Philosophical Arguments against Same-Sex Marriage

[seer]

So you don’t believe in objective morality, this is an interesting position for a Christian

God's law is grounded in His nature, it is subjective to Him. He is the subject. You could say that His law is objective to humankind in that it exists independently of us and our personal moral opinions do not effect it or change it.

Without rules of behaviour, group-living is not possible and we have archaeological evidence that early man lived in groups...as did other hominids such as Neanderthal Man. Hence the precursors of moral behaviour are evident, there’s no leap.

Monkeys DON'T have rules - by definition. Rules are conceptual. They have instinct. So animals can live and thrive just fine without rules. So yes, there is a clear leap.

[shunyadragon]

Monkeys DON'T have rules - by definition. Rules are conceptual. They have instinct. So animals can live and thrive just fine without rules. So yes, there is a clear leap.

Research on tribes of monkeys have demonstrated that chimpanzees definitely have rules and exhibit many human social characteristics including territorial combat and killing chimpanzees of other tribes. Rules also have been shown to evolve from instinctual needs for survival of species, particularly primates

Source: http://www.janegoodall.ca/about-chimp-behaviour-social-organization.php

Chimpanzees live in social groups called communities or unit groups. At Gombe, the number of individuals in the main study community, Kasakela, has ranged between 40 and 60 since 1960. Communities may be smaller or larger in other areas.

Chimpanzees' social structure can be categorized as "fusion-fission." This means they travel around in small subgroups of up to 10 chimps, the membership of which is always changing as individuals wander off on their own or join other groups. At times many of a community's members come together in large excited gatherings, usually when fruit is available in one part of the range, or when a sexually popular female comes into oestrus (period of female sexual receptivity).

Individuals may switch groups on occasion, but close, supportive, affectionate bonds also develop between family members and other individuals within a community, that can last a lifetime. Chimpanzee family bonds are very strong, especially mother-daughter bonds. Mothers and dependent young up to age seven or so are always together. Some individuals travel together more often than others—such as siblings and pairs of male friends. Contact is maintained between members of the scattered groups by means of the distance call: the pant hoot.

Females disperse from the natal group once they are mature and spend most of their time alone, with dependent offspring. Males usually remain in natal groups, cooperate in defense of the community range, and spend long periods of time in proximity to other males. Males will sometimes form coalitions with each other to support each other during conflicts with other groups.

Within a chimp community, a male hierarchy, ordered more or less in linear fashion, establishes social standing, with one male at the top or "alpha" position. All adult males dominate all females, although females have their own hierarchy, albeit much less straightforward.

Age is a deciding factor in male dominance hierarchies - the alpha-male is usually between the age of 20 and 26. Other factors that determine dominance and social status are physical fitness, aggressiveness, skill at fighting, ability to form coalitions, intelligence, and other personality traits. Status is either maintained or changed through communication and social interactions, such as physical competition and grooming.


The males of a community regularly patrol their boundaries, and if they encounter individuals of a neighbouring community they may attack with extreme brutality. The only individuals who can move freely between communities are adolescent females who have not yet given birth. They may transfer to a new community permanently or, having become pregnant, move back to their own birth group.

There are several mating patterns seen in chimps. Some females in oestrus (period of sexual receptivity) are more attractive than others. A popular female may be accompanied by many or all the adult males of her community, with adolescents and juveniles tagging along. Or, the dominant male of the group may show possessive behaviour toward her, trying to prevent other males from mating with her. A third mating pattern is a consortship, during which a male persuades a female to accompany him to a peripheral part of the community range. If he can keep her there until the time of ovulation, he has a good chance of siring her child. Even low-ranking males can become fathers in this way, if they have the skill to lead a female away during her fertile period of her reproductive cycle.

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They have also been shown to mourn the death of members of their communities.

More to follow.

[shunyadragon]

More on primates:

Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/20/science/20moral.html

Some animals are surprisingly sensitive to the plight of others. Chimpanzees, who cannot swim, have drowned in zoo moats trying to save others. Given the chance to get food by pulling a chain that would also deliver an electric shock to a companion, rhesus monkeys will starve themselves for several days.

Biologists argue that these and other social behaviors are the precursors of human morality. They further believe that if morality grew out of behavioral rules shaped by evolution, it is for biologists, not philosophers or theologians, to say what these rules are.

Moral philosophers do not take very seriously the biologists’ bid to annex their subject, but they find much of interest in what the biologists say and have started an academic conversation with them.

The original call to battle was sounded by the biologist Edward O. Wilson more than 30 years ago, when he suggested in his 1975 book “Sociobiology” that “the time has come for ethics to be removed temporarily from the hands of the philosophers and biologicized.” He may have jumped the gun about the time having come, but in the intervening decades biologists have made considerable progress.

Last year Marc Hauser, an evolutionary biologist at Harvard, proposed in his book “Moral Minds” that the brain has a genetically shaped mechanism for acquiring moral rules, a universal moral grammar similar to the neural machinery for learning language. In another recent book, “Primates and Philosophers,” the primatologist Frans de Waal defends against philosopher critics his view that the roots of morality can be seen in the social behavior of monkeys and apes.

© Copyright Original Source

[Tassman]

God's law is grounded in His nature, it is subjective to Him. He is the subject. You could say that His law is objective to humankind in that it exists independently of us and our personal moral opinions do not effect it or change it.

I don’t believe you. How do you know this?

Monkeys DON'T have rules - by definition. Rules are conceptual. They have instinct. So animals can live and thrive just fine without rules. So yes, there is a clear leap.

Of course they do. Research indicates that primates exhibit many human social characteristics and enforce rules of acceptable/unacceptable behaviour within the group just as early man would have done. This behaviour is a form of primitive morality and the precursor of morality as we know it today

[seer]

I don’t believe you. How do you know this?

Which part don't you believe? That all moral ideas are subjective? That God and His law exist?

Of course they do. Research indicates that primates exhibit many human social characteristics and enforce rules of acceptable/unacceptable behaviour within the group just as early man would have done. This behaviour is a form of primitive morality and the precursor of morality as we know it today

Everything you mentioned is merely the result of instinct, again rules are conceptual. You are leaping from instinct to conceptual, propositional rule making. Which takes sophisticated language, understanding of long term consequences, conscious application, shared abstract understanding and acceptance. Monkey one does not tell Monkey two if you don't kill me and take my food, I won't kill you and take your food.

[Tassman]

Which part don't you believe? That all moral ideas are subjective? That God and His law exist?

The whole argument is based on a bald assertion, an assumption on your part. There's no reason for me to believe you.

Everything you mentioned is merely the result of instinct, again rules are conceptual. You are leaping from instinct to conceptual, propositional rule making. Which takes sophisticated language, understanding of long term consequences, conscious application, shared abstract understanding and acceptance. Monkey one does not tell Monkey two if you don't kill me and take my food, I won't kill you and take your food.

The instinctive nature of a moral code does not make it less real. A mother instinctively nurtures her child whether or not the nurturing instinct has been conceptualised. Primitive social instincts are demonstrably the precursors of morality as we know it today.

[seer]

The whole argument is based on a bald assertion, an assumption on your part. There's no reason for me to believe you.

Again, believe what? That all moral ideas are subjective? That God and His law exist?

The instinctive nature of a moral code does not make it less real. A mother instinctively nurtures her child whether or not the nurturing instinct has been conceptualised. Primitive social instincts are demonstrably the precursors of morality as we know it today.

Are you dense, they are not "moral codes" until they are conceptualized. Instinct does not necessarily lead to the conceptualization of moral codes or laws. And those moral codes or laws only go back thousands of years, not millions. Period.

[shunyadragon]

Are you dense, they are not "moral codes" until they are conceptualized. Instinct does not necessarily lead to the conceptualization of moral codes or laws. And those moral codes or laws only go back thousands of years, not millions. Period.

As cited as scientific evidence and research over many years primates have moral codes and social structure.

[Tassman]

Again, believe what? That all moral ideas are subjective? That God and His law exist?

What I'm objecting to is your logically fallacious bald assertion that God's law is grounded in his nature and subjective to him etc. There are no substantive grounds for this belief or indeed that gods even exist.

Are you dense, they are not "moral codes" until they are conceptualized. Instinct does not necessarily lead to the conceptualization of moral codes or laws. And those moral codes or laws only go back thousands of years, not millions. Period.

They are moral codes in practice whether conceptualised and formally codified or not. And they date back millions of years for as long as man and his primate cousins lived in social groups.