Posted on 06/03/2004 9:38:49 AM PDT by BobbyBeeper
You keep making this distinction without a difference.
Any given fact situation can interpreted as "the ends justifying the means" (you must do X, which is bad, to obtain Y, which is good) or "the lesser of two evils" (you must choose between action resulting in X, which is bad, or inaction resulting in not-Y, which is also bad). The two are simply different names for the same moral dilemma.
No, you will take that answer as what it is: "Aquinasfan is hereby exposed as an exponent of the sort of marxist class-warfare drivel that belongs on DU, not FR".
No, we might reject them all. If we do, it will be because they have failed to meet the required standard (i.e. the evidence must be sufficiently sound that faking it would require a greater miracle than the alleged supernatural event itself would be).
It's logically impossible to present empirical evidence of supernatural phenomena to a dogmatic materialist.
Nonsense. Plenty of people (though not you, so far) have presented empirical evidence of supernatural phenomena. (For instance, I recall one instance of a stigmatic priest in the DC area a few years back.) None of the evidence to date has gotten anywhere near the threshold of being convincing (see above), but it obviously was not "logically impossible" to present it.
Very subtle. It would take someone with true spiritual discernment to pick up on that.
Subtle, very subtle.
That standard works for me, although we probably understand it differently.
Plenty of people (though not you, so far) have presented empirical evidence of supernatural phenomena.
OK. Here is a list of ongoing miraculous phenomena available to the public for examination at any time, which have also been the subject of rigorous scientific investigation.
The Eucharistic Miracle of Lanciano
The Shroud of Turin
-Shroud linked with Sudarium
Fatima
Image on the tilma of Guadalupe
Incorrupt bodies of the saints
The blood of St. Januarius
You steal a car from the house of a millionaire (who owns ten cars) because your family can't afford one.
Your car breaks down on a cold, snowy winter night. Your family is in danger of freezing to death. You steal a car from the house of a millionaire (who owns ten cars) and drive to safety.
The first case is an example of the ends justifying the means. The second case is an example of choosing the lesser evil.
Hmmm... I wonder which it will be?
On the one hand is the evil of failing to do whatever it is you needed the car for. On the other is the evil of theft. The difference between the two cases is that the former evil is trivial (e.g. you can't spend as much time with the family because you have to ride the bus) in the first case and severe (e.g. you can't protect your family's lives) in the second case.
Or, alternatively, you are contemplating the means of grand theft auto to achieve the end of being able to drive home from the office (first case) or to achieve the end of saving the lives of your family (the second case).
Again, a distinction without a difference.
(And, even if we stipulate that there is a difference, you have utterly failed to respond to the arguments raised by people who have actually read the HP books that the protagonist is, in fact, correctly choosing the lesser of two evils when he finds it necessary to do so.)
In the first case, the father commits an evil (car theft) to bring about a good (a car for his needy family). The correct moral decision is not to steal the car because the first principle of morality is to do good and avoid evil.
In the second case, the father has a choice between doing nothing and risking the lives of his family or stealing a car. Both acts are intrinsically evil, but car theft is the lesser evil. The father would be absolved of moral culpability for choosing the lesser evil.
In every case in the Potter books is Harry choosing the lesser evil, or doing evil so that good may come? Somehow I doubt that it's always the former.
Regardless, this is a tangential objection to the series. The central objection is that the protagonist is a practicing wizard/warlock.
Have you answered my question yet about whether a person should be allowed by the State to sell himself into slavery, or hire someone to kill him?
Since you admit to being uninformed, your views on the subject are worthless.
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