How does karma work?

[Memeito]

Let's say you are approached on the street by a girl with a foreign accent who tells you a sad story,about how she was robbed and doesn't have any money to return home,etc. She asks you for $40 and promises you she will give it back to you as soon as she gets home. You take pity on her and give her the money.
After that you never hear back from her....
Then, one day while browsing the Internet, you find an article with of photo of that girl explaining how she is a con artist and scammed hundreds of people with that story to get money for drugs.
Do you still get karma points for helping her?

 

[panic in paradise]

... this is a loaded question i think, why do you want to know?

 

[HCandKROD]

Sure you do. You gave her the money on the notion that she was broke and needed help. You helped therefore karma.

 

[Memeito]

Sure you do. You gave her the money on the notion that she was broke and needed help. You helped therefore karma.

Yeah....but she used the money for drugs! Do you get positive karma for that?

What if some guy tricks you for example and you give him money believing that it will be used to help people but in reality those money are used for funding terrorists - therefore your action brings more pain and sorrow to the world -how does karma work in this case?

 

[HCandKROD]

The guy who tricks you gets the bad karma. You gave the money in good faith

 

[Memeito]

The guy who tricks you gets the bad karma. You gave the money in good faith

Yeah...but after I've found out I regreted giving the money !

What if all the good deeds that you do hoping to get good karma like donating money to charity turn out to be useless because the charity organizationa are simply scams? What happens next?
What if by doing nothing you actually do more good?

 

[panic in paradise]

i think if someone only did good things for karma points, that eventually with time they would continue doing good deeds with out the thought of karma.

 

[HCandKROD]

Me and my good karma are out of this discussion

 

[panic in paradise]

mine too

 

[rangrz]

Being an imaginary phenomena, no precise answer can be given, due to the lack of ability to conduct experiments on things which do not exist. Though, it's a moot point anyways.

 

[Jean-Paul]

doesn't exist.

 

[ninjadanslarbretabar]

people have the weirdest ways of understanding karma..

to me the simplest way to understand this old notion is that what goes up, must come down
we could call this gravity
since its 2012

 

[BlueDelight]

Give yourself a break-after all, that's not the reason why you gave the woman the money. You should feel happy, and therefore receive karma points for trying to help. Making something worse wouldn't be what you meant to do either, so you don't receive bad karma.

 

[ninjadanslarbretabar]

could we define wtf do people mean by karma ?

the original hindu concept has changed into idk what at this point

 

[Belisarius]

Though I personally believe in karma, I don't think it's anything like "Joe Blow made a good future in Zone 1!", nor that it impinges on free will, nor that it can somehow contaminate you from someone else.

 

[Jean-Paul]

we could call this gravity
since its 2012

lol

 

[DeathDomokun]

Man, I know OP is a troll account, but I expect more from you rangrz.
Karma is real. Karma is cause and effect.
You're a dick to someone, and they're more likely to get upset and be a dick.
You're nice to someone, and they're more likely to be nice.
There is a mystical, spiritual side to the theory of karma. There is also the rational side that I just explained.
Karma is not some justice system making sure 'good' things happen to 'good people' and 'bad' to 'bad people'
Fuck these Western misconceptions.

 

[Memeito]

What if a person is mentally deranged and believes that God is speaking with him and tells him to kill people because they are demons or something -and that person actually believes he is doing something good, when in reality he doesn't. How will he be rewarded?
Or if a doctor starts to euthanise terminally ill patients because he believes it will end their suffering- is it good or bad karma?

 

[MikeOekiM]

Nobody knows if karma is real or not.

i like to believe it is.

 

[DeathDomokun]

There is no reward. That is not karma, if you want consequences just go with the whole sin theory.
If a person kills people, he is spreading bad karma because he will upset their families and yada yada and they'll be more likely to upset other people through the emotional aftermath they derive from their loved ones' death. If that person were to kill Hitler, just as he was attempting to acquire the means for a genocide, it would spread more good karma than bad as it would prevent/cease the suffering of people and yada yada
If a doctor euthanises a patient who wants to die really depends on where you stand on the ethics of it, in my mind he would spreading good karma by taking control of his patient's life at the patient is too big of a whimp to do it themselves, although still attaining the outcome they desire through weak means. Although the death of his patient may spread bad karma throughout their loved ones this was inevitable so the doctor ultimately did a good act that spreads bad karma through taking on the responsibility of fulfilling his patients desire because the patient is weak willed and wants to give the doctor the onus of their existence and the ceasing of it.