Homosexuality and Natural Law -- A Concern

[inocente]

This is the issue I have with scenarios like the Trolley Problem referred to by inocente above. It places the subject into a position of absolute responsibility as if “everything” hangs on their choice of options. Why is there a need to presume this kind of scope to moral decision-making?

I’d be surprised if you can find any undergraduate course on ethics or psychology (or even politics) which doesn’t use the trolley problem or something like it to discuss how we use moral reasoning.

Inocente’s “live and let live” presumes a kind of ignorance regarding human “good” and, therefore, cannot bring itself to even suggest to others that they may be plying a misconceived notion of “the good.” The presumption seems to be “You don’t really know what is objectively good for you, so stop trying to tell everyone else what that good is.”

And this again is misrepresenting what I’ve said. You do not know whether allowing gays to bond, express their love and form their own family is objectively less good for them or for society than stopping them. You have various not so hot arguments, such as the one about machine parts based on pre-scientific notions of women as no more than incubators, but objective is about facts, and facts are about real-world evidence, and currently there is no society which has not discriminated against gays for long enough.

While we have lots of evidence that treating gays differently from others leads to bullying and homophobia.

Notice, (inocente,) that “live and let live” does not define what I expect (or what I must tolerate) from the cat, but, rather, that a prior conception of what it means to be a “cat” guides when I have a right to intervene and not allow the cat to “live” in any un-catlike way it chooses.

Notice, (Pedro) that you are still chasing after your curious strawman.

 

[Peter_Plato]

Notice, (Pedro) that you are still chasing after your curious strawman.

Your stock-in-trade is to find some innocuous phrase or archaic precept and press it into service by making contentious claims based upon it, then, when challenged, you back down into a ”I didn’t say that" denial that you intended the phrase to function in the way that others understood you to mean.

This is reminiscent of snake oil salesmen who make outlandish “cure all” claims about their product, but when confronted resort to accusing their hearers of mishearing what they claimed.

Okay, the “curious straw man” is mine as long as we agree it doesn’t keep the crows and blackbirds from stripping the field of any point worth spending one’s time trying to raise.

 

[Peter_Plato]

I’d be surprised if you can find any undergraduate course on ethics or psychology (or even politics) which doesn’t use the trolley problem or something like it to discuss how we use moral reasoning.

And your point would be?

Notice you didn’t defend the Trolley Problem by addressing my concern with it, but merely by stating some tangential point to divert attention. A typical sleight of hand “parlour trick.”

Regardless of whether the Trolley Problem is used in undergraduate courses, the question is whether it properly presents ethical dilemmas of a kind that human moral agents ought to be concerned about.

 

[inocente]

Your stock-in-trade is to find some innocuous phrase or archaic precept and press it into service by making contentious claims based upon it, then, when challenged, you back down into a ”I didn’t say that" denial that you intended the phrase to function in the way that others understood you to mean.

Google live and let live and you’ll find lots of dictionary definitions, and I’ve been consistent with all of them. If you can find any definition which serves your perverse reading then post it. You know exactly what I’ve been arguing for, and after you’ve wriggled and shimmied all over the shop you’ve had to resort to your standard tactic of ad hominem, ad hominem and more ad hominem. If you have an argument against the right of privacy then let’s hear it, but come back with more ad hominem and I’ll just keep asking that same question, you don’t get to bully me.

:coffeeread:

 

[inocente]

And your point would be?

Notice you didn’t defend the Trolley Problem by addressing my concern with it, but merely by stating some tangential point to divert attention. A typical sleight of hand “parlour trick.”

Regardless of whether the Trolley Problem is used in undergraduate courses, the question is whether it properly presents ethical dilemmas of a kind that human moral agents ought to be concerned about.

You asked, and I quoted you asking, “Why is there a need to presume this kind of scope [as if “everything” hangs on their choice] to moral decision-making?”

The answer I gave assumed you might know at least a little about moral reasoning, so I wouldn’t have to spell it out, or “divert attention” by “sleight of hand” as you put it.

But as you need it spelled out, it’s because we are moral agents. If we are to have a well developed conscience then we need to understand how we reason morally. For example the same person will arrive at different decisions in various versions of the trolley problem, and understanding why we do this is very important in knowing the strengths and weaknesses of our moral intuitions and in knowing ourselves.

 

[inocente]

Found one of Judy Thomson’s original papers in which she discusses differences in moral reasoning on the trolley problem, from 30 years’ ago - everything is online these days!

philosophyfaculty.ucsd.edu/faculty/rarneson/Courses/thomsonTROLLEY.pdf

Thomson, Judith Jarvis. Yale Law Journal 94.6 (1985): 1395-1415.

 

[Peter_Plato]

You asked, and I quoted you asking, “Why is there a need to presume this kind of scope [as if “everything” hangs on their choice] to moral decision-making?”

That is the crux of the issue, is it not?

You need to “presume this kind of scope” in order to justify same sex behaviour under “live and let live” as a moral principle. Which you claimed it to be.

The point being that "moral decision-making” must occur before applying “live and let live.” Moral decision making is what defines the scope. You cannot use “live and let live” to define the scope of what is allowed if “what is allowed” is morally questionable.

Yet that is precisely what you argued for in attempting to justify same sex behaviour by what you claimed to be the moral principle of “live and let live.”

I leave it to impartial readers to go back through the posts to see if this little bit of ideological snake oil wasn’t precisely what you gleefully attempted to pawn off on the unsuspecting masses.

 

[Peter_Plato]

Found one of Judy Thomson’s original papers in which she discusses differences in moral reasoning on the trolley problem, from 30 years’ ago - everything is online these days!

philosophyfaculty.ucsd.edu/faculty/rarneson/Courses/thomsonTROLLEY.pdf

Thomson, Judith Jarvis. Yale Law Journal 94.6 (1985): 1395-1415.

This is interesting because I was tempted (in my previous post) to use Thomson’s violinist thought-experiment as having precisely the same issues as the Trolley Problem regarding human moral reasoning. It abuses appropriate moral perspective with regard to human agency.

Clearly, it was her paper that was instrumental in legitimating the “right” of a woman to kill another innocent human being. It succeeded, I would suggest, by bestowing an illegitimate moral “right” under the guise of a “perspective” assumed to be required for solving a moral quandary.

 

[inocente]

That is the crux of the issue, is it not?

You need to “presume this kind of scope” in order to justify same sex behaviour under “live and let live” as a moral principle. Which you claimed it to be.

The point being that "moral decision-making” must occur before applying “live and let live.” Moral decision making is what defines the scope. You cannot use “live and let live” to define the scope of what is allowed if “what is allowed” is morally questionable.

Yet that is precisely what you argued for in attempting to justify same sex behaviour by what you claimed to be the moral principle of “live and let live.”

I leave it to impartial readers to go back through the posts to see if this little bit of ideological snake oil wasn’t precisely what you gleefully attempted to pawn off on the unsuspecting masses.

The snake oil is that you asked your question in connection with the trolley problem, and your audience roared their disapproval at your sleight of hand by quietly switching the answer to something else. But leaving aside your shell game, of course everything depends on our choices. When someone cuts you up in traffic, you can’t thumb through a rule book to decide whether to rear-end them or to let it go.

Also I can’t see why you continue to argue that live and let live is not a moral principle, since it fulfills any definition of “moral principle”, or if you prefer, “moral” and “principle” separately. For instance, it says it is wrong to run people out of town because they have a different religion, as is currently happening in Northern Iraq, as their right to freedom of worship is morally more important than everyone coming to the place of worship of the guy with the gun.

It says it is wrong to get upset with people who vote for another party, as their right to free speech is morally more important than them agreeing with you.

It says it is wrong to deny someone else the right to express her love to her partner, when they are not breaking any laws and are in their own home, as her right to dignity, and to privacy, and to a family, are morally more important than your opinion of how her should lead her life.

 

[inocente]

This is interesting because I was tempted (in my previous post) to use Thomson’s violinist thought-experiment as having precisely the same issues as the Trolley Problem regarding human moral reasoning. It abuses appropriate moral perspective with regard to human agency.

Clearly, it was her paper that was instrumental in legitimating the “right” of a woman to kill another innocent human being. It succeeded, I would suggest, by bestowing an illegitimate moral “right” under the guise of a “perspective” assumed to be required for solving a moral quandary.

Ad hominem Her views of other things have nothing to do with how the trolley problem is used to analyze moral reasoning. In any event, as two Catholic posters on this very thread recently had a conversation about whether murder or torture is always wrong, I think you can’t use Thomson as an excuse.

 

[Peter_Plato]

Ad hominem Her views of other things have nothing to do with how the trolley problem is used to analyze moral reasoning. In any event, as two Catholic posters on this very thread recently had a conversation about whether murder or torture is always wrong, I think you can’t use Thomson as an excuse.

Of course, by accusing me of an ad hominem, you, deftly or otherwise, bypassed my point that both the Trolley problem and the violinist thought experiment suffer from the same issue regarding moral perspective. The point is that they both undermine human morality by setting up a false moral perspective. This is not an ad hominem, it is questioning the method by which incoherent moral principles are established as applicable to humans.

It requires some capacity to distinguish a flagrant abuse of method from an attack on the proponent of the abuse, but you should, at least, understand that merely calling out a proponent is not an ad hominem, no matter how much you insist that it appears to be.

Are you now gleefully going to insist that “live and let live,” is NOT MERELY a moral principle, but applies as a method of determining correct logical thinking, are you? I can imagine how this will go. Any philosopher or logician who disputes with others regarding any issue and does not allow them to have their own views on philosophical or moral issues - because s/he disputes those views publicly - is flagrantly abusing the basic logical principle of “live and let live” and, therefore, should have their liciense to practice critical thinking revoked. Merely disagreeing with another person is tantamount to committing a vicious ad hominem BECAUSE by doing so you infringe on the logical principle of “live and let live.” You are free to think what you want, but never, ever disagree with anyone else - that act commits the most heinous of thought crimes: the ad hominem. Tsk. Tsk. You have failed to honour the “live and let live” credo that defines what we are as decent, kind and conforming human beings - you Neanderthal, you!

 

[Peter_Plato]

**

The snake oil is that you asked your question in connection with the trolley problem, and your audience roared their disapproval at your sleight of hand by quietly switching the answer to something else. But leaving aside your shell game, of course everything depends on our choices. When someone cuts you up in traffic, you can’t thumb through a rule book to decide whether to rear-end them or to let it go.

Who says there exists such a rule book?

What normal, morally sane, people do, in the case of uncertainty, is to use the incident as a case study. They do possibly refer to moral authorities, like instances, moral treatises, ethical theories, Christian or religious teaching, etc. to arrive at an appropriate response for “next time.”

What they don’t do is apply “live and let live” indiscriminately as if it has the force of a strong moral principle. "I’ll just let whoever do whatever because I strongly endorse “‘live and let live.’” Unless, of course, the have been radically convinced that moral relativism is the de facto standard for all moral behaviour. I haven’t met many who are that gullible, however. Most reasonable human beings stop at some other definitive point such as when harm or injustice is done, rights are infringed or the law is being broken.

Also I can’t see why you continue to argue that live and let live is not a moral principle, since it fulfills any definition of “moral principle”, or if you prefer, “moral” and “principle” separately.

I just though of another reason why “live and let live” cannot be a moral principle.

Most morally sane human beings have two distinct “stops” in terms of how they respond to the behaviour of others.

1. If another person’s behaviour is deemed “immoral” that would justify the application of some means (the law, force, action of some kind) to compel others to adhere to the moral standard.
2. If another person’s behaviour is merely deemed unwise, impractical, or in some other way inappropriate or unwarranted (but not immoral,) the response would be a less than compelling form of intervention, such as advice, a jibe, a talking to, or even reeming them out publicly.
3. Only with regard to behaviours that do not fit the other two levels, does “live and let live” become the typical response.

Now, since 2) behaviours are not considered immoral, but most morally sane people would nonetheless intervene in some way not requiring moral sanction, this middle ground demonstrates that intervention (thus the application of ~ {not} live and let live) does not require moral grounds. This means “live and let live” cannot have the force of a moral principle because it can be safely ignored on non-moral grounds.

Yes, I know.

I disagree with you so I must be committing an ad hominem against you.

 

[Charlemagne_III]

Google live and let live and you’ll find lots of dictionary definitions, and I’ve been consistent with all of them. If you can find any definition which serves your perverse reading then post it. :coffeeread:

When Pope Francis is reported to have said “Live and let live,” do you think he was talking about sodomy? What is that if not a “perverse reading”?

How many sodomites have to die from AIDS to establish that the principle of tolerating sodomy is “Die and let die”?

 

[inocente]

Of course, by accusing me of an ad hominem, you, deftly or otherwise, bypassed my point that both the Trolley problem and the violinist thought experiment suffer from the same issue regarding moral perspective. The point is that they both undermine human morality by setting up a false moral perspective. This is not an ad hominem, it is questioning the method by which incoherent moral principles are established as applicable to humans.

It was ad hominem to raise her views on something else.

It’s most strange that you think these moral dilemmas can undermine morality. There is no right answer to them. The whole point is there’s no right answer and so the individual has to use reasoning, and this allows the reasoning to be explored.

The trolley problem is used in many undergraduate philosophy and psychology classes, for instance two which a online are Michael Sandel’s Justice class at Harvard and Tamar Gendler’s Human Nature class at Yale.

I looked at Sandel’s course some time back. Watch the first ten minutes of the opening lecture to see how these dilemmas are used. (Note in passing that the video has a hit count of more than 5 million, which imho is pretty impressive for a lecture).

You’ll have to explain how you think courses which explore justice, the harmony of the soul and moral philosophy from Plato et al up to modern times can in any sense undermine human morality.

Unless you’re against people thinking for themselves instead of mindlessly following your rulebook of course.

Are you now gleefully going to insist that “live and let live,” is NOT MERELY a moral principle, but applies as a method of determining correct logical thinking, are you?

No, it would be very silly to try to claim that live and let live means the opposite of what it says and somehow implies 1984, the Soviets, Mao Tse-tung, North Korea, the Taliban, and all follow travelers inside and outside philosophy.

But at least you now agree that live and let live is a moral principle, so that is progress of a kind.

 

[inocente]

Who says there exists such a rule book?

Not me, for sure.

What normal, morally sane, people do, in the case of uncertainty, is to use the incident as a case study. They do possibly refer to moral authorities, like instances, moral treatises, ethical theories, Christian or religious teaching, etc. to arrive at an appropriate response for “next time.”

So… now you agree that moral dilemmas are useful is exploring moral reasoning and intuitions? Much confused I am, Obi.

What they don’t do is apply “live and let live” indiscriminately as if it has the force of a strong moral principle. "I’ll just let whoever do whatever because I strongly endorse “‘live and let live.’” Unless, of course, the have been radically convinced that moral relativism is the de facto standard for all moral behaviour. I haven’t met many who are that gullible, however. Most reasonable human beings stop at some other definitive point such as when harm or injustice is done, rights are infringed or the law is being broken.

We already said that it only applies to law abiding citizens, that’s what the Pope means by it too. We’ve been round this several times so I refer you to previous posts.

*I just though of another reason why “live and let live” cannot be a moral principle.

Most morally sane human beings have two distinct “stops” in terms of how they respond to the behaviour of others.

1. If another person’s behaviour is deemed “immoral” that would justify the application of some means (the law, force, action of some kind) to compel others to adhere to the moral standard.

1. If another person’s behaviour is merely deemed unwise, impractical, or in some other way inappropriate or unwarranted (but not immoral,) the response would be a less than compelling form of intervention, such as advice, a jibe, a talking to, or even reeming them out publicly.

1. Only with regard to behaviours that do not fit the other two levels, does “live and let live” become the typical response.

Now, since 2) behaviours are not considered immoral, but most morally sane people would nonetheless intervene in some way not requiring moral sanction, this middle ground demonstrates that intervention (thus the application of ~ {not} live and let live) does not require moral grounds. This means “live and let live” cannot have the force of a moral principle because it can be safely ignored on non-moral grounds.*

It still fulfills any and every definition of “moral principle”, or if you prefer, “moral” and “principle” separately no matter how many weird and wonderful arguments you make otherwise. It is very frustrating to have to keep going over the same ground. Please come up with something substantive.

*Yes, I know.

I disagree with you so I must be committing an ad hominem against you.*

Another attempt to ignore definitions. Your ad hominem against Thomson was “some irrelevant fact about the author of or the person presenting the claim or argument” - en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem

 

[inocente]

When Pope Francis is reported to have said “Live and let live,” do you think he was talking about sodomy? What is that if not a “perverse reading”?

Everything has to be repeated ad infinitum on this thread. This was already gone into earlier. It’s not as if the posts have dissolved, they’re all still there.

How many sodomites have to die from AIDS to establish that the principle of tolerating sodomy is “Die and let die”?

Everything has to be repeated ad infinitum on this thread. Far more heterosexuals engage in sodomy, in the form of oral sex.

By far the highest death rate from AIDS is amongst straight men and women in Sub-Saharan Africa, and over 2 million children there are infected. So if AIDS is a judgment from God, as you appear to be claiming, it would not be against sodomites, but African kids.

 

[Peter_Plato]

By far the highest death rate from AIDS is amongst straight men and women in Sub-Saharan Africa, and over 2 million children there are infected. So if AIDS is a judgment from God, as you appear to be claiming, it would not be against sodomites, but African kids.

Aids is a “special” case since the manner in which it is diagnosed in Africa differs substantially from how it is in western countries. The use of non-specific tests such as ELISA and Western Blot in many African countries may radically skew numbers since a variety of parasitic infections and other viral infections will give a positive result.

The Western Blot is an antibody test, which, according to Dr Makgoba, is one of the tests used to confirm the diagnosis of HIV infection in South Africa. Dr Sonnabend reported that he regularly uses the Western Blot as a confirmatory test for HIV infection in the USA. A positive Western Blot result is synonymous with HIV infection and the attendant risk of developing AIDS. He was satisfied that there was general agreement on the correlation between Western Blot and AIDS and patients that were suffering from AIDS always reacted positively to the Western Blot test.

However, a number of concerns were raised around the specificity, reliability and reproducibility of the Western Blot test.

Dr Turner believed that the Western Blot should not be used to confirm and validate the results of the ELISA test since the Western Blot and ELISA tests are based on the same antibody reaction mechanism. As with the ELISA test, another concern over the use of the Western Blot test is its non-specific positive reaction to a number of diseases (including tuberculosis, a variety of parasitic infections and other viral infections) in the absence of HIV infection. The antigens used in the Western Blot test may be similar or identical to other human proteins, and hence the results of the Western Blot may thus not provide an indication of HIV infection.

Dr Papadopoulos-Eleopoulos presented a transparency showing the results of a Western Blot test with a number of samples from leprosy, TB and AIDS patients. It appeared that the Western Blot results from the different samples were indistinguishable from one another, showing the Western Blot test to be non-specific and unreliable. All the samples tested positive, even those from leprosy and TB patients. In further deliberations, Dr Mark Smith pointed out that Max Essex had already demonstrated the indeterminate results from Western Blot results in 1994. The above underlines the fact that the Western Blot test cannot be used as a determinate diagnostic tool.
Source: virusmyth.com/aids/hiv/panel/chapter4.htm

There is sufficient controversy among the medical establishment to question whether your point above holds any water.

virusmyth.com/aids/controversy.htm

 

[Charlemagne_III]

By far the highest death rate from AIDS is amongst straight men and women in Sub-Saharan Africa, and over 2 million children there are infected. So if AIDS is a judgment from God, as you appear to be claiming, it would not be against sodomites, but African kids.

Why do you have to go to Africa to get your proof for what is happening in America?

earstohear.net/Separation/sodomy.html

 

[djames99]

1. Are you saying there is a cure for homosexuality?
2. The intent of this thread is to understand why homosexual activity is wrong. It is a philosophical question that has nothing to do with “homosexuality”, since homosexual activity is not terribly uncommon among straight people.

1. Yes. Devotion to the Blessed Virgin through the Rosary.
2. Not spiritually healthy. All understanding has it’s end in the wisdom of God. What has been made clear by God is no longer food for thought. Also, our limited reasoning may terminate at a point where it may surmise to a negative, when the data would under permitted circumstances provide a continuation to a positive. You then have a group who may think everything is considered and a premise has run it’s course, therefore they change to take on an opposing view, when all along data was withheld from above. There is no excuse even in this, has we are told that not all knowledge is revealed in our time. On this issue however, we know God’s opinion, and there is no longer anything to discuss has the opposite can only bode ill as it is false.

 

[inocente]

Aids is a “special” case since the manner in which it is diagnosed in Africa differs substantially from how it is in western countries. The use of non-specific tests such as ELISA and Western Blot in many African countries may radically skew numbers since a variety of parasitic infections and other viral infections will give a positive result.

There is sufficient controversy among the medical establishment to question whether your point above holds any water.

My browser blocked the site that you linked, and it turned out to be because a number of users have complained about its AIDS denial, see en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HIV/AIDS_denialism

I referred to the Sub-Sahara, which is 6,000 km from the Republic of South Africa, where your linked report supposedly originated, if it has any credibility.

Anyone who depends on denying there is AIDS in Africa to make their argument work must be desperate. I’ll stick with figures from UN, UNESCO, universities and so on.