1. Is it more important to be a good person or to perform good acts

I stand split on this issue. I find it is more of a test of rhetoric and can be argued both ways. It depends on what you define a “good person” as. If the “good person” you are thinking of is only good based on their actions, then the more important focus would be to perform good acts. Doing something for the benefit of another shows empirical positivity, so scientifically speaking, I am a better person for doing good than “being good”. However, performing good acts doesn’t always make you a good person – in the example of wealthy people giving to charity for a tax break and to call themselves a philanthropist. Some people perform good deeds for their own benefit, and not for the selfless act they are considered to be. The most generous person in the world might be a criminal. What if a drug lord makes millions upon millions of dollars at the top of a cartel that murders, rapes, and tortures people – but he puts millions of dollars into charity and building the community? Some could argue that these good acts are cancelled out by the bad acts, forming a sort of equilibrium.

2. Does the process by which decisions are made matter more than the outcomes of these decisions

Most, if not all, of these questions heavily focus on context. While in a very serious situation where the question is a matter of morality, there could be a very different answer than something more simple and straight forward. If a decision is a bad one, the process by which is was made could help explain one’s intentions. If a decision is a good one, the process might matter, but those on the receiving end of the positive outcome rarely would care about the process, possibly a more “don’t ask don’t tell” style situation. At the same time, if your decision is developed from poor judgement then the outcome does matter, whether it be good or bad. A decision should always be based off of an analysis of the various parts of a situation, not a judgement. If you go about making a choice only looking at it at face value, and not analyzing the reality of it, then odds are it’s not a good choice.

3. Is my own life worth more than the lives of others, the same, or less

Inherently, our own life always matters more except in situations with very close friends or family – the “would you take a bullet for them” scenario. This being said, my life is worth as much as any life, and that is because consciousness and existence is absolute. My experiences are no more or less important than the experiences of some rice farmer in Laos, we both breathe, think, and feel like any other human, and there is no way to quantify or value consciousness beyond that it is. Although, as a species, I think some of us are a little more important in move us forward than others. But in the grand scheme of things, who even knows how long humans will be around. We are all bound the eternal void, one way or another.