Posted on 05/28/2005 7:21:59 AM PDT by voletti
In Europe religion doesn't rise to the level of burning away “in the open air”; in fact, it barely smoulders. Most European politicians would rather talk about sexually transmitted diseases than their own faith in God. The hugely bulky European constitution doesn't mention Christianity.
America's policymakers, by contrast, don't seem to talk about anything else. Look at the issues that have dominated the past week.
America's religious wars are only going to intensify. Fourteen moderate senators averted a nuclear explosion over conservative judges this week; but explosions over the issues which made those judges controversial seem all but inevitable. Just wait for the next Supreme Court ruling on abortion. Or for the next vacancy on the court to open up.
Forget today's crowing about the ceasefire in Congress. America's wars of religion will get a lot nastier before any long-lasting peace can be declared—if ever.
(Excerpt) Read more at economist.com ...
Have I claimed to have supernatural insight into your personality? No. I claim to have read your posts and seen by entirely ordinary means that you have misunderstood my comments and probably aren't able to follow an argument of the type I'm making.
In fact, this comment is an example. Where would you even get that idea?
I'm interested in how YOU claim to know that the Golden Rule is right.
Because it has worked for me, and for those I've known in my 68 years.
It seems you personally have never had (or, you say, seen -- I suspect you're forgetting some of the things you've seen) the experience of dealing honestly and getting screwed over for it. Which makes your years more lucky than mine. It happens both that people have behaved contrary to the Golden Rule and suffered for it, and that they've prospered for it. So should our moral codes be based on personal anecdotes?
It is not self-evident. On the contrary, it is self-evident that what one random, meaningless collection of atoms does to another is meaningless and hence morally neutral.
That's a nonsensical, and quite a sad statement about your own 'philosophy'. What we say & do to "another" is what this life is all about, imho.
You do not truly believe that life is "all about" what we say and do to others. You just defended the Golden Rule by how following it impacts you. That makes your personal self-interest the fundamental thing. So it's only about others as they influence your personal happiness. I'm glad that you've found that treating others well leads to your own maximum of satisfaction, especially if our paths should happen to cross. But it's not morality. It's just a nice form of amorality. And it has nothing to say to unnice forms.
Pure self interest in having a good life leads rational people to treat others as they would be treated.
Assuming they share something like your conception of a good life. Which they may not.
Two bits you are so convinced of your position that you will be unable to rationally comment upon, or refute, my self interest answer to your question.
Judged by whom?
You think far too highly of yourself. You cannot read minds, neither apparently can you properly read texts.
Your 'supernatural' opinions on my personality are pot/kettle amusing. Get real.
Have I claimed to have supernatural insight into your personality? No. I claim to have read your posts and seen by entirely ordinary means that you have misunderstood my comments and probably aren't able to follow an argument of the type I'm making.
As I said, get real. You've made some baseless & uncalled for personal remarks/opinions about me. There are no "misunderstandings" here.
In fact, this comment is an example. Where would you even get that idea? I'm interested in how YOU claim to know that the Golden Rule is right.
Because it has worked for me, and for those I've known in my 68 years.
It seems you personally have never had (or, you say, seen -- I suspect you're forgetting some of the things you've seen) the experience of dealing honestly and getting screwed over for it.
You suspect? I'm forgetting? -- More guessing on your part. Again, get real.
Which makes your years more lucky than mine. It happens both that people have behaved contrary to the Golden Rule and suffered for it, and that they've prospered for it. So should our moral codes be based on personal anecdotes? It is not self-evident. On the contrary, it is self-evident that what one random, meaningless collection of atoms does to another is meaningless and hence morally neutral.
That's a nonsensical, and quite a sad statement about your own 'philosophy'. What we say & do to "another" is what this life is all about, imho.
You do not truly believe that life is "all about" what we say and do to others.
Incredible. - Again you make a flat out pronouncement about what I've experienced in my life. You must be a psychic.
You just defended the Golden Rule by how following it impacts you. That makes your personal self-interest the fundamental thing. So it's only about others as they influence your personal happiness. I'm glad that you've found that treating others well leads to your own maximum of satisfaction, especially if our paths should happen to cross.
Thank you. Its nice to know that you agree with me on the golden rule.
But it's not morality. It's just a nice form of amorality. And it has nothing to say to unnice forms.
There you go again, off on some irrational tangent. Nice vs un-nice forms of amorality? Good grief.
_______________________________________
Pure self interest in having a good life leads rational people to treat others as they would be treated.
Assuming they share something like your conception of a good life. Which they may not.
It still behooves the rational man to always treat others as "good", with caution.
_____________________________________
Two bits you are so convinced of your position that you will be unable to rationally comment upon, or refute, my self interest answer to your question.
Judged by whom?
Anyone reading this is fine by me, -- or no one. To my mind your flippant retort is my answer. -
Thanks.
You were, and possibly still are (it's hard to tell given your confused style of writing), under the impression I am actually a nihilist. This is very much a misunderstanding.
For what reason did you splice together two paragraphs of mine from two different posts?
You do not truly believe that life is "all about" what we say and do to others.
Incredible. - Again you make a flat out pronouncement about what I've experienced in my life. You must be a psychic.
Except that as anyone can see, my comment said nothing about your experience. It's about your beliefs, and these not learned psychically but -- if you'd pay attention to something called context -- by your other comments. I don't doubt that you "believe" in some sense that life is all about what you do and say to others -- but only as a platitude. As I already discussed, you defended the Golden Rule with reference to your own interests. The secondary principles are derived from the primary ones. If you derive the Golden Rule from your own self-interest, the self-interest is primary and the Golden Rule only secondary.
There you go again, off on some irrational tangent. Nice vs un-nice forms of amorality? Good grief.
The fact that you lack the resources to understand what I said doesn't make it irrational. Now again: if your basic principle is what's good for you (and by the evidence of what you've chosen to say here, it is), you're amoral. Not necessarily immoral; you're simply acting without reference to morality. In your case because you've subsumed morality to self-interest. If treating others nicely promotes your idea of the good life, then, perfectly amorally, you'll behave relatively decently. But others may have different ideas of the good life. What will you say to them? That they ought not to like what they like? But then you need some standard by which to judge their delights bad and unworthy, and then you would need to explain where this standard comes from and what makes it normative and this, I maintain, cannot be done coherently with a naturalistic worldview.
You were, and possibly still are (it's hard to tell given your confused style of writing), under the impression I am actually a nihilist. This is very much a misunderstanding.
Your own confusion is evident when you claim I misunderstand you. And frankly, I could care less about what you "actually" are. - You're not nihilist? - Fine.
For what reason did you splice together two paragraphs of mine from two different posts?
I doubt I did.
You do not truly believe that life is "all about" what we say and do to others.
Incredible. - Again you make a flat out pronouncement about what I've experienced in my life. You must be a psychic.
Except that as anyone can see, my comment said nothing about your experience. It's about your beliefs, and these not learned psychically but -- if you'd pay attention to something called context -- by your other comments.
Typically, you think you've made a point with that pointless sentence. Rest assured, no one but you can "see"..
I don't doubt that you "believe" in some sense that life is all about what you do and say to others -- but only as a platitude. As I already discussed, you defended the Golden Rule with reference to your own interests. The secondary principles are derived from the primary ones.
Gibberish. Platitudes about "secondary principles".
If you derive the Golden Rule from your own self-interest, the self-interest is primary and the Golden Rule only secondary.
There you go again, off on some irrational tangent. -- Nice vs un-nice forms of amorality? -- The golden rule as secondary? -- Good grief.
The fact that you lack the resources to understand what I said doesn't make it irrational.
Nor does the fact that you lack the resources to understand what I said make your observation rational.
Now again: if your basic principle is what's good for you (and by the evidence of what you've chosen to say here, it is), you're amoral.
Absurd conclusion derived not from what I've written here, but from your imagination.
Not necessarily immoral; you're simply acting without reference to morality. In your case because you've subsumed morality to self-interest. If treating others nicely promotes your idea of the good life, then, perfectly amorally, you'll behave relatively decently. But others may have different ideas of the good life. What will you say to them?
You find it necessary to "say" something to those who have different ideas, and find this to be 'moral behavior'. I do not. I mind my own business.
That they ought not to like what they like? But then you need some standard by which to judge their delights bad and unworthy, and then you would need to explain where this standard comes from and what makes it normative and this, I maintain, cannot be done coherently with a naturalistic worldview.
And there we have a partial answer to "Why is America still so prone to wars of religion?". What you 'maintain' is religious strife. -- Why not mind your own business instead?
So far no society and no morality have yielded a perfect world...so people experiment. Sometimes the new is better than the old, sometimes it isn't.
How would you recognize a perfect world if it ever arose? How, indeed, is a term like "perfect world" meaningful? And how can it be meaningful to say the new is better than the old? But you know it is. It might be right or it might be wrong, but it means something. But how could this be if there is no standard transcending culture?
Please tell me which standard this is and how we may discover it with more specificity than you did above
I can't.
But if you're willing to consider anything wrong -- and if you really are a liberal, you must consider a lot of things wrong, some of which really are and some which aren't -- you do have such a standard. You just can't tell where it came from.
In a sense it is since different societies (and the same society during different periods) decide what constitutes child molesting...and they don't always make the same rules.
There is, however, a real biological dividing point: puberty. In legal terms it gets murky because it comes at different times for different people but the law works better if it sets one age in years and applies it to everyone. Some cultures have a practice of marrying off girls who at such a young age they are almost certainly pre-pubecent. Would you say they ought to have a different practice?
Obviously, the people who make up the society decide what is right.
I hope you don't mean this in any serious sense, because if you do you're committed to defending as right a lot of incredibly nasty stuff.
Everyone, not just liberals, has many things they'd like to change, and many things they wouldn't. They advance many reasons for their beliefs but -cynic that I am - they usually just want more of everything for themselves, their family, and their friends, and find justifications which conform to ideology which they claim governs them.
If all cultures recognize puberty then that's a universal - one of many that I know exist.
I hope you don't mean this in any serious sense, because if you do you're committed to defending as right a lot of incredibly nasty stuff
I'm dead serious about this. All cultures have, at one time or another, defended all sorts of nasty stuff. That doesn't mean I agree with any of it...nor am I protected from doing the same thing; I many be willing to defend positions that others find horrifying. In fact, I know this to be true.
You find it necessary to "say" something to those who have different ideas, and find this to be 'moral behavior'. I do not. I mind my own business.
Oh, if someone chooses to act on certain different ideas I would do a lot more than merely "'say' something". I hope you would also.
And there we have a partial answer to "Why is America still so prone to wars of religion?".
As others have pointed out, there is no answer because it's a baseless question. America (unlike Europe) has never been prone to wars of religion and isn't now.
What you 'maintain' is religious strife. -- Why not mind your own business instead?
Fascinating. All I've done is speak my mind as protected by the First Amendment -- this is "strife" in your mind and I should stop. But if advocating my views is strife, what about you advocating your views? I haven't made "mind your own business" equivalent to "shut up", but you have, and also declare that you mind your own business, but you still keep talking. Something has become disconnected here. Or perhaps this only applies to views you don't agree with.
Now, you said the above two things as an objection to this:
That they ought not to like what they like? But then you need some standard by which to judge their delights bad and unworthy, and then you would need to explain where this standard comes from and what makes it normative and this, I maintain, cannot be done coherently with a naturalistic worldview.
You seem to have lost track of the conversation. You defined morality by the Golden Rule, and defended this by reference to self-interest and argued that the Golden Rule is the means to a good life. My objection is that some have a radically different conception of the good life and their interests which does not imply the Golden Rule and may not be compatible with it. So why do those who delight in harming the weak -- and they do exist -- have a delight which is bad and unworthy? The Golden Rule does not serve their interests as conceived by themselves. Why should they follow it anyway? Do you have a reason? Or will you "mind your own business"?
What wars of religion? We have the right of free speech and we use it. As far as Islam goes it's not a war of religion with us.
Europe has had a hundred wars of religion, America has had zero. What is this nut talking about?
If all cultures recognize puberty then that's a universal - one of many that I know exist.
They'd have to be pretty benighted not to notice it happening. It's a biological fact.
Ought they to recognize it? Should it be part of what makes a person eligible to marry?
I'm dead serious about this. All cultures have, at one time or another, defended all sorts of nasty stuff. That doesn't mean I agree with any of it
If you really did mean what you said about the people who make up the society deciding what is right dead seriously, then yes, you agree with it. ALL of it. Not one exception.
Indeed. But that's how it is.
Ought they to recognize it? Should it be part of what makes a person eligible to marry?
I think they should...but I don't think every culture agrees with me and I know many individuals don't.
If you really did mean what you said about the people who make up the society deciding what is right dead seriously, then yes, you agree with it. ALL of it. Not one exception.
Please! This is just sophistry. In no culture do you get universal agreement about anything. You're lucky if you get a majority.
--- you're simply acting without reference to morality.
In your case because you've subsumed morality to self-interest. If treating others nicely promotes your idea of the good life, then, perfectly amorally, you'll behave relatively decently. But others may have different ideas of the good life. What will you say to them?
You find it necessary to "say" something to those who have different ideas, and find this to be 'moral behavior'. I do not. I mind my own business.
That they ought not to like what they like? But then you need some standard by which to judge their delights bad and unworthy, and then you would need to explain where this standard comes from and what makes it normative and this, I maintain, cannot be done coherently with a naturalistic worldview.
And there we have a partial answer to "Why is America still so prone to wars of religion?".
What you 'maintain' is religious strife. -- Why not mind your own business instead?
Most of your post is merely a belligerent display of your incomprehension.
I'm simply responding to your own belligerent manner.
You find it necessary to "say" something to those who have different ideas, and find this to be 'moral behavior'. I do not. I mind my own business.
Oh, if someone chooses to act on certain different ideas I would do a lot more than merely "'say' something". I hope you would also.
And there we have a partial answer to "Why is America still so prone to wars of religion?". -- Your belligerency.
As others have pointed out, there is no answer because it's a baseless question. America (unlike Europe) has never been prone to wars of religion and isn't now.
We've been fighting various internecine 'wars' on religious/moral questions since ratification.
What you 'maintain' is religious strife. -- Why not mind your own business instead?
Fascinating. All I've done is speak my mind as protected by the First Amendment -- this is "strife" in your mind and I should stop.
Babble on if you must, but strifeful it is; - to little effect.
But if advocating my views is strife, what about you advocating your views? I haven't made "mind your own business" equivalent to "shut up", but you have, and also declare that you mind your own business, but you still keep talking. Something has become disconnected here. Or perhaps this only applies to views you don't agree with. Now, you said the above two things as an objection to this: That they ought not to like what they like? But then you need some standard by which to judge their delights bad and unworthy, and then you would need to explain where this standard comes from and what makes it normative and this, I maintain, cannot be done coherently with a naturalistic worldview.
Whatever. - You're just repeating yourself.
You seem to have lost track of the conversation. You defined morality by the Golden Rule, and defended this by reference to self-interest and argued that the Golden Rule is the means to a good life. My objection is that some have a radically different conception of the good life and their interests which does not imply the Golden Rule and may not be compatible with it.
So why do those who delight in harming the weak -- and they do exist -- have a delight which is bad and unworthy? The Golden Rule does not serve their interests as conceived by themselves. Why should they follow it anyway? Do you have a reason? Or will you "mind your own business"?
Now you're asking me why evil exists? -- Good grief man.. Talk to your pastor or get some other professional advice. Obviously I can't help you..
-- You started this by asking me a fairly simple question. My answer was unacceptable to you for some strange reason. -- Let's leave it at that.
Do you still claim to explain morality, or not?
Ought they to recognize it? Should it be part of what makes a person eligible to marry?
I think they should...but I don't think every culture agrees with me and I know many individuals don't.
So should they or shouldn't they?
f you really did mean what you said about the people who make up the society deciding what is right dead seriously, then yes, you agree with it. ALL of it. Not one exception.
Please! This is just sophistry. In no culture do you get universal agreement about anything. You're lucky if you get a majority.
So you still say that that the people who make up the society decide what is right, but you evade the conclusions this would seem to entail about what is right by requiring they do so unanimously. Which means, as you yourself point out, that they don't decide anything. But with no decision NOTHING is right.
Again: is there any sense in which this is a morality, let alone an account for morality?
In my view there is no universal morality, one which is true at all times and all places, for all people. There never has been, even for those who claim that morality is God-given.
The latter have been no more free of disputes, or of what you and I would call heinous acts, or or selfishness and self-righteousness than the rest of benighted humanity.
So why bother with it at all?
And what makes you unable to understand anything deeper than an op-ed piece? You should apply yourself to following a line of argument.
Oh, if someone chooses to act on certain different ideas I would do a lot more than merely "'say' something". I hope you would also.
And there we have a partial answer to "Why is America still so prone to wars of religion?". -- Your belligerency.
Let's try a hypothetical. You come across a man dragging a screaming woman away a knifepoint. Reasoning that if you were in her place, you would want to be rescued, you shoot the man. See? Violence. The man was simply acting on a different idea of the good life -- namely, that it includes raping and murdering. I get to say that his actions are evil and wrong, but if you're being consistent (and you probably wouldn't be -- you'd probably say what is true rather than what is consistent with your false worldview) you'll simply say you happen to dislike his actions. But which is more belligerent, to use violence to stop what is evil and wrong, or to use violence based on your personal dislikes?
We've been fighting various internecine 'wars' on religious/moral questions since ratification.
"Wars" and wars are different things.
Babble on if you must, but strifeful it is; - to little effect.
You have yet to explain why I'm engaging in strife and you aren't, unless you're of the view than everything you don't agree with is strife.
So why do those who delight in harming the weak -- and they do exist -- have a delight which is bad and unworthy?
Now you're asking me why evil exists? -- Good grief man.. Talk to your pastor or get some other professional advice. Obviously I can't help you..
The part I have quoted in bold is, as best I can tell, what you are replying to. But if you look at the rest of the paragraph -- that context thing again -- you will find I was asking if you can provide a basis for that judgment, not assuming the judgment and asking why such things exist (then again, you may not: obliviousness seems to be your style). Again: if there is evil, if it is evil to delight in harming the weak, what is it that makes such things evil? By what standard? You can't just cite the Golden Rule, because you have only defended the Golden Rule itself in terms of self-interest (and I can't conceive of any other defense possible within your worldview) and people who delight in harming the weak judge their interests in a way that precludes the Golden Rule. So at that point what do you say? Or do you kill or imprison them when they act of their desires, not because it is right to do so, but simply because you want to?
Sleep is for wimps!
In my view there is no universal morality, one which is true at all times and all places, for all people. There never has been, even for those who claim that morality is God-given.
The latter have been no more free of disputes, or of what you and I would call heinous acts, or or selfishness and self-righteousness than the rest of benighted humanity.
Why does it matter what you and I would call heinous acts? It's not like our morality is true at all times and places, and according to their morality they were acting rightly. Besides, why do random collections of atoms have a moral status?
So why do those who delight in harming the weak -- and they do exist -- have a delight which is bad and unworthy? The Golden Rule does not serve their interests as conceived by themselves. Why should they follow it anyway? Do you have a reason? Or will you "mind your own business"?
Now you're asking me why evil exists? -- Good grief man.. Talk to your pastor or get some other professional advice. Obviously I can't help you..
-- You started this by asking me a fairly simple question. My answer was unacceptable to you for some strange reason. -- Let's leave it at that.
112 P_A_I
Most of your post is merely a belligerent display of your incomprehension.
I'm simply responding to your own belligerent manner.
And what makes you unable to understand anything deeper than an op-ed piece? You should apply yourself to following a line of argument.
More irrational belligerency. -- You just can't leave it, can you?
Let's try a hypothetical. You come across a man dragging a screaming woman away a knifepoint. Reasoning that if you were in her place, you would want to be rescued, you shoot the man. See? Violence. The man was simply acting on a different idea of the good life -- namely, that it includes raping and murdering. I get to say that his actions are evil and wrong, but if you're being consistent (and you probably wouldn't be -- you'd probably say what is true rather than what is consistent with your false worldview) you'll simply say you happen to dislike his actions.
What can I say? You truly imagine you have all the answers to everything I do, obviously. Dream on.
But which is more belligerent, to use violence to stop what is evil and wrong, or to use violence based on your personal dislikes?
Again, you seem to imagine you've made a big point. - I'm happy for you.
So why do those who delight in harming the weak -- and they do exist -- have a delight which is bad and unworthy?
Now you're asking me why evil exists? -- Good grief man.. Talk to your pastor or get some other professional advice. Obviously I can't help you..
The part I have quoted in bold is, as best I can tell, what you are replying to. But if you look at the rest of the paragraph -- that context thing again -- you will find I was asking if you can provide a basis for that judgment, not assuming the judgment and asking why such things exist (then again, you may not: obliviousness seems to be your style).
You are laboring under a serious misapprehension, -- that your stream of consciousness type paragraphs are decipherable. They aren't.
Again: if there is evil, if it is evil to delight in harming the weak, what is it that makes such things evil? By what standard? You can't just cite the Golden Rule, because you have only defended the Golden Rule itself in terms of self-interest (and I can't conceive of any other defense possible within your worldview) and people who delight in harming the weak judge their interests in a way that precludes the Golden Rule. So at that point what do you say? Or do you kill or imprison them when they act of their desires, not because it is right to do so, but simply because you want to?
Your stream of gibberish defeats me once again. Its late.. Try to give me some more lucid stuff in the morning if you want an answer.
Most of us do have moral opinions, ideas of what is right and what is wrong, how people should act and how they should not act, and of what kind of world we wish to live in. It is much preferable to act in accord with these beliefs than to do otherwise.
It is also true that all choices and all acts have consequences - even though many times these are not predictable and the connections are not direct or even traceable. I prefer our society to others I am familiar with so I try to act in accord with and support its pillars - those choices, rules, acts which I believe constitute its bedrock. I think others do the same. Since circumstances change one must adapt and its not easy to know how...but I do my best and I think many others do the same.
What more do you want?
You are quite right here. The only problem is that there was no claim that "we can determine morality by referring to the law." The word "law" appeared in a context.
Looking at that context, I immediately saw three very obvious interpretations that did not need clarity at that point in the discussion as such distinction were completely unnecessary to what was being argued.
The only criticism that I might attach to the use of the word "law" in the particular context, is that it was unnecessary, as 'personal experience, history, and science' completely triangulate both the rise of, as well as the means of determining morality as a concept. Admittedly the inclusion of "law" brings a specificity not presented in the other three. On the other hand "law" is a source for determining existing societal rules, and there by qualifies as a source for determining morality by definition.
We're talking about whether a worldview which rejects the supernatural can account for morality. Here, the positive claim is that it can.
I quite carefully addressed my reply to what was being discussed. Morality as a concept is quite capable of being explained without mention of the supernatural by definition. Theoretical explanations for its first cause stand quite independent of the supernatural. It can be seen among grooming practices of non human primates as well as in day to day right and wrong decisions made by humans, all independent of the supernatural. The burden of proof lies with those that say the supernatural is necessary for morality to exist. Such has not been presented.
But the people who committed what you and I would call heinous acts in service of their morality were acting in accord with their beliefs. So were they acting heinously or was it preferable to do what they did?
I prefer our society to others I am familiar with so I try to act in accord with and support its pillars - those choices, rules, acts which I believe constitute its bedrock. I think others do the same.
Indeed, and not just in America. Saudis who prevent women from driving are protecting the bedrock of their society as they see it, which is the society they prefer. Is this merely a difference of taste, like prefering techno over classic rock?
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