[quote]ephrem wrote:
The only reason why we exist is to procreate[/quote]
Well, materialistically speaking, not even for that. We just happen to be able to procreate.
[quote]ephrem wrote:
The only reason why we exist is to procreate. Procreation is, in its bare essence, the only real purpose I can see for living.
[/quote]
At our very base we are only here to survive and replicate.
[quote]Sloth wrote:
[quote]ephrem wrote:
The only reason why we exist is to procreate[/quote]
Well, materialistically speaking, not even for that. We just happen to be able to procreate.
[/quote]
That’s only a valid argument if you believe in Adam and Eve, paradise, dirt and a rib.
For those who know better there would be no ‘us’ if we weren’t able to procreate.
[quote]therajraj wrote:
[quote]ephrem wrote:
The only reason why we exist is to procreate. Procreation is, in its bare essence, the only real purpose I can see for living.
[/quote]
At our very base we are only here to survive and replicate. [/quote]
Indeed.
[quote]therajraj wrote:
[quote]ephrem wrote:
The only reason why we exist is to procreate. Procreation is, in its bare essence, the only real purpose I can see for living.
[/quote]
At our very base we are only here to survive and replicate. [/quote]
We aren’t here to survive and replicate though. No more so than any other extinct organism. There is no goal in nature. Just happenstance.
[quote]ephrem wrote:
For those who know better there would be no ‘us’ if we weren’t able to procreate.[/quote]
Or no oxygen. Or no H20. Etc.
Edit: I mean, is the purpose, the reason, for Earth’s qualities as a biosphere, is so that human beings can complete their ‘purpose’ and ‘reason’ for existence within just the right circumstances?
[quote]Sloth wrote:
[quote]therajraj wrote:
[quote]ephrem wrote:
The only reason why we exist is to procreate. Procreation is, in its bare essence, the only real purpose I can see for living.
[/quote]
At our very base we are only here to survive and replicate. [/quote]
We aren’t here to survive and replicate though. No more so than any other extinct organism. There is no goal in nature. Just happenstance.[/quote]
Yes the goal of every organism on this planet is to survive and replicate, I agree with that.
If you don’t want to call it a goal okay, I’m not sure what the correct label would be. Whatever it may be, it is definitely deeply ingrained in all of us.
[quote]therajraj wrote:
Yes the goal of every organism on this planet is to survive and replicate, I agree with that.
If you don’t want to call it a goal okay, I’m not sure what the correct label would be. Whatever it may be, it is definitely deeply ingrained in all of us.[/quote]
Whatever it ingrained in us doesn’t give us purpose or reason to exist in the universe. We just happen to. For now.
When we go extinct, there will be no mourning from the universe.
[quote]Sloth wrote:
[quote]therajraj wrote:
Yes the goal of every organism on this planet is to survive and replicate, I agree with that.
If you don’t want to call it a goal okay, I’m not sure what the correct label would be. Whatever it may be, it is definitely deeply ingrained in all of us.[/quote]
Whatever it ingrained in us doesn’t give us purpose or reason to exist in the universe. We just happen to. For now.
[/quote]
I agree.
As nice as it would be to special or have some ultimate purpose, we aren’t and no ultimate purpose exists.
[quote]Sloth wrote:
[quote]ephrem wrote:
For those who know better there would be no ‘us’ if we weren’t able to procreate.[/quote]
Or no oxygen. Or no H20. Etc.
Edit: I mean, is the purpose, the reason, for Earth’s qualities as a biosphere, is so that human beings can complete their ‘purpose’ and ‘reason’ for existence within just the right circumstances?
[/quote]
No. The circumstances on earth allowed for us to evolve. A happy accident.
[quote]ephrem wrote:
[quote]Sloth wrote:
[quote]ephrem wrote:
For those who know better there would be no ‘us’ if we weren’t able to procreate.[/quote]
Or no oxygen. Or no H20. Etc.
Edit: I mean, is the purpose, the reason, for Earth’s qualities as a biosphere, is so that human beings can complete their ‘purpose’ and ‘reason’ for existence within just the right circumstances?
[/quote]
No. The circumstances on earth allowed for us to evolve. A happy accident.
[/quote]
Not sure if you’re saying that evolution is purposeful, and only the prior conditions of earth were non-purposeful. Or, if both (and everything else) are the continued results of non purposeful chemical reactions. With evolution being a “happy accident” that simply edits out the lesser adapted accidents. I imagine the latter.
[quote]Sloth wrote:
[quote]ephrem wrote:
[quote]Sloth wrote:
[quote]ephrem wrote:
For those who know better there would be no ‘us’ if we weren’t able to procreate.[/quote]
Or no oxygen. Or no H20. Etc.
Edit: I mean, is the purpose, the reason, for Earth’s qualities as a biosphere, is so that human beings can complete their ‘purpose’ and ‘reason’ for existence within just the right circumstances?
[/quote]
No. The circumstances on earth allowed for us to evolve. A happy accident.
[/quote]
Not sure if you’re saying that evolution is purposeful, and only the prior conditions of earth were non-purposeful. Or, if both (and everything else) are the continued results of non purposeful chemical reactions. With evolution being a “happy accident” that simply edits out the lesser adapted accidents. I imagine the latter. [/quote]
We think we’re special but homo erectus roamed the earth for a million years. The dinosaurs for tens of millions of years.
We are just another aspect of life in an endless cycle of death and rebirth.
[quote]ephrem wrote:
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]ephrem wrote:
Perhaps I am broadening the definition of “selfish” incorrectly, but as I explained earlier in the thread I believe that all our actions are governed by emotion. Even a decision that appears rational has its roots in emotion.
That means that I believe all we do is to satisfy an emotion. And here too I use the word emotion in a broad sense. We can act on an emotion we don’t even know we have [anymore] which makes decisions based on that emotion appear rational.
And to satisfy an emotion is ultimately a selfish act.
[/quote]
Okay, demostrate how emotion is at the center of morality. Since we just seemingly agree that and pure goodness and pure evil is elusive to the human body and hence sit outside. Describe how emotion is the center of morality.
[/quote]
Emotion includes empathy and compassion. I use the word emotion to describe all brain- and mental states a human being can experience. I assume this as a given.
When humankind settled, built cities and formed societies after the end of the last ice age, the need for some kind of social structure to guide human interaction arose.
We are genetically predisposed to care for eachother as it increases our chances for survival. In a large enough setting, like a city, the succes and survival of the city depended on the cooperation of its inhabitants.
Laws were created, and a means of enforcing that law. As cities became more succesful, people required less time to meet their daily needs and had more time to ponder and improve their society.
[disclaimer]It is impossible for me to prove this conclusively, and I’m not presuming that this is true, but as far as I’m concerned its plausibility is far greater than morality having an absolute divine source.[/disclaimer]
Anyway, certain problems big cities have that exist now existed back then aswell: overcrowding, crime, poverty and so on. We needed something that allowed the masses to self-govern in a way that ensured the wellbeing and succes of the society.
Religion.
Religion in whatever form has always been very succesful at guiding people to live a certain way, so by incorporating our natural tendency to care for eachother in a set of ‘natural’ laws a society could function without a huge effort to enforce law.
Over time, and we are speaking roughly 10.000 years here, morality evolved into an ideal; an ideal that, over the generations, became ingrained into the psyche of humankind.
Simply because it has been succesful. Behaviour evolves too you see, and I don’t doubt the value of a moral system. I only doubt its origin.
[/quote]
And I really don’t know how many ways I can express that emotion can be misplaced and often is, and that the precedent of compassion is irrelevant. It’s a by product. Compassion does mean moral. You can have compassion for evil.
For something to be moral or immoral you need a very important component, Freewill. With out freewill, there is no morality. If you cannot choose to do otherwise, then whatever action you do is morally inert. It has no moral basis what so ever. If you are simply a function of your emotions, there is no morality.
If you were correct, then any thing can be a moral act so long as emotionally it feels moral. There are no rules then, period. Because consensus without absoluteness is just a fad. It’s therefore not wrong to rape somebody if you are ok with it. Since people who rape are usually ok with it, there is no moral issue. That’s what you are asserting. Everything ok, as long as you are ok with it. That’s simply not true, you know it, but you won’t admit it.
[quote]pat wrote:
And I really don’t know how many ways I can express that emotion can be misplaced and often is, and that the precedent of compassion is irrelevant. It’s a by product. Compassion does mean moral. You can have compassion for evil.
For something to be moral or immoral you need a very important component, Freewill. With out freewill, there is no morality. If you cannot choose to do otherwise, then whatever action you do is morally inert. It has no moral basis what so ever. If you are simply a function of your emotions, there is no morality.
If you were correct, then any thing can be a moral act so long as emotionally it feels moral. There are no rules then, period. Because consensus without absoluteness is just a fad. It’s therefore not wrong to rape somebody if you are ok with it. Since people who rape are usually ok with it, there is no moral issue. That’s what you are asserting. Everything ok, as long as you are ok with it. That’s simply not true, you know it, but you won’t admit it.[/quote]
You still don’t get it: I’m not saying morality is a form of empathy or compassion; morality evolved from empathy and compassion as an ideal in an attempt to surpass the limitations of the former.
In large numbers the genetic tendency to care for one another rapidly deminishes, that’s why empathy and compassion will only work on a small scale. Something else needed to be introduced, something with more clout: divinely inspired morality.
[quote]ephrem wrote:
[quote]pat wrote:
And I really don’t know how many ways I can express that emotion can be misplaced and often is, and that the precedent of compassion is irrelevant. It’s a by product. Compassion does mean moral. You can have compassion for evil.
For something to be moral or immoral you need a very important component, Freewill. With out freewill, there is no morality. If you cannot choose to do otherwise, then whatever action you do is morally inert. It has no moral basis what so ever. If you are simply a function of your emotions, there is no morality.
If you were correct, then any thing can be a moral act so long as emotionally it feels moral. There are no rules then, period. Because consensus without absoluteness is just a fad. It’s therefore not wrong to rape somebody if you are ok with it. Since people who rape are usually ok with it, there is no moral issue. That’s what you are asserting. Everything ok, as long as you are ok with it. That’s simply not true, you know it, but you won’t admit it.[/quote]
You still don’t get it: I’m not saying morality is a form of empathy or compassion; morality evolved from empathy and compassion as an ideal in an attempt to surpass the limitations of the former.
[/quote]
But if it were a human construct it would be under our control and we could make it anything. The problem is, still, that with out freewill, there is no morality. And freewill is in no way, shape, or form a human construct. Whether you support freewill or determinism, your still supporting metaphysical entities that we are subject to. If we’re subject to it, we could not have possibly created it. You are you subject to your creation, your creation is subject to you.
[quote]
In large numbers the genetic tendency to care for one another rapidly deminishes, that’s why empathy and compassion will only work on a small scale. Something else needed to be introduced, something with more clout: divinely inspired morality.[/quote]
You’re having real trouble separating morality from it’s ultimate soruce, and I don’t really know why.
Morality, though metaphysical, is still quite a few degrees removed from it’s source. Just like a pencil, you don’t have to know anything about it’s ultimate source to know it exists and is a real thing.
Large or small scale is not really relevant. Morality still requires freewill to exist. The fact that human behavior changes with regard to scope doesn’t change morality.
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]ephrem wrote:
[quote]pat wrote:
And I really don’t know how many ways I can express that emotion can be misplaced and often is, and that the precedent of compassion is irrelevant. It’s a by product. Compassion does mean moral. You can have compassion for evil.
For something to be moral or immoral you need a very important component, Freewill. With out freewill, there is no morality. If you cannot choose to do otherwise, then whatever action you do is morally inert. It has no moral basis what so ever. If you are simply a function of your emotions, there is no morality.
If you were correct, then any thing can be a moral act so long as emotionally it feels moral. There are no rules then, period. Because consensus without absoluteness is just a fad. It’s therefore not wrong to rape somebody if you are ok with it. Since people who rape are usually ok with it, there is no moral issue. That’s what you are asserting. Everything ok, as long as you are ok with it. That’s simply not true, you know it, but you won’t admit it.[/quote]
You still don’t get it: I’m not saying morality is a form of empathy or compassion; morality evolved from empathy and compassion as an ideal in an attempt to surpass the limitations of the former.
[/quote]
But if it were a human construct it would be under our control and we could make it anything. The problem is, still, that with out freewill, there is no morality. And freewill is in no way, shape, or form a human construct. Whether you support freewill or determinism, your still supporting metaphysical entities that we are subject to. If we’re subject to it, we could not have possibly created it. You are you subject to your creation, your creation is subject to you.
Right, altough I do feel that you still not quite get what I mean, let’s just cut this short and say that I don’t think free will exists.
[quote]ephrem wrote:
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]ephrem wrote:
[quote]pat wrote:
And I really don’t know how many ways I can express that emotion can be misplaced and often is, and that the precedent of compassion is irrelevant. It’s a by product. Compassion does mean moral. You can have compassion for evil.
For something to be moral or immoral you need a very important component, Freewill. With out freewill, there is no morality. If you cannot choose to do otherwise, then whatever action you do is morally inert. It has no moral basis what so ever. If you are simply a function of your emotions, there is no morality.
If you were correct, then any thing can be a moral act so long as emotionally it feels moral. There are no rules then, period. Because consensus without absoluteness is just a fad. It’s therefore not wrong to rape somebody if you are ok with it. Since people who rape are usually ok with it, there is no moral issue. That’s what you are asserting. Everything ok, as long as you are ok with it. That’s simply not true, you know it, but you won’t admit it.[/quote]
You still don’t get it: I’m not saying morality is a form of empathy or compassion; morality evolved from empathy and compassion as an ideal in an attempt to surpass the limitations of the former.
[/quote]
But if it were a human construct it would be under our control and we could make it anything. The problem is, still, that with out freewill, there is no morality. And freewill is in no way, shape, or form a human construct. Whether you support freewill or determinism, your still supporting metaphysical entities that we are subject to. If we’re subject to it, we could not have possibly created it. You are you subject to your creation, your creation is subject to you.
Right, altough I do feel that you still not quite get what I mean, let’s just cut this short and say that I don’t think free will exists.
[/quote]
Then morality doesn’t exist. Which means culpability doesn’t exist which means that all rewards and punishments are completely unjustified.
When faced with certain choices we make a decision based on certain predispositions, but that doesn’t mean we can’t make better choices.
If morality does not exist as a separate, self-evident entity then nothing changes because, as kamui said and as you agreed with him, we act as if it exists anyway.
We, as human beings, are able to break character. We can overrule our instincts and make a better choice.
I think a lot of drama and confusion comes from the fact that we just don’t know ourselves that well, and I’ve found that only with self-knowledge comes the understanding of others.
It’s not a black and white world out there.
If there is no free will, there is actually no choice.
We only think we make some “choice” because of our ignorance of the external and internal factors that determines and explains our actions.
And if there is no choice, there is no “better choices”, only better outcomes.
[quote]
If morality does not exist as a separate, self-evident entity then nothing changes because, as kamui said and as you agreed with him, we act as if it exists anyway.[/quote]
there is still a difference between the two positions : one is inconsistent, and, as such, weaker.
[quote]
We, as human beings, are able to break character. We can overrule our instincts and make a better choice.[/quote]
if you believe this, then you do believe in free wil.
This power to “break character”, “overrule our instinct” and “make a better choice” IS free will.
Tiribulus does not believe in free will, but, consistently, he absolutely doesn’t believe that we can “break character” or overrule anything without God’s predetermined grace.
He believes that spiritually dead autonomous men are powerless and literally bound to sin.