A shared challenge regarding the foundation of ethics

[Tassman]

So why are you arguing that there isn't something wrong in man when we actually murder, rape, steal, etc...

[shunyadragon]

So why are you arguing that there isn't something wrong in man when we actually murder, rape, steal, etc...



And it isn't wrong today when the Stalinist and Maoist annihilated millions of political enemies. It was no more wrong in their culture as it was in the Mosaic culture.



Yes I have more - history. Unless, again, you don't believe that things like murder, rape, greed, fraud, stealing, etc... are wrong.

Actually philosophical Naturalists do better dealing with this than traditional Christians believeing Original Sin and the Fall as the Cause. From the Naturalists perspective violence like murder, rape, greed, fraud, steeling are indeed wrong, but only constitute a minority in terms of human cultures and societies. Of course humans are imperfect and flawed, but they are imperfect and flawed naturally. The positive attributes of culture dominate, therefore the human species survive.

The traditional Christian theists have the problem of explaining the Fall and Original Sin as the cause, because you have a situation where God place the curse of Original Sin and the suffering of all humanity on the failing of two fallible humans who were set up in the garden, and would eventually fall to temptation regardless.

[seer]

Tass, if there is not something wrong in man then again why do we rape, murder, steal, lie, etc... If those behaviors don't point to something wrong in us do they then point to something good in man? Or are those behaviors morally neutral?

[Tassman]

Tass, if there is not something wrong in man then again why do we rape, murder, steal, lie, etc... If those behaviors don't point to something wrong in us do they then point to something good in man? Or are those behaviors morally neutral?

Some behaviours such as rape, murdering and theft, while natural, are harmful to the social fabric and therefore we proscribe them. By this means we restrain individual selfishness and build more cooperative groups. This is the basis of our moral code. The precursors of such behaviour can be seen among our fellow primates.

[seer]

Some behaviours such as rape, murdering and theft, while natural, are harmful to the social fabric and therefore we proscribe them. By this means we restrain individual selfishness and build more cooperative groups. This is the basis of our moral code. The precursors of such behaviour can be seen among our fellow primates.

Again, if those behaviors don't point to something wrong in us do they then point to something good in man? Or are those behaviors morally neutral?

[seer]

Actually philosophical Naturalists do better dealing with this than traditional Christians believeing Original Sin and the Fall as the Cause. From the Naturalists perspective violence like murder, rape, greed, fraud, steeling are indeed wrong, but only constitute a minority in terms of human cultures and societies. Of course humans are imperfect and flawed, but they are imperfect and flawed naturally. The positive attributes of culture dominate, therefore the human species survive.

The traditional Christian theists have the problem of explaining the Fall and Original Sin as the cause, because you have a situation where God place the curse of Original Sin and the suffering of all humanity on the failing of two fallible humans who were set up in the garden, and would eventually fall to temptation regardless.

Again Shuny, your religion teaches something similar:

Now consider how far this meaning conforms to the reality. For the spirit and the soul of Adam, when they were attached to the human world, passed from the world of freedom into the world of bondage, and His descendants continued in bondage. This attachment of the soul and spirit to the human world, which is sin, was inherited by the descendants of Adam, and is the serpent which is always in the midst of, and at enmity with, the spirits and the descendants of Adam. That enmity continues and endures. For attachment to the world has become the cause of the bondage of spirits, and this bondage is identical with sin, which has been transmitted from Adam to His posterity. It is because of this attachment that men have been deprived of essential spirituality and exalted position.

http://reference.bahai.org/en/t/ab/S...=highlight#gr8

So Adam has infected all of mankind.

[Tassman]

Again, if those behaviors don't point to something wrong in us do they then point to something good in man? Or are those behaviors morally neutral?

[seer]

Sheesh Tass, but even our survival is not objectively a moral good. And you really don't believe any of this, because when the left is damaging to the social order for causes you support, you applaud it.

[Tassman]

Sheesh Tass, but even our survival is not objectively a moral good. And you really don't believe any of this, because when the left is damaging to the social order for causes you support, you applaud it.

[seer]

Like I said Tass, you don't even believe what you are spouting. You have no problem undermining social cohesion if it for a leftist cause you agree with. So cohesion can't be the bottom line according to your beliefs. And all other creatures survive just fine with out conceptual ideas of ethics.

[Tassman]

So cohesion can't be the bottom line according to your beliefs. And all other creatures survive just fine with out conceptual ideas of ethics.

Morals are simply rules of behaviour. They derive from the instinctive needs of self-preservation and procreation and are a consequence of natural selection. We see the precursors of such behaviour among our fellow primates, but the higher intelligence of humans enables us conceptualise it. But as you say, other creatures survive without conceptualised ideas of ethics....just as they survive without pop-up toasters or smart-phones.

So, again: just what is 'morality' to you...a nebulous set of eternal values floating around in the ether or values emanating from a deity or what?

[seer]

Morals are simply rules of behaviour. They derive from the instinctive needs of self-preservation and procreation and are a consequence of natural selection. We see the precursors of such behaviour among our fellow primates, but the higher intelligence of humans enables us conceptualise it. But as you say, other creatures survive without conceptualised ideas of ethics....just as they survive without pop-up toasters or smart-phones.

No Tass, I'm not letting you off the hook. You constantly point to social cohesion as the goal for moral behavior yet you don't personally believe that because you are perfectly fine with upsetting said cohesion for a cause you agree with. So even by your own lights cohesion can't be the bottom line. So what is?

[shunyadragon]

Again Shuny, your religion teaches something similar:

So Adam has infected all of mankind.

Being similar is not remotely the same. Your habit of selectively quoting, misrepresenting, and attacking those who believe differently to justify your personal agenda continues unabated.

No like all humanity in the vast history of millions of years of humanity we inherited our fallible imperfect human nature.







Most world views including the Baha'i Faith, Atheists and Agnostics, believe humans are imperfect and are capable of doing bad things, but the good out ways the and humans survive and life goes on. Just because humans do bad things does not justify your world view.

[seer]

Being similar is not remotely the same. Your habit of selectively quoting, misrepresenting, and attacking those who believe differently to justify your personal agenda continues unabated.

No like all humanity in the vast history of millions of years of humanity we inherited our fallible imperfect human nature.

Shuny nothing you said changed a thing I posted. Your religion teaches that we are all descendants of Adam and that Adam's bondage (sin) is inherited by us all. Whether you call it evil or not changes nothing. Adam infected us all with this bondage or as the link said - sin.


Now consider how far this meaning conforms to the reality. For the spirit and the soul of Adam, when they were attached to the human world, passed from the world of freedom into the world of bondage, and His descendants continued in bondage. This attachment of the soul and spirit to the human world, which is sin, was inherited by the descendants of Adam, and is the serpent which is always in the midst of, and at enmity with, the spirits and the descendants of Adam. That enmity continues and endures. For attachment to the world has become the cause of the bondage of spirits, and this bondage is identical with sin, which has been transmitted from Adam to His posterity. It is because of this attachment that men have been deprived of essential spirituality and exalted position.

And stop being a hypocrite, you attack my religion every chance you get.

[shunyadragon]

Shuny nothing you said changed a thing I posted. Your religion teaches that we are all descendants of Adam and that Adam's bondage (sin) is inherited by us all. Whether you call it evil or not changes nothing. Adam infected us all with this bondage or as the link said - sin.


Now consider how far this meaning conforms to the reality. For the spirit and the soul of Adam, when they were attached to the human world, passed from the world of freedom into the world of bondage, and His descendants continued in bondage. This attachment of the soul and spirit to the human world, which is sin, was inherited by the descendants of Adam, and is the serpent which is always in the midst of, and at enmity with, the spirits and the descendants of Adam. That enmity continues and endures. For attachment to the world has become the cause of the bondage of spirits, and this bondage is identical with sin, which has been transmitted from Adam to His posterity. It is because of this attachment that men have been deprived of essential spirituality and exalted position.

And stop being a hypocrite, you attack my religion every chance you get.

It remains that the biased selective of citations does not reflect the view of the Baha'i Faith in the citations I provided.