I believe that people should cooperate on the goal of everyone having a happy life:

1. Avoid competition against all other people.
2. Cooperate to protect everyone from being hurt by nature.

As we compete against each other, the foes in nature defeat every one of us.  We all die, so lose the most critical battle.

With simple morality there would be less confusion in the world that wastes the energy humanity has.

Dec 13, 2010 -- 5:37AM, oddjoe wrote:

I believe that people should cooperate on the goal of everyone having a happy life:

1. Avoid competition against all other people.
2. Cooperate to protect everyone from being hurt by nature.

Groovy. Sign me up. I'd suggest, however, that there would have to be some consensus regarding an acceptable standard of living. That is, agree to cooperate so everyone has more than sufficient food, clothing, shelter, health, and education. We should still encourage competition for the finer things in life. Sorry ... no, I'm not sorry ... I'm not ready to subsidize someone's huge HD television and Xbox game system.

That said, an acceptable standard of living should include decent coffee, affordable microbrews, a MacBook, access to the internet, a reliable automobile, hours of free time for hiking outdoors, a 1200-square-foot house, veterinary care for the family dog, a 60'x30' garden plot, and a few new books each month. I'll add more if I think of something.

What's a "happy life"?

A way of saying the guideline in one sentence might go:

Everyone fight against harmful things like weather, hunger, and disease, rather than against anyone else.

Dec 24, 2010 -- 9:20AM, John_T_Mainer wrote:

A pretty sentiment for perfect world fantasies.  It is a lovely model for how the world could be if everybody had enough, wanted no more than they needed, and chose to work for the common good.  That is as likely as gravity taking a holiday or pi equalling 5.

People are indoctrinated in competition against others.  That could be addressed.

We are hardwired to be competative because nature provides more life than resources to sustain it.  The weak, those who have poor luck or make poor choices fail to thrive, fail to acquire and defend sufficient resources, fail to mate, fail to protect thier offspring, and pass unremembered into oblivion.

That is acceptable for primitive existence.  The more advanced a civilization is, the more cooperation is needed to maintain it. 

If there is enough for only some to live, my family will live by my will, wit, and force of arms.  Where we collect into municipalities, provinces and nations will I give my support through wit, will, resources, and force of arms to support our collective efforts to improve our own, and allied interests.

Until that approach comes back around on you and are you are no more.

When those who wish to take what is not earned by force of arms I will as individual or as part of organized colelctive defense destroy their ability to interfere in the most efficient way possible.  I have no duty towards those who represent a threat to those who depend on me.

OK, civilization can tolerate self-defense to a point.

In the end, your morality fails the first time that there is not enough to go around, or someone wants more than they need.  My morality functions perfectly in times of plenty, times of scarcity, or anyting inbetween.  It is not pretty, it is not nice, it is however a workable model for building and maintaining a society for the betterment of people as they actually occur, not as you feel they ought to.

Someone wanting more than they need isn't part of this new morality, so that isn't a failure of it.  If we are satisfied with humans as they occur, we wouldn't need laws to control them and medicines or hospitals to cure them.  Well, I don't agree with your feeling of morality either.

I have updated the morality summary principle slightly to address the natural state of unknowing, including the possession of wrong ideas, that is the default human state:

Fight not other people but harmful things in our universe like hunger, disease, disasters, and unknowing.