Roots of Human Morality

Off Topic Politics & World Issues
841

[quote]silee wrote:

[quote]kamui wrote:

yes and no.

the physical fall of an apple can cause and explain a physical event in Newton’s brain because it’s physical in both cases.
We reconstruct a (true) story that tells us that some material bodies moves and cause other bodies to move in the same space-time. The bodies may be distinct, but, in last analysis they are made with the same matter, they exists and moves in the same dimensions and obey the same physical laws.

Ontologically, both events are on the same “level” or “layer”.
That’s why we are allowed to say that both events are causally linked.

This is the very basis of the “mathesis universalis” the West dreams about since the so-called Dark Ages. And it’s the very basis of modern Science.

Now, Ideas, affects, concepts and percepts (metaphysical things) interact between themselves. we all expeience that daily, and none of us can deny it seriously. Addiionnally, we all experience the fact that our own metaphysical reality (my thoughts, your thoughts) does NOT causally affect the material world. We may sometimes dream about it but we know that magic doesn’t work.
Nothing special here. It’s just another way to say tha we are finite being (and that we know it).

Now, we sometimes think, like Ephrem, that our metaphysical reality could be affected (and explained) by the material world.
But, there is nothing common, ontologically, between a material body and a thought that could allow us to say they causally interact in any way, shape or form.

We can only affirm the existence of two parallel chains of causes, a physical and a metaphysical one.

But… even parallel lines intersect at some point.
Only they do it at infinity.

So, we can actually say that there is a “bridge”, but this bridge would not be in our eyes, it would only exist at a fundamental level, from the beginning, and globally, not on a “case by case” basis.

The bridge is that, “at infinity”, matter is thought (information)

Hence, an absolute intellect.

[/quote]

all of what you said is just another form of metaphysics. Just ideas about ideas. If Ideas are seen as theory then those idea can lead to say science doing investigations and experiments to see if there is a correlation. Over simplifying here but Science is concerned with correlations.

From your idea of metaphysics coming to a conclusion that an absolute intellect exist is a positing from metaphysics to metaphysics. Just more first philosophy.
[/quote]

So science is various methods that came from metaphysical logic. Scientific methods did have to come from something. Science is not existence, it is one method to understand certain types of information in creation that relies on there being a logical systematic existence. Science can explain how this logical systematic existence works and give us a framework for what physically is (that often changes as new techniques and information arises), but cannot say why it is there or where it came from because of it’s limitations to the physical realm.

I’m still thinking about this one. I feel like something is there that shouldn’t be or something is missing.

842

[quote]ephrem wrote:

Not exactly; form, symmetry, chaos all exist in nature not as a concept but as a part of undefined reality. This is different from ideas/ideals, those are purely human concepts.

Morality is not a part of reality we’ve defined [and refined], morality is part of reality because we conceived it.

[/quote]
If they were human creation, then humans could control them and humans cannot. They are static and there is nothing humans can do about it, we can acknowledge it or disregard it, but we have no control over it.
The proof that morality falls into to this realm is that the theory of relative morality breaks down at the extremes. If something breaks down, it’s either incomplete or wrong.

Ahhh, no. This tree ^^ specifically is only a conception. A form if you will. For we are not talking about a specific tree in a specific place. Which lead directly in to the fact that concepts do exist with out a counciousness to recognize it.
We discover things, we create nothing.

Yes, I said like any thing else, apply causal regression and it’s self evident. Where did the letter “D” on you computer keyboard come from. Go back far enough, it comes from the same place. Now you don’t need to know the source of the letter ‘D’ on your keyboard to know it exists, and you don’t need to know the source of morality to know it exists and use it.

Math isn’t a concept, it’s a reality. Just like morality is a reality, not a concept. We can have a concept of morality, but that’s not the same as morality itself. I am merely saying both are metaphysical realities and we have an idea of their existence by their manifestations.

843

[quote]ephrem wrote:
And yet, the metaphysical is contingent on the physical form.

[/quote]

It’s the opposite. You can have a plan for a motorcycle without the motorcycle existing, but you cannot have a motorcycle with out a plan. All you’d have is random parts.

844

[quote]kamui wrote:

[quote]ephrem wrote:
And yet, the metaphysical is contingent on the physical form.

[/quote]

if it were true, you would be able to show at least one empirical example of a causal interaction between a physical and a metaphysical thing.

and all you can (and will ever) show, is the simultaneity (parallelism) of physical and metaphysical processes.
[/quote]

Further, you could never, ever, ever ,ever ,ever ,ever ,ever, ever show a physical existence without a metaphysical component. Go ahead, try.
However, I can conceive an object without that object having to physically exist.

845

[quote]ephrem wrote:

[quote]kamui wrote:

I don’t understand why this is so?

When Newton saw the apple fall and was inspired to formulate his theory of gravitation, you’d argue that there is no causal effect between the two?[/quote]

Observation of an event is technically establishing correlation in hopes of establishing causation. A theory is a metaphysical form. As well as said ‘law of gravity’. The law exists metaphysically, but the physical cannot violate the law, even though the law has no physical way to enforce itself. Physical matter merely ‘obeys’ with out being compelled.

Nevertheless all these things, laws, correlation, causation, theory, concept, etc. are all metaphysical realities.

846

[quote]kamui wrote:

yes and no.

the physical fall of an apple can cause and explain a physical event in Newton’s brain because it’s physical in both cases.
We reconstruct a (true) story that tells us that some material bodies moves and cause other bodies to move in the same space-time. The bodies may be distinct, but, in last analysis they are made with the same matter, they exists and moves in the same dimensions and obey the same physical laws.

Ontologically, both events are on the same “level” or “layer”.
That’s why we are allowed to say that both events are causally linked.

This is the very basis of the “mathesis universalis” the West dreams about since the so-called Dark Ages. And it’s the very basis of modern Science.

Now, Ideas, affects, concepts and percepts (metaphysical things) interact between themselves. we all expeience that daily, and none of us can deny it seriously. Addiionnally, we all experience the fact that our own metaphysical reality (my thoughts, your thoughts) does NOT causally affect the material world. We may sometimes dream about it but we know that magic doesn’t work.
Nothing special here. It’s just another way to say tha we are finite being (and that we know it).

Now, we sometimes think, like Ephrem, that our metaphysical reality could be affected (and explained) by the material world.
But, there is nothing common, ontologically, between a material body and a thought that could allow us to say they causally interact in any way, shape or form.

We can only affirm the existence of two parallel chains of causes, a physical and a metaphysical one.

But… even parallel lines intersect at some point.
Only they do it at infinity.

So, we can actually say that there is a “bridge”, but this bridge would not be in our eyes, it would only exist at a fundamental level, from the beginning, and globally, not on a “case by case” basis.

The bridge is that, “at infinity”, matter is thought (information)

Hence, an absolute intellect.
[/quote]

Nice :slight_smile:

847

[quote]Severiano wrote:
In response to Pat and Brother Chris-

Sublimus Deus was annulled by Paul III in 1537 (this is documented in many places including wiki)… You realize that if Sublimus Deus was ever in effect, Mexico would have never been Colonized. Sublimus Deus was a convenient little motion that the Church touted even when it was annulled by the Pope because it violated the Spanish patronato rights. Nice and convenient to spread the word while they suck their conquistador dogs and diseases on Native Mexico.

Pope Paul III held slaves, he sanctioned and authorized enslavement of Muslims in the Papal state. It is well documented.

And don’t twist my words. I have stated that the Church didn’t consider certain people to possess souls. Blacks are one of the groups that they argued had no souls and were enemies of Christendom. Interestingly enough indigenous Mexicans were considered enemies of Christendom as well, and were also enslaved.

All you have to do is simply think about it for a moment. Spain brought black slaves to Mexico to aid the Mission System. The indigenous Mexicans were mass Baptized (the ones that survived the onslaught of diseases introduced by the Spanish, the overall population of Mexico at the time was decimated by disease). Inevitably the women were raped, and indigenous people would have worked under the Mission system which would have had Missions as a Center Piece of power run by Spanish Priests and families, with those families having plots of land to have the laborers work.

With time and rape there came to be mixed peoples who would have had their fathers Spanish name, but due to not being natives of Spain they would have lacked opportunity in established Missions, so they were the ones who would have been sent forward to establish new Missions in Mexico if there weren’t any Spanish Natives willing to do so themselves. Only certain mixes which were predominantly Spanish and non black were allowed to do such. The mixed were classified in to a caste system which would have gone as follows-
From Spaniard and Indian,
Mestizo
From Mestizo and Spaniard,
Castizo
From Castizo and Spaniard,
Spaniard
From Spaniard and Black,
Mulatto
From Spaniard and Mulatto,
Morisco
From Morisco and Spaniard,
Albino
From Spaniard and Albina,
Look the other way
From Indian and Look the other way,
Wolf
From Wolf and Indian,
Zambahiga
From Zambahiga and Indian,
Cambujo
From Cambujo and Mulatto,
Albarazado
From Albarzado and Mulatto,
Barcino
From Barcina and Mulatto,
Coyote
From Coyote and Indian,
Chamiso
From Camisa and Mestizo,
Coyote
From Coyote Mestizo and Mulatto,
Go no further

They often were willing to do this because in the Central locations, I guess you could say the hub of the Mission system in Central Mexico would have been dominated by established Spanish Families who would have been considered full blooded Spaniards. Establishing Missions would be their out, and presented them great opportunity. This way the Spanish had mixed and indigenous Mexicans doing their work for them (spreading Missions). We have several of these Mexican Missions here in the U.S. This is why I’m so familiar with the system, as there is one in my home town.

Cheers.

And as for St. Aquainas. You guys need to read up on what was considered internal vs. external freedom. Aquainus argued for internal freedom, not external. In other words, he was for free will/free mind, but not free body. Now you can argue this is freedom if you wish, but I don’t think that enslaving people physically is a lot more distinguishable than enslaving people physically and forcing them into your ideology. Free Will (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)

[/quote]

So cause some people done some bad things, the whole thing is false? That’s not good logic. Evil exists everywhere, that’s basically what this thread is about. The basic tenets of the institution has not changed since apostolic times. It’s still based on the belief in Jesus as the messiah, that love is better than hate and the that good is better than evil.
No matter where you look you will find evil in every place, nation, institution, country, race, origin, etc. Nothing and nobody is immune.

I simply go back to what Jesus himself said, ‘He who has no sin, cast the first stone’.

So when you are a verifiably perfect person, then you can create a perfect religion or church for perfect, sinless people. Then you can make a stone throwing machine and go nuts. As for me I will stick with the one Jesus himself established, warts and all.

848

He was on my side and I never even caught on!!!

849

You can only base this on hindsight, on our current perception of morality.

We discovered radiowaves but invented the radio receiver. Radiowaves are not concepts that exist without a consciousness, they are a funtion of reality. They simply exist.

A concept however cannot exist without consciousness.

I see you refer to the uncaused cause; the cosmological argument, as an answer to “what is the source?”. I’ll assume that this first caused is the original consciousness from whence all came.

And yet all of this would not have been possible without our existence. The mere fact that we exist and are capable of pondering these questions alone is not an indication of outside influence. I mean, we question existence and believe the answers when, if you just look at it, the only indication of anything existing at all is us.

We ask the question but somehow we’re not the answer. I don’t get that.

Our greatest asset is imagination. I believe imagination is our best characteristic. When Da Vinci drew his ideas he had no viable way of testing whether his ideas were feasible. I must admit that his knowledge of… well, everything gave him the ability to intuit certain concepts far, far ahead of his time.

Inspite of this it was his knowledge of… well, everything that predicated his ideas. His revolutionary concepts had a basis in reality, in learned knowledge and basic application.

Da Vinci didn’t pull his ideas out of thin air; they were the result of an extraordinary mind able to connect the dots in a unique and genius way.

[quote]Observation of an event is technically establishing correlation in hopes of establishing causation. A theory is a metaphysical form. As well as said ‘law of gravity’. The law exists metaphysically, but the physical cannot violate the law, even though the law has no physical way to enforce itself. Physical matter merely ‘obeys’ with out being compelled.

Nevertheless all these things, laws, correlation, causation, theory, concept, etc. are all metaphysical realities. [/quote]

And a product of the human mind.

850

[quote]Fletch1986 wrote:

[quote]silee wrote:

[quote]kamui wrote:

yes and no.

the physical fall of an apple can cause and explain a physical event in Newton’s brain because it’s physical in both cases.
We reconstruct a (true) story that tells us that some material bodies moves and cause other bodies to move in the same space-time. The bodies may be distinct, but, in last analysis they are made with the same matter, they exists and moves in the same dimensions and obey the same physical laws.

Ontologically, both events are on the same “level” or “layer”.
That’s why we are allowed to say that both events are causally linked.

This is the very basis of the “mathesis universalis” the West dreams about since the so-called Dark Ages. And it’s the very basis of modern Science.

Now, Ideas, affects, concepts and percepts (metaphysical things) interact between themselves. we all expeience that daily, and none of us can deny it seriously. Addiionnally, we all experience the fact that our own metaphysical reality (my thoughts, your thoughts) does NOT causally affect the material world. We may sometimes dream about it but we know that magic doesn’t work.
Nothing special here. It’s just another way to say tha we are finite being (and that we know it).

Now, we sometimes think, like Ephrem, that our metaphysical reality could be affected (and explained) by the material world.
But, there is nothing common, ontologically, between a material body and a thought that could allow us to say they causally interact in any way, shape or form.

We can only affirm the existence of two parallel chains of causes, a physical and a metaphysical one.

But… even parallel lines intersect at some point.
Only they do it at infinity.

So, we can actually say that there is a “bridge”, but this bridge would not be in our eyes, it would only exist at a fundamental level, from the beginning, and globally, not on a “case by case” basis.

The bridge is that, “at infinity”, matter is thought (information)

Hence, an absolute intellect.

[/quote]

all of what you said is just another form of metaphysics. Just ideas about ideas. If Ideas are seen as theory then those idea can lead to say science doing investigations and experiments to see if there is a correlation. Over simplifying here but Science is concerned with correlations.

From your idea of metaphysics coming to a conclusion that an absolute intellect exist is a positing from metaphysics to metaphysics. Just more first philosophy.
[/quote]

So science is various methods that came from metaphysical logic. Scientific methods did have to come from something. Science is not existence, it is one method to understand certain types of information in creation that relies on there being a logical systematic existence. Science can explain how this logical systematic existence works and give us a framework for what physically is (that often changes as new techniques and information arises), but cannot say why it is there or where it came from because of it’s limitations to the physical realm.

I’m still thinking about this one. I feel like something is there that shouldn’t be or something is missing.
[/quote]

Ok. Well science never trys to answer questions of value, of questions that organize our individual or even collective lives. Collective say for the most part since not all people hold to the same values. So there is that.

Religion has nothing to say of value in regard to the natural world and how it works. If you believe that then stop going to the doctors and just pray to get better when your sick. And its not enough to say well God made scientist and so God is behind everything. You can say that if you want but what is most important is acknowledging that science is giving us knowledge about the way the world works. That knowledge is then passed on to technology which produces things to make our lives better, here I am thinking of advances in medical science.

The history of science shows that it was with Baconian notions concerning the experimental that changed the conception of science which was first philosophy or Aristotelian philosophy which ascribed to objects an animus and a telos a purposiveness to the objects. ( more could be said here… but not from me.

Modern science is both rationalistic and empirical, and perhaps more with the advent of special instruments that help collect data and require work from teams of scientist because of the complexity involved. Again I am not the one to expand on this.

As Stephen J Gould said, Science and religion can exist together on different sides of human activity and need. Science with facts, evidence and data collecting and religion with questions of value.

851

[quote]Fletch1986 wrote:<<< So science is various methods that came from metaphysical logic. Scientific methods did have to come from something. Science is not existence, it is one method to understand certain types of information in creation that relies on there being a logical systematic existence. Science can explain how this logical systematic existence works and give us a framework for what physically is (that often changes as new techniques and information arises), but cannot say why it is there or where it came from because of it’s limitations to the physical realm.

I’m still thinking about this one. I feel like something is there that shouldn’t be or something is missing.
[/quote]Not bad at all man =]

852

[quote]ephrem wrote:

[quote]kamui wrote:

If you believe this then why do you separate the metaphysical from the physical?

I’m beginning to understand what your point is, but I’d like some clarification.

[/quote]

I separate the metaphysical from the physical because understanding the metaphysical and understanding the physical are two different disciplines and nothing good ever comes from the confusion of the two.

Explaining the physical by the metaphysical is the very definition of superstition. magical thinking.

Explaining the metaphysical by the physical is the inverted symmetric of superstition : reductionism. scientism.
And it’s equally wrong.

853

[quote]ephrem wrote:

[quote]kamui wrote:

[quote]
I’m not trying to play stupid here kamui, I don’t have to try hard to do that anyway, but Newton saw the apple fall. It made him ponder certain questions that led to him to devise a theory.

That is a straight line.[/quote]

Yes, but it’s a metaphysical straight line, from Newton’s perception to Newton’s intellect.

[quote]
All the thinking, pondering, wondering and formulating afterwards were also material effects in Newton’s brain.[/quote]

No. But all the thinking, pondering, wondering and formulating afterwards certainly correponded to some material effects in Newton’s brain.
But these material effects were the effect of the “photonic” causes, not intellectual ones. [/quote]

Where lies the difference between material effects caused by the brain, and intellectual ones?[/quote]

Objectivity exists only in the formers. Finality exists only in the latters.

854

[quote]Tiribulus wrote:
Unless of course yer jist doin yer best then he overlooks it. I forgot about that part. =]
[/quote]

Obviously you still don’t understand Invincible Ignorance.

855

[quote]Tiribulus wrote:

He was on my side and I never even caught on!!!
[/quote]

I’m afraid he is actually on MY side.
He just don’t know it yet.

856

[quote]Severiano wrote:
Pope Paul III held slaves, he sanctioned and authorized enslavement of Muslims in the Papal state. It is well documented.
[/quote]

Okay…you pick one thing and ignore the rest of the stuff…cool.

You just said the Church thought Mexicans had souls…now they don’t, which is it? You said that’s why they didn’t enslave Mexicans…which do you claim as actual history. And I just proved that the Church thought blacks had souls since they willingly baptized them. But, you haven’t proved the first claim that they thought they didn’t.

Further, you have utterly failed to make distinctions between the Church’s (Magisterium) teaching and individuals.

857

[quote]Severiano wrote:
And as for St. Aquainas. You guys need to read up on what was considered internal vs. external freedom. Aquainus argued for internal freedom, not external. In other words, he was for free will/free mind, but not free body. Now you can argue this is freedom if you wish, but I don’t think that enslaving people physically is a lot more distinguishable than enslaving people physically and forcing them into your ideology. Free Will (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)

[/quote]

You have still failed to back up your high accusations.

858

[quote]Brother Chris wrote:

[quote]Tiribulus wrote:
Unless of course yer jist doin yer best then he overlooks it. I forgot about that part. =]
[/quote]Obviously you still don’t understand Invincible Ignorance. [/quote]Yes Chris, that was an oversimplification, but that IS what it eventually amounts to.[quote]kamui wrote:<<< I’m afraid he is actually on MY side.
He just don’t know it yet. [/quote]I was only kidding of course, but from his standpoint you and I would be very close the same side.

859

[quote]kamui wrote:

[quote]ephrem wrote:

[quote]kamui wrote:

[quote]
I’m not trying to play stupid here kamui, I don’t have to try hard to do that anyway, but Newton saw the apple fall. It made him ponder certain questions that led to him to devise a theory.

That is a straight line.[/quote]

Yes, but it’s a metaphysical straight line, from Newton’s perception to Newton’s intellect.

I hope it’s not a dumb question, but what’s your definition of finality in that context.

860

I believe he is calling “objectivity” and corresponding “material effects” what I would call the illusion of autonomy while calling “finality” and “intellectual ones” what I call the image of God and by extension God Himself. Forgive the intrusion, but I wanted to take a stab at that and see what he says.