Moral Relativism

[larkin31]

Can you explain why they are artificial? And circumstances to which they do not always apply (with regard to moral choices and decisions)?

Either-Or scenarios are a fallacy of logic. They nearly always falsely categorize and limit the complexity of experience into two (and ONLY two) polarized groups. Jesus famously commits this same error when he says, “You are either for me or against me.” Peter, for example, was both, depending on how close to the crowing of that rooster you asked him.

You haven’t explained why intelligent beings elsewhere in the universe are irrelevant to the nature of morality…

This was your idea. You explain it. You are one weird rhetorician, Tony. You mentioned alien life and now you are asking me to refute an idea that you have not even presented yet in ANY relevance. Please, tell us why you are talking about aliens?

 

[jonfawkes]

Yeah, but the sacrificial gift freely given out of love for a complete stranger is supremely and profoundly different than the act of a soldier jumping on a grenade to save his platoon.

You can’t know if the soldier acted out of love or duty or ???. You just know he did the act. Same with the friar. You can’t know his motivation, only speculate.

I can have a good day and you a bad one , the day is still the day. The value of the day is relative. The day is not good or bad, it’s just a day.

 

[PRmerger]

You can’t know if the soldier acted out of love or duty or ???. You just know he did the act. Same with the friar. You can’t know his motivation, only speculate.

Oh, we surely can, jon. We have the statements of the witnesses at the concentration camp testifying to the love with which Maximilian Kolbe offered in place of the prisoner Franciszek Gajowniczek. We have the canonization process, in which intense scrutiny is placed upon the life and martyrdom of the candidate. We have the witness of his life.

Now, as for the valorous soldier, what you say is true. Whether he did it out of love or duty, we’ll never know. It’s certain that there’s nothing recorded that he did this because he loved his Lord and offered his life so another might live, or whether it was just an instinctual reaction. Even if it was the latter it was heroic. But the same as that which Maximilian Kolbe did? Not so much.

I can have a good day and you a bad one , the day is still the day. The value of the day is relative. The day is not good or bad, it’s just a day.

Do you think that it is justifiable for the public to be more outraged at the sexual abuse done to a child by a priest than by a layman, jon?

 

[fhansen]

Yeah, but the sacrificial gift freely given out of love for a complete stranger is supremely and profoundly different than the act of a soldier jumping on a grenade to save his platoon.

I’d disagree on this point. A soldier may die in the line of duty without anticipating his death beforehand but jumping on a grenade to save ones platoon is acting way beyond an ordinary sense of duty. That’s an act of self-sacrificial love on par with any other. Remember the Good Samaritan wasn’t Christian either.

 

[jonfawkes]

Oh, we surely can, jon. We have the statements of the witnesses at the concentration camp testifying to the love with which Maximilian Kolbe offered in place of the prisoner Franciszek Gajowniczek. We have the canonization process, in which intense scrutiny is placed upon the life and martyrdom of the candidate. We have the witness of his life.

Now, as for the valorous soldier, what you say is true. Whether he did it out of love or duty, we’ll never know. It’s certain that there’s nothing recorded that he did this because he loved his Lord and offered his life so another might live, or whether it was just an instinctual reaction. Even if it was the latter it was heroic. But the same as that which Maximilian Kolbe did? Not so much.

Do you think that it is justifiable for the public to be more outraged at the sexual abuse done to a child by a priest than by a layman, jon?

You have the testimony that he offered his life. How do quantify love?

One can be more outraged but the crime is still the same. The priest presents himself as a model of goodness, so if he falls the fall seems greater. The crime is still the same. I think both should be castrated. The layman will do jail time, so should the priest. Alas it’s not the case. Moral relativity on the churches part.

 

[PRmerger]

I’d disagree on this point. A soldier may die in the line of duty without anticipating his death beforehand but jumping on a grenade to save ones platoon is acting way beyond an ordinary sense of duty. That’s an act of self-sacrificial love on par with any other.

Fair enough.

I can see your point.

Remember the Good Samaritan wasn’t Christian either.

Oh, indeed. I have never argued that one needs to be a Christian in order to be moral.

 

[PRmerger]

You have the testimony that he offered his life. How do quantify love?

Indeed. No one has attempted to “quantify love.”

One can be more outraged but the crime is still the same. The priest presents himself as a model of goodness, so if he falls the fall seems greater. The crime is still the same. I think both should be castrated. The layman will do jail time, so should the priest. Alas it’s not the case.

Indeed.

So you do have an understanding about differences in the same act, despite one life not having more value than another, eh?

I knew it all along.

Moral relativity on the churches part.

Huh?

 

[jonfawkes]

Indeed. No one has attempted to “quantify love.”

Indeed.

So you do have an understanding about differences in the same act, despite one life not having more value than another, eh?

I knew it all along.

Huh?

You are attempting to quantify it by saying one act was done out of “great” love while the other might have been done out of love, but is less worthy. So the love was greater in the first act than the second.

There is no difference in the act. They are equally horrible. Outrage over the act is reaction to the act not the act itself. If I don’t hold priests in high regard and expect them to act more moral than the rest of us then there is no more outrage than any other person committing the act. The relative value of outrage is mine not inherent in the act.

Pedophile laymen who are caught go to prison. Priests that are caught go to another parish or another church institution. It is a relative morality on the churches part. There is little to no culpability. Priests should go to prison just like anyone else. They should go on sex offender lists just like everyone else.

 

[fhansen]

oral relativity on the churches part.

Yes, another reason moral relativity is amoral.

 

[PRmerger]

You are attempting to quantify it by saying one act was done out of “great” love while the other might have been done out of love, but is less worthy. So the love was greater in the first act than the second.

I have qualified the love, not quantified it, jon.

Outrage over the act is reaction to the act not the act itself.

Huh?

If I don’t hold priests in high regard and expect them to act more moral than the rest of us then there is no more outrage than any other person committing the act. The relative value of outrage is mine not inherent in the act.

Right. You do indeed have a different reaction* to the very same act.*

My point exactly.

Pedophile laymen who are caught go to prison. Priests that are caught go to another parish or another church institution. It is a relative morality on the churches part. There is little to no culpability.

There was little to no culpability. That, thankfully, is changing.

Priests should go to prison just like anyone else. They should go on sex offender lists just like everyone else.

Yes, indeed they should.

 

[jonfawkes]

I have qualified the love, not quantified it, jon.

Huh?

Right. You do indeed have a different reaction* to the very same act.*

My point exactly.

There was little to no culpability. That, thankfully, is changing.

Yes, indeed they should.

No you are saying one love is greater than another – that is a matter of quantity.

If I have a reaction to an act, it is simply MY reaction, it doesn’t change the nature of the act. I can be more outraged but it doesn’t change the act. A Jewish person, or an Atheist or a Buddhist is going to have a different reaction to a pedophile priest than a Catholic person is. A Catholic person has more emotional investment in a priest than the others do. The act of pedophilia is still the same, regardless of who commits it.

So in the case of martyrdom - you can find one more compelling than another but the intrinsic value of one giving one’s life for another is the same. The act is the same. How we react to is different. One is not more or less of a sacrifice than the other.

 

[jonfawkes]

Originally Posted by jonfawkes View Post
oral relativity on the churches part.

I thought oral relativity was ok in the context of marriage.

 

[PRmerger]

No you are saying one love is greater than another – that is a matter of quantity.

Please do a search of my posts and see how many times I mention “quantity”.

(hint: the answer is 0)

Here’s how many times I mentioned “quality”.

Here.

and here.

and here.

and here.

and here.

 

[PRmerger]

So in the case of martyrdom - you can find one more compelling than another but the intrinsic value of one giving one’s life for another is the same. The act is the same. How we react to is different. One is not more or less of a sacrifice than the other.

Oh, indeed.

I have never said that martyrs differ in quality.

There is no way, however, that a soldier can be given the title of a martyr, as the Catholic Church defines it.

 

[jonfawkes]

Oh, indeed.

I have never said that martyrs differ in quality.

There is no way, however, that a soldier can be given the title of a martyr, as the Catholic Church defines it.

Of course not - you have to die for the Catholic faith to be a Catholic martyr. Few Martyrs died laying down their life for another. Most we just killed. Pope JP II had to some linguistic shuffling to make Maximilian a martyr, because technically he didn’t die for the faith, he died for another.

We, are talking about laying down one’s life for another. Sacrificing one life for another. You are talking about quantity when you speak to quality. If both lives are worth the same then both sacrifices are equal. If you say they are not equal, then one sacrifice must be grater than the other. Quantity.

 

[inocente]

It seems now that the moral relativists are trying to convey that a sacrifice of one’s life is an absolute good. There are no qualifiers to this, in their opinion.

Wasn’t my idea to refer to Kolbe, I’d never even heard of him before.

Anyway, “a sacrifice of one’s life is an absolute good” is patently false in an age of suicide bombers .

Exactly! What’s the final authority? Does gravity exist or does it not? In the end, the authority of gravity will get you down (ha ha!)

No, really dude, we must be using very different definitions of the word authority – to put us on the same page, could you cite a dictionary that says gravity has authority over us?

Whatever, you original point was:

Humans, as rational creatures, must question and reason and, in the end, submit to a final authority.

If it’s not biology which serves as our moral authority, then what (or Who) is?

There is no other answer but…

God.

Two questions.

1. Why must we submit to a final authority?
2. How can God be that authority when we don’t know His mind? For example, Hindus, Jews, Muslims and Christians have various views on the rightness or wrongness of artificial contraception. Which absolutely knows the mind of God, and how?

 

[tonyrey]

Yet it is obvious that any rational being is faced with the choice of being positive or negative, creative or destructive, selfish or unselfish regardless of any other characteristic - and that is the objective basis of all moral values.

Is the distinction between good and evil artificial? Does goodness enhance or impoverish life? Does evil promote or destroy harmony in society? Can you specify a case where one should be evil rather than good or destructive rather than creative? Is it positive or negative to reject the need for virtues like faith, hope, love and courage?

 

[PRmerger]

Of course not - you have to die for the Catholic faith to be a Catholic martyr. Few Martyrs died laying down their life for another. Most we just killed.

Ok.

But the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church.

Pope JP II had to some linguistic shuffling to make Maximilian a martyr, because technically he didn’t die for the faith, he died for another.

Ok.

We, are talking about laying down one’s life for another. Sacrificing one life for another. You are talking about quantity when you speak to quality.

Absolutely not.

I could proclaim that you are talking about apples when you are actually talking about monkeys…

If both lives are worth the same then both sacrifices are equal. If you say they are not equal, then one sacrifice must be grater than the other. Quantity.

Different in quality, substance and essence.

 

[jonfawkes]

Different in quality, substance and essence.

Collectively these are a statement of quantity. One sacrifice is greater than the other.

I’m saying S1=S2, your are saying S≠S, that S1 > S2.

 

[davidv]

Collectively these are a statement of quantity. One sacrifice is greater than the other.

At this point this is just your opinion You have not demonstrated that this is true. It is just an assertion, without evidence.

I’m saying S1=S2, your are saying S≠S, that S1 > S2.

This is not what the other is saying. You misunderstood.