Good intentions don’t matter. Only thing that matters is behavior, not intentions. Almost nobody has evil intentions. Very few people wake up in the morning and say, «Oh, another opportunity to do evil.» Stalin didn’t think he was evil. Hitler didn’t think he was evil. Mao didn’t think he was evil. Okay, just for the record. They all thought they were good. Communism, the greatest mass murdering machine in history, killed a hundred million civilians in the 20th century alone, was based on good intentions. Equality, fraternity, anti-imperialism and anti-colonialism and whatever else. Good intentions don’t mean anything. You should judge yourself and everyone else by their behavior.
Dennis Prager
Dennis Prager sums up why good intentions do not matter:
And yup, that is a point that was made by several other people. E.g., by Dörner (2015, «Die Logik des Misslingens», translated via DeepL.com):
«The cultivation of good intentions is an extremely undemanding intellectual activity. Designing plans to realize noble goals is a different matter. This requires intelligence. The appreciation of good intentions alone is by no means appropriate, on the contrary!
In my opinion, it is an open question whether ‹good intentions + stupidity› or ‹bad intentions + intelligence› have brought more mischief into the world. Because people with good intentions usually have few inhibitions about tackling the realization of their goals. In this way, inability, which would otherwise remain hidden, becomes dangerous, and in the end there is the astonished and desperate exclamation: ‹We didn’t want this!›»
Dörner (2015) «Die Logik des Misslingens»
or C. S. Lewis:
«Of all tyrannies, a tyranny exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.»
C. S. Lewis
or Star Trek DS9 (great episode BTW):
«My father used to say, that the road to hell is paved with good intentions. I laid the first stone right there. I’d committed myself. I’d pay any price, go to any length, because my course was righteous … my intentions were good. In the beginning, that seemed like enough.»
Star Trek DS9 – 6×19: «In The Pale Moonlight»
or others:
«No person is more capable of evil than the ones convince they can only do good.»
Unknown
Still, well put and a good argument for oppositional collaboration …
«A contemporary philosopher has suggested a paradigm of ‹oppositional collaboration› for areas with high ideological polarization, in which bioethicists (or scientists) with fundamentally opposed viewpoints work together to generate data that they all agree is as objective as possible for the relevant questions. This does not necessarily result in a change in values or agreement of the respective colleagues, but it can result in more accurate data and increased understanding and respect, extremely valuable outcomes.»
Dr. Joseph Stanford
… and intellectual humility.