Mistakes are like tumbleweeds: depending the wind direction and velocity, they may bite you in the ass sooner or later.

But there are also mistakes that are not depended on your knowledge.
You can know all that is possible for you to make predictions and still make a mistake because there are many forces outside your knowledge that could play a role in your mistake.

Thus, there is no reason to dwell on them/live in guilt or shame due to them. — Benj96

If guilt and shame are the direct result of mistakes, which you consider unpredictable and unavoidable, are they not similarly unpredictable and unavoidable? I no more want guilt and shame than I do mistakes but somehow my emotions don't give any more a fig for what I want than the vagaries of fate do.

We are human, mistakes are both inevitable and necessary - to learn from — Benj96

In the math profession one achieves favorable results through a convergent sequence of mistakes. :cool:

A couple of years ago, I rebuilt the deck on our home. It was a large deck, and my carpentry skills are rudimentary, so I made many a mistake - some easily rectified, some undo-able. I ruefully reflected on the fact that apprenticeship largely comprises a long series of supervised mistakes - that the apprentice, supervised by a master, gets the chance to make mistakes in a controlled kind of way, and as a consequence becomes skilled over time. Whereas the home handy-man, committed to a large job of this kind, has no such luxury, and has to live with whatever mistakes he made. (Turned out alright, but I knew where all the errors were.)

You can know all that is possible for you to make predictions and still make a mistake because there are many forces outside your knowledge that could play a role in your mistake. — TheMadMan

I'm not sure that getting something wrong because the information you have is lacking is exactly a mistake, though it is certainly an error. Either way, guilt and shame are only appropriate if one was reckless in not ensuring one had all the information or careless in not properly interpreting it.

Sometimes people feel guilt and shame when it clearly wasn't their fault. That is inappropriate guilt and shame, though it can be hard to shake off. Often people think up things they might have done and didn't do. But they did do everything they could, and that's all that can be expected of them. But those feelings are often part of regret.

OP used mistake and error with the same meaning.
Nevertheless Im not putting moral value to a mistake.
And people will feel regret even if it is a fault-less mistake/error.

Part of what I was trying to say is that mistake and error are different. I'm not sure that I was right to say that lacking relevant information is an error. But I couldn't think of the right word.

Another part of what I was trying to say is that it is appropriate for people to feel regret about something wrong or problematic or lacking when it isn't their fault. But faultless mistake or error is a contradiction in terms and that people do quite often feel guilt and shame about things that are not their fault. I think that life is hard enough without taking responsibility for things we are not responsible for.

If guilt and shame are the direct result of mistakes, which you consider unpredictable and unavoidable, are they not similarly unpredictable and unavoidable? I no more want guilt and shame than I do mistakes but somehow my emotions don't give any more a fig for what I want than the vagaries of fate do. — Baden

True, they are part and parcel of the process of identifying the mistake. Realisation of a mistake is a negative experience. It naturally leads to feelings of culpability, inadecuacy etc.

What i was saying is regardless of the fact we will feel bad, we need not dwell on it. Fixate and propagate those negative feelings endlessly and devolve into a depression.

It's a "c'est la vie" response in essence.

Is there a mistake so unforgivable that one ought to die at their own hand, of their intolerable remorse/ guilt or shame they feel?

Or is the intensity of that remorse suffering enough, a sign that they don't deserve punishment because they fully acknowledge the degree of the mistake?

And people will feel regret even if it is a fault-less mistake/error. — TheMadMan

This is true.
People feel guilt for a lot of things they ought not to. Torturing themselves over minor failings.

And similar others feel no guilt/remorse for many things they've done that most other people would feel guilty about.

So it's a dichotomy.
As for any moral value I'm not sure o know what you mean exactly. Some mistakes are not morally relevant. Others are more so.

yes I see what you mean. Trial and error hones ones skills and ableness.

We see the same in evolution. Except its live or die in that case.

In the math profession one achieves favorable results through a convergent sequence of mistakes — jgill

Converging in what sense? From what I understand is converging on the correct answer by process of elimination (series of errors). I feel this is not just applicable to maths but across the board. Probability underlies most of not all interactions/processes right?

As for any moral value I'm not sure o know what you mean exactly. Some mistakes are not morally relevant. Others are more so. — Benj96

Im not sure how one can give a moral judgment to the mistake/error. I think that the moral judgement falls to what could cause the mistake/error i.e negligence, pride, anger etc.

faultless mistake or error is a contradiction in terms — Ludwig V

It may be contradiction of terms but its a reality. Maybe "innocent mistake" would be a better term for what I mean.

Im not sure how one can give a moral judgment to the mistake/error. I think that the moral judgement falls to what could cause the mistake/error i.e negligence, pride, anger etc. — TheMadMan

Maybe that's so.

It may be contradiction of terms but its a reality. Maybe "innocent mistake" would be a better term for what I mean. — TheMadMan

It would certainly help.

But I think we are agreed that people often feel guilt and shame about mistakes and errors or whatever we call them when they are not at fault. And it can be difficult to deal with. But perhaps this isn't a problem that philosophy can deal with effectively.

Maybe the shame and guilt come from our expectation of our self.
I don't feel guilt or shame when I fail at something I know I'm not good at.
So it maybe be from our self-image and our identification with it.

In the math profession one achieves favorable results through a convergent sequence of mistakes — jgill

Converging in what sense? From what I understand is converging on the correct answer by process of elimination (series of errors). I feel this is not just applicable to maths but across the board. Probability underlies most of not all interactions/processes right? — Benj96

Getting closer and closer to the solution of a problem through a sequence of mistakes. It's a play on math terms, but probably applies to most problem solving.

Perfection is a distant and cruel god. Even refereed published math papers frequently have mistakes, simple typos mostly, but sometimes flaws in reasoning which are much more serious. A highly respected Oxbridge mathematician far up in years, like me, claimed to have solved a long lasting and major problem in analytic number theory, but those who read his paper shook their heads in sad recognition of creativity being a spectacle of youth. :chin:

As for feeling badly when you make a mistake - get back in the saddle and do better.

Maybe the shame and guilt come from our expectation of our self. — TheMadMan

That's perfectly true. As jgill says:-

Perfection is a distant and cruel god. — jgill

J.L. Austin has an essay called "A Plea for Excuses". It is actually about morality, looking at how a normal act gets screwed up, to see how we make amends, learn our responsibility, understand our freedom, etc. He says it starts with someone being accused (even ourselves) of doing something (wrong, bad, poorly, etc). Now admitting the act and denying it was bad is to justify it, which is what most moral theory tries to do (even beforehand -oo- Kant). But to admit it was bad but deny responsibility is to make an excuse, which turns on how (me) doing something works at all.

He looks at the things we say (doing Ordinary Language Philosophy) in making excuses to see how action works. He learns it is broken into parts: knowledge, decision, planning, resolve, execution, etc. But in the case of a mistake it falls under a failure to realize or appreciate the situation. Ultimately every case has its own standards and some excuses fold together, even here with inadvertence, absence of mind, not to mention sheer, mere, simple, etc. but sometimes these distinctions are everything; the more serious or complex the act may call for a closer look at the details of the situation, the context in that case.

To the point at hand, he says "In an accident something befalls; by mistake you take the wrong one; in error you stray..." Philosophical Papers, pp. 201-202. His example of a mistake would be writing Dairy instead of Diary on your new book, but elsewhere he says you may go to shoot your donkey and find you have shot your neighbor's--by mistake (mistakenly taking one for the other). If you go to shoot your donkey and miss and hit his cow--that's an error. If the gun misfires and kills anything, that's an accident.

Now you go to plead your case to your neighbor, and out will come any mitigating circumstances (no coffee blurry-eyed; donkeys all look the same; he just bought a donkey? you didn't know!). Does how bad you feel have anything to do with whether your neighbor will forgive you? Maybe; depends. Will it matter in the case of labeling your journal Dairy? Depends on the judge.

Perfection is a distant and cruel god. — jgill

Haha I like this phrase. I can imagine knowing of/expecting the perfect answer to a formula or maths equation one is working on, and feeling like it proverbially laughs mockingly at you at every failing turn, where the result wasnt sufficient.

Perfection may be "cruel" in the sense that none of us can ever approach it fully. But it is also the great driver behind motivation, desire and passion.

It is the single "ideal" for which we all strive despite knowing the ideal can never be fully realised. Not universally anyways. Personally yes I think so.

Eureka! The maths problem gets solved by someone right? That moment must feel like pure bliss, even if only briefly.

Maybe the shame and guilt come from our expectation of our self.
I don't feel guilt or shame when I fail at something I know I'm not good at.
So it maybe be from our self-image and our identification with it. — TheMadMan

Absolutely.
Expectation dictates the success/failure dynamic.
People with the biggest dreams/ambitions fall the hardest when they don't meet them.

I think thats pretty much part of the basis for stoicism. Going through the motions without grappling too much for the good stuff or avoiding to intensely the bad. That only makes for a turbulent roller-coaster, a high amplitude up and down state of affairs.

In either case it's only transient. Mid range expectations probably foster resilience to disappointnent as well as resilience to adversity.

Interesting outline indeed. Thank you for the insight.

I agree with the process outlined:

knowledge, decision, planning, resolve, execution — Antony Nickles

.

For me a mistake can occur at any stage in that process.
Erroneous knowledge, poor decision, under-strategied plan, inadequate resolve, misdirected execution.

In essence, a failing in any part can lead to an undesired outcome and thus a mistake.
For me, whether a mistake is forgivable or not is primarily based on intent. Intent can be good or bad. How you act out intent can also be good or bad.

Good intentions acted out poorly is in need of attention in that one must acknowledge why their good intentions did not lead to good results.

Contrarily, bad intentions acted out well, are directly malicious/sadistic.

Bad intentions acted out poorly is also malicious (because the intent was bad) but because of one's failing to get the desired result, the damage/harm may be less.
Does that make it less of a mistake? I think not.

Because intention is the most important feature of any act. If you had bad will from the beginning it doesn't matter if your actions were successful or not. It's a mistake. A violation of "good will".

People often conflate poor outcome with bad intention. But this is of course not always true. Usually one with good intentions that commits a bad act will immediately feel guilt, shame or harsh self-criticism/auto-self-punshiment upon the realisation.

Therefore I think there is little need to punish them further. They did enough of that to themselves.

Maybe "innocent mistake" would be a better term for what I mean. — TheMadMan

If a mistake occurs I'm not sure it's "innocent" in the sense that the person caused it.

But the mistake is either caused by "mal-intent" or "despite good intention" . And I think that's the key difference.

If a mistake is caused but the intent was good, then the mistake is in the action/execution. Forgiveable. Perhaps the person requires a bit more careful thinking/reasoning and planning in the future.

If a mistake is caused by bad intention. The error/mistake was in ever thinking it's okay to want harm to befall another.
That is somewhat more sinister and more difficult to tackle.

People can easily justify bringing harm to others especially in a revenge context. But two wrongs do not a right make.

Even if someone had bad intentions towards you, does not give one permission to practise hate and revenge. Reprimand yes, sadism no.

We can address revenge in a constructive way, focusing less on punishing them and fuelling their sadism, and focus instead on targeting their mal-intention as the source of their desire to harm you.

Let's take an extreme example, if one country nukes another. Should we nuke them back?
Many people say yes.
Personally I say no, despite the rage/fury it may cause. This case would be the practise of the greatest restraint from reducing yourself to their level.

The simple fact would be 2 nukes will harm more innocent parties than one nuke would.

And propagating war is not what we want. If we reduced ourselves to the worst mal-intentions possible it would ultimately spell mutual destruction. And in that scenario no one is the winner.

Instead, I think it would be more prudent to disarm them, sanction them, re-educate and "enforce" peace to the greatest degree that avoids further catastrophe.

Even if it requires invading the country and taking over their missiles to disengage them. It is still better than launching your own in counter attack, that is the easiest cheat, but easy does not mean better.

If a mistake occurs I'm not sure it's "innocent" in the sense that the person caused it.

But the mistake is either caused by "mal-intent" or "despite good intention" . And I think that's the key difference.

If a mistake is caused but the intent was good, then the mistake is in the action/execution. Forgiveable. Perhaps the person requires a bit more careful thinking/reasoning and planning in the future. — Benj96

So you don't think that a mistake with a good intention is innocent?
Basically innocence means "meaning no harm" and a good intention means no harm.

a failing in any part (knowledge to execution) can lead to an undesired outcome and thus a mistake. — Benj96

My point (well, Austin's) before was that we have to be clear about the circumstances and describe them accordingly; a mistake is different than an accident, etc., and not every act incorporates all the list of things that an act can. You may not have knowledge, or planning, have executed it perfectly, etc., and this comes into play in judging and excusing.

And, as you say, nothing may go wrong at all in our view, which is what I take you to mean in doing a "good" thing. And this would be something you would justify if someone disagreed, not beg to be excused. You would argue it was not a bad or wrong act. Again, there is admitting I did it and justifying that the act was right or good, but, separately, denying it was me that did it, or that I (fully) did it.

For me, whether a mistake is forgivable or not is primarily based on intent. Intent can be good or bad. How you act out intent can also be good or bad. — Benj96

Which brings me to my main point. Austin will comment that, in philosophy, there is a lot of hand-wringing about "cause", "intention", "effect", "consequence"--thus Hume's attempt at explaining the moral compass in each of us (and our praise and blame) and Kant's reaction to try to remove our feelings from moral consideration altogether by making our judgment logically necessary or categorical (beforehand). What Austin is doing is taking every single act as its own category (with different--mostly external--criteria for what makes up a mistake, accident, etc.) as well as taking into consideration the exact situation (context) and this specific occurrence (here, now, to be drawn out as much as necessary).

My point is that judgment based on one's intent is taken from an oversimplification of action pictured as happening one way; Austin uses the example of pushing a rock (Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations is about looking at tons of examples). In the simple (generalized) case, we make a conscious decision of what to do and how, we "cause" ourselves to move, and we anticipate (intend) a particular result or consequence. However, more types of examples show that we so rarely consider our acts or decide or think what exactly to say--much less that we can even be aware of all the implications, which do not depend on us--that we will find that intention and causality are internalized by philosophy onto every instance only in order to have control, universality of theory, "knowledge", when both are actually only investigated after the act and determined not by our good or bad intention (as some ever-present internal force of mine) but through parcing it out from the shared expectations of this situation (Wittgenstein calls these an act's Grammar, which are the criteria Austin is drawing out for each type of excuse--what makes something a "mistake"). We only ask about intention when something is unexpected: "Did you intend to do that (bad, weird, unexpected act)?" "No, I didn't even cause it to happen; he pushed me!"

That is not to say that with some acts it does matter why (or whether) I did choose to do something--judging between 1st and 2nd degree murder; judging someone who chose to send a missle or did it mistakenly (they wanted to send something else), or, more likely, accidentally (Whoops! Wrong button!) The imaging of ever-present "intention" or "cause" gets at our relationship to responsibility (and freedom) for our actions. But looking at all the different ways we get out of responsibility or say our freedom (to act) was limited, shows it is not always (or even most times) the case there is a good or bad motive. This also shows that having a predetermined judgment of what acts are good and which are bad is not what is really a "moral" situation (just following rules), as most moral theory struggles with and stumbles upon. This is why Nietszche implored us to move beyond good and evil (side-stepping the deontological-teleological-emotive debate).

Missing a whole aspect or edifice in the understanding. I presume sensory simple mistakes are not the essence of the question.

I presume sensory simple mistakes are not the essence of the question. — Alexander Hine

Not sure who you are responding to, but, for my part, the whole exercise of looking at mistakes is to see that we judge them based on what act was being done and how any deviation could be excused by a response from the actor. So the essence of the issue is our criteria for judging what matters to each type of action (and also in this instance)--what counts. So a "[simple] sensory mistake", if I understand that right as, say, seeing something (mistakenly) as something it is not, could be what matters when I shoot my neighbor's donkey instead of mine. The excuse would be that "my eyes played tricks on me" or something similar, but this only shows that that particular excuse is rare and not "essential" to most acts. But the ordinary excuse would probably take the form of: "I wasn't paying close attention", as there is the expectation of care in acting, especially shooting something, and it is the expectation which is important here, not our sensations or my experience of the incident.

The only course of action is this to acknowledge that they were made, why they were made, and plan/intend to never make the same one again. To learn. — Benj96

:up:

This reminds me of a Nietzschean theme of the higher originating from the lower. We start as crazy little savages and slowly and painfully become creatures capable of making and sometimes even keeping promises, include those we make to ourselves.

I think the Christian idea of confession of sin is probably worth assimilating. I remember a mathematician with a website who foregrounded all the famous theorems and ideas which he did not understand. Beautiful, risky humility.

So if all of our mistakes are always behind us, in the past, then there's nothing we can do to change them. Thus, there is no reason to dwell on them/live in guilt or shame due to them. — Benj96

I think the Christian idea of confession of sin is probably worth assimilating. — green flag

I think this is the idea behind confession, confess to one's mistakes, be forgiven, and move forward, released from guilt and shame.

I think this is the idea behind confession, confess to one's mistakes, be forgiven, and move forward, released from guilt and shame. — Metaphysician Undercover

:up:

Right. And it also frees others to speak honestly.

I think it's connected to what teachers sometimes say: there are no stupid questions. The point is of course that one learns by expressing difficulties and having them addressed and not by concealing one's ignorance or confusion.

I think it's connected to what teachers sometimes say: there are no stupid questions. The point is of course that one learns by expressing difficulties and having them addressed and not by concealing one's ignorance or confusion. — green flag

Exactly. When we make mistakes it's usually due to misidentification of rational connections, mislogics, poorly followed trains of thought. Thus the expectations we developed as a result are at a mismatch with what happened irl.

Verbalising what happened out loud allows an observer/witness to hash out suggestions as to where you may have gone wrong. Their own experiences can help a lot here (if they're wise to them).

Or even to just share the experience, silently offering comfort and encouragement while you talk out loud to yourself inherently reduces shame because there's proof that someone else knows and didn't judge you/criticise you for it.

We hide what we are not proud of. But the simple fact is we all make mistakes. We are fallible. And no shame comes of admitting this collectively shared and unifying characteristic of being human. The admitting it is the release. The burden is halfed because it is shared.

Many therapists use this tactic. They act as a mirror to yourself. The questions they ask are prompts to delve deeper into ones ignorance, miscalculations and thus release them guilt, in essence to reconcile the blockade (fixation, self criticism or grudge) holding someone vacn from free flowing and les turbulent thought.

I think that this sort of confession is neccesary for a healthy and resilient mind, be it to a therapist, to a yogi or guru, a wiseman/woman, a parent or friend, or to a clergy member.

We ought not lose the importance of this.