8mm
Posted on 02/17/2007 2:36:34 PM PST by wagglebee
Every generation has a few atheists who seem eager to tell the world how much smarter they are than everybody else. The fact that such individuals still exist, and that they are still producing popular tracts in defense of their disbelief, is no surprise.
Nevertheless, because ideas have consequences, one cannot ignore the recent push by big-name skeptics to persuade Americans that there is no God and that we should therefore adopt a new set of ethical standards. In previous times, most people had a solid enough understanding of moral truth that they were not easily persuaded by atheist rhetoric, but today many Americans are so influenced by relativism that they find it difficult to respond. Some men and women are beginning to wonder if they really believe America's founding principles, as stated in the Declaration of Independence, that "all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights..."
A couple of weeks ago, Peter Singer, a bioethicist at Princeton University, wrote an article for the New York Times that essentially denies the Declaration's core principles. While discussing the sad case of Ashley, a severely disabled girl whose parents had her uterus removed and put her on hormones to stunt her growth, Singer said:
We are always ready to find dignity in human beings, including those whose mental age will never exceed that of an infant, but we don't attribute dignity to dogs or cats, though they clearly operate at a more advanced mental level than human infants. Just making that comparison provokes outrage in some quarters. But why should dignity always go together with species membership, no matter what the characteristics of the individual may be?....[Ashley] is precious not so much for what she is, but because her parents and siblings love her and care about her.
In Singer's mind, Ashley is not precious for what she is, and she does not have dignity simply because she is human. He even strongly implies that dogs and cats have more dignity than this handicapped little girl. Yet the Founders believed that all people are created equal, even those whose mental age does not advance very far.
We have here a tale of two cities. One is the city envisioned by the Founders where God has created all men and women with a fundamental equality which ensures that every person's rights are secure. The strong do not have more worth than the weak, the young do not have more value than the old, and the rich do not have more human rights than the poor. The self-evident truth is that, despite the differences, every human being enjoys an essential dignity. Every life is precious, even the wretched, weak, penniless, despised, feeble and frightened.
Then there is the city envisioned by modern atheists like Peter Singer. This is a place where a dog can have more worth than a handicapped child. This is a place where a grandmother with Alzheimer's disease has no dignity if she has no one who loves her. This is a place where newborn babies can be killed if they are imperfect or unwanted. It is a godless city where human worth is measured on a sliding scale. Woe is she who is wretched, weak, penniless, despised, feeble and frightened. Such people may have been better off as a dog or a cat than an unwanted and imperfect human being!
Ultimately, America will choose one city or the other as its destiny. This week we celebrated the 96th birthday of the man who saw the United States as the shining city on a hill, Ronald Reagan. As the late president said, "A troubled and afflicted mankind looks to us, pleading for us to keep our rendezvous with destiny; that we will uphold the principles of self-reliance, self-discipline, morality, and, above all, responsible liberty for every individual, that we will become that shining city on a hill." This is the same city envisioned by the Founders, and it is the vision that is still admired by a troubled and afflicted mankind.
How might we guard against the men and women who try to persuade us that God does not exist, that there is no inherent human dignity, and that some people have less worth than others? If ideas really do have consequences, this set of ideas will inevitably lead to great human suffering and utter cultural collapse. Therefore, how can America keep its "rendezvous with destiny" and protect the shining city?
Our response must be multifaceted. First, men and women of faith should be educated in their own intellectual heritage. Many of the great Christian minds of the past have confronted similar challenges in their own generation, and they have left behind solid answers. Atheism is not new, nor is the idea that some human beings lack inherent worth. Rather than reinvent the wheel, we should become acquainted with the way these challenges were previously addressed.
Christians must also be involved in the culture. Though a few famous atheists are churning out books, it is the movie makers, the song writers, and the television show creators that have the greatest influence. The church has a long history of producing beautiful and captivating art; there is no reason why Christians should not continue to engage and inspire the culture through art. One outstanding movie can do more to influence the culture than dozens of scholarly books.
Finally, Christians must be involved in the public square. When the ideas of Peter Singer, Richard Dawkins, and Sam Harris are translated into laws, injustice results. It is terrifying to contemplate a world where the law does not consider human beings to have any inherent value or dignity. We have seen this world in the past; we must never allow it to happen again. As Christians, our obligation is to love and serve our neighbors by remaining a persistent public voice in resistance to the growing threat against our culture and our nation. We must not abandon the shining city on the hill.
And this is the world that many want to return to.
Pro-Life Ping
Ping
Freepmail wagglebee or little jeremiah to subscribe or unsubscribe from the moral absolutes ping list.
FreeRepublic moral absolutes keyword search
RE: Professor Peter Singer, Hypocrite
http://www.nationalreview.com/interrogatory/schweizer200510250827.asp
October 25, 2005, 8:27 a.m.
Moore Hypocrites Than True Believers?
Exposing the Do As I Say (Not As I Do) Left.
Q&A by Kathryn Jean Lopez
The mother of Princeton bioethics professor Peter Singer is lucky that
her son is an hypocrite. Her son is a leading proponent of excising the
undesirable — the imperfect via abortion, infanticide, and euthanasia.
The disabled would fall under there, also, sometimes, the elderly.
Peter Singer's mother has Alzheimer's.
Peter Schweizer reports in his new book Do As I Say (Not As I Do): Profiles
in Liberal Hypocrisy that "far from embracing his own moral ethic, Singer
hired a group of health care workers to look after her."
BTTT
How could any rational person like this article? To show why atheists are “bad people” he takes who is probably the most radical moral relativist out there as an example. Singer isn’t even known for being an atheist, his claim to fame is that he believes animals have rights.
This is just like saying OJ killed his ex so all black people must be killers. As for as I can see, there is one reason for this article, these people want to pick a fight. They’re saying you’re either religious or a liberal tree-hugging commie. Well I don’t like religion or commies and if the left comes to my house to take away my guns, their going to get shot and if the right comes to take away my drugs, their going to get shot too.
Publish all the lies you like…hell even be the sucker that falls for them and makes you think people like me are cause of all this nations problems. Just leave me the hell alone and like John Galt said, “Get the hell out of my way!”
Ronald Reagan's appeal emanated from his religious faith and love of humankind.
And this is the world that many want to return to.
When did the law ever consider Human beings not having any inherent value?
It's enough to make you cry.
There is a great irony in trying to develop ethics in the absence of religion, in that objectively, it seems that many ethical systems that can be devised, that people need, have already have reached their apex in religion.
Take marriage for example. In the absence of religion it seems to be a contrived and unnatural relationship. So in its place, the first inclination outside of religion is to revert to the basic biological prerogatives of male and female animals--to have sexual relationships like they are done in the animal kingdom.
However, it quickly becomes evident that while this is a basic system to insure reproduction, it is far from optimal for males, females, or their offspring.
So, still in the absence of religion, government has to intervene to *duplicate* the advantages of marriage in the law. And after many years, it still hasn't succeeded.
But there are so many aspects to human nature that for thousands of years have been examined in religion, seeking the better character, the definition of our humanity, it is foolish indeed to chuck it all in an effort to find everything out, all over again, but in the absence of God.
1. Who said I liked the article? I didn't. 2. Why would you contend rationality with someone named BipolarBob? However anyone who denies the existence of God is irrational. I am in awe of Him and worship Him. 3. God has expectations of all of us (even those who don't believe in Him) to be grateful for what He has given us. You can choose to be grateful or not.
"When did the law ever consider Human beings not having any inherent value?"
Are you serious? Try the laws and policies of National Socialist Germany, the Soviet Union & its empire, pagan Rome, much of today's non-Christian world, etc.
In the 1800s it was US policy to exterminate the Native American.
"Every generation has a few atheists who seem eager to tell the world how much smarter they are than everybody else. "
I'm sure the Zoroastrians said the same thing about those icky people who believed in Gog and Magog. Enlightened people know the giant flying spaghetti monster is the only true deity.
We use reason and logic to define what is rational. By nature, God can only be defined using faith, which does not use reason and logic.
I don't deny the existence of God, that assumes something exists and I'm behaving irrationally to ignore it. Using reason we can all find out there is nothing to deny in the first place.
but today many Americans are so influenced by relativism that they find it difficult to respond.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
But today so many Americans have been so thoroughly indoctrinated by their government schools that they find it difficult to respond.
BTT
"But why should dignity always go together with species membership, no matter what the characteristics of the individual may be?...."
Well said Mr. Singer, well said. Obviously dignity isn't a given. And can't say I care too much for your "characteristics".
Doesn't that contradict the premise of the article?
Are you serious? Try the laws and policies of National Socialist Germany, the Soviet Union & its empire, pagan Rome, much of today's non-Christian world, etc.
Lets see, "much of todays non-Christian world" - don't you mean todays non religious world? Muslims and Jews worship the God of Abraham, the same as Christians. Or is it the point of the article that only Christians can give humans value and dignity?
Pretty much. yeah.
Judaism is indeed in agreement with Christian ethics. Jesus' moral teachings were mostly just reiterations of the best of Judaism. However, Jews are a tiny minority world-wide, and except for one tiny country (Israel) almost all live within what used to be called Christendom. There is no "Jewish world," as there clearly is a large Muslim world and a nominally Christian world. As for the value of human life (let alone human individuality) within the cult of Islam...how about suicide-homicide bombings, stonings, beheadings. amputations, massacres and denials of rights of every other faith, semihuman status for the female half of the population, slavery, etc. Islam claims the Arabs are descended from Abraham, but their accounts are full of warped plagiarism and fabrications. Whereas the Jews were monotheists for many centuries, the Arabs of Mohammed's time were still mostly pagans. Mohammed invented his "theology" by mixing stolen Jewish ideas with bizarre Arab pagan survivals like the Black Stone.
Under Hinduism, race-based class divisions are actually an integral part of the belief system. Millions of people are believed to "deserve" to be subhuman "untouchables." It's the only religion I can think of where racism is part of the faith!
"We use reason and logic to define what is rational."
I guess you think circular reasoning is perfectly "logical."
Thank you so much for the pinglisting, wagglebee! I hope to return to FR in the next month or so. "Real life" just kind of came up behind my knees and said "no FR for you!"
I can't even read any news, if I can't have my say it makes me too mad to read it.
I WILL be back!
Second off, even though Singer's an Atheist, it's not like we have a hierarchy. I don't take marching orders from Signer, or Dawkins, or anyone else, and trying to get Atheists to agree on anything besides the separation of Church and State is like trying to herd cats at a meeting of the Mickey Mouse club.
I am sick and tired of religious folks holding up prominent idiots who also happen to be Atheists and using them to pillory the rest of us. I don't assume that every Christian is Jack Chick or Fred Phelps, and I'd appreciate the same from your side.
Your compass has lost its accuracy. You seem to have missed the point of the article.
Do you think people have worth, or do you even think about such things? Are your drugs, guns and atheisim more important?
Jews and christians alike value life. I don't see how you can reasonably contend that the muslims value life.
I am pointing out the absurdity of the article :) You are helping point out the inconsistency, even though I am sure it is unintentional on your part.
The fact that all three religions, Jews, Christians and Muslims worship the same God of Abraham and yet they don't have the same attitude about human value and dignity is very strong case against the point the author is trying to make, that human value and dignity come from God.
Of course I do, my point is that I value the supremacy of individual rights.
You and the author can believe anything you want, however I rail against anyone who would place their beliefs above my individual rights. What you believe in your private sphere is up to you but this author makes it clear that he isn't limited to that. I don't violate the rights of anyone else and I demand the same in return.
Only if you think the muslims worship the same god and the God of the christians and jews. They do not.
the same god as the God of the christians and jews.
Butterfingers!
Are you trying to tell me that Christians and Jews don't believe in the God of Abraham, Moses and Adam? LOL
I wonder if self admission to illegal activities is enough for a search warrant?
Illegal and wrong are two separate things, they shouldn't be but with people like you around, they are.
Don't you know that laws should never reflect what's right? They should always reflect atheism, because The Constitution strictly forbids freedom of religion, and enforces freedom from religion. /sarcasm
I only added the /sarcasm tag so others won't mistake me for one of the moonbats who really believe that garbage.
I should have read that next post before replying. I see you (bjs1779) have already been informed. LOL
I didn't agree or disagree with you. I merely asked you if your self admission of illegal activity could result in a search warrant being served on you. If you don't want to answer that question, well, I guess you aren't so tough after all.
Let's go out and do some drugs BB. And if some cop stops us we will shoot him. I have been informed that that is our rights./s
No, its not; I'm not under oath
No problem, but why would your Internet communications be any different than tapped phone communications, which are used to convict criminals? My advice is to be a little smarter.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.