(April 25, 2015 at 4:15 am)Nestor Wrote:(April 25, 2015 at 3:37 am)bennyboy Wrote: As for the nothing being Good or EVIL, bullshit, and stop fucking saying it. Good and evil are definitions made by man to describe his feelings about things and events in his environment. Most people have a negative emotional reaction to baby rape, or to the idea of baby rape, and so baby rape is considered evil. No Sky Daddy is required.
me.
As I have completed Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics a few days ago, I can say most assuredly that ethics---and one that is unfortunately in this case quite antiquated in its opinion of women and slaves---need not rely on some notion of divinity to be rational and objective, and furthermore, the results of a secular approach (which is more or less what Aristotle attempts, and in my view, largely accomplishes) are almost guaranteed to be more intuitively pleasing to the senses of a person with a capacity for moral reasoning than religious dogmas are.
I agree with you that Aristotle largely accomplishes his goal of creating a secular ethic. It is a good starting point for further debate. I don't think that you can isolate the Ethics from its traditional context. The notion of 'The Good' is an important consideration. He identifies the good that all men desire as happiness but his next task (if i remember correctly) is to show how happiness is achieved based on the essence of what it means to be human, i. e. a rational animal. This brings into play many concepts I wager you would not be as inclined to accept.
