What are your personal moral principles?

[Jason Harvestdancer]

It's not a rephrasing, it actually isn't even the same rule. It is two different rules with similar phrasing. One is a prohibition, the other a mandate. You cannot rephrase a prohibition into a mandate or vice-versa. There is no trick of semantics that can turn one into the other.

Your "better rule" though, it is a third rule and not a very good one. It counts on you knowing what they would not have you do unto them.

[Alcoholic Actuary]

I think I've posted these before:

1) Does this action deceive anyone or allow anyone to be deceived?
2) Does this action gain or allow the gain of privilege or advantage to which I or someone else might not otherwise be entitled?
3) Would I be unsatisfied with the outcome if I were on the receiving end of this action?

If I can answer yes to any of the above, then I question the behavior and activity in which I'm engaging.

aa

[Loren Pechtel]

I think I've posted these before:

1) Does this action deceive anyone or allow anyone to be deceived?
2) Does this action gain or allow the gain of privilege or advantage to which I or someone else might not otherwise be entitled?
3) Would I be unsatisfied with the outcome if I were on the receiving end of this action?

If I can answer yes to any of the above, then I question the behavior and activity in which I'm engaging.

aa

These are too broad.

1) Magicians.

2) Getting a high score on a SAT or the like.

[Alcoholic Actuary]

I think I've posted these before:

1) Does this action deceive anyone or allow anyone to be deceived?
2) Does this action gain or allow the gain of privilege or advantage to which I or someone else might not otherwise be entitled?
3) Would I be unsatisfied with the outcome if I were on the receiving end of this action?

If I can answer yes to any of the above, then I question the behavior and activity in which I'm engaging.

aa

These are too broad.

1) Magicians.

2) Getting a high score on a SAT or the like.

I said I question my behavior, I don't automatically conclude that it is unprincipled. If I'm doing a magic trick with the intent to deceive someone for the wonderment of the deception, I'm sure the behavior is OK. If I'm doing it to swindle someone out of money then it's not.

I don't really follow you on the SAT score. If I studied hard and did well on my SATs then the privilege or advantage I get from a high score was entitled. If I cheated on my SATs then the high score wasn't entitled.

aa

[Loren Pechtel]

I think I've posted these before:

1) Does this action deceive anyone or allow anyone to be deceived?
2) Does this action gain or allow the gain of privilege or advantage to which I or someone else might not otherwise be entitled?
3) Would I be unsatisfied with the outcome if I were on the receiving end of this action?

If I can answer yes to any of the above, then I question the behavior and activity in which I'm engaging.

aa

These are too broad.

1) Magicians.

2) Getting a high score on a SAT or the like.

I said I question my behavior, I don't automatically conclude that it is unprincipled. If I'm doing a magic trick with the intent to deceive someone for the wonderment of the deception, I'm sure the behavior is OK. If I'm doing it to swindle someone out of money then it's not.

I don't really follow you on the SAT score. If I studied hard and did well on my SATs then the privilege or advantage I get from a high score was entitled. If I cheated on my SATs then the high score wasn't entitled.

aa

If you didn't get a high score you wouldn't be entitled to those benefits.

[Alcoholic Actuary]

I said I question my behavior, I don't automatically conclude that it is unprincipled. If I'm doing a magic trick with the intent to deceive someone for the wonderment of the deception, I'm sure the behavior is OK. If I'm doing it to swindle someone out of money then it's not.

I don't really follow you on the SAT score. If I studied hard and did well on my SATs then the privilege or advantage I get from a high score was entitled. If I cheated on my SATs then the high score wasn't entitled.

aa

If you didn't get a high score you wouldn't be entitled to those benefits.

Neither would anyone who didn't get a high score. If I get the benefits but didn't get a high score, then I'm on the receiving end of benefits to which I might not otherwise be entitled.

aa

[4321lynx]

All that has been said in this thread, and all the endless BS that is yet to come here, and elsewhere, is, as Rabbi(?) Hillel said "commentary" on the Golden Rule; a Rule that nobody human lives by all the time, the "nobody" including all of you, and me, and Hillel himself, and all the gods and prophets, and politicians and other MF's that were ever born or that man has ever invented or will invent, so "Go and Learn."

[fromderinside]

What ever happened to "aspire to" as a fundamental moral mode? Nobody lives by anything consistently. We do have intentions.

Oh, and man invented statistics to predict and explain models.

[4321lynx]

What ever happened to "aspire to" as a fundamental moral mode? Nobody lives by anything consistently. We do have intentions....

And hell is paved with good intentions....