Hacker News Reader

Comment by gitpusher | Hacker News Reader

If you spend all your time worrying about how to be a good person, chances are you're not being a good person. Just go do nice things. Volunteer somewhere. Be of service. And stop worrying so much

View on HN

Last Saturday, myself and two other firefighters managed to find a woman lost in a maze of 40+ miles of trails. Her hip had dislocated, she could not move. The temperatures were in the upper 20s (F) (-3C or so) with serious windchill amidst 35mph/56kph wind gusts. It was extremely dark. We stayed with her and tried to keep her as warm as possible until a UTV arrived to extricate her. I was home by 01:00, after 4hrs outside under the stars.

In the end we didn't really do much at all, but it felt like one of the most meaningful nights of my entire life.

For that person, the security of having help might be as useful even medically as the parts that other medics did later.

That is a epic story. What gear were you in, were you in structural gear or something else? Just the thought of hiking in my structural gear gives me blisters.

No structural gear for 2 of the 3 of us. I had civilian gear on other than my EMS jacket which despite not being "proper outdoor gear" is insanly warm. Thankfully I had also layered a merino wool base layer and my RAB thinsulate-y puffer jacket under that, REI expedition gloves and two layers of hats. One of my colleagues did not do so well, and was really inadequately dressed given that we had to strip down a bit to keep her warm. The 3rd person on the team wore his structural jacket and wildland helmet.

The UTV1 crew had their structural jackets on, but otherwise civilian.

Y'all are experts here. May I ask, are those mylar blankets really a thing ? Do they work ?

Hi, I don’t have their expertise but I backpack and camp a lot, including in some pretty hostile environments. I keep a pack of 12 in my trunk for emergencies. The answer is yes, they’re a thing and they work. They’re super lightweight. However, I wouldn’t want to use one unless I had to. They keep you warm by trapping all of the moisture and humidity from your body inside. This means you’ll feel clammy and sweaty if you use one for long. This is why they’re called “emergency blankets”.

But they trap the body heat too, yes ?

Yes

Wouldn’t she have died from exposure if you hadn’t found her?

There’s a beautiful quote from a 2019 episode of the podcast The Anthropocene Reviewed, Auld Lang Syne. John Green recounts some advice he got while in college and working as a chaplain at a children’s hospital: “Don’t just do something. Stand there.”

The FF/EMT who was on our team of 3 felt that she was likely 2hrs from hypothermic death. How accurate that is, I don't know. But basically, yes, she would have died if not found.

Interesting.

Did the FF/EMT factor in the non-linear response of the body to prolonged cold exposure in a semi-conscious state, or was the 2-hour hypothermic window derived purely from a calculated assumption of metabolic shutdown under idealized conditions?

Given the reported risk of imminent hypothermic death, can we assume the field intervention included a comprehensive thermal balance assessment prior to transport? Specifically, was there any attempt to implement active rewarming protocols during the extrication phase, or was the focus solely on stabilization and preservation of core temperature via passive methods?

Woooooooooowwww

100% ... In my life, I accepted a while back that I don't have to solve world hunger or cure cancer in order to be a good person - just be as courteous to others as I can; focus on the little things. For example, I always park my car in the back of parking lots (or otherwise far away) because I'm perfectly capable of walking, while others might struggle. Is that gonna get me a Nobel prize? Certainly not. But I like to think that, sometimes, maybe once per year, a person who struggles with mobility, like an elderly person or someone with an injury, is gonna struggle just a little bit less because I parked out back. No one's gonna build a statue of me for this, but if it helps just one person, that's a good thing. And it's really not that difficult for me to walk an extra 50 yards. LOL

(Edit to correct spelling: Nobel, not Noble. LOL)

I selfishly park in the back because I hate circling the lot looking for a spot. It may/nor be more time efficient on average, but I do not have to deal with that frustration just to save a few steps.

I selfishly park back a little ways myself, simply because far too many parking lots aren't designed for a full-size pickup. The extra steps are definitely worth the frustration saved for me, as well.

It reminds me of the three great virtues of a programer; laziness, impatience and hubris [0].

[0] https://wiki.c2.com/?LazinessImpatienceHubris

"Do no harm" is a far better precept than "be courteous". Lots of harm has been done by courteous people that I'm sure were perfectly lovely to their inner circle and local neighborhood.

This is a good habit for any able bodied person to get into. Not only can it help out someone who needs a closer spot, it doesn't even cost you time on average since you're less likely to be held up by traffic getting in or out of the spot. Plus adding a little more walking into the day is healthy.

I always shake my head at healthy people who block the traffic lane for minutes waiting for someone to load groceries and free up a specific spot, when there are dozens of open spots 40 ft away. Their laziness isn't even saving them any time or aggravation.

I'm crippled and have a handicap tag for my car, but I'll still park in the back, depending on the store. Trying to get out of handicap spots at Target, Trader Joes, or Costco is always a nightmare because people have no patience.

And in your case, there's probably going to be other people that park somewhere they shouldn't, but... that's their choice and ultimately their moral burden. Like not returning shopping trolleys.

Why is it that only "doing nice things" or "volunteering your time" makes you a good person? Does a traffic engineer not better the lives of others? What about a farmer? Where does the food served in a soup kitchen come from if not from the sweat of the farmer's brow? The shelter over everyone's head only exists because truckers transported the materials. Simply existing in a way that isn't purely self-serving is often enough to be hugely helpful to others.

> Simply existing in a way that isn't purely self-serving is often enough to be hugely helpful to others.

You’re basically saying the same thing. “Doing nice things” just gets you in the mindset of helping others, which many people don’t actively do.

And obviously it’s possible to be a bad person who still works in a job that does some good in the world.

Note that this is a bit of a straw man argument because the person you replied to didn't say "only" doing nice things makes you a good person. These are also ways to be a good person. The other is being a farmer, but only if you treat your staff and land and/or animals with respect and longevity in mind instead of capitalist exploitative min/maxing.

"Do no evil" is a good adage to live by, instead of "be a good person". In a lot of cases, doing nothing is the way to be a good person.

I'm somewhat certain that people who worry about whether they're good people are usually better than people who don't think much about it.

I've not met many people who thoughtfully engage with the question of how to live a moral life, only to just not put any of it into practice. I've met plenty of people who barely think about it, and don't consider it a question of much interest.

However, those that say / claim / behave like they are good people can be called out for hypocrisy, e.g. some people of the clergy, politicians, celebrities etc.

In “Meditations”, his personal journal, Marcus Aurelius wrote “Stop wasting time thinking what it means to be a good man. Be one.”

That sounds like “step 2: draw the rest of the owl”.

Sometimes, it's not that hard to draw the rest of the owl.

Exactly. What I take away from that passage is "most of the time it's really not hard to figure out how to be a good person so you're better off actually taking some concrete positive action than spending further time navel-gazing".

Like in TFA. Just be kind to others. Be thoughtful. Be nice to people even when you don't have to be. Try to make life better for those around you. But also be kind to yourself. Don't worry about doing the best thing. Just try to do some good things. Everything will work out ok.

I listened to an advice show many years back. The vast majority of callers had a question that could be paraphrased:

"I have this problem, and I should do X, but I really want to do Y." The host would say, "do X."

Once I realized that, I noticed that I sometimes stumbled over the same choice.

The root of why that doesn't work is because you're mostly thinking about yourself still. "am >>I<< a good person?". Good people spend more time thinking about others, how to make them feel better, how to help. Obviously there's a balance to be had, as you can end up burning out from never taking your own needs into consideration.

But if you volunteer someone with the goal of being nice, are you actually being nice or just trying to accrue brownie points? I mean to the beneficiaries of your work it honestly doesn't matter what your motivation is.

This is where most effective altruism people go wrong. All the money in the world won’t fix anything if no one acts on the problem.

Most effective altruism people very specifically put money in places that are doing things and can prove they are effective.

So no, I don't think this is where a lot of EAs go wrong.

i think its the opposite. if you do actions that you consider to be good without considering how to be good more effectively, you probably just like the feeling of thinking of yourself as a good person more than actually being a good person

doing good is less about how happy it makes you feel and more about, well, how much you do good

Reply on news.ycombinator.com