Why should we live right, and what ethical behaviors are important for social trust and personal happiness?

This article explains why we should live right, using the example of free riding to highlight the importance of social trust and human relationships. It also discusses how moral behavior benefits both the individual and the community, and argues for the need to live right.

 

If someone were to ask you, do we have a reason to live right? It’s not an easy question to answer. In the modern world, moral values and ethical standards can vary from person to person and change over time. However, if we think about it in terms of analogies to our own society, the question becomes easier to answer. In my opinion, we have a reason to live right. The example of group work, which can be seen as a microcosm of our society, and the free riding that can take place within it, can help explain why.
Free riding in groups is a big problem. Free riding is recognized as a big problem, so much so that a recent Sprite commercial poignantly depicts a senior telling a senior who is free riding that he will stop him from doing so. If we look at the underlying reasons why free riding is a problem, we can come up with ways to prevent it. The surface problem with free riding is that it increases the amount of work that everyone else has to do. However, this is only a surface issue. The real problem with free riding is that it creates discord and breaks down trust. Even the nicest team members don’t like it when someone else benefits from their hard work without putting in any effort. This can lead to a breakdown in communication, which in turn can lead to a breakdown in teamwork.
So how do you prevent this from happening? The first way to prevent free-riding is to make sure that the mutual evaluation of team members is a significant part of the final evaluation. This is similar to the iterative reciprocity hypothesis, which states that people who try to free ride will not be able to do so because their peer reviews will make it harder for them to get good grades. However, this method alone can lead to bad blood among the group, so you’ll need to create an atmosphere where conversations can go well enough so that the group can get along, and also so that the group can adjust the group work plan to suit each other’s situation. However, this method has its limitations. It is not an inherent solution because it does not prevent people who don’t care about grades, such as students who are close to graduation with a job offer, from free riding. Therefore, a more fundamental way to prevent free riding is to create a system that requires members to take responsibility and actively participate.
The second way is to create altruistic behaviors through communication, i.e., communicating how free-riding can be very damaging to the trust between team members. Many free riders often do it casually, thinking, “I’m the only one, so it’s not a problem.” However, we believe that free riding can be effectively eradicated if there is sufficient and continuous communication among the members of the group to make them understand the harmful effects of this behavior and to make them act conscientiously. Not only does this method make the harm of free riding personal, but it also creates a shared sense of group goals and values that makes cooperation and hard work a given.
The example of free riding shows that we have a reason to live right. The first reason to live right is “trust between members of society”. We can never survive alone, just like in the group task situation. Especially nowadays, when everything is done through cooperation and division of labor, it’s important to have good relationships with other people. So, what is the most important thing to have good relationships with others? It’s trust. How do you earn trust? You earn it by doing the right things. When you consistently demonstrate the right behavior, people are more likely to do the right thing with each other due to the reciprocity hypothesis, which is one of the roots of altruistic behavior. If you can build trust by consistently doing the right thing, you can do many things in a society or organization efficiently based on trust, which will benefit all members of that society or organization in the long run. The second reason why we should live rightly is that if we live rightly, we are more likely to have relationships with people who live rightly. According to the theory of eudaimonia, good people (i.e., people who live rightly) are more likely to have relationships with people who live rightly. To be more specific, within a society or organization, there is a lot of communication between members. This communication will inevitably include things about other members. If someone behaves well, good things will be said about them and they will develop a good reputation. If this process is repeated many times, the information about the person with the good reputation will reach the ears of another upstanding member, who will try to establish a relationship with the person with the good reputation. Then, after enough time, a group of people who live rightly and have good reputations will form. Within such a group, there will be relatively little conflict and things will go well, greatly increasing the benefit of the group as a whole. The reciprocity hypothesis can be applied to the opposite situation, i.e., people who do not live rightly. Because they are not living right, they are likely to have a reputation for causing some degree of damage or harm to others. The reciprocity hypothesis then suggests that people who live rightly may be reluctant to engage in relationships with people who don’t, which can be costly in the long run. It’s important to consider that many of the most socially successful people have, in fact, built networks based on these trusting relationships, which have led to many opportunities and growth.
However, the problem with these reasons to live right is that while they make a lot of sense in theory, it’s unlikely that any of these situations will happen in real life. So what is the practical and essential reason that can be directly applied in the real world? The answer is that living rightly benefits us mentally. We will face situations in our lives where doing the wrong thing will bring us material benefits. However, when we make a choice or take an action in these situations, we are not only thinking about the material and short-term benefits, but also the psychological and spiritual benefits, such as conscience and righteousness. In this case, although we may gain material benefits from living rightly, the psychological damage caused by acting against our conscience and authority is considerable, so we do not act wrongly. In addition, we learn about morality through education and experience, and we consider these variables when we act, so when we act correctly, these variables make us feel proud and happy, and when we act incorrectly, we feel unhappy. These variables of conscience, righteousness, and morality, which are built into each individual, are the most important, practical, and intrinsic reasons for us to live right.
So far, we have discussed the reasons why we should live rightly. The reasons why we should live rightly are similar to the theory of how to prevent free riding. On the surface, we should live rightly because it brings us material benefits, directly or indirectly. However, the problem with these reasons is that they are less realistic than the intrinsic reasons. Instead, the intrinsic reason is found in the mental aspect, the mental benefits of living rightly: we have both a conscience and a set of moral standards, and it is in our interest to act in accordance with them. We believe that we should live rightly because it benefits us materially and, more essentially, mentally. After all, a life lived rightly can contribute not only to our personal happiness, but also to the well-being and development of society as a whole. Therefore, we should choose to live right, not only for ourselves, but also for others and the community.