omniadeo:

My brother, perhaps it is you who represents the fundamentalist and narrow view.
I do not, as you do, have a set of questions that ‘qualifies thinking’ based on subjective criteria. It seems to me a bit arrogant to imply that your set of assumptions are only ‘the ones’ that can be used to form ‘correct’ opinions or judgments.

Whether you get your inspiration from Buddhism,Christianity, Snake Handling, or politics, I don’t have any problem with it for those involved. I have opinions on religious types, and I make judgments, you may not approve of them or how they were reached but that’s your problem.

Your ideas on ‘correct thinking’ can also bring up many troubling historical precedents.

Since the topic has been brought up here, I would have a problem in the case of abortion rights for women if any quasi political/religious group would pass laws that interfere with the non-religious to obtain medical treatment. You may assume I have ‘faulty’ thinking by not understanding and ‘feeling the other sides pain’ on the issue, but I don’t subscribe to the idea that if it’s religion, it must be right and good for everyone. I understand why various religious groups have a problem with abortion although no doubt, my insight would certainly not live up to your ‘standards’.

You can cite many examples throughout history where decision making has adversely impacted one side or the other on a variety of social, ethical and religious issues, I am only speaking about the abortion issue here.

You say “ you are fundamentally ignorant of what you criticize”.
I don’t believe I have to be a nuclear theorist or technician to form an opinion on the merits of nuclear power plants. I can read and talk with people about pros and cons and make a decision based on whatever sources I use. You, may have a problem with my sources and my conclusions, but if you can’t accept that I do any searching to help make my decisions, that’s your problem.  Again, that’s where your fundamentalism makes an appearance.  If we don’t go through the process like you do, it’s not ‘real thinking’. Only people who process ideas as you do can be qualified to make ‘proper decisions’.
Perhaps you are at heart, a Scientologist and not yet ‘clear’

If you value the ways and teachings of Buddhism, and it gives you peace and enriches your life and has illuminated ‘proper paths of thinking’ and a balance between reason and moral values, good for you. It doesn’t mean your ‘right’, it means that it works for you.

re:  “but to someone like me”
that, my brother, says it all....

Part 1
A most “rational” post omniadeo and appreciated.  To be succinct is to be blessed (my bumper sticker!) and I should take my own advice, although I think I economize on what I am saying as I could be so much more verbose.  I try to control it with efficiency of word.  But I am here feeling the need to post in two parts. 

I too have studied Buddhism (as admitted to a former other Buddhist practitioner, TD poster, and adversary, D. Chalmers and who I admit to missing these days, as I always enjoyed the intellectual and often acrimonious emotional fray with him).  I agree with all you say, however I discontinued my involvement with Buddhism because I came to see that even it was misguided.  As a human organism it is natural evolution to intuit an “I.” To deny the self, is to deny one’s humanism.  If I wanted to rid myself of my Self, I should commit suicide.  Since I do not, I embrace my Self and try to see it in all of its humanity.  To withdraw from society is to deny humanity as it is.  Within the scope of my ability and wherewithal, I do what I can to further the good in humanity, non-religious as I am, since I thoroughly believe humans can only be fully human by challenging the vicissitudes of life as humans and through their own minds.  I may be a majority of one. 

I suspected that you do not vanquish reason, since you demonstrate rational thought in your writing.  I agree that reason cannot establish a “should, or ought to statement.” However, even a priori moral assumptions do not appear out of a vacuum.  Admittedly Hutcheson and Hume asserted some intuitional moral sense, and Ross’s self-evident morals such as I have a duty to keep my promises, I would agree with Dawkins that such morals were developed through evolution to be self-serving and then upon further intuition good for the community which in turn provides a haven for individuals. I would venture to say that ultimately there is no justification for moral beliefs. Even so, we find we have morals and I contend that these developed because of the need for order in a community, or social, situation, call it contextual if you wish.  Therefore, even if morals cannot be declared to be inherent by reason of absolute justification from the moment humans cognized morals, however prehistoric that might be, I would not hesitate to say there was a proclivity for survival that encouraged them to emerge.  This inclination towards morals, in my mind, establishes a pre-condition.

Whether or not any particular moral belief is justified, some skeptics hold that all moral beliefs are not justifiable. Moral epistemic skepticism, that is, knowledge or cognitive based, is a common position.  It takes either weak or strong forms. According to weak moral epistemic skeptical theories, we can have justification for moral beliefs but we cannot have moral knowledge: the kinds or degrees of justification involved are too weak for knowledge.  According to strong skeptical theories, we cannot even have justified moral beliefs.

Relevant moral sensitivity is I think genetic based, though of course there has been no gene found that would support my notion.  That doesn’t stop me however, from thinking it is possible to discover, just as I think it is possible to discover the up and down, truth and beauty quarks in subatomic physics.  I agree with theorists who indicate that we have a built in heightened tendency to notice morally relevant features of a given situation, i.e., noticing pain in a living entity, whether human or animal such as a cat and that we have a relatively reliable tendency to draw moral conclusions from noticing morally latent circumstances.

Part 2
I am not arguing for any particular moral knowledge.  I hold there is a natural physical/mental tendency for humans to have empathetic emotions for other living entities and that this empathy gives rise to social morals that are at some point agreed to.  I make no claim to truth either.  Morals attain an indispensable rationality when and only when the society agrees to a set of morals, even if there is only one moral imperative.  In this sense it is an expressive morality and some would call it contractarian. 

What I have attempted here is not to give an entire definition to morals justification as having a rational basis.  A course in ethics would be required as there is much not even touched on, such as feminist ethical theories, even though cyrena attempted to bring the topic in, not much has been discussed here, and there is a mountain of talk needed, obviously.  But with respect to this article and much of what you have said I think it has adequately covered the bases, if you will.

The article actually delivers a vague and thin message about a slight shift in what are the evangelical issues.  Discussion surfaced within the dialogue of the forum about the nature of reason, morals, religion, etc., by commenters that seems more consequential.  For instance the broader set of ideological commitments by evangelicals in the first paragraph of poverty, disease, illiteracy, corruption in government, sex trafficking was not taken literally in the discussion held in the church and it would seem if to be taken seriously, sorely needs huge articulation.  And the “plight of the 148 million orphans in the world” is not something the next president will help find homes!  That was pure foolish speculation.

In direct reply to your interests spelled out in your post to at 11:56am, Aug. 25, #1) is too vague to be cogent; #2) How do we talk about values issues?  My reply, “the way we are doing it.” It seems this is a civilized forum.  I would guess the denizens here take their conclusions to others in their lives for discussion or at the least, clarify their own thinking on the topics.  We are only conquered to the degree we stop thinking.

FYI: Shenonymous is a she!

Big E,

1) Behavior similar to holy rolling etc, is quite similar to behavior at some rock concerts etc. Should those people at a rave or in mosh pit be locked up? (By the way, some of them have been known to emerge form a concert with a moral insight or two.) These phenomena are even historically related by way of the relationship between rock and roll and church music. If yiu are as old Snake handling is an interesting phenomenon, but the fact is that many handlers have been bitten and survived. That may or may not be statistically significant, but it is a fact. I don’t know of any secular snake-handlers, but Tony Robbins made a fortune out of teaching fire-walking in a secular context.

2) The guy with the knife screaming that he needs to kill the unbeliever, may be an atheist killing a religious person. If you don’t believe that is possible, I suggest you study the history of violently anti-religious “Marxist” governments. The “Gods” they were appealing to were Science, Reason, and Humanity. I am quite sympathetic to all three, in their place--and even to Karl Marx’s brilliant critique of Capitalism, but facts are facts. Most crimes are not based in religious fanaticism and people of different religious traditions have lived together in peace in different settings all over the world. It is greed that causes most crimes, not religion.

3) I have laid out for you in detail why I think you are closed minded and fanatic. The fact that apparently you cannot read it and take it in is only further indication that I am right. Let me lay it out furtther: 1) You jumped to many conclusions and assumed I believed things I did not say without reading what I wrote carefully. 2) You criticize religious thought, but to someone like me it is very evident that you are fundamentally ignorant of what you criticize. You are exactly like those people who, say, critique evolutionary theory without studying it. Go study before you criticise. 3) Like most religious critics, Dawkins et al, the thing you need to study most is the process whereby you identify abd question YOUR OWN ASSUMPTIONS. You don’t know what they are. That is obvious. To criticize others, and how they make theirs without knowing anything about your own and how you make yours is narrow and ignorant. Think about it.

Shenonymous,

I enjoy your posts the most, as you can probably tell, and consequently they are the hardest to answer, because one feels the need to write a small book in reply.

As someone who practiced and studied as a Buddhist for many years, I am quite comfortable with the notion of a rational inquiry resulting in the declaration that “I” do not exist in any ultimate sense. That is the fundamental insight of the Buddha--go look for the self, and you can’t find it. The “self” or “I” is seen as a limitless web of processes that ultimately encompasses all causes and events, which are also ultimately selfless, or as “mind”—that is, the the one doing the looking, which thus can’t be found or labeled as an entity in any conventional sense, just as you can’t taste your own tastebud.

(Buddhism is usually presented as a non-theistic or atheistic religion, but I have noted with interest that the same thing can be said of God. God does not “exist” in the same way as, say, beans or bricks, or even thought s or fantasies. That is actually blasphemy. That category mistake is implied by every critique of theistic thought on this thread. Spaghetti Monsters etc. It is somewhat understandable, since the average fundamentalist makes the same mistake. Literalism is the spirit of the age and it breeds fundamentalism and kills subtlety on all sides.)

You are wrong, I am not a sceptic about reason. I am definitely a sceptic about its ability to establish a moral norm unaided by pre-rational thought. Actually, I am not a sceptic about that either. I do not doubt. I KNOW that reason cannot establish a “should statement” from any collection of established facts, without resorting to an a priori moral assumption.

My interest here, believe it or not, is twofold:

1) To establish that the average liberal critic of religion is as clueless and closed minded as those they criticise. I do this not only by way of rational argument, but also by pointing out how all one needs to do is to mention the “Pope” or “God” and all kinds of bigoted thoughtless assumptions will be made about what you think and how stupid you are by people who themselves are merely trumpeting some half-baked ill-informed argument they heard somewhere else.

2) To challenge people to answer my question which is: In a society in which no one can agree on moral norms and how to establish them, how do we talk about the values issues that so divide the populace, and--I would be the first to admit--are also used to control and CONQUER us?

omniadeo, good morning!  Contradiction can be an wholly interesting position to be in but it is one where no progress, at all, may be made.  A contradiction consists of logical incompatibility between two or more statements when taken together and provide inversions of each other.  In the words of Aristotle, “One cannot say of something that it is and that it is not in the same respect and at the same time.” It seems right, what Aristotle said.  The poet Walt Whitman put it so lovely in his “Song of Myself.” Do I contradict myself?  Very well, then, I contradict myself. And for another perfect example of how interesting contradiction can be I suggest you read Salman Rushdie’s Satanic Verses for an illustration as there is nowhere better in literature I have found that presents the notion of contradiction so well.  I say this because of your seeming discussion about the concept of reason.  Apparently we have to add that word to our lexicon of definitions because you present yourself as an utter skeptic about a few things actually, reason being one of them.

But before going on to make that definition, we all have to ask you, and I am impertinent enough to speak for others, how you know you yourself exists?  The basis for the belief that there is a “you” is quite invisible and therefore flimsy and we all dare you to prove that you exist in the same way that you say we cannot establish the existence of other invisible entities, as if “reason” was an entity.  If reason is unprovable so is the “intuition” you speak of as being a last resort to even a tentative truth.

Just a small problem, but no matter we will continue as if you do exist and give some “rational” definition to the word “reason.” Oh and by the way, a categorical mistake is taking one category of things and confusing them for another.  For instance, you call reason an entity, when in fact, and here comes a definition, it is a cognitive process of the mind’s search for beliefs, conclusions, feelings (emotions), and behaviors, and none of these latter four are considered entities either.  Reasoning is done by what is called introspection.  Introspection is a mental process with something called the mind, which we can only suppose you doubt the existence of since it is invisible.  Now whether introspection can be a fount of truth is a different matter and is quite debatable another time (oops, time is another invisible). 

The reason (again, the ‘basis’) why I bring these comments to the discussion is because of your utter skepticism that colors all you have said about abortion, life and when it begins, religion, human rights, especially women’s right to choose, and why is it men’s responsibility for unwanted pregnancies is always left out of that question, morals, and science (which we had already stipulated was a domain that does not claim infallibility) and really a whole gallimaufry of things.  Your thinking is muddled, if you think at all since thinking is also one of those invisible “entities.”

So I invite you, if you are there, to review your comments while I have a cup of coffee, and make some adjustments then give your arguments (a rational one please) again. 

The problem with utter skepticism, if you never learned it, is that you have no basis then (reason) to believe that you exist or even can exist and you have to quite shut up.  For instance, besides proving you yourself exists, prove the existence of the universe (uh, without resort to science, please), then prove that the bed you woke up on this morning exists, now that is a hard concrete thing (or soft depending), or that the floor on which you put your feet, as you allegedly arose, was really there.  What does it mean to be there?  Or here?  This is the logical conclusion of your utter skepticism unless of course you want to cherry pick what exists and what doesn’t.  And if you don’t want to use logic, then we in our rational world, all of us, simply…

omniadeo

re: “Your first “humorous” post in this thread was about how a person who appeals to an invisible authority you do not appeal to might be locked up and medicated for not conforming to the consensual reality of those around him--a chilling image of the power of conformity, and a violent act that has been performed historically by power hungry people--theists and atheists--in order to ensure that no one questions their own views. “

•-> take a deep breath there ,.. that’s what YOU read into it…
my point was that an identical action or behavior in religious and non-religious settings might initiate 2 very different outcomes,… ‘speaking in tongues’ and and related rolling around on the floor receiving the ‘holy spirit’ seems not only to be perfectly acceptable behavior in some churches but a desired goal...........
some folks might be a lil bit ‘queasy’ with it compared to their own religious affiliations, but, since it’s religion it’s OK, just not for them.

try that same behavior on the sidewalk in N.Y.C or I’m guessing just about anywhere and you will get a very different result from that behavior. I’m not implying ‘moral’ judgments on the behavior itself, just observing that what might be considered unusual public behavior, is perfectly ‘normal’ and acceptable inside a ‘house of worship’.

‘Snake Handlers’ might be ‘normal worship’ to the folks involved, but trusting poisonous snakes to hand out the decision of an ‘invisible being’ is a lil bit weird to me...... maybe not to you. Now if these good folks want to take their lives in their hands and trust in whatever deity is meaningful to them, knock yourself out, by all means, just keep your distance from me.

re: “chilling image of the power of conformity”
so… if a guy comes running down the street naked, with a bloody butcher knife screaming that the ‘invisible one’ has chosen him to kill the ‘unclean’, I’m going to keep my fingers crossed that the “power of conformity” comes along and hastens the gentlemen into an appropriate setting for further evaluation.

•-> btw:  I really am interested in you explaining how:
“you claim to think for yourself"..“"I say you are as deluded as any religious nut” ...........  lay it on me, my brother.

By omniadeo, August 23 at 9:58

“..My question to you is how do you use reason, experience and observation to justify a moral claim? ...The MORAL interpretation of experience and observation are different. How do we know who is right?

~~~~~

Not to over simplify this, but here’s how reason, experience and observation can lead to a moral interpretation.

Somebody comes along and punches me in the stomach, and it hurts like hell. (or, if you don’t like that word, we’ll settle for I FEEL PAIN).

Somebody else runs over my child because they were driving drunk, and kills her. This is an incredibly, overwhelmingly horrific pain, from which I will never recover.

Somebody refuses to give me a job, or rent me an apartment, because I’m a person of color. I know that this is the case, because I’ve gone through all of the standard preliminary stuff, and I’ve spoken to the people involved via mail, telephone, etc, and the thing is as good as promised. UNTIL…I show up.

Now I also experience, (and observe) the behavior of most people when they are treated respectfully, and decently, and as equal human beings. I’ve experienced that, and I’ve observed it. I’ve experienced and observed hardship as well as gratification under a varying array of life’s circumstances.

Based on those experiences and observations, and because I’m of mostly sound mind and body, I CAN then REASON what is moral and what is not.

Therefore, I can reason, based on my experience and observation, that pain occurs, and I know what pain feels like. It’s not good. So, causing pain to someone else would not be such a moral thing.

So the MORAL interpretation is that if I experience or observe an action that brings physical/mental pain , anguish or hardship to another human being, directly or indirectly, than there’s a 99.9% chance that it is an IMMORAL action.

That’s how we use observation, experience, and reason to accomplish moral interpretations.

As for the Carnivore thing..there’s something in the Bible, (I think Genesis) where God allegedly tells the people who read the Bible, that He’s put the fish, and birds, and other things of that nature there for them to consume. (not those precise words, since ‘consume’ wasn’t in use at the time it was written). But it’s in there somewhere. Check in out.

No, that’s not experience or observation, (unless one believes everything they read in the Bible) but that’s surely the “logic” that some folks much use, just by saying that it’s ‘in the Bible.”

omniadeo

So, you don’t like my sarcasm and satire..well, as ‘they say’, there’s no accounting for taste........

re: “I think you kid yourself when you claim to think for yourself. “"I say you are as deluded as any religious nut”

I’m curious and all ears....

Big E,

You have a sense of humor and are a working musician, both points in your favor, but I think you kid yourself when you claim to think for yourself.

Your first “humorous” post in this thread was about how a person who appeals to an invisible authority you do not appeal to might be locked up and medicated for not conforming to the consensual reality of those around him--a chilling image of the power of conformity, and a violent act that has been performed historically by power hungry people--theists and atheists--in order to ensure that no one questions their own views.

You then assumed that you know what I believe from my name apparently and challenged me with a somewhat banal quote. In that quote Ingersoll counters what he believes is a dogmatic view (for the most part it is a parody of one) and appeals instead to “reason, experience and observation.”

My question to you is how do you use reason, experience and observation to justify a moral claim?  Experience and observation can only establish facts. As important as they are, they will never tell you what to do with the fact. For instance, an animal loving vegetarian and a utilitarian carnivore may both observe and experience a chicken. Vegetarian thinks thoughts of “thou shalt not kill” but Carnivore thinks “what a good fellow I am--dinner for the family.” The MORAL interpretation of experience and observation are different. How do we know who is right?

Ingersoll says Reason can be used to establish a moral claim. It is you who introduced it, not me, as a substitute for an appeal to what you take to be an invisible “entity.” You say that it is not an entity like like “God, spirit, the flying spaghetti monster.” But I must remind you that you are saying it IS like them in one respect--it can be appealed to to establish a moral claim. That’s what Ingersoll anyway is saying.

At this point you can admit that I am right and that reason cannot establish any such thing as a moral claim. Or you can show me how it does. If you are the freethnker you claim to be, don’t tell me what someone else thinks--just show me.

You say reason is used as follows: “[1] a cause, explanation, or justification for an action or event; [2] think, understand, and form judgments by a process of logic.” Fine. Use those definitions and show me.

I do not think the #1 will work. If I ask the carnivore for the “reason” he killed the chicken, he will say something like “it’s right to feed your family and animals are for food” If I ask the Vegetarian for the “reason” he didn’t, he will say “because taking animal life is wrong and the chicken is an animal.” Both have reasons according to their own moral lights, but they do not agree on moral claims.

I think you and Ingersoll were getting at #2: “Think understand and form judgments by a process of logic.”

I say you are as deluded as any religious nut. Neither the Vegetarian nor the Carnivore can use logic to justify a moral claim. As Shenonyous pointed out also, logic performs according to the premises that you feed it. It will not supply the premises. (Shenonymous, who thinks more carefully than most of you here, even if [s]he[?] does misuread me sometimes, could improve on your definitions of reason somewhat, but I don’t think it changes anything here.)

Again, you are no different than any religionist in this respect. Your claim to have better, more rational justification for your moral judgements as compared to those who base theirs on a “bronze age” (there was a lot of iron involved, actually) is bogus.

Your “joke” about locking people up for their religious beliefs and medicating them tells it all.

FRom the year 200o through 2006Bush a Republican, the majority in the Sentate an the House of Representatives were also Republicans.
These people calim to be against abortion including McCain.  However they had six solid years to enact a law to make it illegal to abort. Why didn’t they do it.  Why is it every election year the subject comes up?  Are Republicans really against a woman to have the choice?  I really don’t think they mush give a damn is a woman aborts or not.  All they are worried about is the money coming into them as the bigga churchs want the money coming into them.  By the way these churches who bring the argument up always, have they set asside some of their free monies to build a place to house these women who can’t afford to continue the labor of bringing into the world a new one or ones?

omniadeo

good buddy…
Jeeeeeeeeeeeeezzus H. Christ

re:  “evasion” & “Are we taking votes on truth here?”

I’m saying that when I use the term ‘entity’ as in Holy Ghost, God, invisible being, flying spaghetti monster or whatever, it’s a common understanding of the word ‘entity’,..
ie: a thing with distinct and independent existence,
existence, being; life, living, animation; substance, essence, reality, actuality

you suggest that the concept of ‘reason’ is the same as my description of the word
‘entity’.....  I don’t believe your usage outside of whatever arcane and argumentative philosophic [no offense intended] one you choose is the ‘common’ understanding of it.
ie: a cause, explanation, or justification for an action or event,
think, understand, and form judgments by a process of logic.

‘Most people’ I believe, think of those words in association with the definitions
I’ve provided for you. It’s not a matter of whether I care what people think, it’s
just common usage and understanding of the words.

re: “Think for yourself. Don’t appeal to authority”
as an actual working and performing musician that’s
a requisite for the job.....

re: “Has it ever occurred to you that the separation may not be complete yet?”
That’s an interesting observation, but as I believe that much of what is known as the modern christian religion is as much a political and economic empire as anything else your ‘separation’ is likely never to happen without some very severe and radical changes in the established religious norms.

• “To my mind you are talking about different points. One is your rhetorical question “Why do they care when they don’t know the women involved?” I answered that question. I still believe I’m right: They see it differently than you do, and there is no way you can logically prove them wrong and you right. (They can’t logically prove you wrong either. You just disagree on certain moral judgments. That’s just the way it is. That’s the way moral judgments are made by everyone.”

I appreciate your response here, and can suggest that maybe we are BOTH talking about different points. You appear to be mixing some concepts around here, and it could very well be that I’ve failed to articulate my own original point clearly enough, and it would appear that you have failed to understand it. I have to agree with whomever said it, that you appear to simply wish to be engaged in proving where you are ‘right’ and where others may be ‘wrong’ and you base it all on how ‘moral judgments are made by everyone.” I disagree, but you are talking philosophy, (re morality) and I’m speaking far more in terms of the political realities of Law and Society, (since it happens to be my particular field of study).

Having said that, my question was not at all rhetorical, but intended to provide some clues as to how ones moral persuasion can result in very bad public policy, that can (and ultimately DOES) affect much larger numbers of a collective society, including those that we do not know, and will never know. Not only is there an important question on whether or not *I* should care whether *you* choose to terminate a pregnancy, when I don’t even know you, but becomes even more outrageous when taken further to apply even when *I* don’t know that you even *ARE* making that choice, so I clearly have no way to know WHY you are.

Part II

You make this statement, and it is what puts the fright in anyone with any real morality..

By omniadeo, August 21 at 4:28 pm

• “..Apparently these people consider abortion to be the taking of a human life. You may disagree, but logically, if they feel that way, and are not inhuman monsters, they care about that life, and the consciences of the people who take it..”
~~~~~

How do these people care about the existence of an embryo, of which they have no knowledge? What you’re saying (at least theoretically) is that if the process of conception took place within my human anatomy 3 weeks, ago, (trust me, it didn’t) then *you* (or anyone, anywhere) cares so much about it, (because you believe this small collection of cells is a human life) that you believe there should be a permanent set of laws in place, that would prevent me from terminating that process. And then you go even further to say that it’s because you ALSO care about my ‘conscience’, (or maybe the conscience of the doctor who assists in the procedure).

Consider that. You (or whomever you suggest believes this way) are deciding on behalf of MY conscience! How outrageous is that? You don’t know me, and have no idea of my circumstances, and you damn sure can’t know what’s in my conscience, and yet this is something that you claim a moral judgment on. You have no way to know that my spouse and I already have 3 children, or what the circumstances of those children might be. (such as the health of one or more of any of us, that might require more emotional and/or financial resources that we may or may not have) because in reality, you don’t know anything at all about the circumstances of the conception, or the person cultivating this human life. You don’t know that my spouse has been unemployed for 5 years, and is chronically depressed as a result of it, or that I also have responsibilities in the care of aging parents. You aren’t inclined to set up any arrangements that would assist us in managing these issues, because even if you were willing, you don’t know me or have any logical reason to even be AWARE of my circumstances, and you may not have the resources either.

Based on the above scenario, (which plays out all of the world/country in some variation every hour of every day) it would be unconscionable for me NOT to terminate that pregnancy, at least in MY conscience, based on the responsibilities that *I* have to those other actual living beings, and my obligations to them. Yet YOU (or at least the collection of ‘conscience watchers’ that you reference here) would support a rule or policy that applies in blanket format, which would prevent me from gaining safe access to such a procedure. If that is a ‘moral judgment’, I see it as a very BAD one.

That, onmniadeo, is why Roe v. Wade, the supreme court decision that provided for a woman’s right to make these choices herself, was based on the right of privacy. And from a moral standpoint, we must all be keepers of our own consciences.

Now you can continue to debate philosophy and religion with whomever you want. I find such discussions fascinating, at least when they are undertaken with those who are not fanatical ideologues. I reject entirely any notion that religion or a belief in a spiritual power or entity is required for one to make moral judgments. The primary consideration in moral judgments is that they cannot be made for others.

We CAN make laws that benefit and protect the rights of individuals within any given society as well as the collective. We can and do make laws that prevent any individuals within any given society from arbitrarily killing each other or stealing from each other or engaging in other such acts that are agreed upon as being unacceptable by the society in general. That is not a matter of ‘moral judgment’ but rather an agreement/contract between the people that they will conduct their lives according to those rules.

Hesperion,

I would be very interested in knowing what point I dodged.

You are pretty good at telling me what you believe. You have yet to tell me why you believe what you believe. I suppose you are afraid of debate, since you prefer “discussion,” by which I think you mean people agreeing with each other, or more precisely, with you.

I would also be very interested in knowing how some philosophies are “idiomatic,” but yours is not. If you can explain that, I’ll eat my shoe.

The founders removed “estblishments of religion” from official recognition by the US government. It was definitely one of the great things they did. They did not forbid the use of one’s religious tradition to form an opinion. Still less did they tell us how to negotiate moral disagreements among ourselves when those cannot be based on rational argument.

You rescue the republic. I’ll just go blow some nuance on the funeral, thanks.

Big E,

Your responses seem to be evasions to me.

I find it odd that you use the argument “most folks would [not] equate ‘reason’ as equal conceptually to an entity being a god like character, ghost or other unknown manifestation.” Are we taking votes on truth here? If so, then God certainly exists! (At least here in the US.)

What do you care what “most people” think?  If you can’t see it, hear it, touch it, smell it or taste it, if you can’t even talk about it clearly (that is not an insult, just go ask ten different secular moderns to tell you what “reason” is and compare their answers; if you can’t do any of those things but you continually appeal to “reason” as a source of judgment, how does it differ? Think for yourself. Don’t appeal to authority.

Are you sure that you are not simply brainwashed into appealing to YOUR culturally acceptable invisible entity, and have never really questioned it? Maybe never even troubled to try to define it?

(By the way, as an interesting aside, the second person of that abysmally primitive Trinity, is also the “Logos” which can be translated as “Reason.” The rational tradition of the Western Enlightenment is historically the separation of that concept from that mythology. Has it ever occurred to you that the separation may not be complete yet?)

“"By omniadeo, August 22 at 12:18 am #
Good for you. That’s the old spirit. Get rid of religion AND philosophy. No need to think about all those tricky questions. No need to submit the process by which you determine wrong and right to any real inspection or rational inquiry. You just know you are right and that’s that.
Thanks for protecting me from those fundamentalist fanatics."”

You must get lots of exercise dodging the point and jumping to conclusion. I see you are just one of those who like to argue. Discussion is lost on you. Yes, I do firmly believe that RELIGION should be removed from you political processes (the founders would seem to agree). As far as philosophy; I for one am getting real tired of ideological government experimentation on the people. The functions of governing are quite straightforward. We had the beginnings of a FORM of government but that got lost in all the experimentation, ideology and philosophizing of the years. One symptom of the death of the Republic would be all this debating and espousing of various idiomatic philosophies to add nuance to the funeral. I applaud any optimism as to a possible rescue plan for the nation (if that is what you people come here for rather than to hear yourselves blow) but I feel realistically the USA is finished and is now in it’s death throes. Religionists believe in regulating everyone’s behavior but their own. So, protect yourSELF from them. I will take care of myself.

omniadeo:

re:  “ Those who say, “Get religion out of politics” are really saying, “I can have my pre-rational judgments, but you can’t have yours.” “And then they accuse the other side of arrogance”.  “ It simply means that you are not in any better position than a religious person when it comes to justifying your moral and ethical judgments-”

I understand your point, but, I don’t walk around telling folks that if they don’t believe as I do, or immediately convert to my way of thinking, they will end up as some sort of human BBQ roasting to a ‘ medium well’ state in a burning pit called Hell. Takes a pretty creepy imagination to come up with that concept in the first place IMHO...................Talk about ‘arrogance’.

re:  “Jesus (even if he is only a literary convention) makes the point without any reference to an invisible spiritual world”..

I would suggest that if not for the association of Jesus as part of the Trinity, one might have never really heard of him, as his ‘claim to fame’ is that very association with invisible being(s) and alleged supernatural events.

re:  “I would also point out to you that you too believe in invisible entities since no one has ever seen “reason.”

I don’t really think that most folks would equate ‘reason’ as equal conceptually to an entity being a god like character, ghost or other unknown manifestation..
You can get into some deeper philosophical definitions of ‘entity’ if you are so inclined, but I hope you can accept my very basic definition.

With no intention to ridicule in the least, omniadeo, can you contact your hypothesized moral arbiter?  How does a moral arbiter contact humans to let them know they are on the right moral path?  Could we just call it a conscience such as Socrates did?  He called it his daemon.  But even if we allowed that, who is to say one conscience is hearing better than another?  How shall we go outside the human mind or heart to decide?

Of course different premises lead to different conclusions, but in a particular argument one is stuck with the premises given.  I am not assuming any final truths, as a matter of fact I went to great pains of thought to avoid that specifically.  Please read more critically.

There are different views on when a cell structure is a human being.  The arguments are at conception (which is in reality, please think about it, ambiguous, for who knows exactly when conception takes place?), or it is also theorized as occurring sometime later than conception.  And let’s not blame any god on that decision since a god does not speak directly to anyone about it, if so please stand up and say who it is.  If we want to say conception takes place at coitus, then the billions of everybody who have sex are in deep deep trouble.  Then we actually have marched over to the scientific side of the argument where science will say it is for all practical purposes impossible to determine since a fiber optics or something like it would have to track the path of spermatozooa to ovum at every incident of intercourse.  Let’s do get real.  Moral judgments are subjective and conform to the collective subjectivities of a group who agree to what is and what is not moral.  All societies do not agree on any set of morals.  If you think they do, please specify.  I will consider what you say without prejudice.  I am not attempting to rebut anything you say only see if there is any worthwhile merit to it.  Your allusion to mathematics is not quite right.  Within any mathematical system, axioms must be consistent, otherwise you have no mathematics.  If you want to postulate various formulations of mathematics that is perfectly all right as long as you don’t cross systems and try to impose the axioms of one on the other.  For instance, Euclidian geometry will not justify with non-Euclidean or say hyperbolic and elliptic geometries, i.e., Reimannian geometry.  But it is silly to use the two exclusive systems’ postulates interchangeably.

Appealing to the emotional image such as a beating heart in a womb is not an argument from reason.  The appearance of a beating heart of a foetus is long after conception.  Other arguments arise such as viability outside the womb.  If you wish to use emotion as the basis of your positions it is your right of course.  But since emotions are subjective nobody has the imperative to believe you.

You are very polite.  Thank you.

[Shenonymous--apologies for the mispelling of your handle]

Shenonymoues,

Thanks for at least getting something about what I am driving at. I am not sure what my “category mistakes” are. Perhaps your attempt to delineate reason, logic religion etc is your attempt to tell me. I do not believe that I confused them--I think you are reading things into my statements--but I am not saying I was 100% clear either.  As you yourself seem to realize, it’s not easy to discuss these issues in a forum.

The whole problem I am exploring here is, how do we get along when we assume these different things? Most of the posters here just seem to think that ridiculing others who assume different things is the answer. You do not do that, but you seem nevertheless capable of trumpeting your assumptions as final truths.

For instance, “The question of morality is a social one and only a social one...” May I ask how you know? To make this statement you have to assume that there is no moral arbiter external to human society. You may be right, but if one assumes something different, one comes to a different conclusion.

Your statement leads to well known problems.  “Slavery is immoral in this society, but in that society it is not, so since we are in that society it’s fine to have a slave.” Do you believe that? (Of course, there are plenty of problems with the opposite view: that there is a final moral arbiter external to all societies.)

I do not think that you have rebutted my main point: That primary moral judgments (for instance: a fetus is a human being deserving legal protection--or not) come as intuited truths to human beings. They may form part of a logical statement, but only as assumptions that cannot themselves be proved. That is what, in my lexicon anyway, an “axiom” is. We can form different mathematical/logical systems from different axioms. And we can form different moral codes from different axioms. Fortunately no one is warring over whether to accept Riemannian rather that Euclidean axioms--in the world of utility, we just select the one that is useful. Neither is final.

When it comes to what to do with a beating heart in the womb, things get more heated. For that heart finality is a real possibility.

You seem to think (I could be wrong here) that separating “religion” out as its own category gets you out of the problem I pose. I think you are wrong (if that’s what you are saying). The fact that one person--let’s say “Pastor Rick"--says that a fetus is a human being because the Bible said so, while another person--Cyrena?--says it is not because she says so, or because “science” or “reason” says so (which I think you would recognize as a category error) does not change the fact that they are both assumptions about the world and not susceptible to rational argument.

Omniadeo, even though you make many categorical mistakes, your arguments have much value in my untestable opinion by pointing out various problems in other’s logic and truth-telling.  However, logic and religion are as mutually exclusive as moral/ethical judgments are from reason.  Shall we start a forum lexicon?  I will start with logic:  Logic is a system of following the truth value of statements called premises and whether when strung together they are consistent.  Logic, like mathematics, does not have to do with truth in the sense of what is reality, nor with religion or science which tries to prescribe what reality is.  Truth in logic has to do with whether a statement is true in “all possible worlds.”

Whether a line of reasoning, called an argument, is true or not depends on the premises corresponding, cohering, is constructed by social process, or is determined by consensus of a group that agrees to it, while the latter may or may not correspond or cohere with reality.  Since there are other theories of truth, the extent of which to describe is not appropriate for this forum, a definition for Truth itself is therefore and still is a debatable issue and various measures are currently accepted to determine the reality of a proposed truthful statement (for efficiency’s sake google Truth for further assortments of Truth).  Truth value is logical value and has to do with the degree of the truth or falsity of a statements.  That is, that one statement does not contradict another.  If logic is used to evaluate whether science or religious doctrines are true, the arguments must contain premises that are true.  It is ignorance to put logic and religion in a contest with each other. 

Verifiable facts may be used as statements for an argument, however there must be a consistent logical connection to use facts to support any argument for truth.  Again, logic would only validate the consistency of the argument not prove the correspondence or coherence to reality of the statements.

Religion is a practice usually based on a set of tenets, laws, principles, dogmas, or doctrines usually based on a supernatural being or beings and have developed common beliefs about reality, morality, and humanity.  There is the faith truth of religions.  These are subjective and not provable.  Since a particular religion cannot attain Truth, veracity of any one religion is debatable on the “proof” of the existence of various religions in the world (there are about 21 major religions in the world today and roughly a billion people do not declare to believe in any religion, please google for verification).  Is there a truth to religion?  Say which one is true and which are false.

How does one validate statements as correspondent or coherent with reality, that is, how to determine the Truth?  Among different systems that one may accept, science is just another way to provide the material to hypothesize truth, and science itself says there are no absolute proofs.  Science is the attempt to find out about, and increase human understanding of how the physical world works through controlled empirical (experienced using mind and the information of the external world to the mind via the senses) methods.

The question of morality is a social one and only a social one and morals are determined within the society of the moral under discussion.  Morals, or morality, is a code of conduct and are created by and defined by society through their philosophy and religion.  If there is a debate over morals within that society, then some consensus may or may not be possible (which seems to be the case if the whole world is taken as ‘the society’ today).

Like reason, belief is a psychological state of mind (and yes, one cannot prove the existence of a reasoning mind either) in which the content of an idea is held to be true.  But then prove the existence of the unseen wind.  It is only by its effects do we postulate its existence.

Big E,

Jesus (even if he is only a literary convention) makes the point without any reference to an invisible spiritual world, but by way of an analogy to a very common problem known to gardeners and farmers everywhere: How do you get rid of the bad stuff, without harming the good stuff, when it’s all mixed up together.

I think that’s very important when so many followers of Jesus say we should go “fight evil” in his name.

I don’t really disagree with your quote from Ingersoll, though I think he uses the word faith in a very limited and intentionally pejorative sense. There are other possible definitions and other ways to see faith, heaven and hell. They may not interest you, but that is a different matter.

I would also point out to you that you too believe in invisible entities since no one has ever seen “reason.” Quite possibly you think that is quibbling or something worse, but I say you simply use the word without questioning it much, the way that “soul” is used by others. Can you demonstrate the existence of reason by way of a scientific experiment? I don’t think so, because if you don’t assume something like reason, a scientific experiment is unthinkable. What would be the point? You couldn’t draw a conclusion from the evidence.

Finally, I would ask you: can you show me how a moral or ethical judgment can be made by relying only on “reason, observation and experience?” I say you can’t but I am interested in you proving me wrong.

Show me a rational argument from reason, observation and experience ONLY that proves something is immoral or unethical--even undesirable. At some point you will simply have to appeal to an intuition which is itself unproveable. Does it follow that you are or should be religious? No. It simply means that you are not in any better position than a religious person when it comes to justifying your moral and ethical judgments--they are pre-rational.

This is very important for undertanding our society and the difficulties of separating religion from politics. Those who say, “Get religion out of politics” are really saying, “I can have my pre-rational judgments, but you can’t have yours.”

And then they accuse the other side of arrogance.

Hesperion,

Good for you. That’s the old spirit. Get rid of religion AND philosophy. No need to think about all those tricky questions. No need to submit the process by which you determine wrong and right to any real inspection or rational inquiry. You just know you are right and that’s that.

Thanks for protecting me from those fundamentalist fanatics.

Hesperion,

Good for you. That’s the old spirit. Get rid of religion AND philosophy. No need to think about all those tricky questions. No need to submit the process by which you determine wrong and right to any real inspection. You just know you are right and that’s that.

Thanks for protecting me from those fundamentalist fanatics.

Cyrena,

To my mind you are talking about different points. One is your rhetorical question “Why do they care when they don’t know the women involved?” I answered that question. I still believe I’m right: They see it differently than you do, and there is no way you can logically prove them wrong and you right. (They can’t logically prove you wrong either. You just disagree on certain moral judgments. That’s just the way it is. That’s the way moral judgments are made by everyone. Hesperion may think it’s Jesuitical to point that out. I think understanding it is very important in a democracy where we all--religious or not--have to live together while disagreeing about moral judgments.)

Your other--in my view separate--point is that many people who claim to care about life may be hypocrites and actually show they don’t really care. I couldn’t agree with you more--except that you clearly imply all people who claim to care are hypocritical, and there I know you are wrong, but perhaps you don’t mean it quite as sweepingly as you said it. I can point you to many people who participate in and believe in programs to help the poor--some have given their lives to it--but who disagree with you on abortion and religion. In my experience I have found hypocrites on all sides of every question. (It’s a lot easier to spot them than it is to avoid being one, by the way.)

No one has actually asked my opinion on this, since you all assume you know it, but I happen to believe that the whole issue is just one hell of a nasty tragedy any way you look at it and no one side is completely wrong or right about it--people get hurt by both positions when taken to extremes and there is no easy compromise either. In general I believe in very little government regulation of private lives and I tend to side with a woman’s right to choose. I am not insensitive to the fact that there is an issue about controlling women’s bodies in certain men’s views for reasons that have nothing to do with compassion. That’s for real in some people. But so is compassion in others. Incomprehension as to why someone would care about aborting a fetus is one of the few things that makes me question my opinion.

(I also happen to think that even if that is the right answer, more or less, Roe vs. Wade is a poorly argued opinion and a dangerous precedent for all kinds of reasons that have little to do with abortion.)

Finally, Cyrena, you said that Ron Paul believes that birth control should be outlawed. That’s what you said. You cannot back that up with a source. You just changed the subject to whether removing federal funding would increase unwanted pregnancies. You are probably right about that, but it will not change the fact that you made a false statement--or at least one you can’t support. Admit it.

By omniadeo, August 21 at 4:28 pm

• “..Apparently these people consider abortion to be the taking of a human life. You may disagree, but logically, if they feel that way, and are not inhuman monsters, they care about that life, and the consciences of the people who take it..”

Same old stuff here omniadeo. You somehow failed to include the other related portion of the same post…

• “…You can’t tell me that this is an ideology that applies to the ENTIRE population, because these same people that are so adamantly anti-abortion are just as adamantly opposed to any social programs to assist the poor, (which by nature of the set-up, just happen to be mostly people of color) which INCLUDES pre-natal care, as well as care of these children when they are born in total poverty.

I wrote that as well. So, what I’m saying here, (as I have before) that the Ron Paul types that care so much about the ‘taking of a human life’ before it even becomes a human life, (like at the cell stage) don’t give a shit about the same human life after it enters the world. Ron Paul is adamantly opposed to any type of social programs that provide things like pre-natal care, or care for parent education, and child welfare once these children are born. He is opposed to a whole lot of things that assist the human condition. So spare me the stuff about ‘the taking of a human life’, when I personally know that the infant mortality statistics in the rural South of the US have been as high as those of several 3rd world countries.

The same can be said of his opposition to birth control. Whether it’s federally funded or not, logic dictates that if it were available, it would drastically reduce the number of unwanted pregnancies.

And if you are unaware that Ron Paul advocates for the overturning of Roe v. Wade, there is no amount of research that I can do on your behalf. It would be a waste of time. How complicated is it to understand how radical it is to want to undermine Constitutional Law, and why does any reasonable person not see it exactly as such..the undermining of the rule of law?

Omnia Deo is from heraldry “In God are All Things” A mass reading of your rambles gives the impression of Jesuit theological theory. Might not actually apply in your case but it gives that sense even so. I was joking with my “bad translation” of your handle. MY whole thrust, you will gather, is that religion is a consistently negative influence in our land. It needs to be removed or contained. You will not see me meandering through the ins and outs of that, it is NO song and dance. As far as my morality: I will leave you philosophers and theologians to endlessly debate that.

Hesperion,

Your translation is completely innacurate. I did not have the fortune, for good or ill, of a Jesuit education. I did learn in public school how to read.

I assume you were taught likewise, but apparently you have forgotten, for a reader could search my posts for days and never find me saying any such thing. Please point me to where I said you have to have religion to have morality.

What you will find, if you read carefully and don’t react from hot-headed prejudice, is a simple challenge: Show me a logical argument for any moral action that does not start from assumed moral judgements.

I do not believe you can show me any such thing. But you are welcome to try, though I assure you it’s more difficult than a quick bad translation.

You may be more moral than I am (I would bet on it) and not be religious, but the axioms of your morality PRECEDE logical argument, just as the religious person’s does. And just as mine do---which raises the question of whether you can assume that I am religious based on your bad translation of my online name.

And I suppose you are a musical act, or some kind of Western Star Hero or something.

I know it’s not the musical act, because they have manners. Must be some kind of Greek hero thing. Before Nemesis cut into Hubris. Good luck.

re: “There Jesus makes plain”

‘plain’ , to the believers in the invisible spirit world

you don’t necessarily need science to determine insanity, sometimes it’s pretty easy to see.... starting needless wars in modern times, or’ holy wars of faith’
, sort of that ‘killin’ for the lord’ thing....  yeah......  that’s insane

as you enjoy passing on scriptural legends ...
consider, the agnostic view ...:

“The notion that faith in Christ is to be rewarded by an eternity of bliss, while a dependence upon reason, observation, and experience merits everlasting pain, is too absurd for refutation, and can be relieved only by that unhappy mixture of insanity and ignorance called ‘faith.’” - Robert G. Ingersoll

Re: comment #177172
OMNIADEO (trans.: Almighty God) You got all that from your Jesuit education? No religion = No morality. Don’t lecture about a narrow view from here on. I once heard it put very well: W here I s T he H elp I N eed?

Evil

One more point, had anyone known how to use the Bible against the fundamentalists, they would have pointed to the 13th chapter of Matthew. There Jesus makes plain that we are NOT to try to destroy Evil in the world, because it is so intermingled with Good that we would destroy that too. Only at the end of time will the two be separated.

One need not be a Christian or believe in Christian eschatology to see the wisdom of Jesus’ insight here and its obvious relevance to US foreign policy, our “War on Terror” and all the other “Wars” (against Cancer, Poverty, what have you) that are used to manipulate people for selfish ends.

“WHY these people care so much about whether or not one or more of the 150 million or so women in the US has an abortion, when that person has no connection to them whatsoever...” - Cyrena

Apparently these people consider abortion to be the taking of a human life. You may disagree, but logically, if they feel that way, and are not inhuman monsters, they care about that life, and the consciences of the people who take it. I assume Cyrena, you do not only care about tragedies that happen to people you know. Neither do they. They just disagree with you about whether this situation is a tragedy (or perhaps the degree or some other aspect of the situation.)

By the way, Cyrena, you have an annoying tendency to lecture others about original sources, irresponsible rhetoric, etc. but you never cite your sources and you use inflammatory rhetoric quite freely. Ron Paul (with whom I disagree and agree about much) believes that the states should decide the matter of abortion and he, no doubt, believes it should be illegal in his state, but also believes you should have the right to vote in your state for the legal treatment you believe in. That is a consistent postion, while yours (apparently) is that he shouldn’t have the right to vote in his state for the laws he believes in because of a highly questionable court decision based on a debateable interpretation of the constitution using reasoning which you would not like if it went against you.

Please provide a source for where Ron Paul believes in making Birth Control illegal. I believe he believes that it should not be federally funded. Again, a consistent position. If I am wrong, show me with an original source.

I am no admirer of Warren, or most organized religion, but the ill-informed, illogical nattering here about religious people is amazing to me.

To the person who believes that “logic” always trumps religion, please show me how logic can be used to establish a moral imperative. It cannot be done. Logic has to work with axiomatic or self-evident principles. If we disagree on those, we cannot use logic to settle our differences, even if we agree on facts.

To the person who touts facts, ditto. Arguing from facts, to what should be done about them only works when everyone already agrees on what should be done about them. Abortion is a great example. Two people can agree on all the scientific facts about a pregnancy and completetly disagree on the morality of its termination, because they disagree on principles.

Religious people are NOT the only people who cannot establish our morals and principles on facts and logic. Like it or not, we all share that condition.

My favorite is the great freethinker below, who believes that religious people should be locked up and medicated. I realize there was irony, but the unquestioning assumpion that “science” can determine “insanity” and lock people up and medicate them is implied.

I also love the quote from the Gospel of Christopher Hitchens. Now there is a peace loving soul. A guy who makes a career out of justifying wars using high-flown literary references and liberal principles of freedom. Much more “liberal” than those religious nuts like the Pope who actually opposed the war in Iraq and its brutal murder of a million people for geo-political military and economic power.

re: By Kwaayesnama, August 21 at 6:59 am:

Yeah, isn’t it funny how he forgot to ask such a question - this self-appointed spokesman for a religion whose founder was about as explicit and absolute in his pacifism as it is possible to be?