Guilt is a programmed response to events. It is also a large part of empathy.
However in philosophy class, we defined guilt psychologically and socially.
Social guilt implies negative consequence against the one whom would experience the guilt.
Personal Guilt implies negative regard for ones actions, in light of alternate or "better" actions that could have been taken to produce positive results.
Then you get the combination of the two: Personal and Social guilt, with respect to both of the aforementioned.
I remember being asked the question (as many of us have asked countelss times)
"If you could get away with action, thought, or decision
A with zero negative consequences as a result, would you still commit to action, thought, decision
A?"
Its interesting to note just how much social guilt is generated by even thinking about that question in public after it has been asked. Everyone in the room suddenly halts, stops to think, and considers their response carefully.
Why? Because its a social event involving social overtones.
If everyone answers: "Yes!" then they have all implied their total disregard for everyone else in the event that negative consequences would never occur. Thus they only have regard for their peers as a result of necessity, not choice.
If everyone answers: "No!" then those are decisions based upon personal guilt, and/or empathy with respect to everyone else.
Ive found that those whom answer "No" are usually heavily religious, or very caregiving in nature.
Then there are those who answer: "Maybe..."
These individuals are very unique, in that they categorize various levels of guilt or rational thinking when applied to justification and fairness.
This is the thin line between social programming and genetic programming.
Now one must still ask, "If someone could choose No in light of Yes, when Yes would incur them no negative consequences, why would anyone chose No to begin with?"
That is the evolutionary standard by which one would have to revert to productivity as one possible answer. While its true, if there were no negative consequences, many would go out and do whatever they wanted without any fear of harm.
Would raping an individual without any consequence yield any productive result?
Would killing someone off the street arbitrarily yield any productive result?
Would causing mental turmoil to someone else merely for the sake of amusement yield any productive result?
These questions are ambiguous due to the enormous amounts of variables and circumstances involved. But it still defines Guilt as a requisite to effective social function in which any greater gains or continued developments of progress are defined. There has existed no chaotic or anarchy-driven civilization that thrived, progressed, and dominated the world.
So perhaps Guilt could be defined as a necessary function to human interaction on a social level. If not, there would be no regret for anything, regardless of the consequences.
Such people do exist. They are called "sociopaths" and those once identified are usually locked up or erradicated from society.
The mere fact of that demonstrates the unlikelyhood of any such person or group of persons successfully integrating any kind of functional and productive society.
There has to be some value of enough significance which is held as a social standard for a society to function. Otherwise, we are merely co-existing as a result of circumstance and causality. While that definition might prove accurate for the majority of the non-sentient species on this planet, it wreaks havoc with sentient ones.
Of course, one might argue that the backbone of our current society is based upon deception, greed, corruption, and fear. It would seem that guilt is absent from this model, at least as far as socially. Darwins memetics are very problematic and complex arent they?
Edited by Omnido, 04 November 2003 - 10:09 AM.
