Originally posted by carpedm9587
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I have not thought through the link between evolution and morality. At first blush, it makes sense that if our entire being is the product of evolution, then morality is likewise a product of that process. If that is true, then we will tend to be wired to arrive at moral positions that enhance survivability. The problem is the typical nature/nurture discussion. I tend to think our ABILITY to moralize is likely driven by evolution. The specific moral conclusions we reach are not just related to evolution - but are also strongly influenced by experiential influences.
Claiming consistency and showing consistency are not the same thing. You can claim it all day long. You cannot show it. Indeed, you claim moral certitude and cannot even show that position to be consistent with other views. I have shown this many times.
1) How do you know what the absolute/objective moral framework is?
2) It's documented in the bible with 100% accuracy
3) How do you know your interpretation is correct?
4) It is self-evident from the bible
5) Then why are there so many differing views on what this "absolute/objective" moral framework and so many people claiming 100% certitude for different interpretations?
6) Because of sin.
7) Are you a sinful person?
8) We are all sinful in the eyes of god
9) So how do you know it is not YOUR sinfulness that is leading you to misinterpret this absolute/objective framework?
The argument ends in an inconsistency. You cannot have or show 100% certitude - even within your own worldview.
How you choose to see yourself is your concern, Seer.
Pretty much any that you have made:
1) That you can have 100% moral certainty
2) That the god you believe in exists
3) That your moral positions are consistent with one another
4) That the bible documents the one, true, absolute/objective moral framework.
Moral disagreement exists, period. You cannot even cite moral agreement in your "absolute/objective" worldview given that there are demonstrable, competing and conflicting "absolute/objective" frameworks.
Like Sparko, you seem dedicated to the proposition that you are going to continually repeat this lie - so again I call you on it. You are making a claim whose truth value you cannot know. YOu have testimony from the one person who CAN know that this is not my process. Continuing to repeat something you cannot know to be true in the face of the only evidence available that it is NOT true is no different that promulgating a lie.
Yes - morality is about moral preference - so you are complaining, again, that green is not blue. We already know moral relativism/subjectivism is not absolute/objective. Again - so what?
The exact same way you do - I don't. If our premises do not align, then no amount of reasoning will bring us to the same moral conclusion. So we ignore, isolate/separate, or contend. Which is exactly what YOU do, Seer. When someone rejects your premise that "the bible is the absolute/objective moral authority," you likewise cannot necessarily get to any moral alignment. Even when they DO agree with your premises - you are not necessarily going to get to moral alignment - which is evident all around us. You call it "sin" (which also defeats your claims to moral certitude). So here is how our worlds compare Seer:
For Carp:
If our premises align, we can use reason to align our conclusions, eliminating the need to ignore, isolate/separate, or contend.
If our premises do not align, we cannot use reason to align our moral conclusions, leaving us with the need to ignore, isolate/separate, or contend.
For Seer:
If our premises align, we cannot use reason to align our conclusions, leaving us with the need to ignore, isolate/separate, or contend (if we happen to differently interpret what the bible says)
If our premises do not align, we cannot use reason to align our moral conclusions, leaving us with the need to ignore, isolate/separate, or contend.
So you and the Episcopalians have conflicting moral views on homosexuality. You have no means for reconciling - each see the other as wrong, so you have isolated into separate sects, each claiming to have "THE truth." Christianity (and all religions) are replete with this behavior.
A rational process for reasoning to moral conclusions.
Which is exactly what you have, Seer. Christianity has the same morass of conflicting points of view. You have no less variation in your moral outcomes than the rest of the world.You have had these variations throughout history. For all of your objection to "moral morass," Christianity has itself been in the "moral morass" from the dawn of the religion.
Wow - you and Sparko do like to continually hammer away at interpretations of my words that have nothing to do with anything I have said. So this discussion went as follows:
Carpe) Your bible contains MANY moral prescriptions for many amazingly bad things.
Seer) Amazingly bad things to whom - you?
Carpe) Yes - to me. To most living humans. Even to most Christians. Indeed - to you as well.
Seer) Appealing to the majority again?
So, once again, for those who seem to be having a difficulty with some basic understanding...
a) I was answering a question you asked and identifying who finds these things to be amazingly bad.
b) There is a significant difference between listing people who find something to be bad in response to a question, and believing it is bad because a lot of people believe it. The latter is "appealing to the majority." The former is not.
Really, Seer - do you actually find this kind of response to be useful? You have to know by now that my morality has nothing to do with "appealing to the majority" and I have never once said anything to suggest or imply that "X is right because most people think it is right."
And yet what you are left with is moral proscriptions that hold for one group and not for another, that hold in one time and not in another. God apparently "changed his mind" or "changed his rules." And then you ask me how your worldview is inconsistent? Really?
Seer) I believe in absolute/objective moral truths that I have 100% certainty in, but sin keeps us from clearly seeing/understanding/agreeing on these moral truths.
Seer) I believe in absolute/objective moral truths that can change from context to context and time period to time period
And then you wonder why I find your position internally inconsistent?
Face it, Seer. You are functionally a subjective/relative moralizer - just like the rest of humanity. You simply have relinquished any effort to think for yourself and hitched your moral wagon to the moral writings to the translated version of the copies of copies of copies of a small group of men who lived/wrote 2000-3500 years ago and whose original works are lost. Despite all of that, you claim absolute certitude on the basis of a magical supreme being you cannot show to exist.
And you think this is going to seem "reasonable" to someone? That someone will definitely not be me.
Claiming consistency and showing consistency are not the same thing. You can claim it all day long. You cannot show it. Indeed, you claim moral certitude and cannot even show that position to be consistent with other views. I have shown this many times.
1) How do you know what the absolute/objective moral framework is?
2) It's documented in the bible with 100% accuracy
3) How do you know your interpretation is correct?
4) It is self-evident from the bible
5) Then why are there so many differing views on what this "absolute/objective" moral framework and so many people claiming 100% certitude for different interpretations?
6) Because of sin.
7) Are you a sinful person?
8) We are all sinful in the eyes of god
9) So how do you know it is not YOUR sinfulness that is leading you to misinterpret this absolute/objective framework?
The argument ends in an inconsistency. You cannot have or show 100% certitude - even within your own worldview.
How you choose to see yourself is your concern, Seer.
Pretty much any that you have made:
1) That you can have 100% moral certainty
2) That the god you believe in exists
3) That your moral positions are consistent with one another
4) That the bible documents the one, true, absolute/objective moral framework.
Moral disagreement exists, period. You cannot even cite moral agreement in your "absolute/objective" worldview given that there are demonstrable, competing and conflicting "absolute/objective" frameworks.
Like Sparko, you seem dedicated to the proposition that you are going to continually repeat this lie - so again I call you on it. You are making a claim whose truth value you cannot know. YOu have testimony from the one person who CAN know that this is not my process. Continuing to repeat something you cannot know to be true in the face of the only evidence available that it is NOT true is no different that promulgating a lie.
Yes - morality is about moral preference - so you are complaining, again, that green is not blue. We already know moral relativism/subjectivism is not absolute/objective. Again - so what?
The exact same way you do - I don't. If our premises do not align, then no amount of reasoning will bring us to the same moral conclusion. So we ignore, isolate/separate, or contend. Which is exactly what YOU do, Seer. When someone rejects your premise that "the bible is the absolute/objective moral authority," you likewise cannot necessarily get to any moral alignment. Even when they DO agree with your premises - you are not necessarily going to get to moral alignment - which is evident all around us. You call it "sin" (which also defeats your claims to moral certitude). So here is how our worlds compare Seer:
For Carp:
If our premises align, we can use reason to align our conclusions, eliminating the need to ignore, isolate/separate, or contend.
If our premises do not align, we cannot use reason to align our moral conclusions, leaving us with the need to ignore, isolate/separate, or contend.
For Seer:
If our premises align, we cannot use reason to align our conclusions, leaving us with the need to ignore, isolate/separate, or contend (if we happen to differently interpret what the bible says)
If our premises do not align, we cannot use reason to align our moral conclusions, leaving us with the need to ignore, isolate/separate, or contend.
So you and the Episcopalians have conflicting moral views on homosexuality. You have no means for reconciling - each see the other as wrong, so you have isolated into separate sects, each claiming to have "THE truth." Christianity (and all religions) are replete with this behavior.
A rational process for reasoning to moral conclusions.
Which is exactly what you have, Seer. Christianity has the same morass of conflicting points of view. You have no less variation in your moral outcomes than the rest of the world.You have had these variations throughout history. For all of your objection to "moral morass," Christianity has itself been in the "moral morass" from the dawn of the religion.
Wow - you and Sparko do like to continually hammer away at interpretations of my words that have nothing to do with anything I have said. So this discussion went as follows:
Carpe) Your bible contains MANY moral prescriptions for many amazingly bad things.
Seer) Amazingly bad things to whom - you?
Carpe) Yes - to me. To most living humans. Even to most Christians. Indeed - to you as well.
Seer) Appealing to the majority again?
So, once again, for those who seem to be having a difficulty with some basic understanding...
a) I was answering a question you asked and identifying who finds these things to be amazingly bad.
b) There is a significant difference between listing people who find something to be bad in response to a question, and believing it is bad because a lot of people believe it. The latter is "appealing to the majority." The former is not.
Really, Seer - do you actually find this kind of response to be useful? You have to know by now that my morality has nothing to do with "appealing to the majority" and I have never once said anything to suggest or imply that "X is right because most people think it is right."
And yet what you are left with is moral proscriptions that hold for one group and not for another, that hold in one time and not in another. God apparently "changed his mind" or "changed his rules." And then you ask me how your worldview is inconsistent? Really?
Seer) I believe in absolute/objective moral truths that I have 100% certainty in, but sin keeps us from clearly seeing/understanding/agreeing on these moral truths.
Seer) I believe in absolute/objective moral truths that can change from context to context and time period to time period
And then you wonder why I find your position internally inconsistent?
Face it, Seer. You are functionally a subjective/relative moralizer - just like the rest of humanity. You simply have relinquished any effort to think for yourself and hitched your moral wagon to the moral writings to the translated version of the copies of copies of copies of a small group of men who lived/wrote 2000-3500 years ago and whose original works are lost. Despite all of that, you claim absolute certitude on the basis of a magical supreme being you cannot show to exist.
And you think this is going to seem "reasonable" to someone? That someone will definitely not be me.
I'm sorry Carp, I just can't keep up. Here is the bottom line, as a Christian I hold that universal moral truths exist, and that we find them both in the New Testament and in our innate moral sense as image bearers of God. And I don't need to justify that, any more that you need to justify your worldview. But I do not trust your moral reasoning prowess any more that I trust the reasoning prowess of the Stalinist. You both may come to conclusions I agree with, but they, in your worldview, are forever subjective and culturally relative. In other words they are nothing that I as a Christian need to pay attention to. Finding more elaborate ways (your so called reasoning) of justifying your subjective opinion does nothing for me. Morally there is just no place to go if relativism is true. It is an endless search with no end, goal or moral progress.
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