Is it possible to live your life without harm to others?
Asked by
bubbacg (
58
)
June 4th, 2010
You may have heard the Wiccan Rede, which includes the sweeping charge, “Do as you will, but harm ye none.” The idea is that we are free to do anything we want as long as it does not cause harm to others. This is similar to the Golden Rule, “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you,” and Bill and Ted’s advice to “Be excellent to each other.” Almost every religion and philosophy has some variation on this theme. However, though it may sound cynical, I am not sure it is even possible to avoid harming others. Short of living alone atop a mountain, how could anyone truly follow these deceptively simple sounding rules? Would living alone atop a mountain even be enough?
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18 Answers
@bubbacg very good question! Have always thought the worse sin a man can commit, is harming their fellowman…could be emotional or physical. Bottomline, i just try to be nice to all people and hopefully they will do that in return. oh, my ex-wife never believed in that!
I think the best you can do is to not intentionally harm others.
There is always unintended harm and perceived harm – both of which you have little control over. Furthermore, if you are competitive in any area of your life, you are likely to harm (or be harmed) durning the course of “competition”. There’s always winners and losers.
No. Life eats life. If that’s a problem for you, complain to the Maker. Even vegans and fruitarians consume and destroy countless animals each day, from yeasts to mites. That’s not to say we should go out and deliberately harm others, but we must accept that the cost of our lives is misery and terror and death for other life forms. That means we are born with a debt which deepens every second we’re alive, a debt to accept the burden of pain we cause, and to do what we can to alleviate it, while serving the forces of Life against the ever-encroaching and eternal enemy, Entropy.
Rather than “Do what that wilt, an ye harm none,” I think a better rede would be, “Do what thou wilt, and accept the cost thereof.”
And, then there’s the creed of the physicians, “First, do no harm.”
hmmmm…
The least harm for the largest number is the best we can do. I don’t believe there is such a thing as “no” harm.
The Jains are a group with centuries of practice.
“No. Life eats life.”
Well said.
Other humans, yes. But it’s a challenge.
No. While life is not a zero-sum game, it’s impossible for one’s actions to always lead to Pareto improvements.
No.Some people look for reasons to be offended.They are known as PITAs :)
To answer your Q, no it isn’t.
But you can aim to minimise your “harmful” effects.
Which is an ideal aim.
Your question implies an absolute standard of “harm no other at all.” I believe there is no course of actions or inactions that leads to such a result.
I would urge you to be thoughtful about your choices in life and be prepared to learn from your inevitable mistakes and failures. The goal is admirable and so is its pursuit, even if it cannot be fully attained.
There are many great books written from the point of view of many different traditions that you may find to help you. Start reading.
It would be impossible and frankly I am surprised there is not more of it! I know I exercise great restraint everyday!
well, everyone in town knows about @mattbrowne, the word is…be careful !
The consensus seems to be, “No”, though the details vary.
There were a few qualified “Yes” answers, so far. Things like “other humans only” or “intentional harm” limit the scope of the original statement, but I suspect are still not enough. Every choice we make in our world of limited resources has consequences. When you spend you money at the grocery store rather than sending it to Darfur, that is intentional, and results in harm to other humans. You can’t argue it is unintended, either since you know about the suffering, know your money could help, but bought ice cream instead.
Many wrote to treat it as an ideal, an ideal you can never achieve, but that we could attempt. I like that a lot. So, we spend some of our money at the grocery store, send a little to Darfur, volunteer at a soup kitchen, and never cut someone off on the freeway. We may not have done all we can to avoid harming others, but we mitigate our negative impact and do a little something extra to partially make up for the rest?
Synopsis of answers, so far:
Yes, if only humans count
Yes, if unintentional harm doesn’t count
Yes, if harm through inaction doesn’t count
No, but we should still try. (my favorite)
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