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InvisibleDividedQuantumM
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personal worth
    #21577633 - 04/21/15 06:47 PM (9 years, 2 months ago)

One doesn't have to be good at making money to be a good person, or to be intelligent, or to be talented or even gifted.  The meme that individual worth as a human being and as pertains to one's bank account balance are equivalent is particularly American, and totally insane.  It's disturbing that we can be so lost as a society.  Money shouldn't define who we are, but it so often does.


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InvisiblePenelope_Tree
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Re: personal worth [Re: DividedQuantum]
    #21577645 - 04/21/15 06:50 PM (9 years, 2 months ago)

Agreed, and the converse is also true, that lacking money doesn't make you a good person.


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Offlinedeff
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Re: personal worth [Re: DividedQuantum]
    #21577650 - 04/21/15 06:50 PM (9 years, 2 months ago)

agreed :smile: i think if there is to be a metric for such a thing as personal worth, then it should be the extent to which one is loving and compassionate to others. the culture of ego-competition around finances, careers, and intellect is something that i see as a drain on our potential as a species for sure :smile:


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InvisibleDividedQuantumM
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Re: personal worth [Re: deff]
    #21577669 - 04/21/15 06:55 PM (9 years, 2 months ago)

Quote:

Penelope_Tree said:
Agreed, and the converse is also true, that lacking money doesn't make you a good person.




How about just removing the moneymaking spectrum entirely from evaluations of the inherent worth and character of an individual?


Quote:

deff said:
agreed :smile: i think if there is to be a metric for such a thing as personal worth, then it should be the extent to which one is loving and compassionate to others. the culture of ego-competition around finances, careers, and intellect is something that i see as a drain on our potential as a species for sure :smile:




Definitely, well said.


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InvisibleLunarEclipse
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Re: personal worth [Re: DividedQuantum]
    #21577731 - 04/21/15 07:06 PM (9 years, 2 months ago)

It wouldn't be worth it for me to tell you poor people just what I think.


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Invisibleonce in a lifetime
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Re: personal worth [Re: LunarEclipse]
    #21577833 - 04/21/15 07:25 PM (9 years, 2 months ago)

I agree completely.  Since I was 16 or so, I developed the understanding that the value of a person should be who they are, not what they have. 

Einstein put it succinctly: 'the true value of a human can be found in the degree to which he has found liberation from the self.'

Of course I don't consider it quite the only criterion - there are many who are extraordinarily beautiful who didn't reach perfect health and peace from which one never falls down from. . . say -- Stuey Ungar or Edgar Allan Poe.


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Invisibletedias
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Re: personal worth [Re: once in a lifetime]
    #21578669 - 04/21/15 11:33 PM (9 years, 2 months ago)

Here's a question for you all then:

If money doesn't measure personal worth, and other factors like charitability, kindness and intelligence do, then what of someone who embodies none (or few) of these?

Does a greedy, unkind, unintelligent person have the same level of personal worth as a kind, charitable, humble person?

That is to say, are we morally justified to treat the former less worthy than the latter? Or do we, regardless of their personal worth, still have to treat the two as equals?

As a general rule I will always favor someone with a high natural personal worth and kindness, but I still believe that in order for me myself to have high personal worth, I must treat everyone as if they have equal personal worth. In short, I ought to treat everyone equally.

But then we have a problem- If We ought to treat everyone equally, then wherein lies the benefit of having a high personal worth to begin with? Surely we run the risk of being exploited in our kindness and ultimately being left in the dust for our honest, noble efforts.

I believe there are many benefits, yet I thought I'd play devil's advocate to promote some interesting responses.

(also, I understand that things like Karma and religious afterlife etc. can be a reason for holding high personal worth, but I'm thinking of more worldly benefits.


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InvisibleDividedQuantumM
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Re: personal worth [Re: tedias] * 1
    #21579672 - 04/22/15 09:34 AM (9 years, 2 months ago)

Those are very good points.  Personally, I look at it this way:  there is a sense in which we are all equal, say, before God (if you will), and another sense in which we are decidedly not equal.  I think every creature should have an equal right to life, regardless of anything -- that is, to the resources and comforts that should be the baseline material reality for everyone, and also under the law.  (Of course, we do not have this in our world, but to me it is the ideal -- that all creatures should not have any material fetter, and should be respected). 

However, the reality -- and I think we all know this -- is that there is another, individual sense in which we are all quite unequal.  For me, a single mom sacrificing everything for her children, who never misses her volunteer shift at the soup kitchen on Saturday nights because it would be unthinkable for her to do so, I view in a bit of a different light than a billionaire who stepped on countless throats to get where he is, and is completely dishonest and corrupt.  (Not that all billionaires are, but to get to that point there is usually some seriously nasty stuff going on, and many getting pushed aside).

This is just an example, but it illustrates my point that one can't just look at it as 'are we equal or what?' because it's not that simple.  No creature should be denied the right to life or fairness under the law -- in that sense we are equal before God.  (In reality, things don't work that way, I know).  But people in different walks of life and in different stations are really not equal in practice.  And we all know that people we've met are different and we like some more than others.  I think if anything, it takes something of a bastard to 'get to the top.'  As John Lennon said, "You have to be a bastard to make it, and that's a fact."  And I don't think everyone is that way at all.  Hence, unequal.


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Invisibletedias
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Re: personal worth [Re: DividedQuantum]
    #21582120 - 04/22/15 09:27 PM (9 years, 2 months ago)

I agree that there is a sense in which we are not equal, but I feel the question at hand is "should it be the case that we ought to consider everyone with equal personal worth and equal moral value, despite their vices".

I feel that morally speaking we ought to treat everyone equally, as to ignore this would result in the inequalities we have today. Then again, if you try to treat everyone equally there are always, as you said, the billionaires that will happily exploit your moral generosity to get where they want to be.

I think you're right in the sense that there are literal inequalities (fiscally, legally, socially, etc), but I don't think that means that we aren't all equal in personal worth. A paedophile may commit horrendous acts, and deserve to be punished rightly, but we punish them for justice, and deterrence of others, and not because we consider them to be of lesser human value than others. In short, we need to judge them by their actions, and not who they are (their personal worth).

It may seem like I've missed your point, but trust me when I say I understood completely- I'm just taking it down a different tangent.
And as always, it's not because I genuinely believe these things necessarily, I'm just promoting the debate :smile:


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OfflineCosmopolite
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Re: personal worth [Re: tedias]
    #21582473 - 04/22/15 11:07 PM (9 years, 2 months ago)

I think that everyone should have equal rights, but not everyone is equal. Some people are more gifted than others in their characteristics. Regardless, we should treat everyone the same because who are we to judge, when we really have no perception of who they actually are inside of themselves? If you are going to smoke someone out, or hand them a $5 bill, then you should do so regardless of if you've done it a thousand times for them. People shouldn't be generous, kind, judicial, or exploitative with some and not with others. You should really treat people the same, because really, we are ignorant of others' station in life.

"I tell you that virtue is not given by money, but that from virtue come money and every other good of man, public as well as private." - from The Apology of Socrates

Edited by Cosmopolite (04/23/15 12:52 AM)

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OfflineArenis
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Re: personal worth [Re: Cosmopolite]
    #21585152 - 04/23/15 10:30 AM (9 years, 2 months ago)

All you are talking about is duality...
You are wrong, yet you are right.

People who posses more money than you have worked HARDER than you to reach that point ( in most cases). There is absolutely nothing wrong with wanting a safe secure future not only for one self, but for the children as well. If you did not think about how you will live in a government society and your children, it is your and only your fault.

I could write much much more, however most people dont reply to harsh truth so i dont bother.

most of your points only apply to women to begin with ( a man with more money is more "attractive", because he buy her more junk so she can feed and emmit her ego in front of otheres).

All of this is so pointless because only the truly low which deserve living on street are like that, also it is not their fault, they have been conditioned to be like that by TV soap rubbish and similar techniques. Fuck this i cant believe people actually need to discuss something so obvious


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Re: personal worth [Re: DividedQuantum]
    #21585846 - 04/23/15 01:12 PM (9 years, 2 months ago)

To OP, I think the higher focus in America for personal worth=bank account is because there is a culture, and perhaps a reality, that people in America can work hard and grow their bank accounts.  Whereas, in many other countries the wealthy were wealthy for generations, and the poor could hardly ever hope to achieve wealth due to the way the systems are set up to oppress.  In addition, most of these countries with little economic class mobility still ascribe more personal worth to wealthy individuals.  Money is power.  It's difficult to discount the personal worth of someone who wields considerable power in a society.  Anyhow, I think it's completely oversimplified to say personal worth=bank account.  As people ITT have been talking about, there are many other factors that go into society's and an individual's concepts of personal worth.  It would be insane for personal worth=bank account, if that were really how it was.

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InvisibleRahz
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Re: personal worth [Re: Hippocampus]
    #21586094 - 04/23/15 02:08 PM (9 years, 2 months ago)

I don't think there's a single metric on which we can estimate a persons worth. Income is valid but not the whole picture. Inherited income of course would be different than "earning potential", but both have a worth. Being able to make others smile has worth. In lieu of that, not being a backstabbing asshole has worth.

But I don't subscribe to worth as an inherent factor. There is potential to consider but at some point it might be best to cut one's losses. Exile or death could be useful tools in a less civilized setting. We only take that for granted because we have the resources to isolate those who have negative worth to society.


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Offlineakira_akuma
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Re: personal worth [Re: Arenis]
    #21588747 - 04/24/15 01:03 AM (9 years, 2 months ago)

Quote:

Arenis said:
All you are talking about is duality...
You are wrong, yet you are right.

People who posses more money than you have worked HARDER than you to reach that point ( in most cases). There is absolutely nothing wrong with wanting a safe secure future not only for one self, but for the children as well. If you did not think about how you will live in a government society and your children, it is your and only your fault.

I could write much much more, however most people dont reply to harsh truth so i dont bother.

most of your points only apply to women to begin with ( a man with more money is more "attractive", because he buy her more junk so she can feed and emmit her ego in front of otheres).

All of this is so pointless because only the truly low which deserve living on street are like that, also it is not their fault, they have been conditioned to be like that by TV soap rubbish and similar techniques. Fuck this i cant believe people actually need to discuss something so obvious



yes, think of the fuckin' children.

the ones who'll shit on your dead Grandma because they weren't taught not to. :rolleyes:

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Invisibleonce in a lifetime
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Re: personal worth [Re: tedias]
    #21589197 - 04/24/15 06:57 AM (9 years, 2 months ago)

Quote:

tedias said:
Here's a question for you all then:

If money doesn't measure personal worth, and other factors like charitability, kindness and intelligence do, then what of someone who embodies none (or few) of these?

Does a greedy, unkind, unintelligent person have the same level of personal worth as a kind, charitable, humble person?

That is to say, are we morally justified to treat the former less worthy than the latter? Or do we, regardless of their personal worth, still have to treat the two as equals?

As a general rule I will always favor someone with a high natural personal worth and kindness, but I still believe that in order for me myself to have high personal worth, I must treat everyone as if they have equal personal worth. In short, I ought to treat everyone equally.

But then we have a problem- If We ought to treat everyone equally, then wherein lies the benefit of having a high personal worth to begin with? Surely we run the risk of being exploited in our kindness and ultimately being left in the dust for our honest, noble efforts.

I believe there are many benefits, yet I thought I'd play devil's advocate to promote some interesting responses.

(also, I understand that things like Karma and religious afterlife etc. can be a reason for holding high personal worth, but I'm thinking of more worldly benefits.




This was very true; (is) and I realized a minute or two after I posted that I'd left this point out.  Very well said and thank you for making this point. . Any human being has nearly unlimited potential in them; there are many methods for learning, and ways of accelerated learning. . . one of the most simple questions would be, "what is worth learning?"  Our sages and prophets and wise men have generally forever said the most valuable thing to know is the self -- the most important thing to know is how to live; peacefully, naturally, in harmony with nature, etc.  'The happiest man, whether king or pauper, is the man who has peace in his home,' - Goethe, or 'Peace is always beautiful,' - Whitman. . nice points. . . True and good memes, to help replace the bountiful silly ones that a lot of society has let themselves slip into.

There are many things that we believe, as a society, that are just not true.  Yet there isn't really a single human that doesn't have all the true memes within them -- they just don't have knowledge ordered in the right way; and some of the good ideas are covered over by other, less valuable ideas, and habits that don't exactly help protect themselves or the environment.  In terms of ordering knowledge, I have generally come to understand that the best order is along the lines of 1)I create my world, 2)I am responsible for it (same as 1), and 3)Peace is possible, etc., etc., all the way on down the line; until you have a UTE. . . (last night in my dream I unified the theory, there were two, I forgot what they were; like physics and psychology -- not those I don't think, but something. . . it was very, very simple and they went together very, very well. . . so it's very simple, ans basically human has got it).

My natural inclination is to immediately go to species life. . . personal worth. . I can't separate humanity from other life forms, as we are all connected.  So human life is a part of a whole, we are interdependent on all other life forms -- even the idea of one species as separate from others is not true; what I mean is, every other form of life is equally part of our life, we are made up of all other forms on earth, and in the cosmos, and the same is true of each species. . So -- all other cool critters out there, are equally as valuable and important as we are. . . indeed, you might say, we are the least valuable, because we are the most destructive.  We're the parasitic guest.  So ----- no reason to worry, there is infinitely never a reason to worry. . . but IF this is true, which I believe it is and is very simple; the simple thing is -- what is good and worthwhile is improving our status in the Real Order, that is, the system that is Real and True -- how much good and harm we do to the environment as a whole, to all other species, the bio-diversity and plant and animal life, which is the one true wealth. . . So, reducing our consumption of Earth's species, resources, habitat and forest life, that is the Good thing we can do, etc., etc.  And however much someone improves in that direction (reducing consumption etc.), that is how much we should value them; as well as, of course, how much solid work they do to attain peace (ending war for good), and improving social living (restoring dignity and equality).


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OfflineMarkostheGnostic
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Re: personal worth [Re: DividedQuantum]
    #21629801 - 05/03/15 11:59 AM (9 years, 1 month ago)

Money is power, financial power, and power is never given, it is always taken. That immediately defines the necessary aggression required to obtain, manage, and prevent others from getting a hold of your monetary power. Not being very characterized by Manipura chakra motivations, I am not a good businessman, which is why I worked for a huge bureaucratic school system on a salary for 27 years. My private work was always negligible. I learned a lot, but never made a lot of money privately for lack of marketing ability and other reasons. Nevertheless, I did tax shelter for most of my career, and I did inherit a stock portfolio which I recently moved out of a managed account ($7K-$8K a year in fees) to low-cost index funds. So, between my pension, our collective investments, and my wife's inherited apartment, we're OK financially. If I wait another 4 years before taking Social Security, I'll have in income that is higher than the highest amount I brought home while working. At any rate, without ever wanting to 'be rich,' or having an interest in social status, I never had to be a "bastard" to anyone.

The problem with most people I meet, is that they are crassly materialistic and envious of more monied people. That is because they are bereft of a philosophical or spiritual mentality, but identify themselves primarily as social beings, with social status needs. Their psychology, by-and-large, is governed by the egoic motives of the Manipura chakra, Adler's Individual Psychology 'social interest' and 'inferiority-superiority' dynamics. For a lot of these people (many of whom were school teachers), they want to 'live large,' on an educator's salary, show up to work driving a leased Mercedes, Lexus, BMW, or some other luxury car that is more-or-less standard in Miami for wannabe rich people. The actually well-to-do drive Bentleys, Rolls Royces, Lamborghinis, Mazaratis, etc.. My wife has dropped off a friend's daughter at Barry Gibbs (of the Bee Gees) whose daughter she was friends with, who lives two doors down from Jennifer Lopez on Miami Beach. These are the kind of vehicles these people own.

I have know all-to-many shallow people who identify entirely with their appearance, their body for one, but even more superficially, with their clothes. They feel acutely the judgemental looks of other superficial people, because they are not centered in an aspect of themselves which transcends appearances. One such woman, a shop-girl at the time, became tearful as some well-heeled businessman seemed to look at her with a smug expression on his face. She felt small and worthless because all she experienced herself as was the appearance that the businessman could see with his evaluative gaze. She could not 'see' the box that he was stuck in because she was stuck in the same kind of box with the same values as he had, only he had more money and she had less. She eventually divorced my hard-working jet mechanic friend, and left her two children, on her search for someone to marry who had more money in order to bolster her own pathetic identity based on financial social status. She was a poignant example to me.


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InvisibleDividedQuantumM
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Re: personal worth [Re: MarkostheGnostic]
    #21629951 - 05/03/15 12:30 PM (9 years, 1 month ago)

Yes, very lucid post.  What is ubiquitous, and really at issue, is the psychology of money as power, the superficiality associated with it and all of the desires which manifest as a result.  This is a uniquely American mindset, and without it I'm not sure our country could compete so well economically.


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InvisibleCognitive_Shift
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Re: personal worth [Re: DividedQuantum]
    #21629959 - 05/03/15 12:33 PM (9 years, 1 month ago)

In a capitalistic society why is it so surprising to people that a persons worth as a human being is based on net worth?  We are ingrained to idolize the rich and demonize the poor.


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InvisibleKhancious
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Re: personal worth [Re: Cognitive_Shift]
    #21629980 - 05/03/15 12:38 PM (9 years, 1 month ago)

Quote:

Cognitive_Shift said:
In a capitalistic society why is it so surprising to people that a persons worth as a human being is based on net worth?  We are ingrained to idolize the rich and demonize the poor.




If you allow it of course. That is the key :heytheresexy:


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Re: personal worth [Re: Khancious]
    #21630013 - 05/03/15 12:47 PM (9 years, 1 month ago)

It's inherently built into the value system of the society.  It's going to exist no matter what if the our values stay the same.


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