Philosophy of The Golden Rule

I like observing people. When I was younger I wanted to be a psychologist. I wanted to be a psychologist because I wanted to know how and what other people thought, and wanted to understand them. It used to amaze me how different we all are but at the same time almost identical. It still does, but I approach the topic with the mind of a much older person than I was before. I’m so young. I’m not even born. Philosophy isn't one thing.

Philosophy is the love of wisdom. Philosophy is a way of thinking about the world, the universe, and society. It works by asking basic questions about the nature of human thought, nature of the universe, and the things linking them. The ideas in philosophy are often general and abstract such as the question themselves. Philosophy is a science that has been studied for ages but yet the mysteries of it remain pretty much unsolved. Maybe not entirely unsolved but that also depends on people’s perspectives. It’s all about perspective. It is not hard to comprehend that all of more than 7 billion humans will never think the same about everything, especially when we’re talking about such conceptual matters. Why do we look for loopholes in things that make sense? I mean some answers are pretty obvious but yet a lot people choose to stay oblivious to them. Because humans are curious beings and we always like to optimise and figure out shortcuts, usually for some kind of gain. And well of course, everyone likes to be right. Questioning the world, questioning the truth, questioning what you see and what surrounds you, are all smart things to do. You don’t know the truth and you probably never will. Think about how many things you know, how many you think you know and how many you don’t. It doesn’t feel good to know how unsafe we actually to are due to the small amount of information we own. The Golden Rule is the principle of treating others as one's self would wish to be treated. Philosophical reactions to it vary, it has both supporters and detractors.

The claim that the Golden Rule is accepted by most people is arguably the most common feature of just about any discussion of the Golden Rule. Indeed, many religions and moral systems, from Islam and Christianity, do have some version of it. And what could be simpler than to treat others as you would want to be treated? To do so, just imagine yourself in the place of the other, if while in the place of the other, you would want to be treated as you were treating them, then treat them that way; if not, then don’t. But just because some version of the traditional Golden Rule can be found in different cultures and religions does not mean that people within that culture or religion actually believe it to be true, nevertheless practice it.

To add to this, even if we had some common understanding of what it is to be treated well and badly, it simply isn’t true that we all want to be treated well. Some people might (even rationally) think that they do not deserve to be behaved towards, others may not understand what it being treated properly means, some may simply not care one way or the other.