Hey, I know its been brought up b4, but what defines a perfect society?

Someone told me it's when everyone is happy... :bugeye:

One ruled by Xev under the principle:

As long as you harm none w/o consent, do as you wilt.

Surely the perfect society is one where noone suffers, everyone is happy and safe.

However, what if you are unhappy with everyone else's happiness, what if you get off on other people's suffering.

Wouldn't be a perfect society then would it.

Can't please 100% of people all of the time.

Its true you can't please 100% of the people when the people are taught to be independent and carry their own opinions and morals. Teach people to be tolerant of other before teaching them to be independent and you will be closer to a perfect society, under your terms.

Teach people to believe the same ideas, reject the same ideas, and tell them they are part of a whole community...not an individual, and you will have a perfect society where everyone respects each other and have the same idea of what is happiness.

*THWAPS Xev*

It shall be ruled by me, the kingpin demon!!

Ok, but the point I was making is that there will be people who are not happy with having the same ideas as someone else, to such an extent that there would be movements against the society, no matter how perfect it is.

Its a bit of a mindjob, but I've made my comments and I stand by them. To wit : A perfect society cannot exist.

Having a perfect society by keeping everybody happy is possible. Just read Brave New World by Huxley.

And Xev, according to your golden maxim, how would you punish someone who broke that rule?

Surely the perfect society is one where noone suffers, everyone is happy and safe.

That sounds really boring. Don't we need horrible shit to make things interesting and stimulating?

*Xev has Zero thrown into the dungeon*

Be good now, Zero, or I'll feed you to the alligators.

Teach people to believe the same ideas, reject the same ideas, and tell them they are part of a whole community...not an individual, and you will have a perfect society where everyone respects each other and have the same idea of what is happiness.

Lord Cthulhu! That's a horrible idea! Everyone would just be slaves, like in "Brave New World".

And Xev, according to your golden maxim, how would you punish someone who broke that rule?

They'd be considered to have surrendered certain "rights". How much they surrendered in way of "rights" would be proportional to how much they took away from others.

Eg: Steal, you lose your right to property. You would have to pay the amount you stole, plus twice that in punitive damages in order to deter you. Unless you could prove mitigating circumstances.

Eg: Rape someone, go to prison for most of the remainder of your life, castration or clitoridectamy if you were released, because they would have to deal with the pain of being raped for the rest of their life.

Eg: Kill someone, you would be killed. But since there's a chance of executing an innocent person, you'd be sent to prison for life -- and your prison would be a very, very nasty place.

Vodoo:
That sounds really boring. Don't we need horrible shit to make things interesting and stimulating?

If my system worked perfectly, then we'd deal with that.

I'm seriously leaning to public torture and execution, but that'd be pretty gross and I wouldn't want to kill an innocent person that way.

Thus, I'd give free broadband internet access to every system, as well as Playstations and "Vice City". There would also be extensive government funding of the arts and sciences.

Would we really be happy if we didn't have sadness or discomfort to compare it to?
The perfect society is cannot be one where everyone is happy all the time because it is impossible to please everyone.
I'm not going to try to fully define the perfect society, but I think an importan element would be true equality.

Welcome Lilicia (nice name:)),

I have to disagree.
Actually... maybe only poor minds need discomfort to understand comfort and suffering to know happyness.
Do you think I'll have to take more Zen-lessons? :confused:

I think that a perfect society is impossible, but if it were possible I think it would be something like in "The Dispossessed"

As long as you harm none w/o consent, do as you wilt. :D

Actually... maybe only poor minds need discomfort to understand comfort and suffering to know happyness.

I have to disagree with you and agree with Lilicia (Welcome Lilicia). How could one appreciate happiness without the feeling of utter unhappiness. Maybe since Im a Libra I need balance, but I dont think something could be deemed (perfect) - without knowing the two opposites. (Example: you see a beautiful girl and call her "perfect" - but how would you know she was perfect if you hadnt seen an ugly girl before. If all you know is ugly, you get used to it and believe its perfect, but you couldnt be honest in comparing the two unless you've actually SEEN the two opposites. After seeing the 2 complete opposites, you can look into yourself and determine what YOU think is perfect).
You dont have to need discomfort to understand comfort - you need discomfort to compare to comfort and know that it is actually comfortable and not what "the masses" tell you is comfortable.

I just confused myself:p

I was only wondering. This is an issue that I have not yet decided what my opinion is.

Consider this: we know time, but we do not know the lack thereof.

Also, the hint of Zen and relaticvistic thought makes me suspicious!

:m:

One in which there is lots of pot?

Well hey, I agree!

Actualy the questions brought up in by Huxley in 'a brave new world' are realy fascinating.
A society where everyone is conditioned to exist in a certain way and to be eternaly happy(content?) with their existence.
Would we truely be best off in this way, does the loss of individuality matter at all? Is it a small price to pay for the loss of all pain sadness and greif?
Do we need these to appretiate joy and happines and is that our lifetime goal. (I would like to think there is something above that, ex. eternal knowledge, call it enlightenment:D)

Ofcourse in Huxelys society there is a hierarchy that we may find 'wrong' moraly or ethicaly, but everyone is happy. So does it matter?
And at this time and age when it seems like we are just a few steps away from inventing computers that can do all the thinking for us and solve all our problems(building machines that will run on undiscovered energy sources and do all our work) This is almost a current question that would require some serious philosophical pondering.

I have a couple of these:p And I was getting carried away, so I'll start a new thread.

Ahh yeah either that or the world on pills for a while....a perfect society cannot exist our current happiness is dependent upon others misery its correlated, their simply isnt enough resources in the world to provide everyone with what westerners would consider normal. If we all used toilet paper like the west their would be no trees.

One where the laws of society are as unbreakable as the laws of physics, nobody has to socialize unless they want to, and anyone can break away to form another society with others who feel the same way and make their own unbreakable laws. No society can be infringed on by another without general consent of the first.

Originally posted by The 39Th Element
Ok, but the point I was making is that there will be people who are not happy with having the same ideas as someone else, to such an extent that there would be movements against the society, no matter how perfect it is.

Its a bit of a mindjob, but I've made my comments and I stand by them. To wit : A perfect society cannot exist.



EXACTLY, it can not exist and it will never exist, as long as people are devided into certain geno-type groups...

Joy can come only from within oneself. For one to find joy, one must focus on oneself, not on the mind or the emotions or the will, but rather to focus on one's heart. Then, one by one, peopl will find Love and Truth in their hearts, they will be filled with joy and one by one we will make a perfect society.

A perfect society begins with each one of us. :)