Lugubert

The Golden Rule is disgustingly Übermensch - I know what's best for you, so I'll treat you accordingly. Being a masochist, I'm gonna hurt you all.

The Silver Rule seems to be more on the safe side: I don't know what you want, but there's at least a possibility that we have the same dislikes, so I'll spare you.

Apikorus

I think Anat explained the differences perfectly. I'm also for the Silver Rule, which basically says "live and let live" and doesn't oblige one to make others happy.

Phlox Pyros

Oops...I missed it by a verse earlier.

Tobit 4:15:

Do to no one what you yourself dislike. Do not drink wine till you become drunk, nor let drunkenness accompany you on your way.

johno

I wasn't endorsing my schoolmaster's point of view, merely reporting it. He assumed the superiority of the golden rule over the silver one and cited christianity's assertion of the golden rule as evidence of the superiority of christianity over all other religions. In retrospect the whole thing seems a stupid argument: superiority versus inferiority. If he had thought for a while he would have seen that the central claim he was making was the christianity is true, and all other religions are false, so even if other religions taught ethics more coherently than christianity that would make no difference to their falsity. I was being taught all this sort of stuff when there was no suggestion of multiculturalism. Christianity (almost any protestant kind, but not christian science, of Jehovah's witnesses) was right and every other religion was a dangerous delusion. When we were deemed old enough, 17--18 years old, we were entrusted with our first classes on comparative religion. The title of the course book was Dangerous delusions.

johno