(January 2, 2015 at 11:58 pm)Losty Wrote: Hmm...I feel like I'm missing some key information. I have 7 people on my list, 8 including myself. 4 Hispanic people, 3 white people, 1 black person. 4 with blue eyes, 3 with brown eyes, 1 with hazel eyes. 3 are medium height, 2 are tall, 3 are very short but may or may not remain that way. The only way you can identify my tribe as a whole is these are the people I would risk my life to save and the people I trust completely. They're my people because they're mine. Doesn't mean I don't identify with other people for various other reasons. My people are my people because I love them. I don't see that as the same as saying "my people" and meaning all white people. Millions of strangers? The only constant is that they're white? These aren't the people on your side in a fight. If I see a white person and a black person in a fight I am going to back away until I'm at a good distance and then I'm goin to turn and leave. I'm not going to jump in the fight with someone because they're white.
Your immediate allegiances are not the only factors in play.
There are human groupings of every conceivable size from couples to nation states. You probably identify with some of these; with your city, state or country. Perhaps your company or a sports team. I hope not your church. You have only specifically identified your people as those you would risk your safety for. For most of us, that would include family. The stability and persistence of all these replicating patterns is a complex function of their internal information exchange and its interplay with the environment and each other. Racism is not only an individual choice, it is a societal decision embodied in institutions and codified in law, written or not.
Geologically not long ago, humans lived in groups of a couple dozen or fewer, strangers were probably advance scouts or raiding parties so xenophobia made good sense. We've gotten friendlier with one another and so social and successful as a species that we've filled the planet to a density which cannot be sustained. Thus, in the long run, the friendliness we exhibit as social justice, equality of sexes or gender identities is a characteristic that threatens to lead us to our own extinction. I do not consider this to be good or bad in an absolute sense because I do not believe in absolute good or evil. But I do personally consider it undesirable because I depend on technological society for my comfort and well being and for that of those I care for. The entities driving this are much larger and more influential than I and I find my impotence in affecting them frustrating. But, given the liberty, I'm not sure I would always act in a speciesist human friendly way. For instance, given the ability, I would probably destroy all humans who poach elephants, whether they do so to feed their starving children or not.
So how, exactly, does God know that She's NOT a brain in a vat? 
