|
Register | Sign In |
|
QuickSearch
EvC Forum active members: 65 (9162 total) |
| |
popoi | |
Total: 915,817 Year: 3,074/9,624 Month: 919/1,588 Week: 102/223 Day: 0/13 Hour: 0/0 |
Thread ▼ Details |
|
Thread Info
|
|
|
Author | Topic: Absolute Morality...again. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
LinearAq Member (Idle past 4676 days) Posts: 598 From: Pocomoke City, MD Joined: |
Faith writes:
Please tell me what Commandment # 6 means by the term "murder". The reason it is absolute is that He is absolute and the moral law expresses His own mind, and He made us in His image so we reflect His own mind -- or did before the Fall. God's writing the Ten Commandments in stone has the meaning that the Law is absolute. Written in stone =absolute. It means that He made His universe to run by them, He made human nature to operate by them, so that violations of them are resistance or opposition to the natural operations of things, which has inevitable repercussions. There is no way to avoid the repercussions of the Law. It affects everyone equally and exactly. It is a universal Law. Does this commandment apply to everyone equally? How about an unborn child?Exodus 21 quote: Or a resident of a conquered city...Joshua 6: quote: Or a slave who lingers a few days before dyingExodus 21: quote: Apparently, none of the above killings constitute "murder" so your definition of murder must be such that it cannot be applied to the actions described above.
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||
jar Member (Idle past 394 days) Posts: 34026 From: Texas!! Joined: |
No, it merely shows a specific application of the Law to a particular situation, nothing subjective or relative about it. Yes, the law must be considered in relation to the particular situation.
Murder has many degrees because of different circumstances that don't call the absoluteness of the law into question, as the idea of subjectivity or relativity does. Huh? And the Commandment say "Thou shalt not kill." To change it to "Thou shalt not do murder" makes it very much subjective and relative. What is murder under one set of conditions may be self defense in fact. Give us an example of an Absolute Moral. Aslan is not a Tame Lion
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||
LinearAq Member (Idle past 4676 days) Posts: 598 From: Pocomoke City, MD Joined: |
Faith writes:
Please tell me what Commandment # 6 means by the term "murder". The reason it is absolute is that He is absolute and the moral law expresses His own mind, and He made us in His image so we reflect His own mind -- or did before the Fall. God's writing the Ten Commandments in stone has the meaning that the Law is absolute. Written in stone =absolute. It means that He made His universe to run by them, He made human nature to operate by them, so that violations of them are resistance or opposition to the natural operations of things, which has inevitable repercussions. There is no way to avoid the repercussions of the Law. It affects everyone equally and exactly. It is a universal Law. Does this commandment apply to everyone equally? How about an unborn child?Exodus 21 quote: Or a resident of a conquered city...Joshua 6: quote: Or a slave who lingers a few days before dyingExodus 21: quote: Apparently, none of the above killings constitute "murder" so your definition of murder must be such that it cannot be applied to the actions described above.
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||
New Cat's Eye Inactive Member |
Please tell me what Commandment # 6 means by the term "murder". It doesn't matter if we can define it at all. If god set up a perfect, and absolute, definition of murder and decided it is immoral, then it would be absolutely immoral if we can define it as well or not.
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Discreet Label Member (Idle past 5064 days) Posts: 272 Joined: |
Where else could it come from then? If morals aren't absolute then it was formulated by the opinions of the lawmakers. Morals are seperate from laws. For laws touch a broad subset of life beyond what is morally correct and incorrect. I.e. booze, tying up giraffes to telephone polls etc.
Otherwise you are saying that morals are intrinsic. If morals are intrinsic then that would mean that everyone would agree upon what is moral and what is not, which would make it absolute. Your statement is a well thought out try however, you have several misconceptions. If morals are intrinsic the intrinsic value of a moralistic action will not necessairly be the same for every person. For example in murder, I can choose not to participate for the reason that denying someone else's right to live horrendous, and thats the intrinsic value i see in it. Another person could see the intrinsic value in it that if they were to kill another person then they have to live under the threat that they can be killed at any time. And yet a third person can see the intrinsic value of murder as instead a continuation of the life cycle and thus it becomes a matter of restarting the cycle.
Not with absolutes, it can't! Alrght, lets break it down a little further. Do you believe that absolutes of any kind exist or is everything relative? I am open to the possiblity that absolutes do exist. But I will give you an example of why relativity has more support through a sliding scale action then anything else. (for sake of example, not whether the ten commandments are actually the Absolute Morality)You see a neighbor and he is beating his wife. Wife is incredibly beautiful and she is nearing death. You act out from your conception that Absolutely murder is wrong. So you take him down and send him off to jail. Yourself you know why you went through the action. However, in a possibility others shall judge you and say. NJ you are covetting that man's wife, you sent him to jail for his actions for your desire of this man's wife. Thus allowing you to pursue this woman, or maintain your secret desire for her. Now if GOD does exist s/he knows your intent. However, GOD is not the one to be looking at what your actions are, it is other people who have to live with you that you are. By thier mind if they ascribe to GOD's supposed moral code you have sinned and broken it while trying to protect it. You may have 'maintained it' but in doing so you have broken the code set.
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Discreet Label Member (Idle past 5064 days) Posts: 272 Joined: |
Absolute----> Definite------> Certain-------> Nothing can circumvent or supplant its authority. Does that work for everyone? Are we clear on what an absolute is? So definitively you can point at an example of morale code that everyone can see as morale and that in no way shape or form application of this moral can be misconstrued in any way?
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Discreet Label Member (Idle past 5064 days) Posts: 272 Joined: |
For the sake of this particular portion of discussion we will say that GOD exists so we can stop talking about if or who.
The reason it is absolute is that He is absolute and the moral law expresses His own mind, and He made us in His image so we reflect His own mind -- or did before the Fall. God's writing the Ten Commandments in stone has the meaning that the Law is absolute. Written in stone =absolute. It means that He made His universe to run by them, He made human nature to operate by them, so that violations of them are resistance or opposition to the natural operations of things, which has inevitable repercussions. There is no way to avoid the repercussions of the Law. It affects everyone equally and exactly. It is a universal Law. That's how God made it. When Jesus said that not one jot or tittle of the Law would go unfulfilled, He was referring to the absoluteness and precision of the Law down to minute details. Inexorability. So in your mind Law is conflated to and the same as Morale. And specifically we are only talking about the 10 commandments. However, how can 'law' be the same as 'morale'. Again although using man law, law talks of things outside of morale, i.e. tying giraffe's to a phone poll. In terms of GOD's 10 laws then and their application within the text you probably should look toward linearag he brought up so interesting examples of the meaning of 'murder' present throughout the bible. As well as post may want to examin this situation.
(for sake of example, not whether the ten commandments are actually the Absolute Morality) You see a neighbor and he is beating his wife. Wife is incredibly beautiful and she is nearing death. You act out from your conception that Absolutely murder is wrong. So you take him down and send him off to jail. Yourself you know why you went through the action. However, in a possibility others shall judge you and say. NJ you are covetting that man's wife, you sent him to jail for his actions for your desire of this man's wife. Thus allowing you to pursue this woman, or maintain your secret desire for her. Now if GOD does exist s/he knows your intent. However, GOD is not the one to be looking at what your actions are, it is other people who have to live with you that you are. By thier mind if they ascribe to GOD's supposed moral code you have sinned and broken it while trying to protect it. You may have 'maintained it' but in doing so you have broken the code set. How do you respond to this particular context? Where you have the possibility of having broken at least two different commandments. Lastly also if these are the 10 'morals' that must be adhered to, do these cover the entirety of the reality that we live in?
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Lithodid-Man Member (Idle past 2931 days) Posts: 504 From: Juneau, Alaska, USA Joined: |
I think from reading this thread (up the 45 current posts) that the root of the problem is both semantics and philosophy. That is, I wonder if some aren't using 'morality' as both 'what is good' and 'what is the law'. And also at the root is the philosophical point (I can't remember exactly how DL worded it) of whether something is good because God said it or that God said it because it is good.
I would assume from posts here and elsewhere that Faith is taking the former view. Because of this counter arguments from the latter perspective are meaningless. I hope this makes sense (Dammit Jim, I am a zoologist not a philosopher!). So to specifics, let's say Faith were arguing from the latter perspective (God said it because it was good). Then the counter argument would be to analyze what's good about not working on the Sabbath, what exceptions would be valid etc. If however, she is arguing the other viewpoint then those counter arguments are futile (reminds me of the Army of Darkness quote "Good. Bad. I'm the guy with the gun"). This is in no way an attack on Faith's arguments, just a suggestion that she may be arguing apples and getting replies about oranges. Now for fun I want to pose an absolute moral situation. As an atheist and a relativist, I define absolute morality as a right or a wrong that is wrong in any culture in any time irregardless of that societies mores. Something for which there is never an exception that makes it right. I am sure this can be picked apart, but it is a fun mental experiment. I believe that it is immoral for a thinking, self-aware human being to own another thinking self-aware human being. That is ownership in the complete and absolute sense of the word. It is not right if the person agrees to the ownership. It is not right if your chosen diety says it is (even with rules). It is not right if you have a thousand years of tradition behind it. Breaking the rule will have no effect on the cosmos, but it makes anyone who does a bad, bad person. People who traditionally did this knew they were bad bad people hence the great stretches of justification (they are not really human or they like it this way). Doctor Bashir: "Of all the stories you told me, which were true and which weren't?" Elim Garak: "My dear Doctor, they're all true" Doctor Bashir: "Even the lies?" Elim Garak: "Especially the lies"
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||
RickJB Member (Idle past 4991 days) Posts: 917 From: London, UK Joined: |
faith writes: The answer is that any morality given by the God who made us would be absolute. Which god?
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Faith  Suspended Member (Idle past 1445 days) Posts: 35298 From: Nevada, USA Joined: |
Whichever one made us.
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Discreet Label Member (Idle past 5064 days) Posts: 272 Joined: |
Acually, I just jumped in becuase I thought it was stupid that DL was all like "Oh yeah, define it!" Which I thought was a pretty easy thing to do. Stupidity is a pretty questionable attribute. Some of the most innovative and powerful ideas thoughout history have been seen as incredibly stupid. But I digress. To my understanding, this part I may not have communicated to well (probably implied vs explicitly stating what i wanted), I was spefcifically looking for Nemsesis Juggernaut's defined absolute morality. But again thank you for the refrence to wiki on abolute and relative they will be a useful resource.
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||
New Cat's Eye Inactive Member |
What if I demand that you own me?
What if I force you to own me?
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Annafan Member (Idle past 4579 days) Posts: 418 From: Belgium Joined: |
The fact that our observations/experiences don't reveal absolute morality (i.e. we see examples everyday of how morals were/are differently interpreted, or 'violated'), is IMO enough in itself to conclude that no such thing exists.
Suppose 'a' proposed set of morals, then I ask the question "In which way can we be able to recognise this set of morals as an absolute one?" - claiming that the source is some 'God' clearly doesn't cut it. Too many around, how to prove that the source is indeed 'God'?, some of those morals turn out to sound too silly to take serious... - a set that emerges from a democratic process obviously clearly admits that it is not absolute, but just a matter of numbers - coming up with your personal set and concluding that it is an absolute one, is nothing more than a proof of extreme arrogance and lack of self-critique (in the knowledge that other people happen to have a different set of morals) An actually existing set of absolute morals would prove/impose itself, quite simply. It would be inescapable. And by being inescapable, it would prove itself to be absolute. There simply is no other way.
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Discreet Label Member (Idle past 5064 days) Posts: 272 Joined: |
As this arose inside of chatroom i thought it might be useful to place out here. Instead of trying to go top down why not go the reverse.
Could anyone possibly posit an absolutely immoral act? And in all acontext no matter how it is interpreted everyone could arrive at the same conclusion that this act was immoral? Maybe from this point we could try and work toward an absolute morality?
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Discreet Label Member (Idle past 5064 days) Posts: 272 Joined: |
Very curious take, What would an immergent and inescaple set of morals look like? Could you go through the process of how you think it might arrise or work out?
|
|
|
Do Nothing Button
Copyright 2001-2023 by EvC Forum, All Rights Reserved
Version 4.2
Innovative software from Qwixotic © 2024