Believers: What Would You Do?

Off Topic Politics & World Issues
181

[quote]forlife wrote:

[quote]Sloth wrote:

[quote]forlife wrote:
It’s impossible to know that rape is evil.[/quote]

No, I know rape is evil. I know God exists. I’m hold to religious faith unapologetically. Now, your last sentence is exactly why humanity is naturally religious. For all the talk of atheistic Western Europe, or wherever, even they KNOW rape is evil. A statement of fervent religious faith. Even they believe they have certain rights which don’t vanish with a change in consensus or government. See, religious beliefs will still persit for a time.

However, eventually, they would begin to believe just as you say “Well, actually, maybe rape isn’t evil…” Your hypothetical is answered by your own argument, rape wouldn’t be known as an evil. There would be no such thing as evil or good. This is the underlying foundation of a purely atheistic/materialistic world?! Besides, it’s already been answered by humanity itself, which has a religious nature.[/quote]

Your first two sentences contradict the third.

Faith is not knowledge. You can’t know something is real, when it is derived from an authoritative source that you don’t actually know exists.[/quote]

Yet, I know rape is evil. You don’t.

182

This is the last stand of desperate ‘science or bust’ atheism backed into a corner…The inability to say they know rape is an evil act, by an evil man, so as not to give an inch to the religious. My, my, my, what a display.

184

[quote]pushharder wrote:

[quote]Vires Eternus wrote:

[quote]pushharder wrote:

[quote]Vires Eternus wrote:

Where people grow up with no concept of a personal God…
[/quote]

No such thing.

Now I’m sure you will recoil in abject horror but nonetheless I will post an excerpt from the apostle Paul’s letter to the church at Rome:

"The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of people, who suppress the truth by their wickedness, 19 since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. 20 For since the creation of the world God�??�?�¢??s invisible qualities - his eternal power and divine nature - have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse.

21 For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22 Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools.

Romans 1[/quote]

I can assure you that after signing a vow of obedience and poverty and living a monastic life for over three years in a religious order, dedicating the better part of that time to intensive bible study and the histories applicable to it, that I am familiar with all the writings of the apostle Paul.

And my point is absolutely correct, because there are MANY societies that while having spiritual beliefs did not and still don’t have a concept of one overriding godlike entity. Taoists for one have a sense of reverent awe for the energy and flow of the universe at large, that could easily fit Paul’s description of eternal power. But they are seemingly not arrogant enough to assume they do or even could comprehend the source of it.

Only in Judeo/Christian and Muslim faith do we seem to imagine that the self same being that sustains the endless eons and all of existence by will alone, cares about our choice of food, clothing, sexual partners, etc. I have no problem with the concept of an eternal being that may have had a hand in all existence. I no longer tolerate the idea that this being is the petty tyrant described in the scriptures.

[/quote]

So now YOU are the god, huh? YOU decide what YOU will “tolerate?”[/quote]

Within the context of being part of a larger society, yes. Now that I am no longer deluded into believing I can be pre-absolved of patently wicked behavior, I am even MORE careful about my words and actions. This is life without the safety net of salvation.

If G-d exists, and he did in fact create me, then that is enough. I do not expect any further reward than life itself and existence. I do not NEED or desire either salvation, nor forgiveness. I will gladly take the same cold indifference doled out to the animal kingdom, and use the natural gifts and talents given to exercise ‘self’ reliance, and ‘self’ sufficiency. What more profound thanks could you offer your divine designer than to operate at the maximum of the ability he designed into you?

And if it truly is just me against the cosmos, then it is truly just each and every other person against the cosmos alone, and that makes my respect for my fellow man soar. Because to live life without the illusion of eternal salvation, without the cosmic safety net, is to face your fears each day naked. I could not imagine a greater test and builder of courage and fortitude.

185

[quote]DoubleDuce wrote:

[quote]forlife wrote:

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
Absent some transcendental moral order, human behavior would be governed in the long run by nothing more than raw utilitarianism. Sometimes that generates cooperation, sometimes that generates a murderous destruction.

And, there’d be no moral distinction between either event. Each would merely be a preference.

The question is a bit fatuous - there is no answer because the question moots itself. In the absence of God/higher morality, humans would do all manner of things with and to each other. And all of these things would be equally “right” from the point of view of morality (which, in order to exist, inherently must transcend individual preferences), so there is no reason to entertain a hyopthetical designed to prove that, in the absence of a God/higher morality, that human beings would still do “right”.

There wouldn’t be a “right” or “wrong” in the absence of a higher moral order. The idea is a nullity.

In the absence of a higher moral order, we could rationalize that everyone on welfare was a drain on society, and we could kill them all in the interest of the greater good. That’d be just as “moral” as recognizing an individual’s right to his own life.[/quote]

The hypothetical doesn’t ask whether your choices and behavior would be right or wrong. It asks what those choices and behavior would be, irrespective of whether you ascribe them to an ultimate moral source. A mother would still protect her child, whether or not there was a god or an afterlife.[/quote]

Not true if god created genetics. You cannot logically remove gods influence from the equation. Or, if you do, the answer becomes entirely unknowable.[/quote]

There’s pretty good reason to believe the mother would try to save her child, even in the absence of a god. The maternal instinct perpetuates the species.

188

[quote]forlife wrote:

There’s pretty good reason to believe the mother would try to save her child, even in the absence of a god. The maternal instinct perpetuates the species. [/quote]

And there’s good reason to belive she wouldn’t expose it to the elements during lean times. Infanticide isnt’ exactly a foreign concept to humanity. Now, we may have made it a bit more unsightly with the pill and abortion, but you shouldn’t assume too much.

Serious question, how are YOU so confident you can answer for the behavior of a humanity that doesn’t exist? Heck, you’ve admitted that you can’t deny the formative impact that religion has had on beliefs and values you still how today as an agnostic. How do you even know what you as individual would do?

189

[quote]DoubleDuce wrote:

[quote]forlife wrote:

[quote]DoubleDuce wrote:

[quote]forlife wrote:

[quote]Sloth wrote:

[quote]smh23 wrote:
Some sort of absolute ethical code has not been–and presumably never will be–shown to exist, either on its own or, as is more commonly posited, as a system contingent upon some supranatural judge, or God.[/quote]

Yep. Good and evil, inalienable rights, and so on depend on faith. Without faith, there is no way to say I KNOW rape is evil. I KNOW that I have a right to life.

Now, I do say such things. But, I’m superstitious like that =P[/quote]

Faith by definition isn’t knowledge. You can only have faith that rape is evil. It’s impossible to know that rape is evil.[/quote]

Faith is a component in every belief and action.[/quote]

Be that as it may, my point stands. You don’t know what is good and what is evil any more than I do. You can only express faith that something is good or evil, but have no knowledge of whether it actually is.[/quote]

So you are claiming there is no such thing as knowledge, since all things require faith?[/quote]

Given our inability to prove a negative, perfect knowledge is impossible. At best, we can have tentative hypotheses based on current evidence, nothing more.

191

[quote]Sloth wrote:

[quote]forlife wrote:
You don’t know what is good and what is evil any more than I do.[/quote]

Yes we do. We can look at a rape victim and tell her (or him), without any uncertainty, that what happened was an evil act by an evil man. You can’t. That’s an act of fundamental faith.

You hypothetical is answered. That world would be chaos. Why is this still going? [/quote]

I didn’t say you couldn’t judge rape with confidence. I only said your confidence is based on faith, rather than knowledge as you claim.

Why are you disputing this? You admit that you only have faith that there is a god, rather than knowing there is a god. Therefore, you can only have faith that rape is evil, rather than knowing rape is evil.

192

[quote]forlife wrote:

[quote]Sloth wrote:

[quote]forlife wrote:
You don’t know what is good and what is evil any more than I do.[/quote]

Yes we do. We can look at a rape victim and tell her (or him), without any uncertainty, that what happened was an evil act by an evil man. You can’t. That’s an act of fundamental faith.

You hypothetical is answered. That world would be chaos. Why is this still going? [/quote]

I didn’t say you couldn’t judge rape with confidence. I only said your confidence is based on faith, rather than knowledge as you claim.

Why are you disputing this? You admit that you only have faith that there is a god, rather than knowing there is a god. Therefore, you can only have faith that rape is evil, rather than knowing rape is evil.[/quote]

So, wait, you not only have no knowledge that rape is evil (since you have no knowledge of the real existence of evil), but further, you don’t even have faith that it’s an evil?!

193

[quote]Sloth wrote:
This is the last stand of desperate ‘science or bust’ atheism backed into a corner…The inability to say they know rape is an evil act, by an evil man, so as not to give an inch to the religious. My, my, my, what a display.

[/quote]

Finely crafted statement, and spot on, too! Wait, I have heard this before…But still right the fuck on…

194

Are you then agnostic about the evil of rape?

195

[quote]Sloth wrote:

[quote]forlife wrote:

There’s pretty good reason to believe the mother would try to save her child, even in the absence of a god. The maternal instinct perpetuates the species. [/quote]

And there’s good reason to belive she wouldn’t expose it to the elements during lean times. Infanticide isnt’ exactly a foreign concept to humanity. Now, we may have made it a bit more unsightly with the pill and abortion, but you shouldn’t assume too much.

Serious question, how are YOU so confident you can answer for the behavior of a humanity that doesn’t exist? Heck, you’ve admitted that you can’t deny the formative impact that religion has had on beliefs and values you still how today as an agnostic. How do you even know what you as individual would do?[/quote]

Infanticide is the exception, not the norm, and the maternal instinct governs most of the time.

I never claimed to know what would happen in my hypothetical example, I can only guess based on what I know about human motivations, drives, instincts, and behavior. In a godless world, it still makes sense from an evolutionary perspective that parents would tend to protect their offspring. If they didn’t, the species would probably go extinct.

196

[quote]Sloth wrote:

[quote]forlife wrote:

[quote]Sloth wrote:

[quote]forlife wrote:
You don’t know what is good and what is evil any more than I do.[/quote]

Yes we do. We can look at a rape victim and tell her (or him), without any uncertainty, that what happened was an evil act by an evil man. You can’t. That’s an act of fundamental faith.

You hypothetical is answered. That world would be chaos. Why is this still going? [/quote]

I didn’t say you couldn’t judge rape with confidence. I only said your confidence is based on faith, rather than knowledge as you claim.

Why are you disputing this? You admit that you only have faith that there is a god, rather than knowing there is a god. Therefore, you can only have faith that rape is evil, rather than knowing rape is evil.[/quote]

So, wait, you not only have no knowledge that rape is evil (since you have no knowledge of the real existence of evil), but further, you don’t even have faith that it’s an evil?![/quote]

We both have faith that rape is evil.

Neither of us knows that rape is evil.

Are you still disputing this?

198

[quote]Sloth wrote:
This is the last stand of desperate ‘science or bust’ atheism backed into a corner…The inability to say they know rape is an evil act, by an evil man, so as not to give an inch to the religious. My, my, my, what a display.

[/quote]

I’m simply being honest. I would appreciate you doing the same. You admit your belief in god is based on faith, not knowledge. How then can you state with integrity that you KNOW rape is evil? Your belief that rape is evil must similarly be based on faith, not knowledge.

199

[quote]pushharder wrote:
Forlife, c’mon man. Climb on out. We’ll give you a hand, bud.[/quote]

Sloth is bright enough to know what I’m talking about. And I believe he’s honest enough to admit it.

200

[quote]forlife wrote:

We both have faith that rape is evil.[/quote]

Ding, ding, ding! And you act on it so fervently, so zealously, as if it were reality. As if should, no must, be accepted as reality.

I bet you don’t hem and haw about it. I bet you don’t qualifty any statements about the evil of rape. I bet you say “what was done to you was an evil thing, committed by an evil person.” And you believe it with a passion. For all intents and purposes, it’s a fact to you.

Not, “well, I can’t really know that an evil act was committed against you, since neither of us can know that rape is evil, since we can’t know the real absolute existence of evil–but in my opinion it was. Let’s ask the rapist if he’ll agree. If we all do, than we can be morally outraged over this!”

Welcome to nothing short of religious faith. Your hypothetical humanity wouldn’t even have that capacity.