be who has the nicest house, the most money in their bank account and the best job, then people as a whole would indeed be less selfish.

 

[Tarvos]

It's just like... well, take an ethical viewpoint and duke it out really.

 

[GameFreakerZero]

People are fundamentally blank slates upon which behaviour and morality are formed.

 

[Music Dragon]

It may help to understand human affairs to be clear that most of the great triumphs and tragedies of history are caused, not by people being fundamentally good or fundamentally bad, but by people being fundamentally people.

 

[PokeNinja]

People do what they think is right, more often than not good for themselves.
But I am a pessimist...
That means I believe that most people usually turn for the worse anyway...

 

[President Michael Wilson]

If people were fundamentally good the world would be free from violence and all that stuff.

 

[Departure Song]

If people were fundamentally good the world would be free from violence and all that stuff.

Not really. "Good" is subjective.

 

[EvilCrazyMonkey]

People are neither fundamentally good nor bad. People fundamentally try to be good. For example, Hitler thought he was doing the world a favor by getting rid of its "scum." Very greedy people (such as those who conducted that multimillion dollar scam) don't see that taking money is a bad thing and don't see poverty as a bad thing; they only see the benefit of themselves. (This argument kind of fits in with the "people are generally selfish" argument in the cases of greedy people.)
This is why people help other people. Extremely cold and bitter people don't see the harshness of what they do, and they see good in their "benefit" of not interacting with others.

The inherent "goodness" of people really depends on how they view the world. When people see benefit for anyone (although usually themselves), they will try to make that benefit happen.

 

[pcbby]

Good and bad are subjective. They change; what is good can become evil and what is bad can become good. Slavery used to be commonplace, now it's something that is obviously looked down upon.

But pushing that aside and taking into account today's good and evil, people can never be one or the other. Trying to put people into one category or the other is stupid. People are not black and white, they are grey. The kind and loving mother looks down upon the beat up homeless man laying on the sidewalk.

The people who we do mark as "bad" or "good" are only that way because of our mindsets. The male psychopath who bankrupts lonely women doesn't think he's bad because in his mind, they're getting their money's worth. He gives them love and is able to get by day after day.

It's also silly to be too pessimistic or optimistic about people. No one will be a saint and no one will be a devil. Many people seem too caught up on the means rather than the ends. The man who saved people from say, a burning bus, might of been running on an adrenaline rush or just did it for the adventure of it rather than save people's lives. A juvenile delinquent might stop their criminal activities because it's far too much trouble as opposed to it being morally wrong.

ahem, yes, well, people are grey. No matter what, they're grey.

 

[Zhorken]

No, people aren't fundamentally good or not. Trying to decide boils down to useless semantic nitpicking.

EDIT: this is assuming we're arguing over whether the human mind is geared to be good or bad, and not whether we're good with bad bits or bad with good bits

 

[Harlequin]

People are fundamentally selfish. Whether this selfishness causes us to do "good" things or not depends on how you look at it.

 

[1. Luftballon]

Is the concept of good fundamental in the first place?