 |
Bible-Discussion.com
Private Bible Studies and Christian Fellowship Available - Ask Nobby
|
|
|
| Author |
Message |
Ana
King of the Jungle
Joined: 10 Mar 2006
Posts: 1566
Location: BC
|
 Posted: Thu Feb 01, 2007 12:26 pm Post subject: |
 |
|
| Trinity1 wrote: | | P1234567890 wrote: | Yes, this is a pretty good characterization. Secular humanist philosophy is basically all of the moral teachings of Jesus Christ without any of the spiritual and mystical aspects.
Trinity, I don't see how you can possibly object to it. |
Christian morality without a moral authority (God) is not morality at all... but the imposition of ones beliefs on the other based on what that person decides.
Joe Stalin, for an example, his philosophy was what was good for Russia was good for the whole. If the individual was hurt in the process... to bad... the greater good of majority was what mattered. |
Sounds like the Moses stories to me - what's good for Moses' people is good for the whole, right? Who cares about that village that got slaughtered? Who cares about the Egyptians? (that one seems to be a recurring theme, actually)
_________________
Truth doesn't care about theology, and theology doesn't care about truth.
Ana's Bananas |
|
| Back to top |
|
 |
P1234567890
Emperor of the Universe
Joined: 11 Mar 2006
Posts: 8324
Location: Victoria, Canada
|
| Posted: Thu Feb 01, 2007 12:30 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| Trinity1 wrote: |
Joe Stalin, for an example, his philosophy was what was good for Russia was good for the whole. |
Are you asserting that Stalin was a secular humanist?!?
Because if you are, then I feel obliged to tell you that you've totally missed what secular humanism is all about. In fact, if you lined up every human that ever lived with the person who most embodied secular humanist views on the left, and those who least embodied them on the right, then I'd say that Stalin would be somewhere in the bottom three.
For one, you can't really be a HUMANist if you are happy to kill literally millions of humans.
I would also argue that your role model Jesus Christ would be somewhere in the top three at the other end with people like Mahatma Gandhi.
_________________
"Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from religious conviction."
-Blaise Pascal
"...with or without religion, good people can behave well and bad people can do evil; but for good people to do evil -that takes religion..."
-Steven Weinberg
"I would bless my children with your destruction instead."
-Someone who shall remain anonymous. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
Trinity1
Emperor of the World
Joined: 02 Apr 2006
Posts: 3123
|
| Posted: Thu Feb 01, 2007 12:42 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| P1234567890 wrote: | | Are you asserting that Stalin was a secular humanist?!? |
I'm asserting that Stalin had no objective moral foundation from which to base his decisions on. It was seemed right at the time... good for the whole... virtuous.
The same applies to Secular Humanism. If it virtuous to murder Jews... then I guess the Nazi was a pretty good secular humanist.
If it was virtuous to murder 20 million of your own countryman to move your country into the 20th century... than I guess it is virtuous to be a secular humanist.
If it is virtuous to murder 3 million Vietnamese and Cambodians to instill in the atheistic morality… I guess secular humanism reigns on high.
However, none of these are Christian ideals... there is a moral code we are accountable to uphold. What you are forgetting is that Stalin, Hitler, Pol Pot… were accountable to no one other than themselves… and that is my point. Your philosophy is nothing more than empty rhetoric as it not accountable.
_________________
Exodus 20:11 "For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them..."
‘The German Führer, as I have consistently maintained, is an evolutionist; he has consciously sought to make the practice of Germany conform to the theory of evolution.’ Sir Arthur Keith |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
Trinity1
Emperor of the World
Joined: 02 Apr 2006
Posts: 3123
|
| Posted: Thu Feb 01, 2007 12:49 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| Ana wrote: | | Sounds like the Moses stories to me - what's good for Moses' people is good for the whole, right? Who cares about that village that got slaughtered? Who cares about the Egyptians? (that one seems to be a recurring theme, actually) |
Well... if the authority Moses carried wasn't from God... then perhaps you might have a point. However, if it is from God, then your don't.
_________________
Exodus 20:11 "For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them..."
‘The German Führer, as I have consistently maintained, is an evolutionist; he has consciously sought to make the practice of Germany conform to the theory of evolution.’ Sir Arthur Keith |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
P1234567890
Emperor of the Universe
Joined: 11 Mar 2006
Posts: 8324
Location: Victoria, Canada
|
| Posted: Thu Feb 01, 2007 12:55 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| Trinity1 wrote: | | P1234567890 wrote: | | Are you asserting that Stalin was a secular humanist?!? |
I'm asserting that Stalin had no objective moral foundation from which to base his decisions on.
|
Yeah, but you believe that Hindus and Buddhists, and Muslims and Sikhs and every single religion except for Christians (and probably even some of them) have no objective moral foundation from which to base their decisions on. You believe that only a tiny minority of humans have that capacity...
| Trinity1 wrote: |
It was seemed right at the time... good for the whole... virtuous.
The same applies to Secular Humanism. If it virtuous to murder Jews... then I guess the Nazi was a pretty good secular humanist.
If it was virtuous to murder 20 million of your own countryman to move your country into the 20th century... than I guess it is virtuous to be a secular humanist.
If it is virtuous to murder 3 million Vietnamese and Cambodians to instill in the atheistic morality… I guess secular humanism reigns on high.
However, none of these are Christian ideals... there is a moral code we are accountable to uphold. What you are forgetting is that Stalin, Hitler, Pol Pot… were accountable to no one other than themselves… and that is my point. Your philosophy is nothing more than empty rhetoric as it not accountable. |
Trinity, what on God's green Earth are you banging on about?!? If you think that Stalin, Hitler, and Pol Pot were secular humanists, then you REALLY don't know what you're talking about. You couldn't be more wrong. Every secular humanist on the planet completely rejects EVERYTHING that those men stood for.
_________________
"Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from religious conviction."
-Blaise Pascal
"...with or without religion, good people can behave well and bad people can do evil; but for good people to do evil -that takes religion..."
-Steven Weinberg
"I would bless my children with your destruction instead."
-Someone who shall remain anonymous. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
Pondering
King of the Jungle
Joined: 15 Sep 2005
Posts: 1512
|
| Posted: Thu Feb 01, 2007 12:58 pm Post subject: |
|
|
I'm with P#s on this one...
and Trinity, you're missing the key point that I've tried to stress twice....The good of the majority WHILE protecting the value of the Individual. Please review the list of attributes again a few posts up....
_________________
Links of note:"Review for Doubting Christians"
Sheep, Wolves, and Sheepdogs
“You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong...You cannot help men permanently by doing for them what they could and should do for themselves.” - Ronald Reagan |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
Ana
King of the Jungle
Joined: 10 Mar 2006
Posts: 1566
Location: BC
|
| Posted: Thu Feb 01, 2007 1:32 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| Trinity1 wrote: | | Ana wrote: | | Sounds like the Moses stories to me - what's good for Moses' people is good for the whole, right? Who cares about that village that got slaughtered? Who cares about the Egyptians? (that one seems to be a recurring theme, actually) |
Well... if the authority Moses carried wasn't from God... then perhaps you might have a point. However, if it is from God, then your don't. |
My point is that when Moses did it, it was God-steered morality, so it was deemed 'okay', so if someone else does the same, they're just following God-steered morality. Therefore you can't blame his attitude on godless morality, because it falls under the same attitude shown in the Bible, the moral authority of Christianity.
_________________
Truth doesn't care about theology, and theology doesn't care about truth.
Ana's Bananas |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
Trinity1
Emperor of the World
Joined: 02 Apr 2006
Posts: 3123
|
| Posted: Thu Feb 01, 2007 5:26 pm Post subject: |
|
|
OK.. it looks like we need to nail a definition of what is and what isn’t secular humanism.
Here is wikipedias definition of humanism:
| Quote: | | Humanism is a broad category of ethical philosophies that affirm the dignity and worth of all people, based on the ability to determine right and wrong by appeal to universal human qualities |
Notice… it is based on the ability to determine right from wrong based on an appeal to universal (let me say that again… universal) qualities. Did I mention universal qualities?
Now that we have that cleared up… secular is, according to the same website:
| Quote: | | Secular is the state of being separate from organized religion. |
So, we have a lifestyle…a way of life separate from religion.
Both combined would then mean a way of life separate from God (religion) based on a universal understanding of right and wrong.
First... my understanding was that everything is relative. There is no universal right and wrong.  Contradiction number uno.
Then, if my understanding of right and wrong is to ensure that Jews don’t live to see the light of day… and this belief is universally employed in my country… or areas in which I control (as one’s universe only reaches as far as one is able to exert control)… secular humanism was employed in Nazi Germany... universally. It was codified into law. Based on secular... the absense of religion... and humanism... the universal truth that Jews don't deserve to live as they are nothing more than animals... it appears that Hitler practiced his own form of secular humanism... and please... Hitler was no more Catholic than Saddam was Muslim.
Now, if there is an appeal to what is and is not universal, perhaps you can start discussing these agreed upon universal truths that have been approved by mankind… If you are going to cite these, I really would like to see who approved them.
Contradiction numero trey.
The same site defines Secular humanism as:
| Quote: | | Secular humanists generally believe that following humanist principles leads to secularism, on the basis that supernatural beliefs cannot be supported rationally and therefore all traditionally religiously associated activity must be rejected. |
So... no religion... universal right and wrong... and man decides what is and is not right and is and is not wrong.
Stalin made this decision.
Hitler made this decision.
Pol Pot made this decision.
None applied any religious prinicples to their decisions.
All maintained that their opinions were universally true as the individual benefited by their decisions.
Where were they wrong if they could not decide what is and is not right and wrong.
_________________
Exodus 20:11 "For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them..."
‘The German Führer, as I have consistently maintained, is an evolutionist; he has consciously sought to make the practice of Germany conform to the theory of evolution.’ Sir Arthur Keith |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
P1234567890
Emperor of the Universe
Joined: 11 Mar 2006
Posts: 8324
Location: Victoria, Canada
|
| Posted: Thu Feb 01, 2007 7:20 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| Trinity1 wrote: |
So, we have a lifestyle…a way of life separate from religion.
|
Not a lifestyle; a government. We're talking politics here, and not what life is like in people's homes.
| Trinity1 wrote: |
Both combined would then mean a way of life separate from God (religion) based on a universal understanding of right and wrong.
First... my understanding was that everything is relative. There is no universal right and wrong. Contradiction number uno.
|
This is where you go off the rails. If you take human beings, it doesn't matter where they come from, but the vast majority of them have certain morals instinctively built in. For example, all normal human beings have a sense of empathy and sympathy. Normal humans find it very hard to watch the suffering of others. Do you think that it is an accident that virtually every civilization in the history of the planet outlawed murder and theft?
This is what secular humanism means when it talks about universal values. And just to drive the point home: the values in the Bible are virtually identical to the values that humans have instinctively built in. Same with the values in pretty much every other holy book.
| Trinity1 wrote: |
So... no religion... universal right and wrong... and man decides what is and is not right and is and is not wrong.
Stalin made this decision.
Hitler made this decision.
Pol Pot made this decision.
None applied any religious prinicples to their decisions.
All maintained that their opinions were universally true as the individual benefited by their decisions.
Where were they wrong if they could not decide what is and is not right and wrong. |
Trinity, you're not listening to what Pondering has said again and again. The decisions made by those monsters were fundamentally incompatible with humanism because they were INHUMANE.
What do we mean when we say 'inhumane'. We mean that it goes against the basic values that all humans (except for psychopaths) are born with.
So stop trying to shoehorn Hitler and Stalin into the definition of Secular Humanism. It just doesn't work. You're just making yourself look as if you know nothing about Secular Humanism.
_________________
"Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from religious conviction."
-Blaise Pascal
"...with or without religion, good people can behave well and bad people can do evil; but for good people to do evil -that takes religion..."
-Steven Weinberg
"I would bless my children with your destruction instead."
-Someone who shall remain anonymous. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
Trinity1
Emperor of the World
Joined: 02 Apr 2006
Posts: 3123
|
| Posted: Thu Feb 01, 2007 7:37 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| P1234567890 wrote: | | Trinity1 wrote: |
So, we have a lifestyle…a way of life separate from religion.
|
Not a lifestyle; a government. We're talking politics here, and not what life is like in people's homes. |
| Quote: | | This is where you go off the rails. If you take human beings, it doesn't matter where they come from, but the vast majority of them have certain morals instinctively built in. For example, all normal human beings have a sense of empathy and sympathy. Normal humans find it very hard to watch the suffering of others. Do you think that it is an accident that virtually every civilization in the history of the planet outlawed murder and theft? |
So there are moral absolutes?  P... be extremely careful how you answer that one... the hole you just dug goes deeper than you can imagine.
| Quote: | | This is what secular humanism means when it talks about universal values. And just to drive the point home: the values in the Bible are virtually identical to the values that humans have instinctively built in. Same with the values in pretty much every other holy book. |
So... SH get to have their cake and eat it too... 
Anyway, you still did not tell me where those values come from. Who decides these values? If there is no God... man decides... I want to know which man... men... group of men get to make this decision. This is vitally important. You are claiming these are universal… says who?
Abortion is a central belief of secular humanism… it is not universally accepted… so your insistence is incorrect.
| Quote: | Trinity, you're not listening to what Pondering has said again and again. The decisions made by those monsters were fundamentally incompatible with humanism because they were INHUMANE.
What do we mean when we say 'inhumane'. We mean that it goes against the basic values that all humans (except for psychopaths) are born with. |
Then, can an entire group of people be psychopathic? These cannot be their universally held values? Sorry... I disagree with Pondering on this... and you (which isn't unusual  )
| Quote: | | So stop trying to shoehorn Hitler and Stalin into the definition of Secular Humanism. It just doesn't work. You're just making yourself look as if you know nothing about Secular Humanism. |
I'll quit when you can answer the above questions... I'm not as ignorant about this term as you have convinced yourself to believe P.
_________________
Exodus 20:11 "For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them..."
‘The German Führer, as I have consistently maintained, is an evolutionist; he has consciously sought to make the practice of Germany conform to the theory of evolution.’ Sir Arthur Keith |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
Pondering
King of the Jungle
Joined: 15 Sep 2005
Posts: 1512
|
| Posted: Thu Feb 01, 2007 7:56 pm Post subject: |
|
|
hmmm...
i'm trying to simplify the definition, and remain fairly objective, but it's difficult.
P#s (and my point) is secular humanists DO NOT hold that everything is relative...there are moral obsolutes. It's just the "source" of those absolutes is where folks differ. Christians say they come from God as outlined in the Bible. Muslims would say they come from Allah as outlined in the Koran. Jews...Jehovah...Torah. Buddist, Taoist, Sikhs, Shinto, etc, etc. Each of these has some element of supranatural source of
the moral authority.
Secular humanists hold that that source is intristic to what makes us all "human".
So again, dictators, by definition are not secular humanist because they project thier personal views on other WITHOUT respecting the intrinsic value of others.
As an aside, you took one issue "abortion" and made a moral judgement based on your cultural framework based in Christianity. That's a hot button issue that I don't want to get into here (we have a special thread chain just for that  )
Let's take one that's not so "hot". Birth Control. For Catholics, the Pope has said that using birth control, pill or condom, is a sin. As a Catholic, the Pope is God's authority on Earth and therefore, it's a moral violatin (ie sin) to use condoms. Yet millions of people who consider themselves true Catholics ignore this prohibition and use either the pill or condoms because they don't want children that can't afford to raise yet still want to have intimate relationships. God doesn't curse them...he doesn't smite them. The condom using Catholics behavior is more akin to a secular humanists beliefs than the Church's definition of a Catholic. Odd example, but hope it's illuminating
_________________
Links of note:"Review for Doubting Christians"
Sheep, Wolves, and Sheepdogs
“You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong...You cannot help men permanently by doing for them what they could and should do for themselves.” - Ronald Reagan |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
P1234567890
Emperor of the Universe
Joined: 11 Mar 2006
Posts: 8324
Location: Victoria, Canada
|
| Posted: Thu Feb 01, 2007 8:09 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| Trinity1 wrote: |
So there are moral absolutes? P... be extremely careful how you answer that one... the hole you just dug goes deeper than you can imagine.
|
The moral absolutes come packaged like this: virtually every single society since the beginning of time has certain laws in common: no murder, no theft, no telling lies, etc. It is not a coincidence that all of these cultures and civilizations INDEPENDENTLY came up with these laws DESPITE the fact that only the tiniest minority of them had any access to Bibles. These laws are a natural result of mankind's nature as an empathetic and sympathetic creature. The universality is in our moral instincts.
| Trinity1 wrote: |
Anyway, you still did not tell me where those values come from. Who decides these values? If there is no God... man decides... I want to know which man... men... group of men get to make this decision. This is vitally important. You are claiming these are universal… says who?
|
There is no 'decides'. Humans don't 'decide' not to be murderers. Humans by default find it very hard to kill other humans or make others suffer. We are hard-wired to be a social creature which gets along with others at least to a certain extent.
Says who? Just look at every civilization which has ever existed. They all have a core set of laws and values in common: don't rape, don't kill, don't steal, etc.
| Trinity1 wrote: |
Then, can an entire group of people be psychopathic?
|
No. Sociopaths and psychopaths only constitute a tiny minority of any society.
| Trinity1 wrote: |
| Quote: | | So stop trying to shoehorn Hitler and Stalin into the definition of Secular Humanism. It just doesn't work. You're just making yourself look as if you know nothing about Secular Humanism. |
I'll quit when you can answer the above questions... I'm not as ignorant about this term as you have convinced yourself to believe P. |
Trinity, you're making the argument that Hitler and Stalin were Secular Humanists! This is a patently absurd claim! I can't believe that you're even trying to pull off this argument!
It's like me arguing that Jesus Christ was a Satan worshipper.
Your claims are only true on opposite day!
_________________
"Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from religious conviction."
-Blaise Pascal
"...with or without religion, good people can behave well and bad people can do evil; but for good people to do evil -that takes religion..."
-Steven Weinberg
"I would bless my children with your destruction instead."
-Someone who shall remain anonymous. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
Trinity1
Emperor of the World
Joined: 02 Apr 2006
Posts: 3123
|
| Posted: Fri Feb 02, 2007 10:08 am Post subject: |
|
|
| P1234567890 wrote: |
The moral absolutes come packaged like this: virtually every single society since the beginning of time has certain laws in common: no murder, no theft, no telling lies, etc. It is not a coincidence that all of these cultures and civilizations INDEPENDENTLY came up with these laws DESPITE the fact that only the tiniest minority of them had any access to Bibles. These laws are a natural result of mankind's nature as an empathetic and sympathetic creature. The universality is in our moral instincts. |
Couple of things about this...
First, I'm surprised you didn't recognize the possibility of all of these laws may have been a result of them being handed down by God and then passed down through the generations... but… that is an aside.
Second, if these truths are suppose to be 'universal', you are saying they should be universally accepted by all human beings? That is after all what universal means... does it not? The problem is… they are not.
With that established... why is it proper in most societies to have your neighbors over for dinner, and then in some others, you have your neighbors for dinner? Cannibalism is, according to your criteria, a pretty universal moray, however, in the final analysis, it is indeed not universal using your criteria of it being universally accepted… as it turns out to be a manmade truth. There are… were societies in the Pacific Islands that practiced cannibalism…
| Quote: | | Quote: | | There is no 'decides'. Humans don't 'decide' not to be murderers. Humans by default find it very hard to kill other humans or make others suffer. We are hard-wired to be a social creature which gets along with others at least to a certain extent. |
Says who? Just look at every civilization which has ever existed. They all have a core set of laws and values in common: don't rape, don't kill, don't steal, etc. |
What? I'm sure we have heard of human sacrifices before?
| Quote: | | Trinity1 wrote: |
Then, can an entire group of people be psychopathic?
|
No. Sociopaths and psychopaths only constitute a tiny minority of any society. |
Then how is that an entire society, nation, culture fell for the ideal that Jews were not human? The entire country, and the majority of the eastern European Countries in their zeal to steal Jewish property went along with this idea. This wasn't just some isolated idiot saying this... this was law... this is what the nation practiced... and it flew directly in the face of your analogy that there are 'universals' endowed by or presumed by men... and my argument is, that by allowing men to decide does not allow for a 'universal' truth to exist. Therefore, secular humanism is what is determined by men… it is not some transcendent truth accepted by all humans.
| Quote: | Trinity, you're making the argument that Hitler and Stalin were Secular Humanists! This is a patently absurd claim! I can't believe that you're even trying to pull off this argument!
It's like me arguing that Jesus Christ was a Satan worshipper.
Your claims are only true on opposite day! |
P... my point is that, in the absence of some transcendent being (God), there can not be universal truths. If mankind is the arbitrator of what is and is not universally accepted, then anything can be true... as an accepted belief. If you have Pacific Islanders who, as a matter of practice, eat their enemies, then, what you and I would consider to be a universal truth... cannibalism is wrong... is not necessarily true to them. Therefore, it is not universal.
The same argument could be made of Greek culture during the Bronze Age. Here you have a universal truth... cultural practice, that essentially states that failing to be courteous to others is simply unacceptable. It was a universal truth then... why is it not a truth now? The simple answer, with out God, a god, or deity, truth is relative and can be made to fit anyone's paradigm. Therefore, if today the truth is that Jews are not human... then it makes your assertion that killing is universally accepted as wrong… is not true as killing those who are not considered human in not wrong… then we start defining what is and what is not a human… just like the abortion issue.
There are too many problems with your definition of SH for it to be some objective standard accepted universally. It is therefore subjective… and can be construed as a belief (of men) in the absence of a transcendent being. Without the objective truth of a transcendent entity, anything and everything can become true to each individual, thus becoming true to entire societies. In the end… not being universal. So, when Hitler, Stalin, and Pol Pot killed others, they were only acting upon their own sense of truth… right and wrong… how they felt others should be treated. After all… it wasn’t really them pulling the trigger now was it? It was those who endorsed these truths.
_________________
Exodus 20:11 "For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them..."
‘The German Führer, as I have consistently maintained, is an evolutionist; he has consciously sought to make the practice of Germany conform to the theory of evolution.’ Sir Arthur Keith |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
Pondering
King of the Jungle
Joined: 15 Sep 2005
Posts: 1512
|
| Posted: Fri Feb 02, 2007 11:56 am Post subject: |
|
|
First, thanks for the longer post Trinity, because I now understand where you're coming from...your POV is much clearer
| Trinity1 wrote: |
P1234567890 wrote:
The moral absolutes come packaged like this: virtually every single society since the beginning of time has certain laws in common: … These laws are a natural result of mankind's nature as an empathetic and sympathetic creature. The universality is in our moral instincts.
Couple of things about this...
First, I'm surprised you didn't recognize the possibility of all of these laws may have been a result of them being handed down by God and then passed down through the generations... but… that is an aside. |
Valid point, but Religion is subject to the same inspection...therefore, if morality does come from 1 monotheistic God, then why is there such observable differences (foreshadowing your cannibal point below as an example).
If anything, the final analysis seems to be that there is NO universal morality. Period. None. It's either the dogma on one faith group or the philosophy of another group. People don't like to think of that, even god-less ones. As I said before, SH becomes the religion of atheists...It has a moral base without a divine "arbiter/father-figure/judge".
| Trinity1 wrote: |
Second, if these truths are suppose to be 'universal', you are saying they should be universally accepted by all human beings? That is after all what universal means... does it not? The problem is… they are not. |
and reflexively true to any religion. It then becomes a battle of whose dogma is "more correct." God seems not to intervene. The Chinese have a 5000 year recorded history...no mention of Abraham in that. The Jews have about 3200 years of recorded history...but not everyone is Jewish, etc, etc, etc.
| Trinity1 wrote: |
With that established... why is it proper in most societies to have your neighbors over for dinner, and then in some others, you have your neighbors for dinner? Cannibalism is, according to your criteria, a pretty universal moray, however, in the final analysis, it is indeed not universal using your criteria of it being universally accepted… There ... were societies in the Pacific Islands that practiced cannibalism…
|
Valid point, but argues that there is no universal morality vice that God is the source of morality. If he allows it, then he at least tacitly accepts it. Go down that path further and God becomes either a racist or a bigot depending since he revealed himself to some people but not all people.
| Trinity1 wrote: |
Can an entire group of people be psychopathic? |
hmmm, yes and no. I think individuals are psychopathic. I think groups suffer from desensitation, "group think", and herd behavior. After WWII, most Germans appeared genuinely shocked by their own behavior despite actively or passively participating in genocide. There are lots of clinically interesting reports from the atrocities in Darfar and Rwanda and Serbia/Bosnia and other places about the average persons behavior/psychology in emotionally detaching from their "enemy." Some, the leaders mainly, are truly psychotic...the rest, get led. Many feel guilt and remorse afterward, so P#s has a point that I agree with.
| Trinity1 wrote: |
...secular humanism is what is determined by men… it is not some transcendent truth accepted by all humans. |
sorta like the Bible and Christianity? or Islam and the Koran? an honest point to ponder
| Trinity1 wrote: |
P... my point is that, in the absence of some transcendent being (God), there can not be universal truths. If mankind is the arbitrator of what is and is not universally accepted, then anything can be true... as an accepted belief. If you have Pacific Islanders who, as a matter of practice, eat their enemies, then, what you and I would consider to be a universal truth... cannibalism is wrong... is not necessarily true to them. Therefore, it is not universal. |
fair enuff. But would you argue that your beliefs are universally true to all mankind, or just to you?
| Trinity1 wrote: |
The simple answer, with out God, a god, or deity, truth is relative and can be made to fit anyone's paradigm. Therefore, if today the truth is that Jews are not human... then it makes your assertion that killing is universally accepted as wrong… is not true as killing those who are not considered human in not wrong… then we start defining what is and what is not a human… just like the abortion issue. |
And how does religious dogma or doctrine not do the same thing? Plenty of Holy Wars in the Bible. That's killing. For the recorded, the Bible specifically addresses the treatment of slaves. It makes no specific mention on abortion. Seems to me that God is pro-slavery and apethetic on abortion.
| Trinity1 wrote: |
There are too many problems with your definition of SH for it to be some objective standard accepted universally. It is therefore subjective… and can be construed as a belief (of men) in the absence of a transcendent being. |
Yep...it's a philosophy....a pretty benevolent one that has alot of Judeo-Christian underpinnings, but yep, that's pretty much true.
| Trinity1 wrote: |
Without the objective truth of a transcendent entity, anything and everything can become true to each individual, thus becoming true to entire societies. In the end… not being universal. |
Again, this differs from religion how?
_________________
Links of note:"Review for Doubting Christians"
Sheep, Wolves, and Sheepdogs
“You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong...You cannot help men permanently by doing for them what they could and should do for themselves.” - Ronald Reagan |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
P1234567890
Emperor of the Universe
Joined: 11 Mar 2006
Posts: 8324
Location: Victoria, Canada
|
| Posted: Fri Feb 02, 2007 3:45 pm Post subject: |
|
|
Ok Trinity, let me try a different approach. Forget about morality and forget about right vs. wrong and objective truth.
Secular humanists have a set of rules which they consider to be very important for creating a stable, successful, free society. These rules are very good, and they WORK. In fact, many of them are taken straight from the Bible.
Hitler and Stalin pretty much created societies in which ALL of these rules were violated, and therefore they were not secular humanists.
So your arguments that Hitler and Stalin were Secular Humanists are just plain wrong.
And by attacking Secular Humanism, you are in fact attacking the Bible, because Secular Humanism got many (most?) of its ideas from the Bible.
If you support the Bible, then you support Secular Humanism.
_________________
"Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from religious conviction."
-Blaise Pascal
"...with or without religion, good people can behave well and bad people can do evil; but for good people to do evil -that takes religion..."
-Steven Weinberg
"I would bless my children with your destruction instead."
-Someone who shall remain anonymous. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
|
|
FAQ 
Search 
Make a Donation 
Usergroups 
Contact
Register
Submit Articles 
Log in to check your private messages 
