Human morality
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Human morality
My sole purpose for being here at all, is to remain abstinent from alcohol.
In addition to my BP, which is essentially all I need, I read and post, agree and disagree with posters and examine, introspectively, how I feel\think about opinions. TBH though, it's mostly think. I'm not entirely convinced that I feel anything much. But that's beside the point.
For this discussion point, I was just wondering how others feel about the necessity of a moralistic precursor to "giving up" alcohol. Personally, I don't feel that need. I didn't like my life as a drinker. That in itself is sufficient motivation for me.
It's just that I read a lot about family morality in JD's musings and whilst I fully embrace the AVRT "method", I do question the need for a moralistic element.
I am somewhat of a nihilistic disposition!
In addition to my BP, which is essentially all I need, I read and post, agree and disagree with posters and examine, introspectively, how I feel\think about opinions. TBH though, it's mostly think. I'm not entirely convinced that I feel anything much. But that's beside the point.
For this discussion point, I was just wondering how others feel about the necessity of a moralistic precursor to "giving up" alcohol. Personally, I don't feel that need. I didn't like my life as a drinker. That in itself is sufficient motivation for me.
It's just that I read a lot about family morality in JD's musings and whilst I fully embrace the AVRT "method", I do question the need for a moralistic element.
I am somewhat of a nihilistic disposition!
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Making your BP because you didn't like your life as a drinker seems a good reason to me.
But what would happen if you ever started 'romanticising drink' and thinking that your life as a drinker wasn't really all that bad? Would you loose motivation and start drinking again?
To avoid this, it it would help if you were absolutist about it and viewed drinking in itself as an absolutely wrong thing for you to do, if not for moral reasons then because it would inevitably lead to you not liking like your life so much. This would mean that your decision to quit won't be subject to any review of your former life as a drinker.
But what would happen if you ever started 'romanticising drink' and thinking that your life as a drinker wasn't really all that bad? Would you loose motivation and start drinking again?
To avoid this, it it would help if you were absolutist about it and viewed drinking in itself as an absolutely wrong thing for you to do, if not for moral reasons then because it would inevitably lead to you not liking like your life so much. This would mean that your decision to quit won't be subject to any review of your former life as a drinker.
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When I made my Big Plan, I established my new moral code of behavioural conduct (I will never drink again).
The morality issue was important, to me, because I view the behavioural drive to drink in my brain (addicted ‘Beast’ neuronal loops) as amoral - in that the Beast was unaware that its constant AV seeking a drink, was encouraging me to perform an immoral (wrong) conduct, i.e, harm myself by drinking. In fact, the Beast was originally born of a moral (good) behavioural drive, to make me feel better, via dopamine driven neuro plasticity: until I drank so much that IT turned rogue.
In the AVRT literature, I took the ‘family morality’ issue as pertaining to the family members, being guided towards non-acceptance of the behaviour of their addict (to support their addict to quit once and for all). As opposed to the alternative program mentioned, which favours the family acceptance of the addicts behaviour (because ‘they couldn’t help it, as they were diseased) and offers a linked program for the addicts spouses and children to attend.
The morality issue was important, to me, because I view the behavioural drive to drink in my brain (addicted ‘Beast’ neuronal loops) as amoral - in that the Beast was unaware that its constant AV seeking a drink, was encouraging me to perform an immoral (wrong) conduct, i.e, harm myself by drinking. In fact, the Beast was originally born of a moral (good) behavioural drive, to make me feel better, via dopamine driven neuro plasticity: until I drank so much that IT turned rogue.
In the AVRT literature, I took the ‘family morality’ issue as pertaining to the family members, being guided towards non-acceptance of the behaviour of their addict (to support their addict to quit once and for all). As opposed to the alternative program mentioned, which favours the family acceptance of the addicts behaviour (because ‘they couldn’t help it, as they were diseased) and offers a linked program for the addicts spouses and children to attend.
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There are innumerable reasons for drinking to be wrong for people, and those reasons motivate people to decide to make a Big Plan. But for me, and I would imagine for anyone who really made a Big Plan, the reasons for quitting no longer hold any sway regarding drinking some more. The pledge "I will never drink again." does it all.
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I believe morality has little to do with it. I harmed myself by drinking. I came to understand that I was unable to control my drinking. I wish to harm myself no further. It is more a self-preservation response than a moral one. It was more logical than moral for me.
As for the nihilistic viewpoint, one has to ask what they value in themselves if anything at all. But if one has a care about themselves to seek an improvement, then one clearly cannot claim a viewpoint that would suggest otherwise. It's a bit of an oxymoron. I lean more toward existentialism than anything else. But by all accounts I am a humanist. I value all people - who wish me no harm. There is a certain "morality" as more of a common respect for all life, and oneself. To seek sobriety for oneself surely is a human trait of self preservation, whether one thinks it moral or not. As people, we do not do things untoward to other people simply as happenstance. Our nature is to be caring of all regardless of what is taught or accepted as the norm. Also, morality is a very broad term and could mean different things to different people - the taught or accepted morality.
I have not read any of the literature associated with any of the RR or AVRT approaches to sobriety, so if this is questioning something written, then I have no input on that aspect of it.
But the final answer for me was, alcohol negatively impacted my life in a profound way, remove it from my life. It just made sense.
As for the nihilistic viewpoint, one has to ask what they value in themselves if anything at all. But if one has a care about themselves to seek an improvement, then one clearly cannot claim a viewpoint that would suggest otherwise. It's a bit of an oxymoron. I lean more toward existentialism than anything else. But by all accounts I am a humanist. I value all people - who wish me no harm. There is a certain "morality" as more of a common respect for all life, and oneself. To seek sobriety for oneself surely is a human trait of self preservation, whether one thinks it moral or not. As people, we do not do things untoward to other people simply as happenstance. Our nature is to be caring of all regardless of what is taught or accepted as the norm. Also, morality is a very broad term and could mean different things to different people - the taught or accepted morality.
I have not read any of the literature associated with any of the RR or AVRT approaches to sobriety, so if this is questioning something written, then I have no input on that aspect of it.
But the final answer for me was, alcohol negatively impacted my life in a profound way, remove it from my life. It just made sense.
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Originally Posted by Trohyn 
For this discussion point, I was just wondering how others feel about the necessity of a moralistic precursor to "giving up" alcohol.
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Originally Posted by LBrain
As for the nihilistic viewpoint, one has to ask what they value in themselves if anything at all. But if one has a care about themselves to seek an improvement, then one clearly cannot claim a viewpoint that would suggest otherwise. It's a bit of an oxymoron.
It's not that I don't have a care for myself, nor of others, rather that for me , life doesn't need a meaning nor purpose to have intrinsic value. One can read so much into a label, such as "Nihilist", and perhaps I have mis-labelled myself.
The morality question of my post was in response to my readings of Jack Trimpey's assertions of the importance of family morals, which Tatsy addressed earlier in this thread. Sorry if I was obtuse.
Last edited by Trohyn; 01-20-2018 at 03:12 AM. Reason: Autocorrect preferred Trumpet to Trimpey
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Originally Posted by Trohyn
It's not that I don't have a care for myself, nor of others, rather that for me , life doesn't need a meaning nor purpose to have intrinsic value. One can read so much into a label, such as "Nihilist", and perhaps I have mis-labelled myself.
The morality question of my post was in response to my readings of Jack Trimpey's assertions of the importance of family morals, which Tatsy addressed earlier in this thread. Sorry if I was obtuse.
The morality question of my post was in response to my readings of Jack Trimpey's assertions of the importance of family morals, which Tatsy addressed earlier in this thread. Sorry if I was obtuse.
As I mention, I have not read any of the associated literature. But what I am gathering from this discussion is that Trimpey (?) mentions morality as it affects family and friends. It seems to me that it falls in line with, "Make a list of all people we have harmed...." "Make amends to those..." If you are not familiar with the "12 steps", it sounds very much the same idea as put forth in that book - I could be mistaken. But only in the reflective sense - I am guessing.
Humility is a big player in the concept of how our actions affect others. We can have a strong sense of compassion for others, or we can be as an inanimate object, just there.
The seven deadly sins come to mind. Whether one adheres to these as problematic or not, they do in fact have a profound effect on how we view others and how other view us. But in a lesser sense as how our actions alone may have affected those close to us.
I will say that while I was drinking, my choices and actions were totally independent of outside influences or the "expected norms" of society at times. I ignored my family or brought embarrassment to them by my actions over time. But at that time, I didn't give a care about it. Since becoming a sober person, I see the harm I had done and the feelings I hurt. So it is more of a retrospective approach to the 'morality' issue I presume - for me at least. Or perhaps, it could be used in the present if one can step outside themselves to see how their actions are affecting others. Or both. Yeah, both.
When I lost my job, I was more concerned about my wife than myself.
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Interesting discussion.
We could say that if we value something we are evaluating something that we experience as positive, and if we have purpose, or are being purposeful, we are making an effort we make to bring about a future state that we value. Quitting drinking very much qualifies as having both purpose and value with these definitions.
As to whether or not these things are intrinsic would depend I suppose on how we view things. My own belief is that the universe exists in order to allow beings like us who have personal experiences and purposes to share a common environment in which we can learn, develop and act (philosophical idealism). This "in order to" makes purpose and values intrinsic to the basic structure of the cosmos. But anyway, without believing this, purpose and values could still be intrinsic to how you see yourself and others and IMO that would be just as good.
We could say that if we value something we are evaluating something that we experience as positive, and if we have purpose, or are being purposeful, we are making an effort we make to bring about a future state that we value. Quitting drinking very much qualifies as having both purpose and value with these definitions.
As to whether or not these things are intrinsic would depend I suppose on how we view things. My own belief is that the universe exists in order to allow beings like us who have personal experiences and purposes to share a common environment in which we can learn, develop and act (philosophical idealism). This "in order to" makes purpose and values intrinsic to the basic structure of the cosmos. But anyway, without believing this, purpose and values could still be intrinsic to how you see yourself and others and IMO that would be just as good.
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The morality underpinning AVRT is indeed real and has an origin and purpose.
Basic to AVRT is our shared humanity. It recognizes alcohol consumption by chronic drunks as immoral because it is what leads to the unthinkable - vehicular death, even homicide, all of the domestic tragedies that are all too familiar. Add assault, infidelity, your basic list of horrors as drunks wild in the night.
When only alcohol encourages those behaviors, or the chance of them, alcohol consumption must be viewed as a profoundly immoral act.
When something makes you unfit to live in peace with your intimates and neighbors - the human family - it is profoundly immoral.
That is because AVRT is the lore of the self-recovered, collected and recorded. And because it comes from common people, it reflects the common desire for peace, love, family.
AVRT does not reflect the desires and goals of intellectuals, philosophers, master debaters, quibblers and amateur rhetoric poseurs. That is because of cross-purposes - the intelligentsia is flooded with collective AV and generally anti-family.
Such old-fashioned sentiments aren't as popular today as they once were, so some people will object to any "outside force" interfering with their pleasure, placing any restraint on their behavior or in any way limiting their so-called "liberties."
All of which I call AV.
Basic to AVRT is our shared humanity. It recognizes alcohol consumption by chronic drunks as immoral because it is what leads to the unthinkable - vehicular death, even homicide, all of the domestic tragedies that are all too familiar. Add assault, infidelity, your basic list of horrors as drunks wild in the night.
When only alcohol encourages those behaviors, or the chance of them, alcohol consumption must be viewed as a profoundly immoral act.
When something makes you unfit to live in peace with your intimates and neighbors - the human family - it is profoundly immoral.
That is because AVRT is the lore of the self-recovered, collected and recorded. And because it comes from common people, it reflects the common desire for peace, love, family.
AVRT does not reflect the desires and goals of intellectuals, philosophers, master debaters, quibblers and amateur rhetoric poseurs. That is because of cross-purposes - the intelligentsia is flooded with collective AV and generally anti-family.
Such old-fashioned sentiments aren't as popular today as they once were, so some people will object to any "outside force" interfering with their pleasure, placing any restraint on their behavior or in any way limiting their so-called "liberties."
All of which I call AV.
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Originally Posted by Greenwood618
AVRT does not reflect the desires and goals of intellectuals, philosophers, master debaters, quibblers and amateur rhetoric poseurs. That is because of cross-purposes - the intelligentsia is flooded with collective AV and generally anti-family.
Are you really suggesting that if my desire not to drink doesn't agree with Jack Drimpsey's assertions that family morals underpins such a desire that I'm part of a "collective AV and anti family"?
I think I must be mistaking the gist of your post.
My original question was whether there was a need for a moral element, which I don't think there is.
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Because I deeply believe that sobering-up is, and can be, a purely-Terrestrial change, I find the power to fundamentally change to be within ourselves. The added overlay of a Morals-driven POV is a nice Icing on the proverbial Cake for some of us. I think it can serve to help lock in fundamental changes if wavering is an issue to power through.
As Sobriety becomes The New Normal, I find such strategies to become optional over time.
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Because I deeply believe that sobering-up is, and can be, a purely-Terrestrial change, I find the power to fundamentally change to be within ourselves. The added overlay of a Morals-driven POV is a nice Icing on the proverbial Cake for some of us. I think it can serve to help lock in fundamental changes if wavering is an issue to power through.
As Sobriety becomes The New Normal, I find such strategies to become optional over time.
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Bottom line is if you don't ingest the psychoactive chemical, you don't become addicted. A clear case that morals has nothing to do with chemical addiction is new born infants, they have no morals. Basically all they can do is coo when they are happy and scream at the top of their lungs when they are not, yet they can be as addicted as any adult. On Amazon.com you can type The Addictive Brain and if you are a member of Amazon prime you can watch for free a course about addiction, very informative. Rootin for everyone. 
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Hi nefer. I believe the question was whether or not 'morals' had an influence on the decision to get sober. I'm sure even those who did it to themselves didn't make a conscious decision to become an addict, but eventually made the decision to get sober - was it a moral decision?
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I’d say at the very least it is a value pursuit decision, you have to value ‘sobriety ‘, or the lack of drunkenness, more than the current state in order to pursue it.
And since morals are the principles that guide our choice of values and actions to gain and keep them , it has to be , yeah?
And since morals are the principles that guide our choice of values and actions to gain and keep them , it has to be , yeah?
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I think introducing morality into addiction recovery, in the sense that a moral choice is necessary to get sober, is very much like insisting that sobriety can only follow a spiritual awakening. Well, sometimes morals play a role, and sometimes spiritual awakenings play a role, but general statements like these are pretty much always incorrect. Personally I quit because I knew I was going to die in misery if I took even one more drink, and didn't stop the madness right now. It was my very last exit, the road continued straight to hell, and deep down I knew it and had enough cerebrum left to see the last exit for what it was.
I think, you decide for whatever reasons to stop drinking, and you stay sober using whatever approach you find or invent that works, and that's it. That doesn't necessarily make you a perfect person, and maybe there are still issues you should work on, but that statement is true for nearly all humans, whether or not they were ever addicts.
It's no longer an addiction issue at that point, it's personal growth issue, that you can choose to work on, or not.
I think, you decide for whatever reasons to stop drinking, and you stay sober using whatever approach you find or invent that works, and that's it. That doesn't necessarily make you a perfect person, and maybe there are still issues you should work on, but that statement is true for nearly all humans, whether or not they were ever addicts.
It's no longer an addiction issue at that point, it's personal growth issue, that you can choose to work on, or not.
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If we look at our own story, I guess we'd all see that see that it was a rational choice for us to quit. We all had very good reasons why we wanted to stop, and for me these were that I would be happier and freer without drink in my life, and the people close to me would be happier too.
It feels to me that when I made this decision I was evaluating and choosing a goal that was good or right for me. I personally would use the word 'moral' here to describe the ability I had to choose this goal, and also to pursue this goal
I love animals and I don't think we are better than them but one way in which we are different is that we have the capacity to choose or ignore future goals for ourselves. I think saying that we are morally responsible agents is a good description for this capacity, with 'morally' stripped of any association with religious hypocrisy.
It feels to me that when I made this decision I was evaluating and choosing a goal that was good or right for me. I personally would use the word 'moral' here to describe the ability I had to choose this goal, and also to pursue this goal
I love animals and I don't think we are better than them but one way in which we are different is that we have the capacity to choose or ignore future goals for ourselves. I think saying that we are morally responsible agents is a good description for this capacity, with 'morally' stripped of any association with religious hypocrisy.
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