Ask HN: Does each individual have a social duty to better themselves? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Does each individual have a social duty to better themselves?

8 pointsdesertraven18 comments

All collective issues require individual action. Whether that action be a change in behavior (climate change) or a change in mindset (critical thinking).

I wonder if it follows that each individual has a duty to others to always develop themselves? We see this "duty" pop up in a economic or political sense - "study and get a good job"/"serve your country".

Only in religious, spiritual or philosophical texts do I see any reference to a duty to be morally/ethically better.

Why hasn't duty for individual progress and betterment become prevalent in society?

View on HN

Does duty make you a better consumer? Does it make you take on personal debt? Does it make you subscribe to more services? Do you increase anyone's MRR by being dutiful?

Does self development improve the bottom line? Can I sell you as many pharmaceuticals if you get into good shape? Can I sell you as many therapies if you get your mind in order? Can I sell you as many recreational substances if you have fewer things to avoid?

The incentives structure in modern society no longer instills these values because they do not produce the ideal consumer.

I do see that. I wonder the effect of all advertising replaced with wellness advice and encouragement.

Do you see any path to a society that does prioritise these values?

Such a path has to start from a set of core, reinforcing values. We often see such things in the form of religion, though I don't think that's a hard requirement; merely a natural formation that serves as a fertile place for the kind of conversations and decisions and commitments that need to be made for such a thing to happen.

The values then have to extend their way out to action; this comes in the form of positive action (pushing the new message in art and media and society, proselytizing and getting converts, debating and contrasting and encouraging dialogue) and negative action (enforcing restrictions, clamping down on things that have been marked as undesirable).

Success in this kind of effort is informed by many factors, from the raw aesthetic of the set of values and the artifacts created around it, to the willingness of adherents to sacrifice and prioritize the cause above themselves. We sometimes see this kind of thing in fledgling political movements... and sometimes in cults. Fine line between the two!

Imagine such a group got power with their message: they would have competition, and it would take a lot of work. There's a choice here: either draconian control over information (and all the negatives that go with it), or consciousness raising in amongst the population. The latter is harder, takes more time, but ultimately is the way to do this kind of thing while preserving freedom: we need to personally, individually reject negative content and work towards self-improvement and improvement in the aggregate.

You can imagine that when one side is selling sex, drugs, and rock-n-roll and your side is selling duty and self improvement, you're going to have a hard fight. In fact, this is the kind of thing that the Moral Majority and its predecessors thought that they were doing, in decades past; opining for moderate censorship in specific channels (broadcast media) to help create a wholesome environment in the hopes that it would result in mentally healthy, dutiful children.

Say what you will about their specific choices, we can agree most of that effort has been abandoned now, because the battle for the mind has been lost; people want their creature comforts, their bread and circuses, and it's insanely difficult to deny this when you have nothing that adequately fills the gap.

...

I think it could happen in a small group of people if they had space to live and grow and separate themselves from the decaying excesses of our culture. Groups like the Amish and Mennonites and some of the newcomer Islamic and Sikh communities demonstrate an ability to perpetuate and propagate their values to their children and others well. We may have lost this as we flushed religion our of our societies; perhaps this means there is a niche to fill to bring some semblance of discipline back without having to continually be at odds with our new scientific lens on reality.

Even if we all agree that such a duty exists, we would still need to decide what constitutes "betterment". How do we collectively decide that for a specific individual learning X betters society, but learning Y does not.

No. The only social duty one has is to govern oneself and cause no harm. All else is nuance.

Could you elaborate more on governing oneself?

If you mean controlling ones thoughts and actions - does this rule out being impulsive/reflexive and thus not governing oneself?

I mean truly exercising freedom - which is the ability to govern oneself. All we can really control is ourselves. Sure, one could be impulsive/reflexive and even reactive, so long as it doesn’t impinge on anyone else’s freedom to govern themselves.

Begs the question in regard to, better in the eyes of whom? There's a secular assumption in the question that doesn't apply to a majority of generally theistic people around the world.

I'd re-frame the question as, "what can one reasonably expect from an atheist?" The answer is "literally, nothing."

For anyone who doesn't find that funny, I'd say asking why should be the most interesting question of all.

Extract from Ilium, from Dan Simmons: "If you don’t know your father, Odysseus was answering in that low, calm, but fiercely firm voice of his that always seemed to carry as far as it had to, how can you know yourself? I am Odysseus, son of Laertes. My father is a king, but also a man of the soil. When I saw him last, the old man was down on his knees in the dirt, planting a tree where an old giant of a tree had finally – cut down by his hand finally – after being struck by lightning. If I do not know my father, and his father before him, and what these men were worth, what they lived for and were willing to die for, how can I know myself? Tell us again about arête, came a voice from the front row. Ada recognised the man speaking as Petyr, one of the earliest visitors. Petyr was no boy – Ada thought he was in his fourth Twenty – but his beard was already almost as full as Odysseus’. Ada didn’t think the man had left Ardis since he’d first heard Odysseus speak that second or third day, when the visitors could be counted on two hands. Arête is simply excellence and the striving for excellence in all things, said Odysseus. Arête simply means the act of offering all actions as of sacrament to excellence, of devoting one’s life to finding excellence, identifying it when it offers itself, and achieving it in your own life. A newcomer ten rows up the hill, a heavyset man who reminded Ada a bit of Daemon, laughed, and said, How can you achieve excellence in all things, Teacher? Why would you want to? It sounds terribly tiring. The heavy man looked around, sure of laughter, but the others on hill looked at him silently and then turned back to Odysseus. The Greek smiled easily – strong white teeth flashing against his tanned cheeks and short, gray beard – and said, You can’t achieve excellence in all things, my friend, but you have to try. And how could you not want to? But there are so many things to do, laughed the heavy man. One can’t practice for them all. One has to make choices and concentrate on the important things. The man squeezed the young woman next to him, obviously his companion, and she laughed loudly, but she was the only one to laugh. Yes, said Odysseus, but you insult all these actions in which you do not honour arête. Eating? Eat as if it was your last meal. Prepare the food as if there were no more food! Sacrifices to the gods? You must make each sacrifice as if the lives of your family depended upon your energy and devotion and focus. Loving? Yes, love as if it was the most important thing in the world, but make it just one in the constellation that is arête."

> become prevalent in society?

You mean secular society? They are still very prevalent through unwritten cultural norms everywhere. Mechanisms like the market/jobs market evolved for the same reasons. Society is progressing towards individualism thanks to technology so large-scale normative religious texts no longer appeal to people

Individual progress and betterment is not scalable for everyone all the time, many (if not most) people are close t their peek already.

I do like to some degree the Swedish society conformity, people are expected to do good for the society as a whole even if sometimes conflicts with their own personal good.

Do you seriously think most people are close to their peak? I'd guess it's only around a few percent of all people. Most people are lazy and only do enough to get by.

Yes. As the social animals that we are we need to devote to a certain social duty, wolves, ants, bees, penguins, you name it...any animal that lives in community look for the benefit of the colony, doing the opposite would be unnatural.

Are you saying it’s impossible for a being to act against the nature of the whole? As I think I observe this often.

Could it perhaps be that in modern society it isn’t exactly clear what benefits the whole?

People already better themselves for the sake of their own consciousness, family members, children and peers.

Do you the rate of betterment could be improved if it were more spoken about and encouraged?

In a democracy I actually think we do. Otherwise how do we be knowledgeable voters?

Perhaps it’s just my perspective, but I don’t see present in the mainstream media an emphasis on education and critical thinking that would allow the population to be knowledgable voters.

In fact, I see the opposite in that we are bombarded with simple slogans without any reference to policy, or if there is mention of policy there isn’t any path to implementation.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com