[quote]SexMachine wrote:
[quote]DBCooper wrote:
Why the long discussion? The Church has no temporal power as doctrine. Render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s, render unto God what is God’s.
[/quote]
That’s an assertion about scripture. I’m not considering scripture here.
[/quote]
Well, forgive me for coming late to the party, but are you discussing temporal authority as in, does the Church actually have it, or can the Church ever legitimately have it?
[quote]DBCooper wrote:
Whichever people choose that particular form of government as the form under which they expect their rights to be protected. Whichever people choose to give such consent.
[/quote]
So who is legitimate amongst two factions, both of whom claim to represent and act in the name of the people? What is it beyond consent that creates legitimacy?
[quote]
Was the current form of gov’t in a given location justly chosen by the people? Or is that sovereign simply the result of internecine warfare? The piece of shit that floated to the top, so to say.
I’m not aware of any “people” who have granted the Church this sort of temporal authority. What natural rights does the Church purport to protect? None. Since that is the only proper role of a temporal authority, and since the Church does not fill this role, it has no legitimate authority.
You can just read John Locke for further clarification of my views regarding the proper role of gov’t. I just defer to him when in doubt.[/quote]
I’m challenging you to defend Locke.
[quote]DBCooper wrote:
[quote]SexMachine wrote:
[quote]DBCooper wrote:
Why the long discussion? The Church has no temporal power as doctrine. Render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s, render unto God what is God’s.
[/quote]
That’s an assertion about scripture. I’m not considering scripture here.
[/quote]
Well, forgive me for coming late to the party, but are you discussing temporal authority as in, does the Church actually have it, or can the Church ever legitimately have it?
[/quote]
Neither. I’m asking what is authority and from where does it derive? You say it derives from the consent of the people. I’m interested in exploring exactly what that means in theory and in practice. I’m arguing that sovereignty is absolute and can never reside in law or in some abstract notion of “the people.”
[quote]SexMachine wrote:
[quote]DBCooper wrote:
Whichever people choose that particular form of government as the form under which they expect their rights to be protected. Whichever people choose to give such consent.
[/quote]
So who is legitimate amongst two factions, both of whom claim to represent and act in the name of the people? What is it beyond consent that creates legitimacy?
I’m not sure how to defend Locke. All previous experience hath shewn that natural rights and natural law exist and that there is no discernible divine right to rule. No one would willingly consent to a form of gov’t that explicitly states as its goal a violation of the natural right to life, liberty, property, and the pursuit of happiness. Now, have there been MASSIVE examples of people consenting to be protected by a sovereign who has then turned around and violated such natural rights? Of course. Many would argue that it has been going on in this country for quite some time.
But no one willingly chooses such a scenario, at least not an entire group of people. I don’t really know how to expand upon the idea of natural rights and natural law any further than Stoics, Locke, or anyone else already has.
Regardless, Locke argued that not only do we have natural rights, but that the contract between the sovereign and the people is such that the people have the obligation to remove a sovereign who does not protect these rights. The proverbial defense of the right to revolution. I’m not sure how to defend this one, either. Like Jefferson wrote, all previous experience has revealed that people will suffer as long as they are made to believe that they are supposed to suffer, that they do not have the right to revolution, as Hobbes argued.
When suffering includes the violation of natural rights, can you or anyone else argue that we do NOT have the right to end our suffering with whatever legal means we have at our disposal? And by legal means, this takes into account that the sovereign has violated the terms of the social contract, thereby voiding it entirely, and thus making any actions against the sovereign (and the breaking of political law that such action might imply) entirely within bounds.
The Church is a moral authority, one whose authority is supposed to surpass that of a temporal one’s. I don’t think the Church has ever claimed that what happens on Earth is more important than what happens elsewhere. I’ve always had the impression that life on Earth was seen as more of a preamble to something bigger in the afterlife. In that sense, the authority of the Church isn’t even applicable to this discussion. It’s like asking whether the NFL has authority over the NCAA.
Does the Church even make claim to temporal authority?
[quote]SexMachine wrote:
[quote]DBCooper wrote:
[quote]SexMachine wrote:
[quote]DBCooper wrote:
Why the long discussion? The Church has no temporal power as doctrine. Render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s, render unto God what is God’s.
[/quote]
That’s an assertion about scripture. I’m not considering scripture here.
[/quote]
Well, forgive me for coming late to the party, but are you discussing temporal authority as in, does the Church actually have it, or can the Church ever legitimately have it?
[/quote]
Neither. I’m asking what is authority and from where does it derive? You say it derives from the consent of the people. I’m interested in exploring exactly what that means in theory and in practice. I’m arguing that sovereignty is absolute and can never reside in law or in some abstract notion of “the people.”[/quote]
Ah, so you’re a political realist more along the lines of Machiavelli rather than Hobbes or Locke. I like it.
Sovereignty is absolute or supreme power. I suppose for something to be absolute or supreme, it has to be legitimately gained, and in that respect legitimacy raises the question of consent.
Does sovereignty necessitate consent by the people? I think it does, otherwise it is not sovereignty at all but power that falls just short of that. I hate to start bordering on semantics here, but I suppose any definition of what sovereignty is depends on some sort of lexical definition of supremacy or absolutism.
If I break into your home and barricade you from it, at that point I am the sovereign of your property in that I control it and neither you nor anyone else does. But is that absolute control of it? If the gov’t confiscates your property for no reason at all, are they now the legitimate sovereigns of that property?
Sovereignty has also typically been associated with the establishment of a state or other such governing body, and as a prerequisite there has virtually always been some sort of moral responsibility to live up to. Who the sovereign is/was ultimately responsible to has been the source of controversy regarding the nature of sovereignty, as I’m sure you’re more than aware of.
In that sense, I think any discussion of what sovereignty is must first address to whom the sovereign is ultimately responsible. Or is the sovereign responsible to anyone at all other than himself? I argue that the sovereign is ultimately responsible to the people over whom he rules. If the discussion is whether or not the Church is the one to whom the sovereign is ultimately responsible, then I would simply counter with the writings of Locke.
However, even that is a dangerous path, since Locke argued that God would never choose a sovereign who would then willingly violate both God’s Law and natural law in his duties as a ruler. Therefore, according to Locke, it would actually be a violation of God’s Law if those who were so capable did not remove said sovereign from power and choose one of their own accord.
That assumes that we know ANYTHING about God, which we do not. Like I said earlier, the God as we understand Him either cannot exist, or He can but we cannot ever know anything at all about Him, including, of course, His intentions regarding sovereigns.
So I suppose that means that the sovereign is not responsible in the end to God but to either the people or nobody but himself.
[quote]DBCooper wrote:
[quote]SexMachine wrote:
[quote]DBCooper wrote:
Whichever people choose that particular form of government as the form under which they expect their rights to be protected. Whichever people choose to give such consent.
[/quote]
So who is legitimate amongst two factions, both of whom claim to represent and act in the name of the people? What is it beyond consent that creates legitimacy?
I’m not sure how to defend Locke. All previous experience hath shewn that natural rights and natural law exist and that there is no discernible divine right to rule. No one would willingly consent to a form of gov’t that explicitly states as its goal a violation of the natural right to life, liberty, property, and the pursuit of happiness. Now, have there been MASSIVE examples of people consenting to be protected by a sovereign who has then turned around and violated such natural rights? Of course. Many would argue that it has been going on in this country for quite some time.
But no one willingly chooses such a scenario, at least not an entire group of people. I don’t really know how to expand upon the idea of natural rights and natural law any further than Stoics, Locke, or anyone else already has.
Regardless, Locke argued that not only do we have natural rights, but that the contract between the sovereign and the people is such that the people have the obligation to remove a sovereign who does not protect these rights. The proverbial defense of the right to revolution. I’m not sure how to defend this one, either. Like Jefferson wrote, all previous experience has revealed that people will suffer as long as they are made to believe that they are supposed to suffer, that they do not have the right to revolution, as Hobbes argued.
When suffering includes the violation of natural rights, can you or anyone else argue that we do NOT have the right to end our suffering with whatever legal means we have at our disposal? And by legal means, this takes into account that the sovereign has violated the terms of the social contract, thereby voiding it entirely, and thus making any actions against the sovereign (and the breaking of political law that such action might imply) entirely within bounds.
The Church is a moral authority, one whose authority is supposed to surpass that of a temporal one’s. I don’t think the Church has ever claimed that what happens on Earth is more important than what happens elsewhere. I’ve always had the impression that life on Earth was seen as more of a preamble to something bigger in the afterlife. In that sense, the authority of the Church isn’t even applicable to this discussion. It’s like asking whether the NFL has authority over the NCAA.
Does the Church even make claim to temporal authority?[/quote]
So you can’t defend Locke beyond saying it’s self evident? Fair enough. That’s about as far as the founders got too.
Does the Church claim temporal authority? Yes. See Unam Sanctam - the temporal sword(the state) is supposed to be subordinate to the spiritual sword(ecclesiastical authority).
Ha ha. You haven’t been to the Middle East have you?
BTW, Hobbes didn’t argue that people don’t have the right to overthrow the king. He argued that they only have the right to do so in the name of God; not in the name of “the people.”
[quote]SexMachine wrote:
Ha ha. You haven’t been to the Middle East have you?[/quote]
Well-played.
[quote] DBCooper wrote:
Ah, so you’re a political realist more along the lines of Machiavelli rather than Hobbes or Locke. I like it.
[/quote]
I’m a realist in the sense that I agree with Machiavelli that no one political system is universally “the best.” Machiavelli is remembered for The Prince but he gave an equally good defence of republicanism in Discourses on Livy.
That’s right. And so “the people” cannot be sovereign. The person or institution that decides what the will of the people is is sovereign.
No. Absolute authority is not a derived power. Absolute authority cannot ever be legitimate because legitimacy means that a higher authority confers its power. But there is no higher authority than absolute authority. Absolute authority can only be the authority of God. So what does this mean in a political sense? It could mean any number of things. It could mean radical individualism or the exact opposite.
If it requires consent then it is not absolute. It is a derived authority. Derived from “the people.” And “the people” cannot be sovereign because “the will of the people” is abstract and uncertain.
Yes. Because they(the burglars) have made themselves sovereign. They are sovereign individuals. When the police take over they are exercising an absolute authority that has(supposedly) been conferred upon them by “the people.”
Yes. My position takes two forms depending upon whether you believe in God.
Atheist position: The individual is sovereign > sovereign individualism.
Religious position: God is sovereign. However only the individual can determine God’s will. So, in practice sovereign individualism.
That’s just it. The sovereign is answerable to no one. That’s what makes him sovereign.
No. By the very definition of sovereignty a sovereign cannot be answerable to anyone but himself.
That’s Locke’s position. That the people are sovereign. That’s a fine and admirable position to take but it breaks apart completely under scrutiny.
The church is answerable to God. Its authority can only be legitimate when it is derived from God.
[quote]
However, even that is a dangerous path, since Locke argued that God would never choose a sovereign who would then willingly violate both God’s Law and natural law in his duties as a ruler. Therefore, according to Locke, it would actually be a violation of God’s Law if those who were so capable did not remove said sovereign from power and choose one of their own accord.
That assumes that we know ANYTHING about God, which we do not. Like I said earlier, the God as we understand Him either cannot exist, or He can but we cannot ever know anything at all about Him, including, of course, His intentions regarding sovereigns.
So I suppose that means that the sovereign is not responsible in the end to God but to either the people or nobody but himself.[/quote]
If you’re an atheist then the answer must be the latter: only to himself.
[quote]SexMachine wrote:
[quote]DBCooper wrote:
[quote]SexMachine wrote:
[quote]DBCooper wrote:
Whichever people choose that particular form of government as the form under which they expect their rights to be protected. Whichever people choose to give such consent.
[/quote]
So who is legitimate amongst two factions, both of whom claim to represent and act in the name of the people? What is it beyond consent that creates legitimacy?
I’m not sure how to defend Locke. All previous experience hath shewn that natural rights and natural law exist and that there is no discernible divine right to rule. No one would willingly consent to a form of gov’t that explicitly states as its goal a violation of the natural right to life, liberty, property, and the pursuit of happiness. Now, have there been MASSIVE examples of people consenting to be protected by a sovereign who has then turned around and violated such natural rights? Of course. Many would argue that it has been going on in this country for quite some time.
But no one willingly chooses such a scenario, at least not an entire group of people. I don’t really know how to expand upon the idea of natural rights and natural law any further than Stoics, Locke, or anyone else already has.
Regardless, Locke argued that not only do we have natural rights, but that the contract between the sovereign and the people is such that the people have the obligation to remove a sovereign who does not protect these rights. The proverbial defense of the right to revolution. I’m not sure how to defend this one, either. Like Jefferson wrote, all previous experience has revealed that people will suffer as long as they are made to believe that they are supposed to suffer, that they do not have the right to revolution, as Hobbes argued.
When suffering includes the violation of natural rights, can you or anyone else argue that we do NOT have the right to end our suffering with whatever legal means we have at our disposal? And by legal means, this takes into account that the sovereign has violated the terms of the social contract, thereby voiding it entirely, and thus making any actions against the sovereign (and the breaking of political law that such action might imply) entirely within bounds.
The Church is a moral authority, one whose authority is supposed to surpass that of a temporal one’s. I don’t think the Church has ever claimed that what happens on Earth is more important than what happens elsewhere. I’ve always had the impression that life on Earth was seen as more of a preamble to something bigger in the afterlife. In that sense, the authority of the Church isn’t even applicable to this discussion. It’s like asking whether the NFL has authority over the NCAA.
Does the Church even make claim to temporal authority?[/quote]
So you can’t defend Locke beyond saying it’s self evident? Fair enough. That’s about as far as the founders got too.
Does the Church claim temporal authority? Yes. See Unam Sanctam - the temporal sword(the state) is supposed to be subordinate to the spiritual sword(ecclesiastical authority).
http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unam_Sanctam[/quote]
Ahhh, but where does the Church derive said authority? From a God which it cannot logically derive such authority since such a God cannot logically exist in a form that the Church, or any other temporal entity, can comprehend to the point where authority can be derived from it.
The claim to authority by the Pope is legitimized by the Gospels, but that is problematic for anyone who does not believe in the Christian God.
Setting that aside for a moment, I don’t think that the Unam Sanctam was even legitimate by the Church’s standards. The Church itself in part rejected Boniface’s obvious grab for temporal power. Boniface was essentially destroyed by the overt public reaction against his power grab. Subsequent popes deferred to the temporal authority of the time, the king of France. This in and of itself betrays a certain deference to temporal authority in general.
Obviously, the Church was at least partially deferring to pragmatism, since no dead person can ever be an authority of any kind.
How is it that the people cannot be sovereigns? Why is uniform agreement on “the will of the people” even necessary beyond a universal agreement that our natural rights should be protected? Does the will of the people need to be any more concrete than that? Is the will of the sovereign any less abstract? What is the will of the sovereign? To be sovereign? Is that really any different than the will of the people?
BTW, I think it should be obvious that I reject the notion that “all men are created equal.” I would say it’s “self evident” that they are not. However, I would qualify that by saying that I don’t have the authority to judge the value of someone else to the extent of their life and liberty. Only God can make such decisions. But if I am to accept atheism as many seem to want theists to do - then I would have to accept everything that entails; specifically, my authority to make such judgements as to the value of people. For me, rationalism and atheism do need lead to “open mindedness” or “tolerance” - quite the contrary. People should probably think twice about trying to “convert” theists to pure rationalism.
I would also argue that it is completely impossible for authority to be derived from God. How is it possible to derive authority from something that cannot ever be comprehended? For anyone to sit here and say that God is the ultimate source of power is ridiculous. Maybe He is, but we can never know that because our understanding of Him is contradictory.
Is it even possible for power to be absolute without ruling everything that is known to exist? In that sense, is absolute sovereignty even possible? I don’t think so. Absolute sovereignty is really just an abstraction itself. Who is sovereign over the entire known universe? In fact, the “known” universe isn’t really relevant. Just because we don’t know about it doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. And for sovereignty to truly be absolute, then it one’s sovereignty must extend across all that exists.
[quote]SexMachine wrote:
BTW, I think it should be obvious that I reject the notion that “all men are created equal.” I would say it’s “self evident” that they are not. However, I would qualify that by saying that I don’t have the authority to judge the value of someone else to the extent of their life and liberty. Only God can make such decisions. But if I am to accept atheism as many seem to want theists to do - then I would have to accept everything that entails; specifically, my authority to make such judgements as to the value of people. For me, rationalism and atheism do need lead to “open mindedness” or “tolerance” - quite the contrary. People should probably think twice about trying to “convert” theists to pure rationalism.[/quote]
Your long history of posting on all topics homosexual makes your position on equality beyond obvious.
The “men created equally” line simply refers to equal opportunity, NOT an equal ability to make something of that opportunity. I think that is partially why Jefferson changed Locke’s line about “property” to “pursuit of happiness”.
You’re right, we are not all created equally in terms of our ability to take advantage of opportunity and so forth. If that were the case then communism or socialism would be a de facto condition, not one that has to be imposed by the state or voted into being by an ignorant populace.
@DB - I’m out at the moment so I don’t have the time to give these questions the time they deserve. I’ll be back later to address them.
Okay, where were we?
[quote] DBCooper wrote:
Ahhh, but where does the Church derive said authority?
[/quote]
From God.
I don’t agree that God’s will is inscrutable. As I’ve shown, man made law is secularised divine law. Thou shalt not kill > homicide; thou shalt not steal > larceny etc.
Absolutely it is.
Not the “public” reaction no. In 14th Century Europe there was no concept of “the public”. “The public” or “the people” was a Greco-Roman conception that survived in the Italian City States but was not passed on to Europe but rather developed organically starting with Magna Carta. Unam Sanctam was rolled back by the Kings; the Kings were rolled back by the aristocracy and the aristocracy rolled back by “the people”. This process was the “anacyclosis” described by Polybius and Cicero.
[quote]
Subsequent popes deferred to the temporal authority of the time, the king of France. This in and of itself betrays a certain deference to temporal authority in general.
Obviously, the Church was at least partially deferring to pragmatism, since no dead person can ever be an authority of any kind. [/quote]
Well, it is true that a dead person cannot hold authority which is what Nietzsche was getting at when he proclaimed that God is dead. Whether or not you agree that God is dead, you have to agree with the implications of such a thing which Nietzsche certainly did.
Nietzsche’s mental breakdown is attributed to an episode where he watched a horse being savagely beaten by his master. I believe that Nietzsche’s emotional response to this was on some level a recognition that God isn’t dead - that the cruelty he saw was not just a subjective reality but an objective reality.
[quote]DBCooper wrote:
I would also argue that it is completely impossible for authority to be derived from God.
[/quote]
I would argue that authority can only come from one person or from God. It cannot be derived from “the people”.
Again, it can be comprehended. Further, it can be comprehended. I believe in Friedrich Jacobi’s claim that man has a “spiritual eye” through which objective morality can be “seen” or “revealed”.
On the contrary, to say that “the people” are sovereign is ridiculous. Now if you said that you are sovereign then I could take you seriously.
I disagree. Sovereignty only becomes abstract when you attempt to universalise it. There can only be one sovereign.
[quote]
Who is sovereign over the entire known universe? In fact, the “known” universe isn’t really relevant. Just because we don’t know about it doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. And for sovereignty to truly be absolute, then it one’s sovereignty must extend across all that exists.[/quote]
I agree with the latter yes.
[quote]DBCooper wrote:
Your long history of posting on all topics homosexual makes your position on equality beyond obvious.
[/quote]
That’s a fair point to make about the tone of my statements on homosexuality but it’s not a fair point regarding the substance. I have never argued or meant to imply that homosexuals are less worthy as individuals; only that homosexual acts are immoral - a value judgement of the behaviour itself, not a value judgement of homosexuals as people. In fact, I’ve made the point many times that I don’t believe that homosexuals are inherently evil - or at least, no more so than anyone else.
Also, I think I’m more of a realist in many ways regarding homosexuality than many religious people. For example, I’m far from convinced that someone can “pray the gay away”. So that of course begs the question of what should a gay person do? Celibacy? I don’t know. I’m inclined to think it’s something they need to decide for themselves. And I don’t presume to answer that question for them. However, my fundamental belief is that homosexual activity is immoral.
Hold on, SM. How can God be comprehended? Can you explain to me how it is possible for a contradiction to actually exist? If God is omnipotent then he is, by definition, a contradiction. He cannot create a force so powerful that He cannot overcome, thereby discovering a limitation to His powers. Either there is a limit to His powers and He is not omnipotent (which would shatter any and all concepts of God), or He is omnipotent but in such a way that we are not equipped to comprehend.
Can you actually comprehend how a contradiction can exist in reality? How can something be both blue and not blue at the same time? How can something with truth values that negate each other exist? I’m not discounting any possibilities as far as His existence goes, except for the possibility that we can even comprehend Him or His nature.
If there can only be one sovereign, then that sovereign is a Higher Power that we cannot or have not comprehended yet. Perhaps in the future we will develop the ability to understand how a contradiction can exist, how something can be both blue and not blue at the same time. But that sovereign is certainly not a god whom/that we cannot understand in our present condition.
Since the Church derives its authority from a god who is all-powerful, and since the Church is not capable of comprehending such a thing, they have no legitimate authority. I suppose it’s sort of like saying that I cannot be an authority on the addition of 2 and 2, even if I can correctly say that 2 plus 2 equals 4, when the reality is that I have no concept of what a number is. If no one else had the ability to comprehend what a number is, how can we use the law that 2 + 2 = 4 to further develop mathematics?