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ribozyme
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What is a “being”… Don’t you mean all humans?
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johnnycatholic
Guest
I don’t necessarily wan’t to start a debatee about the existence of objective moral truth, but here is an argument for it I like:
argument against Society Says Relativism or Society Does Relativism is thus:
The Society Says relativist believes there is no objective morality due to the differences in activities that are morally acceptable. Take the practice in India of Indian widows who throw themselves on the funeral pyres of their husbands or the Indian tribe whose old folks have their children strangle them when they become too old and unproductive. Both of these customs are morally repugnant to the modern Christian mind, but if we look deeper, these customs are just expressions of moral principles which all humans share. In the case of the Indian tribe, sacrificing oneself for the good of the many has long been a moral principle of the west. In the case of the widow, it is an expression of wifely devotion, not an act of suicidal depression.
These differences of expression are ultimately rooted in what principles a given society puts emphasis on. So the difference is really only one of emphasis.
The only way true objective moral principles like this can exist is if they are built into the nature and essence of the universe, thus observable outside man and ringing true within man.
This could only be done by an intelligent Creator God.
Any morality concocted by individual man or societies need not be obeyed because they have no authority other than the violent means used to enforce them. So the choice is: 1) Universal objective moral principles built into the universe by God and backed by His authority or 2) Might makes right.
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johnnycatholic
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Being = any intelligent entity w/ a rational enlightened soul be it e.t. or human.
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Everstruggling
Guest
A lot of people seem confused by that. Which in turn baffles me. It’s really quite easy to understand. A plant produces a seed, the wind blows the seed through the air until it reaches good soil. The seed forms a new plant. Do the air, seed, plant or soil plan it? No.
You can think God plans it if you want, but you certainly don’t have to. Even if you think God plans out exactly how plant life will reproduce, does he plan on every single plant? I find the notion that a creator would plan every single, solitary event in the universe laughable. If anything can be chance, then everything can be. If there is any randomness at all, then creation itself could be random.
Have you heard about the programme that beat Kasparov at chess. The people who created it couldn’t beat Kasparov at chess, but the computer could. So yes, God can most certainly create a rock so heavy he can’t lift it.
Not greater, different or outside. Prove it’s greater.
It can be programmed to start and continue expanding. The universe isn’t infinite though, remember we discussed that?
It has to be finite or else the whole theory of God false apart.
Er… I do argue that. Frequently. All the time. Whatever caused the universe to be almost by definition was not alive in anyway that we would understand the term.
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ribozyme
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I do not think the universe is logical because things like “Christian atheists” exist such as Luboš Motl and Oriana Fallaci. Yes, there are no Penrose triangles out there.No, just the laws of logic. The cause of the universe must be logical or have logic in him to impart logic. Non-logical things are usually contradictions like square triangles, which are meaningless contradictions i.e. nothings. Logic is built into the universe like crazy. It is the only way we can reason things out so if the cause of the universe is non-logical then we cannot logicaly say anything about it, that is nothing logically flows from it including the existence of the universe.
There are things that contradict some logical postulates, such as the fact that parallel lines can intersect. For example, all the lines of longitude intersect at the North and South poles. No, we live in a preposterous universe, and it is our job to make sense of it.
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johnnycatholic
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God follows the rules of logic because he is logic, if you don’t believe that then follow your reasoning to it’s logical conclusion or read my post to ever above.You’ve already started with a false premise. God isn’t bound by our rules for He is eternity we are time, so we are bound by His necessarily but He isn’t bound by ours.
No, you started with a false premise which lead to a false conclusion. God isn’t bound by our rules, He’s eternity, we are time. God could have created the universe in 200 trillion years or one second per our concept of “time” for God is in the enternal now, everything is eternally now
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Everstruggling
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That completely refutes your own objection to my argument. The logic that governs the universe need not be the same logic that governs the universe of God. God doesn’t have to exist in time, doesn’t have to exist in matter, etc. So, we can not logically discuss what God is like. Are you arguing on my side or against it?No, just the laws of logic. The cause of the universe must be logical or have logic in him to impart logic. Non-logical things are usually contradictions like square triangles, which are meaningless contradictions i.e. nothings. Logic is built into the universe like crazy. It is the only way we can reason things out so if the cause of the universe is non-logical then we cannot logicaly say anything about it, that is nothing logically flows from it including the existence of the universe.
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johnnycatholic
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Parallel lines only intersect on a sphere I believe, and it is logical that they do so. He can’t be a christian athieist because that means he believes christ is God, he can say it but that don’t make it so. ALL the examples you gave here are illusions and prove that you don’t understand logic. I would say you were an existensialist, that said you are difficult to talk to about truth. Your last sentence makes no sense if the universe is absurd you can’t make sense of it so your own position is absurd. Make sense = draw logical conclusions.
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johnnycatholic
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God isn’t “in” a universe the universe is in God. Im trying to establish the fact that the cause of the universe must be logical because the universe is logical. To say that the cause of the universe is illogicalI means we a) don’t live in a logical universe which sucks the real (i.e. God given) meaning out of everything. b) would mean that there is no reason to think that the cause of the universe was the cause logically. I don’t see anything illogical in the fact that God doesn’t have to exist in time (though in a sense he does) or matter these conclusions about God were drawn logically through metaphysics (takes a while to explain) you could also use the ontological argument i.e. a God that exists in time is limited by time and thus not the greatest concievable being etc… Logic is an attribute of God like omnibenevolence or omnipotence, omnilogical.
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Everstruggling
Guest
What is more moral:
To act in a way that causes the greatest happiness?
To act in a way that you would want to become a moral law?
Or to act in accordance with the teachings of the Catholic Church?
These are completely different methods of calculating what is moral. They aren’t differences in emphasis, they are completely different standards as to what should be moral and what isn’t. Self-sacrifice might seem like a universal moral good, but it isn’t. There are many instances of self-sacrifice that are selfish and base, at least to observers of other backgrounds. There is significant room for debate as to what constitutes not only a moral act, but how one reasons whether an act is moral or not. There are those who debate whether morality really exists or not. If it is debatable, it’s not objective.
Compare this to something like weight. There are various measurements of weights. Stones, pounds, kilograms. But no matter how you calculate it 2 stone will be heavier than 1 stone, 28 lbs. is heavier than 14 lbs. and 12.72 kilos is heavier than 6.36 kilos. People will sometime disagree about which is heavier of 2 things, but they are willing to concede a common property of weight. They would agree it is possible to measure it and discover which was truly heavier. Doesn’t happen with morality.
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Everstruggling
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Okay, this is totally going around in circles. I don’t get the impression that you are even considering my points anymore. To tell you the truth, I’ve kind of given up on yours. It seems to me that you are arguing that the God you believe in has to exist, because he has to exist.
If you feel like going through and pulling some sort of coherent argument out of all of these posts, I’d be happy to re-engage otherwise I’m just going to give it a rest.
I wish you well johnnycatholic, but this is just getting too frustrating.
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johnnycatholic
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I disagree with your assertion that there are acts of self-sacrifice that are truly selfish at base. If this is the case, it isn’t really an act of self-sacrifice. I am not sure what you are thinking here, but an example would help.
I still have to maintain that my explanation of emphasis holds. In our culture, we revere caring for our elderly as a sacrifice instead of killing them so that the sacrifice is done by them. Emphasis is all that changes in this instance.
In the case of, say, sexual morality, nobody argues the morality of certain acts, such as premarital sex, homosexuality, bestiality, etc. People will argue the moral neutrality of these things, but no one says they are moral; they only deny their immorality.
Furthermore, i have to disagree that just because people will debate that there is or is not morality that it means it is objective. People will argue against morality, not because it doesn’t exist, but because they are trying to justify an act. People will argue geocentrism, that the earth is flat, that they didn’t steal something when a security camera clearly shows them caught in the act, etc. People argue against provable things all the time. This does not make their arguments valid, just existent.
Furthermore, people may say that morality is objective (or relativistic) but they really don’t believe it at heart. If I stole your wallet, you would know that is wrong. Certain things like stealing are just obviously wrong. People will try to argue that it is okay for them to steal (Wal-Mart’s just a big evil coroporation anyway), but that still does not mean it is arguable. There may be an instance where it is more moral to steal, as in to save a starving child where letting the child die would be a greater evil, but it is still not moral, only the lesser of two evils.
Finally, you may say there are people who will argue that there is no morality, but they will still get angry when you wrong them. I think you will find that almost everyone deep down really does believe there is such a thing as “weight”, to use your example. Teachers in classrooms argue for relativism all the time, but as soon as a student cheats on a test, guess who goes to the principal’s office? If the student’s standards of morality say cheating is okay, why can the teacher punish the student? Furthermore, why do we lock up rapists and murderers? Why don’t we just let them roam free with their standards of morality instead of judging them and imprisoning them? Because there ARE some moral principles the majority of people understand are necessary for a healthy society. Yeah, NAMBLA may disagree, but aren’t you glad we’ve judged them wrong?
The major immoral acts are self-evident; murder, rape, robbery, etc. The innate guilt we feel over these acts can be subdued over time; with each commission of the act, it gets easier to buy the lie you’ve told yourself to justify it. That doesn’t mean it stops being immoral, just that it stops feeling immoral.
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johnnycatholic
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I am trying to argue that God/cause is logical because creation is logically intelligable, creation would only be this way if its cause were logical and intelligable and posessed also the capacity for creation. The attributes of logic and intelligence are not rules that bind the cause/God they free it to be able to intelligently create.
Therefore the God/cause is by necessity Logical and intelligent. (basically the teleological argument)
I am also trying to argue against your version of the “how do you know this universe wasn’t caused by another universe with the ability to cause universes”. Your version was:
*It does beg the question, but a different universe has different rules. The universe of the computer geek could expand and contract endlessly. The God you postulate could create it. Life could have evolved according to Lamarckian evolution. It exists outside of our space and time. Once you slip the bonds of space and time the imagination has much more room to play. In other words, the turtles don’t need to play by the rules.
You are talking about a universe (for lack of a better word) that is free of the rules and responsibilities of ours*
I don’t believe that I have done a good job of this because I don’t have an accurate definition of what you mean by: “rules and responsibilities of our universe” I assumed you meant laws of logic like the law of non-c and the principal of e.m.
A universe/God/cause that did not contain these principles could not cause one that had them and a universe/God/cause that did have them had to follow them but not necessarily as binding laws that rule the universe but as principles that free you to act.
So basically a universe that could cause a universe with the law of non-c could not be a universe where the law of non-c didn’t apply.
nd if you argued that this would not necessarily be true in the universe/God/cause that you posit then I would argue that the u/g/c/ you posit is illogical and thus we could not logically infer anything about it because we couldn’t logically see how this type of creation is possible. In short you can’t infer anything logically from something that is illogical either in design or thought…Except that it is illogical.
I also attempted to prove the intelligence and personhood of God by showing not only the intelligibility of the universe but the existece of an objective morality.
Sorry for the lack of post citations and confusion, I pray to the holy spirit that I put this clearly for you.
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Bishopite
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Of course God is logic. I never said He wasn’t and I NEVER said God doesn’t follow rules of logic. Where did you get that from?
Here is what I said in post #46.
…"God isn’t bound by our rules, He’s eternity, we are time.
I said God isn’t bound by our rules not that He doesn’t follow rules of logic!!
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Bishopite
Guest
How do you know for sure it’s the plant that produces the seed? Since you believe in potential chance then there is a chance it isn’t the plant that produces the seed but something else.
And how do you know for sure that its the wind that blows?
If everything can be chance then there is a “chance” that you could be wrong.
But then how do you explain the non-randomness of creation? Like, the human liver which I’m told makes some 40,000 functions and if one of those functions go wrong then our bodies begin to seriously fall apart. Or perhaps the human heart which keeps beating even though nothing seems to be the cause of its constant pumping of blood to the body.
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RyanL
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Hmm. If you would like to pursue this, it can certainly lead to the reasoned belief in God, although it’s a bit more complex and eventually leads only to a (highly) probabilistic (and deeply rational) proof. If you would like, we certainly can go here.
- Greatest happiness, i.e., Utilitarianism. This isn’t really morality – it’s pragmatism. Morality deals with what you ought to do, regardless of the consequences. Utilitarianism deals with what you should do given the consequences. It’s not morality, strictly speaking, so you’re not quite right in listing it. Further, Utilitarianism (as you have expressed it) is completely and severely illogical on several counts, as well as being practically unworkable. Since we’re not typically trained in logic in the post-Christian West (a result of the En-darken-ment way of thought), I’m not surprised you would list this as a viable method of moral reasoning. I can explain in greater detail if you wish.
- Kant. He’s a bit off, although much closer to a good answer than the Bentham/Mills wonder-twins.
- You’re not giving enough credit to this one. It’s not simply “following the Church” in the fideist sense, as you imply. That’s short selling some of the greatest minds the world has ever known. The Church’s moral teaching is firmly and essentially based in reason, and you appear to be treating it like it’s completely divorced from it - as if it’s rooted in fiat and nothing else. Tsk tsk.
- If congress passed a Constitutional amendment which said that it’s fine to kill all disabled people, would it be “wrong”? Or, if you like, that atheists should be shot dead upon profession of their beliefs – would it be unjust? Or, to give a real American example, was the Civil Rights movement just, or should they have simply accepted the law as it was?
- Derived from your assumed answer to #1, on what basis could you deem a given law (read: Constitutional Amendment) “unjust”?
God Bless,
RyanL
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RyanL
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Your syllogisms are a bit funny, if I might say so. You need to construct them differently if you’re going to use the word “therefore” or properly call them syllogisms. First, you need a Major Premise (a Value Premise, in the case of moral reasoning). Second, you need a Minor or Factual Premise. What follows is the conclusion.
Example:
All dogs are mortal.
Spot is a dog.
Therefore, Spot is mortal.
The first is an absolute statement, the second is a specific application, and the conclusion is…well…the conclusion.
I wouldn’t normally say anything, but you’ve done this several times on this thread (all, actually).
I have a brother.
My brother’s name is Tom.
Therefore, I have a brother named Tom.
This is not a valid syllogism. Your minor premise is the same as your conclusion, and your major premise is actually a factual premise.
I have a coffee cup which is red
I have a coffee cup which is not red
Therefore, I have a coffee cup which is either red or not red.
Again, this is not a valid syllogism. First, the conclusion doesn’t logically follow. Second, your minor premise is neither a subset nor a specific application of your major premise.
As for the rest of your response, it seemed to focus on our subjective judgment of the cases rather than the objective reality of them. Whether or not it is difficult for us to judge, it does not follow that it cannot be true. Whether or not we subjectively agree with the analysis, it does not follow that the analysis is wrong.
Take that for what it’s worth.
God Bless,
RyanL
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Everstruggling
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That can be easily explained. They are not syllogisms. None of them were supposed to be. I was just informally writing out my argument to make it easier to understand.
I could have said:
Premise: I have a brother.
Premise: My brother’s name is Tom.
Conclusion: My brother’s name is Tom.
It is okay for the conclusion to be the same as one of the premises. This is called the argument from reiteration.
Premise: I have a blue nose.
Therefore: I have a blue nose.
This is a valid argument because it is impossible to go from a true premise to a false conclusion. If the premise is true, the conclusion is also true be because it is the same as the premise.
Premise: I have blue ears.
Conclusion: All animals are dogs or they aren’t.
This is also a valid argument because it is impossible for the conclusion to be false if the premises are true. In this case it is valid because the conclusion is logically true. A or not-A is logically true, no matter what the premise.
The following argument is* also* valid:
Premise: My dog Spot is not a dog, and my dog Spot is a dog.
Conclusion: I am the smartest man ever.
This argument doesn’t look valid but it is. It is impossible for this argument to lead to a false conclusion from a true premise because it is impossible for the premise to be true.
In the case of the blue nose, the conclusion is true if and only if I have a blue nose (happens to be false in this case, but I could easily grab some paint and make it true). In the case that all animals or dogs or they are not, it must be true because it can not be otherwise. In the case of my being the smartest person ever, it happens to be false. The truth value of the conclusion isn’t based on the validity of an argument.
None of my arguments are syllogisms, they have just all happened to have two premises and a conclusion.
My argument is based on the fact that you are using the word “objectively” incorrectly. It isn’t that what we are discussing is difficult to judge, it is that there is no right answer.
Which is more beautiful?
It is subjective, it depends on what qualities of beautiful you value more. There is no right answer.
Which is longer? It depends on which is longer. Whether we know it is longer is immaterial.
Let us say you are right though. That all qualities are objectively definable. Your argument would follow that there is an ideal lenght that all other lengths are mearly degrees of. God decreed the ideal length and all other lengths fall short of this. The argument is patently absurd.
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RyanL
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For the record, I believe it can be shown through reason that God is one, infinite, simple, personal, omnipresent, omniscient, omnipotent and all-perfect. (Aquinas, Summa Theologica, Q 1-43.)RyanL:
about God through philosophy and rational thinking? Not a whole lot, quite frankly.
So, in other words, we agree? That’s a rather surprising conclusion.
The rest is pure guess work without Divine Revelation. (S.T., Q 44-119.)
That’s what I mean by “not a whole lot”. We can’t get to the Trinity or salvation, for example, by reason alone; nor can we **ever **fully know God (even *with *Revelation) - to do so we would have to be God, and quite frankly our ladder doesn’t go that high.
We can also get to the existence of the soul (both material souls and spiritual souls - id, Q 75-89), and the existence of an immortal spiritual soul in man by the use of reason alone. As for what happens after death - again, guess work without Revelation.
God Bless,
RyanL
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Everstruggling
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The Church is based on revelation, or at least that is what the Catechism of the Catholic Church suggests. The Church teaches that knowledge of God’s existence can be reasoned, but not the fullness of Church teaching. Revelation and reason are not the same thing. I’m not suggesting anything.
Are you suggesting that a person could be led into moral error by following the teachings of the Church in a faithful, if non-understanding manner? I doubt you are. You might not follow blindly, but if a person followed the majesterium to the best of their ability, with no deeper understanding of why they are doing it, are they not acting morally?
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