(January 27, 2016 at 3:11 pm)Lemonvariable72 Wrote:

(January 27, 2016 at 2:36 pm)Drich Wrote: What part of EMPATHY is a Propaganda controlled response do you not get?

I gave several examples where society THIS SOCEITY has taken away all basic human rights to several different groups of people and has or is working to obliterate them!

This is NO Different than what Osama did. That's what Empthay is! It's sympathy for those in whom you've been trained to identify with. Take away their humanity with mindless propaganda and all empathy ceases.

Empathy is not a propaganda controlled response, if it was then it would not appear in all societies.

lol.. It doesn't! While empathy is a core 'value' of western society it does not mean all soceities have been trained to tap empathy. North Korea is a big middle finger to your idea that all societies have empathy. Thier empathy for their fellow man has been trained out of them, their is only loyalty and love for their leaders. This is demonstrated over and over by families turning on it's members because someone didn't love their leader as he should. The fact that empathy can be removed from people or it can be trained in or even magnified by definition means it is not a core value. The fact that we don't see abortion as killing babies speak volumes on how empathy can be controlled by propaganda. We take the most basic and primal of all of our instincts (protect our offspring) use a different language's word for baby (fetus) and all attachments society has for our children are just gone. It's because we are trained/condition to suspend empathy.

Quote:The examples you described are examples of the suspension of empathy. Also sympathy and empathy are separate things, empathy is the ability to understand the thoughts and feelings of others. If you notice, all attempts in the past to wipe out others groups were followed with dehumanizing propoganada, that not manipulating empathy, its trying to make it go away all together.

I agree with the statement just not your conclusion. How does dehumanizing people so empathy is with held NOT Empathy Being controlled by Propaganda?

Quote: What's more is that your morality system openly brags about murdering entire groups and is proud of it.

Actually no.
I am not an Old testament Jew, therefore my 'religion' does not command nor brag about genocide.
That said. I do not have a problem with destroying a whole people if they can be rightfully identified as evil.
I know you proably cant see straight to read the rest of this right now but just incase you can, I want to also point out we in the US have already done this very thing. Not to mention 2 or 3 more generations into a middle eastern conflict, a few cities of our dirty bombed or nuked, a fallen president or two and 'pop morality' will also find away to justify the whole sale destruction of an entire people as well in post modern times.

Quote:You make it clear in this statement that you have never experienced empathy before, as you defined as sympathy for those you've been trained to identify with. Did you know that children as young as 3 understand that when you hit someone else it hurts? And that this has been present in every culture where children have been observed. Now of course through how your raised this basic empathy is turned off, but its easy to discover again if you try to understand another person from a rational point of veiw. However I can't help but feel that discribing empathy to you is like describing color to a blind man.

But again, the fact that empathy can be turn on or off makes it subject to pop morality. If you want to talk about who the stupid one is in this conversation answer my question honestly. The subject of empathy came up when I asked what 'force/principle' do you possess that would transcend the pull of pop morality, and keep you from being like one of the german citizens who fell into Nazism by simply following the tides of pop morality in their time and culture?

Now you admit that empathy can be trained or controlled... Do you not understand that our cultures tell us who to have empathy for and whoo not to have it for, just like the nazis did with the Jews? Just like we do with unborn Babies?

So then if Empathy is controllable by the culture, it is not a force that will trancend the culture and help you define right and wrong because the culture will control who it is you will have empathy for. So again if the culture makes a hard left into evil then you can be sure your empathy will have been long switched off so you can march right over who the culture wants gone.

(January 28, 2016 at 11:28 am)Drich Wrote: So then if Empathy is controllable by the culture, it is not a force that will trancend the culture and help you define right and wrong because the culture will control who it is you will have empathy for. So again if the culture makes a hard left into evil then you can be sure your empathy will have been long switched off so you can march right over who the culture wants gone.

And if you happen to be born into the wrong religion, will your belief in the wrong 'objective' values help you to transcend your predicament?

(January 27, 2016 at 3:25 pm)Jenny A Wrote: @ Dritch

Just assuming for the sake of argument, that there is a god (and that is a rather big assumption), at what point in time have people ever agreed about what god's righteousness is?

Man does not have to agree on righteousness. Righteousness is God, for us righteousness can be found in his law, and the understanding that we can never obtain righteousness through following the law. that righteousness for us can only come through atonement.

Quote:  Man's conception of god's will appears as variable over time as man's morals.

completely agree. which is what I told true christian.

Quote: You may argue that you know, but I fail to see how your view is superior to that of other Christians here and now, elsewhere, or past.  If the standard is unknowable, than it is of no practical use.

No the standard is knowable in the Law of moses as well as the extention of the Law though Christ.
The problem is that 'morality' seeks to justify sin and make allowances in the law that were never supposed to be there.
Morality even on a high 'christian' level is nothing more than man's perversion of God's righteousness. it is the allowance of sin in God's law baring some circumstance or minimalization of sin in general.

For God all sin is the same. a white lie is deserves the same sentence as murder.
For us because we lie alot and can not seperate ourselves from this sin/slave to sin, and because 'we' hold to the idea that we are 'Good' people. we put lying on the low end of our scale of sin/evil. Now because murder is something that most of us can live a life without doing, and because we are all 'good people' those who murder must be wicked. So then we must augment God's law/righteousness to fit our sliding scale. This augmentation is morality.

Morality says it is ok to lie so as to not hurt someone's feelings, to steal food to keep your family from dying of starvation..

Righteousness says It is never ok to lie or to steal no matter what.

Now because God knows we can not live by His righteousness he provides atonement. Atonement says I forgive you when you lie not to hurt someone's feelings. I (God) Forgive you for stealing to feed your family, but we must own our sin, not justify it with circumstance as morality allows for.. Why? Because Morality begets/spawns Selfrighteousness. Self righteousness if a word that describes a morality that can be bent or twisted to do anything even marching jews to a death camp, and everyone still feel like they are 'good people.' When in fact the very core of selfrighteousness is Evil and evil that loves the sin that we want to be apart of and yet still see ourselves as 'good people.'

My question demonstrates that 'we' are never in a position to see our own self righteousness without the benefit of an unchanging absolute like God's righteousness.

Quote:You see, the extreme variability of man's understanding of god's will suggests that god's will is an idea created by man to bolster particular men's views of morality and nothing more.  It's better to leave god out of it, as then we can discuss what morality is best in a rational manner.

That's the thing God's will hasn't ever changed since it was made know to moses and extended by Christ. The change you are talking about is 'christian morality' which is nothing more than self righteousness itself.
God has a very simple plan. show us via the law that we can never abide by it.
provide atonement so we don't have to to be found righteous.
allow us the freedom to worship to the best of our ability.
Eternally separate those who want to retain their own righteousness.

Quote:I suggest this standard:  on any given moral question the rule should be that which a person who is not yet born and does not yet know what his race, gender, sexual orientation, or place in society will be would consider to be the best rule.  Applying this standard requires dispassion and reason, and would result in fairness. I will not hold my breath for the standard to be applied though because our morality is not entirely born of reason.  It is a product of empathy, which is why our moral standards are higher with regard to those we know or can otherwise identify with, than it is with regard for those we don't know or can't identify with.  The "other" is always given less rights be it because they differ in income, race, religion, sex, sexual orientation, nationality, language, profession, or dress. Biblical morality demonstrates this clearly.  Hebrews are expected to treat those they identify with (other Hebrews) better than those they don't (everyone else).  The adult male Hebrews writing the OT naturally give more rights to adult male Hebrews.  The adult Christian men writing the NT naturally give more rights to adult Christian men.  Naturally, they denigrated the rights of Jewish men who rejected Christianity.  

Far from behaving better when applying god's standard, people use god's standard to justify their lack of empathy for others.  Thus, the differing standards for: the chosen people versus all other people; my gender versus other genders; people of my faith versus people of other faiths; people of different incomes versus people of my income and so on.  Selfish people have used god's standard to justify everything from socialism (easily justified by Jesus's teachings) to capitalism (easily justified based on god's obvious preference).

This is still performance based morality.. which means no matter how well intentioned it is still subject to self righteousness, and will eventually degrade and fail.

(January 28, 2016 at 12:05 pm)Drich Wrote: This is still performance based morality.. which means no matter how well intentioned it is still subject to self righteousness, and will eventually degrade and fail.

Every criticism you can come up with for a subjectivist morality plagues your subjectively selected 'objective' morality too.

(January 27, 2016 at 3:36 pm)TubbyTubby Wrote:

(January 27, 2016 at 3:00 pm)Drich Wrote: The question then becomes how do you know you did not grow up in a society as bad if not worse than the Nazis or anyone else you look at as being way/unquestionably evil?

Well you can't know is the honest answer. You can only compare your behaviour against that which has gone before and make a relative judgement (e.g. it was wrong to stone adulterers to death and now it isn't). It would be some fucked up world that tried to reverse that trend eh?

So Drich, give us an example of what you are arguing for at least. What absolute moral is there in your bible that us heathens don't adhere to today that you think we should?

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As stated above their is no man made 'moral standard' that will not be based in the selfish heart/desires of that particular community, and the sins it wishes to keep.

Which means 'morality' is a junk standard because it simply show cases the evil we are willing to live with.

God set an impossible standard when Christ extended the law of moses. This means we are not to try and retain the mantel of 'good people.' That's what morality does. it justifies 'minor sin' sin that we as slaves to sin can not help but do, and makes us 'good people.'

Rather instead of being 'good' God offers us righteousness through Christ.

If we accept that we will never be 'good people' then we can accept the atonement and adopt righteousness apart from our morality/immorality.

That means the hold society has in dictating what is moral and what is not no longer applies. And you can stand in stark contrast to the evils a self righteous society adopts.

(If you haven't read what I wrote Jen-A this goes with that)

Jeus schrist man we get it, you're certain that people are terrible, shitty and craven things.  I'd suggest that you may be under this impression due to a small sample size.  Namely yourself.

My moral standard has nothing to do with my heart - which pumps blood. You;re free to hold the opinion that any given morality is junk, as am I. So, pop morality is out as per you, biblical morality is out as per me. I guess that means I'm just going to have to drift into amoral cuntitude.


.....Or not.

(January 28, 2016 at 10:54 am)Drich Wrote: But my point and question is... (the point) The Germans of Nazi Germany did not see themselves as evil (the vast majority) Because their pop morality told them what they were doing was right! They could not challenge this because they had removed all absolutes of God and repplaced them with state written propaganda (and they used science just like we do) to justify their efforts and changes. Their only measure of right and wrong/their morality was corrupt by the state. so what ever the state said was always right and what it said was wrong was always wrong.. Again much like where we are now.

Except that the claims the Nazis used to justify their holocaust were, you know, factually incorrect? If you build a moral outlook based upon false foundations, the moral system that results will not supply morally correct conclusions because the means of deriving those conclusions would be wrong. Are you so completely spaced out and separated from reality that you don't even consider whether the things people do align with the facts anymore?

Quote:(the question)
So how then do we know in this soceity who like Nazi German has separated the state from God, have not made an 'evil' left turn like the nazi's did?

Constant reverification of the moral underpinnings of that society via evidence and logic. Democracies are actually pretty good (not perfect, but pretty good) at that.

I think I see the problem though, which is sort of the problem with every argument you make, Drich: your conception of the issue you're discussing is so simplistic that a child could have it. You're sitting here acting like any change to a moral system is evidence that the system is arbitrary and ineffective, and that stolidly never changing is the sign of objectivity, and that's ridiculous. "You know what I want, out of a moral system? A refusal to ever change in the face of new evidence."

Morality is a learning process because we as humans are always learning. We don't know everything, and as the pool of information we have available to make our ethical determinations grows, the determinations themselves must change with that. Why would that be a bad thing to you? If we discover that the underpinnings of something we'd taken as morally bad are factually wrong, why should we continue to pretend as though it's still bad, when the basis of that turned out to be untrue?

(January 27, 2016 at 3:36 pm)Esquilax Wrote: It's called "reality," and it's what I hold every potential moral claim up to in deciding whether it is or is not true.

using the filter of pop morality your culture programmed you with. My question asks what if Nazi germany programmed you from birth? What in your bag-o-trix (if anything) would have kept you from marching the jews into death camps, like the vast majority of the generation/soceity did?

Quote:Let's use your example of homosexuality for this: the claim that homosexuality is immoral simply doesn't stand up to scrutiny, if one keeps in mind the real world.

again the real world looking which societal/generational set of glasses?

Again, Homosexuality 'morality' is completely based on what or how popular culture defines it. 50 years ago not only was it immoral it was even criminal in certain states. So no doubt their, at that place and at that time pop morality defined being gay as immoral. However now opposing homosexuality is the immoral behavior.

That said Homosexual behavior will always be an unrighteous sexual act. Which again 'morality' is simply man's version of god's righteousness. It our personal sense of righteousness or as He described it Self righteousness.

Quote: It causes no actual harm (that couldn't also be inflicted by straight couples, meaning to focus on gays there would be special pleading) nor any deleterious social consequences such that it should stand. In fact the sole reason at the core of why it was considered immoral for so long is that god doesn't like it... and examining that claim up against reality casts serious doubt on whether such a being even exists, and even if he did, his pronouncements aren't simply automatically moral truisms. Thus, unchanging, objective reality disproves the moral claim that homosexuality is bad.

if you want to put that logic and reason to the test I ask you to answer the 'hypothetical' I asked crossless1 a few posts back.

Quote:You say that a changing view on this issue is a sign of ineffective "pop morality," but I'd suggest it's a little thing called "learning," and that as we gained the ability to collect demographic data such that the wild claims people made about the gay community could be measured and tested, we learned that actually, those claims were largely factually wrong. The moral view regarding that issue didn't change for no reason, Drich, and it'd be a huge oversimplification to say otherwise; what actually happened, both via a gay community refusing to stay closeted and increased research that this afforded, was that the lies told by religious ideologues and conservative fraudsters were no longer able to stand unchallenged, and those of us who value truth over fantasy changed our views to fit the evidence once we were all afforded the ability to see it. It wasn't some arbitrary shuffle of morals: the lies your side told got shouted down by the truth.

Pop morality is not 'ineffective morality.' Is what ever popular culture deems moral. morality effectivness is not what i am questioning here.

I am asking you and people like you, that without God's righteousness to anchor your ideas of right and wrong/your morality, and your morality simply hangs on what society tells you is right and wrong how will you know when and if society makes a hard left turn into evil Like Nazi Germany did? I pointed out that the Germans did not see themselves as evil, but being moral up right citizens, just like the Americans responsible for the whole sale slaughter of Indians and or the Aussie slaughter of its indigenous people.

(January 28, 2016 at 12:33 pm)Drich Wrote: I am asking you and people like you, that without God's righteousness to anchor your ideas of right and wrong/your morality, and your morality simply hangs on what society tells you is right and wrong how will you know when and if society makes a hard left turn into evil Like Nazi Germany did? I pointed out that the Germans did not see themselves as evil, but being moral up right citizens, just like the Americans responsible for the whole sale slaughter of Indians and or the Aussie slaughter of its indigenous people.

God's righteousness is nothing but the pop morality of several thousand years ago. First we had the Jews and their version of pop morality. Then along comes Jesus, and he teaches a different sort of morality, based on blood sacrifice and atonement. Then we have Mohammed's version which builds on that. And eventually we get to Baha'ullah's version further on down the road. You aren't defending a specific morality because they all share the same traits of 'pop morality' regardless of from when and where they come. You're simply arguing a preference for dogmatic truths, ones that don't change, over those that do. But your God's righteousness is just another link in a chain of relativistic morals. It's no different, and no better. Matter of fact, by its inability to accommodate changes in our knowledge about the world makes it worse in that it is a slave to past errors. (And yes, Virginia, God's righteousness isn't immune to mistakes.)

(January 28, 2016 at 12:33 pm)Drich Wrote: using the filter of pop morality your culture programmed you with. My question asks what if Nazi germany programmed you from birth? What in your bag-o-trix (if anything) would have kept you from marching the jews into death camps, like the vast majority of the generation/soceity did?

The facts don't have a filter, Drich. That the Nazi claims regarding the Jews were factually wrong, both at a genetic, societal, and historical level, does not change depending on where I was born. Considering the verifiable data would lead one to the conclusion that the Nazis were wrong; that someone might be indoctrinated into failing to do that in favor of dealing in their inculcated preconceptions is not a failure for what I'm suggesting any more than someone disagreeing with your biblical morality is a failure for yours.

If I tell you that my moral framework comes from a rational consideration of the facts, saying "yeah, but what if someone didn't rationally consider the facts, huh?" is not a rebuttal of that framework.

Quote:again the real world looking which societal/generational set of glasses?

No glasses. No biases. You look at the facts, that which can be verified, not "the facts according to X, Y, and Z."

Quote:Again, Homosexuality 'morality' is completely based on what or how popular culture defines it. 50 years ago not only was it immoral it was even criminal in certain states. So no doubt their, at that place and at that time pop morality defined being gay as immoral. However now opposing homosexuality is the immoral behavior.

Are you just going to ignore everything that I said, while attempting to refute what I said? At the time that being gay was considered immoral, that moral claim was wrong. There was, at that time, as now, a moral claim regarding homosexuality that is right, but society then was not accepting of that claim. Now, happily, we have moved on to accept the correct claim. What determines which claim is correct? The facts! Were one to consider the claims made about homosexuality as justification for calling it immoral 50 years ago, what you would find is that not a one of them aligns with the evidence: they all relied upon things that are objectively wrong. How can you have a morally valid conclusion if the justification for it is literally incorrect?

Quote:That said Homosexual behavior will always be an unrighteous sexual act. Which again 'morality' is simply man's version of god's righteousness. It our personal sense of righteousness or as He described it Self righteousness.

Why, without just asserting that it's god's opinion, is homosexuality wrong?

Quote: if you want to put that logic and reason to the test I ask you to answer the 'hypothetical' I asked crossless1 a few posts back.

Why bother? All it's going to be is "I've found a single piffling possible exception to what you're saying, therefore the entire argument is invalid."

Quote:Pop morality is not 'ineffective morality.' Is what ever popular culture deems moral. morality effectivness is not what i am questioning here.

Except, again, I don't accept that whatever culture deems moral, is moral. I'm appealing to the objective reality that these cultures coexist in. Do you disagree that we live in a real world that doesn't change depending on what we think of it?

Quote:I am asking you and people like you, that without God's righteousness to anchor your ideas of right and wrong/your morality, and your morality simply hangs on what society tells you is right and wrong how will you know when and if society makes a hard left turn into evil Like Nazi Germany did? I pointed out that the Germans did not see themselves as evil, but being moral up right citizens, just like the Americans responsible for the whole sale slaughter of Indians and or the Aussie slaughter of its indigenous people.

Reality. It'll always be there to correct us. Were the claims of a Jewish conspiracy that Hitler used to justify the holocaust true, or false? Why, they were false, and hence, any moral claim made on the basis of them were similarly false. Were the claims made about the sub-humanity of the Aboriginal people that white settlers used to justify their mistreatment of them true, or false? Oh, they were false too: turns out that genetically there wasn't a great amount of difference between the settles and the Aborigines. Therefore, how could a moral claim made on those bases be true, if the bases themselves weren't? It's like if you were to make a moral judgment on the idea that people can grow back limbs: it's okay to dismember people, since they'll just grow back their limbs like a starfish, right?

... Except that people verifiably do not grow back their limbs, we're biologically incapable of that. Given this, in what sense would a moral idea based on an untrue statement be correct?

Also, how is "my morality is based on whatever god thinks," any better than the "my morality is based on society," claim that you're deriding here? Oh, and you can't just assume your conclusion or make a circular argument, nor can you present claims you can't demonstrate, in justifying the difference. So go right ahead: how are god's opinions superior to society's?