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Author | Topic: The Dangers of Secularism | |||||||||||||||||||
macaroniandcheese  Suspended Member (Idle past 4183 days) Posts: 4258 Joined: |
it only undercuts my point if you are correct that there is no right. there are laws which govern everything in the universe. how is humanity any different?
example. both matter and energy are conserved. life is the merging of these two things. how does that make it not wrong to block the momentum of a life? it seems to me that one needn't be a relativist simply because one is godless. there are correct answers in math problems. no, i don't suppose we can know any authority on it, but since when has human knowledge about the universe changed how it works?
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Silent H Member (Idle past 6074 days) Posts: 7405 From: satellite of love Joined: |
Many American Presidents have had a strong Christian faith and Christian presence, have in fact called for specifically Christian observances by the nation from the declaration of the religious day of Thanksgiving for instance to calls to fasting and prayer in times of national crisis. I am certainly not claiming that Presidents have not been religious, did not use faith in some manner or another to support themselves, or did not mention or support some religious "moments" in public ceremony. I guess I am a bit confused by calling Thanksgiving a religious day, but maybe you can show this is true. There have been periods in the past where religion has been a greater or lesser part of the US gov't. The late forties to early fifties was a major turning point in the forcing of religious iconography into gov't, in order to separate us from "atheist" Russia. However, what is new is a presence of overt proselytization within the executive branch and what's worse an expectation of its support of a specific style of faith. That is very new and even the religious leaders have pointed this out so I am a bit confused why you would suggest otherwise. Well to be truthful, many of the fundie leaders claim the early presidents and founding fathers were overtly religious in their leadership (which is not substantiated by factual evidence outside of careful quotemining) and after a brief loss of religion in gov't, has finally come back to the political stage. Their point (and it was their doc so I tend to assume this is their position) was that Jimmy Carter was the first openly Xian president, and they had high hopes for him. Later they were disappointed by his refusal to push his faith through legislation, and so went on to back Reagan, then Bush (with varying degrees of happiness and disappointment)... fought Clinton, and then are back with Bush. The end result was a change for overt religious nature of the presidency. Even Clinton, who was opposed by the fundies, ended up having to continually express religious convictions. It is now almost a mandatory exercise for presidential candidates.
The secular trend is what is new. What some think is a greater presence of religion in national life is really the reaction of religion against the more aggressive secularization and explicit anti-religion of the last few decades I am calling you on this assertion. The founding fathers were pretty specific in teh secular nature of our gov't. What are the recent trends which you consider "secular" on the gov't? I will agree that there have been actions (or even an overreaction) by secularists, and anti religious people (who are not the same as secularists), that are aggressive and even offensive to religion (that means fighting its existence). As a secularist I do not like these actions. But they are the reaction, not the initial action. You need to research the "culture war", its foundations and history. It was begun unilaterally by fundamentalist Xians and waged against a generally surprised secular nation. The reaction has been to pick up arms and fight the fundies as they have suggested. To believe that secularism forced a reaction by Xians is to buy into propaganda. I defy the culture war, and want both sides to put down arms. I am a secularist.
the judicial branch usurping the functions of the legislative branch. I find this new twist amusing since it without an overt usurping of the legislative by the judicial, Bush never would have been in office in 2000. But lets get this straight, the judicial is the check on the legislative. They do not usurp, they check. To say that a law is not adequate, which forces a legislature to rewrite is not the same thing as drafting a piece of legislation. Even when they return a law as inadequate and suggest the only way it will fill Constitutionality, is not a form of legislation. The Court cannot create laws and they haven't as of yet (with the possible exception of the Bush decision, which practically amended the constitution). Perhaps it is the legislature which continually tries to create laws which are unconstitutional which is the problem. As such they keep finding the courts a hindrance, and so are now trying to usurp the role of the courts and allow themselves to judge constitutionality by whether they happen to vote for it. That is a dangerous precedent. We are served by checks and balances. I might add that your statement does not refute my original position. If anything it supports it. You have identified the executive office as the religious supporter, and the judicial branch as secular or anti-religious in nature. My statement regarded the nature of the executive. I hope to impress upon you that secular does not mean anti-religious. The idea that if one is not prosyletizing, or fighting that action by gov't, one is anti-religious is a fallacy. Secularism is a movement to deal with nonreligious issues, without appeals to religious mechanisms. One can actually be religious and support secularism. holmes "...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)
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Alexander Inactive Member |
RAZD writes: or you have to be deceived by hard line conservative reactionaries that are endangered by any encroachment on their capitalist greed power systems. Holy shit. After moving out of Greenwich village, I was hoping to not hear the words "capitalist greed power systems", or any permutation thereof, on a daily basis. 'Most temperate in the pleasures of the body, his passion was for glory only, and in that he was insatiable.'
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robinrohan Inactive Member |
How about the following?
We can say that humans are endowed with moral intuition or what we can call the faculty for moral reasoning just as we have a faculty for mathematical reasoning. We intuit that 2 + 2= 4. Now when we examine this proposition, we realize that it is merely a definition, or even a tautology. We are just saying that something is something else, but at bottom it's the same proposition as 4=4, a tautology. Nonetheless, these mathematical definitions are very useful, and 2 + 2=4 is an absolute, true anywhere, anytime, for anybody. We can say that moral reasoning produces intuitive propositions which are on a level with mathematical reasoning. So we intuit, "Thou shalt not commit murder." If we analyze this, we might ask, what do you mean by murder? I mean unjustifiable homicide. Ah, but what do you mean by "unjustifiable"? Well, I mean "for no good reason." So the proposition is really "It is wrong to kill for no good reason" or "it is wrong to kill wrongly." Just a tautology. But as we saw above with mathematical statements, these tautologies are very useful. How do we know that "It is wrong to kill wrongly" is an absolute? We know because everyone but a few cranks agree with it. We can dismiss the few cranks as not being endowed with the proper faculty for moral reasoning in the same way that some people are not endowed with the faculty for mathematical reasoning. One might say, but we still have not solved the problem of what "unjustifiable" means. But we don't have to solve that question. That will be solved on a case by case basis. It does not disturb our standing Absolute, "Thou shalt not commit murder." It remains as an absolute. This message has been edited by robinrohan, 05-17-2005 08:13 AM This message has been edited by robinrohan, 05-17-2005 08:20 AM
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Silent H Member (Idle past 6074 days) Posts: 7405 From: satellite of love Joined: |
Although I found your argument to be errant, it was certainly a thing of beauty. Indeed it harkened back to some very early (ancient) arguments regarding moral reasoning.
We can say that humans are endowed with moral intuition or what we can call the faculty for moral reasoning just as we have a faculty for mathematical reasoning... We can dismiss the few cranks as not being endowed with the proper faculty for moral reasoning in the same way that some people are not endowed with the faculty for mathematical reasoning. This is ultimately a circular argument, as well as ad hominem. But like I said, I do understand its appeal. But do look closer to analyze the argument, broken down you are saying... Humans do X (a property you are taking to be true), and since there are few (at this point in time) who disagree and do not do X or agree humans do X, we can dismiss them as "cranks" who lack the ability to comprehend that humans do X. Not good. I can agree that there are people with variable abilities in logic and comprehension, and thus some may fill that category you are describing, but to say that anyone who disagrees with you must have the mark of those with low logic and comprehension, is a bit self-serving. What happens to the people who simply disagree with you? Indeed I can even make an opposing argument. Just as there are fewer people with low levels of logic and comprehension, there are also smaller numbers with exteremely high levels of logic and comprehension. Thus it could be that the few are not the cranks... who are likely to go along with the crowd anyway... but rather the geniuses who correctly figured out how things work. Frankly I don't believe people intuit that killing is wrong. First people have to understand what death is, what purposely killing someone is, and finally a conception of justice. Usually people don't have a problem with killing, until they have a conception of Justness and how that relates to specific acts of killing. Of course this is separate from people who feel that they themselves should not be killed. Generally everyone has an "intuitive" feeling that that is wrong, but I would argue that comes from an inate instinct toward self-preservation. As an aside, I could start detailing what we mean by unjustified or "with no good reason", or how a moral system could work without any code which says killing is wrong (mine doesn't have that)... but that is wildly outside the scope of this thread. holmes "...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)
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robinrohan Inactive Member |
Thanks, Holmes. I figured you would tear it apart.
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Silent H Member (Idle past 6074 days) Posts: 7405 From: satellite of love Joined: |
example. both matter and energy are conserved. life is the merging of these two things. how does that make it not wrong to block the momentum of a life? Is this serious? I'll bite but I think I'm sticking my foot into some kind of gag. How is life the merging of matter and energy? Matter is energy and energy is matter. They are related by e=mc^2. I have not been privvy to any findings regarding life and that equation. But lets assume this is true and life is the combination of matter and energy, and it has a momentum. You ask how does that make it not wrong to block the momentum of a life? Well I would answer you using your own words. If indeed moral laws are the same as "laws which govern everything in the universe" then there is NO sense that it is wrong to block the momentum of a life. The only laws we have are descriptive and not proscriptive. For example, an object which is in motion will stay in motion until acted upon by a force. Are you telling me that that law indicates that it is immoral to block the momentum of a moving object?
it seems to me that one needn't be a relativist simply because one is godless. And thus is the crux of the problem. Like the religious fundamentalist, atheist moral fundemantalists argue they have an understanding better than those who are religious because they understand the world, and thus THEIR moral schemes must be absolute. Fight and bicker and oppress. If one actually notes how the world works one will be a relativist. That does not mean you cannot have a moral system, or argue why you hold it, but its nature will be reigned in to a proper degree. Math and science work because they are descriptive, and their laws are descriptive in nature. The fact that you will not be able to bend, and if you can then you get some kudos, is that you cannot get to an "ought" from a series of "is" statements. Scientific laws link facts ("is" statements) with logic to a greater conclusion about what "is". There is no "should be", without a subjective premise, and thus such things cannot be an absolute nor work as an objective counter to another moral system. holmes "...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)
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Silent H Member (Idle past 6074 days) Posts: 7405 From: satellite of love Joined: |
Thanks, Holmes. I figured you would tear it apart. Thanks for the compliment, but do take my comments seriously. Your argument was seductive and elegant in its own way. By total coincidence I just got done reading a very similar argument from a popular Greek philosopher, thus I was prepared when you stated your argument. holmes "...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)
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macaroniandcheese  Suspended Member (Idle past 4183 days) Posts: 4258 Joined: |
eh
i'm just kind of entertaining ideas. i can't really imagine a world without an objective but that's ok. i do feel that governments should be run in a fairly relativist manner, but not entirely. cause then you have problems.
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Silent H Member (Idle past 6074 days) Posts: 7405 From: satellite of love Joined: |
i do feel that governments should be run in a fairly relativist manner, but not entirely. cause then you have problems. I'm sort of surprised. I thought you supported secular gov't. You do understand that a secular gov't is almost by definition relativist? What problems are produced by purely relativist gov't? I can only think of deeper problems emerging with nonrelativist gov't. What manner of morals and/or religion do you feel should be imposed as the basis for gov't? holmes "...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)
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macaroniandcheese  Suspended Member (Idle past 4183 days) Posts: 4258 Joined: |
i do support a secular government.
by problems i mean anarchy. by fairly i meant with defined and precise laws immaterial of a person's original culture. i.e. there was some japanese lady in california who was left by her husband. she was arrested after killing her children and i think was about to kill herself. this is an honor policy in japan that arose in more traditional times when there would be no one to care for them if they got abandoned and it would be better than dying of starvation. however, it is illegal here and she should not be given a lax sentence just because she had good intentions... it's kind of like not prosecuting a fundie for murdering an abortion doctor because he thought he was saving lives. i wasn't suggesting a religious-based government, just an unwavering one.
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robinrohan Inactive Member |
I would like to change my argument. I've decided that there are no "cranks." It's impossible.
No one could disagree with the following rule: "If a homicide is unjustified, it is murder, and therefore absolutely wrong." There's our absolute rule. For consider: Suppose I kill someone. There are two ways I could feel about that: (1)what I did was justified and (2)what I did was wrong. In both cases, I am not outside the code. If I think what I did was wrong, then I am a believer in the code, even though I violated it. If I think it was justified, then I am still a believer in the code, because I think I did not violate it. Suppose there's a group who thinks that the only way to save life on Earth is to kill randomly many people, because there are too many people. All the people are using up the oxygen so fast that there is no way to save the human race and all other life on Earth except by killing a lot of people. Suppose they are wrong. Scientists have determined that we will survive and there are not too many people. Is this line of reasoning outside the code? (Notice a distinction between "violating" and being amoral) No, as long as they believe that the homicide is justified, they remain within the bounds of our Absolute rule. If they kill many people and find out later they were wrong, and feel guilty, they are within the code. They will feel guilty if they sincerely believed their mistaken theory, which is what we are assuming. This message has been edited by robinrohan, 05-17-2005 05:04 PM
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RAZD Member (Idle past 1660 days) Posts: 20714 From: the other end of the sidewalk Joined: |
lol
I was just parodying faiths post
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Alexander Inactive Member |
Haha ok then.
'Most temperate in the pleasures of the body, his passion was for glory only, and in that he was insatiable.'
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jar Member (Idle past 94 days) Posts: 34140 From: Texas!! Joined: |
Read the SCOTUS decision Cherokee Nation vs State of Georgia sometime.
The excesses of Stalinist Russia were not unique or limited only to Communist societies. Aslan is not a Tame Lion
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