Cultural Relativism

[Carl]

*I am here becuase untruths are spread here about atheists. Just a few that I’ve seen:

Atheists have weak fathers*

More often true than not. Well documented among notable atheists by psychologist Paul Vitz in his book Faith of the Fatherless. Where is your documentation to the contrary?

Atheists Deny the existance of god

I’ve never known an atheist who didn’t.

*Atheists worship no God *

I’ve never known an atheist who did.

You tend to make generalizations without any proof or documentation. If you can name any famous atheist who refused to deny the existence of God or who worshipped a god, I’d like to see your atheist’s remarks to that effect in book, chapter, and verse.

Can you do that for us?

Much obliged if you would.

 

[Monarchy]

*I am here becuase untruths are spread here about atheists. Just a few that I’ve seen:

Atheists have weak fathers*

More often true than not. Well documented among notable atheists by psychologist Paul Vitz in his book Faith of the Fatherless. Where is your documentation to the contrary?

I’ll do some research, but I can say my own father was not weak.

Atheists Deny the existance of god

I’ve never known an atheist who didn’t.

I don’t and most of the atheists I know don’t either

*Atheists worship no God *

I’ve never known an atheist who did.

You tend to make generalizations without any proof or documentation. If you can name any famous atheist who refused to deny the existence of God or who worshipped a god, I’d like to see your atheist’s remarks to that effect in book, chapter, and verse.

Can you do that for us?

Much obliged if you would.

What do famous atheists have to do with this?

 

[Carl]

What do famous atheists have to do with this?

You said:

I am here becuase untruths are spread here about atheists. Just a few that I’ve seen:

Then you go on to list three untruths.

If these untruths were being spread about atheists in general, a few of those atheists would have to be famous atheists.

Since documentation is what I am demanding from you, you could find plenty of that pertaining to untruths spread about famous atheists by citing the beliefs of these atheists that would contradict these untruths.

You can’t cite a single atheist to build your case because you can’t find a single one to corroborate your three so-called slurs against atheists.

Give it up, son. You’re out of your league.

 

[AnAtheist]

After reading all the posts absolute morals vs. relativism, I wonder how you regard those morals once set by your God:

• eating pork is wrong (wrong for Jews only? wrong in OT times only?)
• killing people for various deeds, e.g. having homosexual sex, is the law (morally ok in OT times only? valid today?)
• slavery is ok (which throughout the bible is not regarded as evil (NT says slaves must not run away from their captors), is it ok to have slaves here and now?)

Is our current opinion to those morals not a form of relativism?

 

[Carl]

AnAtheist

When you have satisfactorily answered post # 55, which concerns the devastating effect of moral relativism on our current morals, I will consider answering post # 61.

This thread is a two-way street. Please honor that fact by watching out for traffic coming your way.

Thank you.

 

[buffalo]

AnAtheist:

After reading all the posts absolute morals vs. relativism, I wonder how you regard those morals once set by your God:

• eating pork is wrong (wrong for Jews only? wrong in OT times only?)
• killing people for various deeds, e.g. having homosexual sex, is the law (morally ok in OT times only? valid today?)
• slavery is ok (which throughout the bible is not regarded as evil (NT says slaves must not run away from their captors), is it ok to have slaves here and now?)

Is our current opinion to those morals not a form of relativism?

Homosexual sex was OK in the OT?

 

[AnAtheist]

buffalo:

Homosexual sex was OK in the OT?

No, it was ok to kill to people who had it.

 

[AnAtheist]

Carl:

AnAtheist

When you have satisfactorily answered post # 55, which concerns the devastating effect of moral relativism on our current morals, I will consider answering post # 61.

This thread is a two-way street. Please honor that fact by watching out for traffic coming your way.

Thank you.

@your post #55: It seems to me, we have a slightly different perpespective of what relativism means. Morals are relative, or better to say not absolute, when we look at them in different societies, cultures or times. That is an observable fact.
What you seem to neglect is, once a society has defined its set of morals, within this society there is no room left for relativism. If you commit a crime you commit a crime. Relativism means, that crime might not be a crime in another culture. Wearing yellow clothes for example was a crime in imperial China. It was never a crime in Europe, and today it is not in China as well. When a society changes, the rules change.

What e are discussing here are meta-morals, i.e. is there a set morals that apply anytime and anywhere. You claim that such a set was established by your God, hence it is valid anytime and anywhere.

Now, your God has commanded his chosen people to follow a bazillion of laws, which christians don’t. Not eating pork, not wearing clothes made of different fabrics, to sacrifice animals, etc. I have heard apologetics (even here) claiming, those laws were good for Jews but not for everyone or those laws were good in OT times but not today. Alas, the rules have changed in time, that’s cultural relativism.

 

[Carl]

AnAtheist

Not so fast!

You haven’t answered the points raised in post # 55. Instead you offer sidetracks into meta-morals, whatever those are.

My point is this:

The Judeo-Christian opposition to homosexuality and pedophilia is ancient. It hasn’t changed because it is absolute. Likewise, it is part of the natural law and virtually every culture has censured it. Even when the Greeks practiced it openly in the Golden Age, Plato censured it as unmanly in his book Laws. It was condemned in the Old Testament and the New Testament. Are you saying this has changed?

And are you saying that any new morality is valid just because it is a new morality?

 

[ncgolf]

@your post #55: It seems to me, we have a slightly different perpespective of what relativism means. Morals are relative, or better to say not absolute, when we look at them in different societies, cultures or times. That is an observable fact.
What you seem to neglect is, once a society has defined its set of morals, within this society there is no room left for relativism. If you commit a crime you commit a crime. Relativism means, that crime might not be a crime in another culture. Wearing yellow clothes for example was a crime in imperial China. It was never a crime in Europe, and today it is not in China as well. When a society changes, the rules change.
.

Morals are absolute. By their nature they cannot change. What does change is how people perceive and act on those morals. That is relativism. While I am not familar with all cultures, the ones I am familar with generally have a set of morals that laws are based. Killing your neighbor for wearing a yellow shirt could be made legal, but it will always remain immoral. Written law does not have to be moral, it can be written to support immoral actions.

 

[AnAtheist]

Carl:

AnAtheist

Not so fast!

You haven’t answered the points raised in post # 55. Instead you offer sidetracks into meta-morals, whatever those are.

Meta-morals is to judge morals morally. I apply meta-morals as follows: If the moral or the outcome of a moral do not harm anyone, it is ok. Otherwise not. And the other way round.

The Judeo-Christian opposition to homosexuality and pedophilia is ancient. It hasn’t changed because it is absolute. Likewise, it is part of the natural law and virtually every culture has censured it. Even when the Greeks practiced it openly in the Golden Age, Plato censured it as unmanly in his book Laws. It was condemned in the Old Testament and the New Testament. Are you saying this has changed?

Regarding homsexuality - yes. Gays do not harm anybody by simply commiting homosexual sex among themselves. And if it is against nature, why do we observe it among animals (which do not free will to commit a sin I assume)?
Pedophilia - no, the morals have not changed. Pedophils actually harm someone, children without an own sexuality, as it is not developed yet.

And are you saying that any new morality is valid just because it is a new morality?

I say, that morals are defined by the society. And new morals are valid, if they meet the needs of the society’s members better than the old ones.

 

[kjvail]

You find the roots of modern relativism in J.S. Mills and J. Bentham’s Utilitarianism (www.utilitarianism.org) which defines what is good is as what brings the most “happiness” to the most people.

Happiness is such a vague and relative term that of course it changes from society to society and time to time, even from person to person in the same society at the same time!

All of this of course goes back to Protestantism which declared I don’t need any authority outside myself to decide what is right. I will ignore tradition and the work of others and rely on my own reasoning.
Pride goeth before a fall and the pride of one man deciding, without the benefit of tradition, the morality of acts is truly what the Greeks would have called Hubris.

Utilitarian morality says that the ends *do *justify the means therefore we see it’s extreme results in Marxist revolutions and other totalitarian societies.

 

[Carl]

AnAtheist

Regarding homsexuality - yes. Gays do not harm anybody by simply commiting homosexual sex among themselves.

The spread of AIDS is not harming others?

*And if it is against nature, why do we observe it among animals *

Experiments with rats have demonstrated that they engage in homosexual behavior only when they are living under extremely stressful situations. Remove the stress and the homosexuality goes away. This is hardly a recommendation for homosexuality among humans.

I said:

*And are you saying that any new morality is valid just because it is a new morality? *

You said:

I say, that morals are defined by the society. And new morals are valid, if they meet the needs of the society’s members better than the old ones.

Are you saying that to kill the unborn is o.k. if society says it is o.k.?

You conceded earlier that laws allowing sex with children would not be lawful because children have not a fully developed ability to make moral choices regarding sex. They would therefore be harmed. Weren’t you also conceding that it is unnatural for such sex to occur? And if it is unnatural, wouldn’t it always be unnatural? And would a decision by the Courts to allow it (as they have allowed the killing of the unborn) not be a violation of natural law?

And since you insist (as I do) on the principle that anything that does harm to children should not be legalized, would you agree that abortion does harm to children and should not be legal? And if you agree, would you also agree that the Catholic Church is right to stick to the natural law in this regard?

And would you agree that atheists have been notoriously silent on the subject of legalized abortion? If that is not true, name me more than one atheist who has spoken out against it.

 

[AnAtheist]

Carl:

AnAtheist

Regarding homsexuality - yes. Gays do not harm anybody by simply commiting homosexual sex among themselves.

The spread of AIDS is not harming others?

Of course it does, but heterosexuals spread AIDS as well. It is NOT limited to homos.

Carl:

Experiments with rats have demonstrated that they engage in homosexual behavior only when they are living under extremely stressful situations. Remove the stress and the homosexuality goes away. This is hardly a recommendation for homosexuality among humans.

It has been observed in wildlife, not only in experiments. I do not know the latest research, but afiak homosexuality is due to a hormon imbalance during pregnacy. If that’s true, it cannot be healed, recommended, or learned. Homosexuals ARE just the way they are. A theist might even say, they were created that way.

Carl:

Are you saying that to kill the unborn is o.k. if society says it is o.k.?

Killing someone does seriously harm him. Ergo I am against abortion, if there wasn’t a reason like the mother would be harmed. And economical reasons, which are the most applied ones at least here in Germany, are a ridiculous excuse in a rich country like ours.And it makes little sense to me to abolish death penalty and legalise a kind of killing at the same time.

Carl:

And would you agree that atheists have been notoriously silent on the subject of legalized abortion? If that is not true, name me more than one atheist who has spoken out against it.

Yes I do agree to that. I know one other than me though, and that is, sadly to say, not much.

 

[Carl]

AnAtheist

Of course it does, but heterosexuals spread AIDS as well. It is NOT limited to homos.

Yes, heterosexuals do spread AIDS, but this is generally done by promiscuous sexual conduct, which is as unnatural among hetero men and women as it is among homosexuals.

Moreover, the human penis is not shaped to fit the human anus, male or female, so that such sexuality is painfully contrary to the natural law.

We had been talking about relativism as it relates to the natural law. The point is that you had said homosexual sex was a victimless activity. No one is harmed. But someone is, so it is against the natural law as taught by Catholic theologians, just as any other kind of promiscuous conduct is against the natural law (prostitution, pedophilia, etc.).

Some actions are wrong in themselves, regardless of the circumstances. We can try to talk our way past guilt and responsibility, bemoaning our genes. This is merely the modern version of “The devil made me do it!”

Rank fatalism … the easy way out.

I’m glad to see that as an atheist you find abortion to be unnatural. I recently observed that Chester Dolan, an outspoken American atheist, agrees with you.

I quote from his book Religion on Trial.

“Abortion is not a human thing to do. It is monstrously inhuman.”

Dolan goes on to argue that at no stage of embryonic development can we fool ourselves into believing that an abortion is not the taking of a human life.

I have never heard any other atheist come this close to acknowledging the natural law as a basis for moral action. His essay on abortion could have been written by any traditional Catholic theologian.

 

[larryo]

In order to understand why people go astray in their search for God, one must look at the different ways that people err in their pursuit of truth. There is an animating force in man called the soul that enables us to know and contemplate truth. The power of the soul that can know is called the intellect. The object of the intellect is truth. The intellect can sometimes fail to know the truth. Even if the intellect does attain the truth, often the will (the power to choose), because of its weakness chooses a false or lesser good instaed of the true good. The intellect and will can mislead each other. If the will is attracted to evil, the intellect can distort the truth to make the evil seem more acceptable. If the intellect mistakes something evil for something good, the will naturally chooses the apparent good (the evil) rather than the true good.

Cultural or moral relativists and atheists need to address three aspects of their thinking: 1) Are they actually dealing with facts and sound reasoning or are they relying on imagination and wishful thinking? 2) Are they relying on emotions instaed of evidence and clear thinking? 3) Are they being seduced by moral error? (Often, people don’t seek the truth sincerely because it contradicts their immoral lifestyles and wounds their swollen pride.) Pride and immorality are perhaps the most common reasons why people reject God’s existence.

For our unbelieving friends, I would suggest that you look into the scientific work being done on intelligent design versus evolution. The current best estimate is that the universe is about 14 billion years old. Mathematically, this is not enough time for complex proteins to have assembled of their own accord into DNA and other bilding blocks of life, let alone a human being. I would also suggets that you read Professor Paul Vitz’s book, Faith of the Fatherless, to see if you fit the profile. In any event, best wishes to cultural relativists and atheists in their search for the Truth, which is a person, Jesus Christ. To search honestly, though, will require humilty and a certain level of naivete.

 

[buffalo]

AnAtheist:

I do not know the latest research, but afiak homosexuality is due to a hormon imbalance during pregnacy. If that’s true, it cannot be healed, recommended, or learned. Homosexuals ARE just the way they are. A theist might even say, they were created that way.

.

Catholic Medical Association - for the latest on homosexuality reaearch

 

[AnAtheist]

Since nobody cares to answer my previous post, I ask it outright: Is slavery immoral?

 

[Carl]

AnAtheist

Since nobody cares to answer my previous post, I ask it outright: Is slavery immoral?

One discussion at a time, please, so as not to leave us hanging and twisting, as it were.

I can’t speak for others. I’ve been waiting for several days to hear your answer to post # 55. When you finally responded today it was, I felt, a trifle unclear where you stand.

Do you agree, as I sense maybe you do, that some acts are objectively immoral, but that modern relativism has contributed to chaos in the world of morals?

Or do you maintain that all morality is relative? You seem to be poised to argue that case with your question about slavery.

I would like a flat out answer before moving on to your question.

Thanks for clarifying this.

 

[Carl]

larryo

I also have been pushing Paul Vitz’ book in various forums, but I have yet to find an atheist who has read it.

Wonder why.