Abusive Theology 101

[Mister Agenda]

Why do you assume God is the one who broke the elevator?

It doesn't matter who broke it, the landlord is responsible for maintaining the building and getting the lift repaired as soon as possibe while taking all reasonable measures to make sure no one falls in the meantime.

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I focus on the subject, you focus on the verb. Go figure.

How does focusing on the subject make a difference? Are you arguing that gorillas are automatically precluded from exercising condemnation, and if so, what is your basis for that position?

No, I'm arguing that you're focusing on approval and disapproval in a conversation about good and evil.

I realize it comes before a paragraph that asserts that a behavior's naturalness is morally irrelevant - there are those who would argue against that. The point is, what distinguishes gorilla's behavior as natural, but certain human behavior as unnatural?

I think you might be misunderstanding the sense in which the word 'natural' is being used.

4.
c. Biology Not produced or changed artificially; not conditioned: natural immunity; a natural reflex.

That is, we're talking about innate/instinctual vs. learned/conditioned.

If you can't define and support that distinction, then what do gorillas have to do with it at all?

I'm not the one who brought up gorillas, but regardless of how satisfied you are with the distinctions, chimps and gorillas illustrate that moral concerns aren't limited to humans, and aren't based on good and evil...more the other way around. A 'sense' of empathy and fairness is not unique to humans, but combining those feelings with moral reasoning and abstracting them into concepts like good, evil, and justice is unique to humans, as far as we're able to discern.