Ebay seller flipping Stepped Blue Titanium Chaparral's that he got for $19 each

[PG5768]

TL;DR.

To quote someone much wiser than me this thread is full of "Troll on troll crime".

What does that mean? LOL

Trolls trolling trolls.

[Cliff Stamp]

I'm not looking to profit from their mistake.

Here is the thing, and it goes for pretty much most people here - in general people are eager to profit from the mistakes of others. At your work when there is a promotion and raise and you get it vs the guy next to you because he made mistakes you didn't, do you feel you did something morally wrong by taking the raise/promotion?

If you and I are heading to the Spyderco annual sale and I take a wrong turn and you get there first, are you doing something morally wrong because you capitalize on my mistake and buy knives I would have wanted? Now I can continue with obvious examples but surely you see the point, are you really in general not willing to profit from the mistakes of others?

Now as for the rep lying, well that is illegal and it violates fundamental contract law. I don't see how you could lump that in with someone who is willing to purchase an item which has a very low listing price even if they knew it was a listing mistake. I a pretty sure you don't see the above mistake scenarios as being immoral so what is the difference?

[Bodog]

I'm not looking to profit from their mistake.

Here is the thing, and it goes for pretty much most people here - in general people are eager to profit from the mistakes of others. At your work when there is a promotion and raise and you get it vs the guy next to you because he made mistakes you didn't, do you feel you did something morally wrong by taking the raise/promotion?

If you and I are heading to the Spyderco annual sale and I take a wrong turn and you get there first, are you doing something morally wrong because you capitalize on my mistake and buy knives I would have wanted? Now I can continue with obvious examples but surely you see the point, are you really in general not willing to profit from the mistakes of others?

Now as for the rep lying, well that is illegal and it violates fundamental contract law. I don't see how you could lump that in with someone who is willing to purchase an item which has a very low listing price even if they knew it was a listing mistake. I a pretty sure you don't see the above mistake scenarios as being immoral so what is the difference?

I think you're playing with semantics now as there is obviously a difference in getting a promotion or getting lost versus taking obvious advantage of someone who didn't know they were screwing themselves over. If I was working with someone and they were trying to be honest and decent, I would tell them that maybe they were screwing up. If they listen, they listen. If they don't and I get the promotion, so be it.

If you get lost of your own accord to the factory store that has nothing to do with me.

Neither of those examples are the same in principle. The better example is taking $200 in change when the clerk was blind to what he was doing and had done nothing but, by all reports I can find, had treated people fairly in the past and you only should've gotten $20 in change. If you choose to keep it, so be it, the clerk messed up and that's his fault. Part of being a decent person is saying "hey, you gave me $200, you're not out to hurt anyone that I can see, are you sure you want to give me $200 in change?" If they say yes, then pocket it and whistle a good tune and click your heels together and walk out happy. If they didn't mean to, then let them correct their mistake and feel good knowing that you just helped someone. Being a decent person transcends laws and usually transcends cultures. If you don't want to see that obvious truth, then you don't want to see it.

[Cliff Stamp]

If you get lost of your own accord to the factory store that has nothing to do with me.

In all cases :

-I make a mistake
-You are aware of it
-You could chose not to capitalize on it and equalize the situation - but you don't knowing I take a loss in the exchange

Why is it different, simply stating it is doesn't do anything to explain your situation and it certainly is immoral under the reason that you gave which is "I would not profit from another's mistake".

Note that even in the case where you don't know, the argument was made that this isn't even enough and that the purchaser should have went out of their way to confirm it was not a mistake before purchasing, why isn't the same rule held in general?

[jabba359]

Cliff, these are not the same thing at all. You oversimplified the steps, leaving out perpetuating the mistake with intent to cause loss.

In the case of this knife, the steps are:

-They make a mistake
-I am aware of it
-using this awareness of a mistake, I capitalize on it and get them to make another mistake, thereby causing a loss

In this case, the pricing mistake required a direct action to capitalize on it and only through my direct action would any loss be caused. The mere act of pricing the item wrong causes no loss, but only through my act of capitalizing on the mistake by hoping they will make the further mistake of selling it before realizing the pricing is way off, is any loss incurred. No loss would be incurred if I didn't actively attempt to leverage the initial mistake. And in this case where the item was grossly under-priced, it's obvious that it's a mistake and not a super-duper special pricing that was made by the seller with full knowledge of the loss they'd be taking.

In your examples, a mistake was made, but it wasn't capitalized on to specifically cause the mistake-maker a loss.

Now, in your example of a promotion at work, it is not the same thing at all unless you had foreknowledge of the mistake your coworker is making, and then you enable them to continue making the mistake, knowing full well that the mistake will cause them a loss. If your direct intervention resulted in the mistake that led to their loss, then yes, I think it's wrong. But if they made a mistake independent of you and your boss independently decides to promote you, then your promotion is well earned, as you didn't actively seek to undermine your coworker and are being rewarded for your diligence to doing your job correctly.

As for getting to the sale late because you took a wrong turn, there's nothing wrong with me being in front of you in line because I didn't take a wrong turn. There was no intent on my part to cause you to take the wrong turn. Now, if we were about to leave for the SFO and you showed me your map and asked if it looked right and I saw that it took you to the wrong place, then I would certainly agree that it would be wrong of me to take advantage of your mistake just so I could get there before you by saying "Yes, it looks right", thereby perpetuating your mistake. As a decent person, I would let you know that the map is wrong, although it means giving you a better chance to get there before me, even though I would prefer to be in front of you buying all the knives you want just so you can't have them.

[Bodog]

In my job we get asked all the time. How do you define integrity? Everyone always says "doing what's right even when no one's looking." That's a pretty common way to explain it. I would take it a step further and say "do what's right even when there's no law telling you to do so." Now I know you're going to ask me to define "right." I will say I can't but people should know it when they see it. You'll say that's different for everyone based on how they were raised. I will agree with caveats and then retort asking you if it's ok to steal if their parents taught you to steal. You'll not answer the question but instead come up with 5 legitimate reasons why it might be ok to steal. And then we'll get sidetracked until someone brings it back around to the point. Is it generally ok to steal even though your parents and your culture taught you that it's ok and there are no laws to say otherwise? I say no, even though there's, in this scenario, nothing on paper to say it's wrong.

[MichaelScott]

I think there are certain innate human moral imperatives. One would be that it is wrong to abuse children. Period. Another might be that it is wrong to take someone's life without just cause. The problems arise when things get more complicated, such as, is it right to take the life of an unrepentant and repeating child abuser if there is no other way to get that person to stop?

I'd also observe that some people will go to great lengths to avoid answering or directly addressing the point or topic of a discussion, dissembling in such a manner as to sidetrack the conversation into irrelevant and perhaps inappropriate directions. Don't see that as something to be argued over, but observed and, having observed, move on.

[Surfingringo]

In my job we get asked all the time. How do you define integrity? Everyone always says "doing what's right even when no one's looking." That's a pretty common way to explain it. I would take it a step further and say "do what's right even when there's no law telling you to do so." Now I know you're going to ask me to define "right." I will say I can't but people should know it when they see it. You'll say that's different for everyone based on how they were raised. I will agree with caveats and then retort asking you if it's ok to steal if their parents taught you to steal. You'll not answer the question but instead come up with 5 legitimate reasons why it might be ok to steal. And then we'll get sidetracked until someone brings it back around to the point. Is it generally ok to steal even though your parents and your culture taught you that it's ok and there are no laws to say otherwise? I say no, even though there's, in this scenario, nothing on paper to say it's wrong.

I like how you distilled two pages of back and forth debate into one post!! :D I think we should call that...

CLIFF NOTES!! :cool:

[Cliff Stamp]

Cliff, these are not the same thing at all. You oversimplified the steps, leaving out perpetuating the mistake with intent to cause loss.

Again, in all cases :

-you are aware the other party made a mistake
-you did nothing to directly cause the mistake to happen
-you could equalize it and not cause the other party loss
-you chose not to and undertake actions which maximize your profit which causes them a loss

Now, in your example of a promotion at work, it is not the same thing at all unless you had foreknowledge of the mistake your coworker is making, and then you enable them to continue making the mistake...

The purchasers did not directly cause the pricing mistake, they did nothing to make it happen.

As for getting to the sale late because you took a wrong turn, there's nothing wrong with me being in front of you in line because I didn't take a wrong turn. There was no intent on my part to cause you to take the wrong turn.

And the exact same can be said of the purchaser, there is no intent to cause the seller to make a pricing mistake either.

[Cliff Stamp]

You'll say that's different for everyone based on how they were raised.

If you want to have an actual moral discussion then you might want to not ask a question and then answer as well.

You perspective towards this is also why moral discussions in general are not productive outside of academic environments. In almost all moral discussions, one party quickly reverts to naming some extreme action, demanding the other part say if that is moral or not, and then take the implication as some personal character flaw and focus then on the individual vs the actual topic of discussion. This is a great way to make an inflammatory discussion, it does absolutely nothing to generate knowledge.

An example of this was when Laurence Krauss was asked in a debate about morality without religion was incest morally wrong. Now it was easy to know that based on Krauss's perspective on morality (utility based) that incest isn't morally wrong. However as soon as Krauss started to even describe that, everything about his position was reduced to the fact that he supported incest and the web exploded with taglines of such for days after the debate about what that meant about his character. Now this does nothing to understand utilitarianism (you ought to do that which causes least harm), the problems with it, and how many people approach trying to resolve it - but it makes for good taglines.

You are also not even reading my posts as you keep asking me if I think something is wrong. i already noted in the above that I don't advocate moral realism so that question to me is jibberish, it is like asking me how to count to potato. Now you could ask me if I would assert that someone ought to steal, or if someone ought not to steal and you could actually listen to my response and try to understand it and my position. Or you could keep poking about for taglines and inflammatory responses.

[Galen]

[...] but I doubt that you can tell me I am wrong about either of my assessments of your character.

What I would do in a situation would not lead me to conclude that if someone else had a different viewpoint they were lacking in understanding and/or character.

Listen to this man. Some replies were painful to read.

After reading a few pages of this weird thread, it is clear who has a superior intellect :) I am not sure what the bickering is for, perhaps you do not understand him? I do not see him attacking anyone's point of view, relax people. Why talk down his opinions? It is sound.

[jabba359]

Sigh...I don't know why I even try sometimes. :rolleyes:

[Surfingringo]

[...] but I doubt that you can tell me I am wrong about either of my assessments of your character.

What I would do in a situation would not lead me to conclude that if someone else had a different viewpoint they were lacking in understanding and/or character.

Listen to this man. Some replies were painful to read.

After reading a few pages of this weird thread, it is clear who has a superior intellect :) I am not sure what the bickering is for, perhaps you do not understand him? I do not see him attacking anyone's point of view, relax people. Why talk down his opinions? It is sound.

Thank you so much for the kind words Galen!! Not everyone is able to recognize the superior nature of my intellect. Very astute of you! :cool:

[Cliff Stamp]

I do not see him attacking anyone's point of view...

I can't, it denies my foundation. It is in fact fairly ironic that people often will adopt a moral stance which is argued to be somehow based on rights or equality but will deny others the same rights they claim are obviously inherently present for them. My partner, in many cases will advocate a very different obligation to an action - this isn't because they lack character compared to me, it is because they have very different basic starting values.

If anyone actually thinks that they know which values are the right ones, or that they can even make a argument to support something as simple as stealing is obviously morally wrong well there is easily a PhD in it for you and you have solved one of the greatest and oldest problems in moral philosophy. By all means make that argument and collect your fame as having solved a problem which the greatest philosophers to have exist could not. To this day people spend entire Phd's arguing over if morality even exists, if it does is it objective, if it is not objective then what does moral relativism even mean aside from obligation=majority.

However before that leap is made and you start writing up your acceptance speech, I would offer a few suggestions :

-take a brief look at modern experimental psychology to come to an understanding of how most people form moral conclusions

-do a little research into the current understanding of how brain states relate to decision making processes

A few of the more interesting findings :

-The brain states can be measured and the conclusions people will form can be predicted based on those measurements before the person is even aware they have made them. This has some very strong implications for determinism. If determinism is true it makes the notion of morality meaningless because it is like arguing what a toaster ought to do. A toaster doesn't ought anything, it just does whatever physics says it does. Experiments into brain states and the ability to predict responses have a lot of people rethinking about what it even means to argue for morality in people if decisions are nothing more than chemical reactions in the brain which proceed under known rules of physics.

-Most people tend to not have a moral philosophy which comes from a well defined foundation which they employ to make moral determinations. Instead they have a hatch patch of strict rules which are often highly contradictory and they are just rote memory which have been imposed on them. This isn't even on the conscious level. Most people think they have a foundation and will provide one or give a reason as to why they think something is moral or not but it is trivial to provide counter factuals to their reason/foundation. There are many excellent lectures on YT on moral philosophy which explore this and other topics.

Shelly Kagan is a nice place to start if you want to see a current view on objective morality as Kagan argues that this exists and provides a framework for it without God. His courses/lectures are also online on YT and he is responsive to email if you really want to explore it in more depth. However as with most academic positions, there are strong contentions to it and there are arguments which are also very strong for moral relativism and moral nihilism, and then there are the radical skeptics who no one takes seriously and everyone leaves to their own devices of wondering how do they know they even exist.

[SpeedHoles]

I want further details on how to count to potato. Seems to be one process which may have stumped Cliff. :p
Maybe it transcends labels and categories of thought...?
...mmmm, potato...

Sorry if that was a "tagline".

[Cliff Stamp]

I want further details on how to count to potato.

The first step is that you must realize there is no step.

[SpeedHoles]

I want further details on how to count to potato.

The first step is that you must realize there is no step.

Realization of no step as a step... like a toaster pondering determinism. I'll lose myself into the illusion...
...oh wait no, I gotta come back and stay aware until HAP40 gets released. :D

[MichaelScott]

I want further details on how to count to potato.

The first step is that you must realize there is no step.

How very Zen of you.

Morals are cultural artifacts and determined by time and culture, not absolute values. I think we all know that. Absolutism kinda died with Einstein, Kant not withstanding. Chemical and neurological "brain states" don't dictate behaviors and decisions and there really is no one "brain state" as is shown by current neuroscience research. There are many brain functions and interactive regions working in synchrony to effect human behavior.

Proposing limited and constrained examples and positing "moral conundrums" may a display a certain familiarity with many topics but your arguments wander, often fail to address the relevant points if not miss them entirely.

I am open to cogent and reasoned discussion, supported by evidence, but I'm not finding that in your dissertations. Please be more concise and stick to the point.

[Archimedes]

I do not see him attacking anyone's point of view...

I can't, it denies my foundation. It is in fact fairly ironic that people often will adopt a moral stance which is argued to be somehow based on rights or equality but will deny others the same rights they claim are obviously inherently present for them. My partner, in many cases will advocate a very different obligation to an action - this isn't because they lack character compared to me, it is because they have very different basic starting values.

If anyone actually thinks that they know which values are the right ones, or that they can even make a argument to support something as simple as stealing is obviously morally wrong well there is easily a PhD in it for you and you have solved one of the greatest and oldest problems in moral philosophy. By all means make that argument and collect your fame as having solved a problem which the greatest philosophers to have exist could not. To this day people spend entire Phd's arguing over if morality even exists, if it does is it objective, if it is not objective then what does moral relativism even mean aside from obligation=majority.

However before that leap is made and you start writing up your acceptance speech, I would offer a few suggestions :

-take a brief look at modern experimental psychology to come to an understanding of how most people form moral conclusions

-do a little research into the current understanding of how brain states relate to decision making processes

A few of the more interesting findings :

-The brain states can be measured and the conclusions people will form can be predicted based on those measurements before the person is even aware they have made them. This has some very strong implications for determinism. If determinism is true it makes the notion of morality meaningless because it is like arguing what a toaster ought to do. A toaster doesn't ought anything, it just does whatever physics says it does. Experiments into brain states and the ability to predict responses have a lot of people rethinking about what it even means to argue for morality in people if decisions are nothing more than chemical reactions in the brain which proceed under known rules of physics.

-Most people tend to not have a moral philosophy which comes from a well defined foundation which they employ to make moral determinations. Instead they have a hatch patch of strict rules which are often highly contradictory and they are just rote memory which have been imposed on them. This isn't even on the conscious level. Most people think they have a foundation and will provide one or give a reason as to why they think something is moral or not but it is trivial to provide counter factuals to their reason/foundation. There are many excellent lectures on YT on moral philosophy which explore this and other topics.

Shelly Kagan is a nice place to start if you want to see a current view on objective morality as Kagan argues that this exists and provides a framework for it without God. His courses/lectures are also online on YT and he is responsive to email if you really want to explore it in more depth. However as with most academic positions, there are strong contentions to it and there are arguments which are also very strong for moral relativism and moral nihilism, and then there are the radical skeptics who no one takes seriously and everyone leaves to their own devices of wondering how do they know they even exist.

Really dude? This is a knife forum and we isn't as smart as you. You lost me at determinism...LOL.

[Bodog]

Double tap