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Martin Krisko's avatar

You actually hit the nail on the head—this is the core of the problem: how to deal with consequences people are born into, without personal responsibility. My nihilistic take would be: “Probability is a bitch.” Which is true—but not helpful.

The issue is that our moral compass tends to operate in the world of abstract principles—Plato’s realm of ideal forms. That’s where we create these perfect, clean rules that work great in black-and-white scenarios. But reality isn’t black and white—it’s a thousand shades of gray, and worse, everyone sees a different shade.

That’s why I personally steer away from moral universalism and lean toward utilitarianism. It forces me to deal with the real, messy, imperfect world—not the curated world of ideas. It’s less elegant, but at least it’s grounded.

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what'stheanti-matter's avatar

Fuck the shades of grey crap. The world is full of colors, dummy. Do you only dream in black and white and grey. How depressing.

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Martin Krisko's avatar

Black and white represent binary logic—true/false, 0/1. When I say “shades of gray,” I’m referring to a spectrum between those absolutes. It’s not about visual aesthetics or mood; it’s about recognizing nuance and complexity in systems that aren’t purely binary. Most real-world situations—especially in history, ethics, and human behavior—exist somewhere between 0 and 1.

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