Are some theists afraid of atheists?

[The Grand Nudger]

Let’s start with some basic illustrative examples:

A Chevy Nova is a car.
A Corvette is a car.
Every car is worth $20,000.
Therefore, a Chevy Nova and a Corvette are worth $20,000.

Bill is a human being.
Mary’s unborn child is a human being.
Every human being has absolute value.
Therefore, both Bill and Mary’s unborn child have absolute value.

Hmmm…let’s also take another quick look at empathy towards other human beings. Are we talking about empathy only for the immediate pain and suffering of others or must we also consider their long term good? A child may feel very hurt and humiliated by being disciplined but his future self would be thankful for appropriate correction. Similarly, do we have moral obligations to human beings who do not even exist yet? Are we obligated to protect the environment and preserving culture for future generations?

All you guys are doing is expressing a personal and cultural preference. There is nothing particularly rational about the claims as currently being presented.

You disagree with them, but even in the amateurish caricatures you present...they are rational expositions whose flaw, is that the propositions contained therein are arguably wrong, not that they are invalid reasoning.  

If a nova and a vette were both cars, and if all cars cost 20k, then the nova and the vette -would- cost 20k.  That would be a true conclusion by valid reasoning.  If bill was a human being and marys child was a human being and all human beings had absolute value then both bill and marys unborn child would have absolute value.  

Immediate pain and suffering or long term suffering..there's no reason to limit oneself to one or the other.  A fully informed moral consideration would probably need reference to both. That's called a compromise from exclusively sub-optimal fields, btw.  Do a little wrong today to stave of a big wrong tomorrow.  Slap on the wrist in the present to prevent electrocution in the future.  Humiliation today to prevent misery tomorrow.  A person may, for any number of reasons, get the severity of either particular wrong, but the reason for doing so is cut and dry and very much a rational process.  If doing x today could prevent y tommorrow, and y was worse than x - then among that field of sub-optimal choices x stands out as what we colloquially call "the lesser of two evils".  

As to your questions, that would depend, rationally, on ones moral framework and propositions....there can be no answer that would be consistently true of every respective and disparate framework.  In mine, yes, though neither answer can be taken absolutely and in every instance.  Do we have a moral obligation to preserve the environment, as in..a place for people to live..yes.  Does that extend to every jot and tittle thereof, including the harmful or lethal shit?  No.  In the case of the good shit, if preserving it meant our own destruction, no.  The same would be true of culture.  In some cases I would say that it would be nice or even a practical necessity if some of us went above and beyond, but I wouldn't assign an obligation in the absolute in a vacuum to such vague questions...because I simply couldn't...rationally.

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If we both agree that there are, in principle moral facts, then any dispute would only be an epistemological one given a common acknowledgment that values have some kind of ontological status. As for me, I have not seen a reasonable defense of value realism coming from atheists. On AF there seems to be a universal denial of nearly all kinds of realism in favor of nominalism. Correct me if I am wrong but based on prior conversations I took you for a nominalist/conceptualist. If that is not the case then I would be very much interested in how you could justify any kind of realism, including value realist, without making reference to transcendence.

I first seek to establish that there is something very real that all moral systems concern themselves with.  The subject of morality, something that can be referred to as a basoic moral fact of a great many matters - as it were.  You could call it transcendent, but probably not transcendent in the manner you'd hope for.   That there is a demonstrable and objective reason for any given thing being wrong..across cultures and despite their contradictions in their assessments thereof.    

Maybe I am missing something but I am trying. Kiel is saying that if people acting on the assumption that everyone had equal valve simply because they are human. That's fine but is not better than a Christian saying because people are made in the image of God. Both statements rest on unsupported claims. In his case he calls for a rationally consistent evaluation between human beings. That's not saying much. He hasn't shown why human beings are existentally equal other than appealing to empathy. And I do not see how that in anyway undermines my earlier demonstration. He's arguing in a circle.

Simply because they're human is probably the laziest assessment of human value I've ever seen...but you know what, that would be enough, wouldn't it?  Both statements rest on unsupported claims...really?  Because, last I checked, I could support the claim that somebody was a human being............this "image of god" shit, along with "god"...not quite as easy to demonstrate, is it?