Philosophy Discussion Forums | A Humans-Only Club for Open-Minded Discussion & Debate

[heracleitos]

Casting shade and blame elsewhere, but not looking within. Your weak ad hominem against "atheists" are naive and unconvincing.

That would rather be an ad homines instead of ad hominem. But then again, that term does not even exist because how can a supposedly personal attack simultaneously be non-personal?

OK, your attacks weren't ad homs, they were illogical, unpleasant, and unconvincing.

They were not personal at all.

Ad hominem (Latin for 'to the person'), short for argumentum ad hominem (Latin for 'argument to the person'), refers to several types of arguments, most, if not all, are fallacious. Typically this term refers to a rhetorical strategy where the speaker attacks the character, motive, or some other attribute of the person making an argument rather than attacking the substance of the argument itself.

This term does not apply when it is not a personal attack against the person making an argument . I reject atheism and atheist behavior. Where is the personal element in it?

[heracleitos]

Likewise, it's an implied ad hominem attack if one claims that atheists have no morality because they do not believe in a 2,000 year-old anthology

The problem is not that atheists do not believe in a particular moral theory. The problem is that they do not propose a documented alternative. That effectively amounts to claiming that we do not need a documented moral theory.

If we do need one, then incessantly criticizing an existing moral theory without proposing an alternative, is quite negative behavior.

Nassim Taleb needs to rethink. It flies in the face of reality to claim that the minority rule of the Middle East and Africa is more stable than the democracies of the west.

More stable ... for now. I think that we are very close to the point in which all of that is going to be tested extensively. We are clearly heading towards some kind of perfect storm: energy crisis, food crisis, inflation crisis, financial, economic meltdown, and even a massive military confrontation dooming up on the horizon. All of that can easily lead to a complete chaos, social and otherwise.

Orwellian doublespeak. Minority rule is simply corruption, the transfer of national assets into the leader's. How did Vlad Putin come to have hundred of millions of dollars as a politician? High wages or standing over the oligarchs whose wealth he helped to facilitate?

In Taleb's view, the governing mafia is almost surely not such renormalizing minority. Politics may not be a domain in which group renormalization is the dominant process for change. He mentioned instead: morality, science, and technology.

[Sy Borg]

Likewise, it's an implied ad hominem attack if one claims that atheists have no morality because they do not believe in a 2,000 year-old anthology

The problem is not that atheists do not believe in a particular moral theory. The problem is that they do not propose a documented alternative. That effectively amounts to claiming that we do not need a documented moral theory.

If we do need one, then incessantly criticizing an existing moral theory without proposing an alternative, is quite negative behavior.

Nassim Taleb needs to rethink. It flies in the face of reality to claim that the minority rule of the Middle East and Africa is more stable than the democracies of the west.

More stable ... for now. I think that we are very close to the point in which all of that is going to be tested extensively. We are clearly heading towards some kind of perfect storm: energy crisis, food crisis, inflation crisis, financial, economic meltdown, and even a massive military confrontation dooming up on the horizon. All of that can easily lead to a complete chaos, social and otherwise.

Orwellian doublespeak. Minority rule is simply corruption, the transfer of national assets into the leader's. How did Vlad Putin come to have hundred of millions of dollars as a politician? High wages or standing over the oligarchs whose wealth he helped to facilitate?

In Taleb's view, the governing mafia is almost surely not such renormalizing minority. Politics may not be a domain in which group renormalization is the dominant process for change. He mentioned instead: morality, science, and technology.

There's no need to create a new moral theory, you simply take what is bestowed by history and tweak it as needed, which is what has occurred. The result of this pragmatism has been unprecedented prosperity and stability.

Rest assured, the "perfect storm" is not just coming for the west. Russia's Ukraine invasion makes it clear just how deeply entwined the world is. For instance, China cannot afford for the US to fail - without US dollars their economy would soon shrivel. Likewise, the US need China to succeed or there will be extreme supply shocks in the world economy.

On the surface "morality, science and technology" seem like admirable enough areas of focus, but vague.

Whose morality? The discriminatory morals based on ancient customs or inclusive morals based on humanitarianism?

Whose science? The sciences that accept evolution and anthropogenic climate change or the politicised creationist "sciences" of climate change denial?

Technology would seem to be neutral, aside from reproductive tech.

[heracleitos]

There's no need to create a new moral theory, you simply take what is bestowed by history and tweak it as needed, which is what has occurred.

Historically, there has always been a scripture at the core of moral theory. Tweaking the scripture itself has always been considered not done.

There has historically never been a problem with having a law discovery process that discovers new theorems that necessarily follow from the immutable scriptural foundation.

Therefore, I am certainly in favor of the historical way of doing things.

The result of this pragmatism has been unprecedented prosperity and stability.

Stability, but with quite a few lapses. We have always had devastating wars.

Prosperity, on the other hand, is rather the result of dealing with the challenge of massive population growth. We have always managed to figure out how to provide for the now much bigger population, by improving technology, and then we even managed to exceed the goal, leading to surpluses and prosperity.

Whose morality? The discriminatory morals based on ancient customs or inclusive morals based on humanitarianism?

I thought that you wanted a historically-transmitted system of morality? How are we supposed to do that without ancient customs?

The bedrock of moral theory has historically always been the religious scripture.

Again, I am not opposed to law discovery.

In my opinion, every theorem that necessarily follows from the moral theory, is a legitimate part of the moral theory itself.

[Sy Borg]

There's no need to create a new moral theory, you simply take what is bestowed by history and tweak it as needed, which is what has occurred.

Historically, there has always been a scripture at the core of moral theory. Tweaking the scripture itself has always been considered not done.

There has historically never been a problem with having a law discovery process that discovers new theorems that necessarily follow from the immutable scriptural foundation.

The scripture was tweaked countless times until the Guttenberg Press, and has been tweaked aplenty since.

Further, interpretations are many, which tends to lend credibility to fundamentalists. Trouble is, a literal interpretation of ancient texts based on modern language use will guarantee wrong interpretations. There is an ability, outside of religious scholarship, to try to understand what the writers were trying to say. For instance, the creation myth in Genesis is obviously a metaphorical account of evolution, as described by a person without scientific language. Now there millions convinced in the absurdities that God created the universe in six Earth days, and it is just 6,000 years old.

The result of this pragmatism has been unprecedented prosperity and stability.

Stability, but with quite a few lapses. We have always had devastating wars.

Unlike the devastating wars of the past, there was also significant peace and progress in between. It's not as though The Crusades or the Inquisition were peaceful times.

Whose morality? The discriminatory morals based on ancient customs or inclusive morals based on humanitarianism?

I thought that you wanted a historically-transmitted system of morality? How are we supposed to do that without ancient customs?

The bedrock of moral theory has historically always been the religious scripture.

Again, I am not opposed to law discovery.

In my opinion, every theorem that necessarily follows from the moral theory, is a legitimate part of the moral theory itself.

Fine, we have already started on the Roman Catholic model. We don't need to return to the source material. Societies have gradually shed their anachronistic aspects, though some remain.

[LuckyR]

Jews have a fully documented foundherentist moral theory in the Torah. Muslims have one in the Quran.

Atheists do not have a moral theory. They merely criticize other people's theory. At best, atheists could have an elusive, undocumented one, but even that is debatable.

An undocumented theory can never be used to successfully attack a documented one. That is the fundamental weakness of the atheist take on morality.

Furthermore, the atheist attack on foundherentism itself is laughable. In that case, they should also reject mathematics.

Atheists inevitably find themselves before an insurmountable obstacle when trying to take on Judaism or Islam. In fact, atheists have always known that they do not stand a chance against Judaism and Islam.

In theory, Christian morality also rests on Jewish Law, just like Judaism.

In practice, however, the Christian take on Jewish Law is a patched and hacked concoction with numerous undocumented alterations. Therefore, in practice, Christian moral theory is as undocumented as the atheist one.

Concerning undocumented patching and hacking of the Law, Jesus warned his followers in his Sermon on the Mount not to do exactly that.

You can find Jesus' explicit no-patches-and-no-hacks orders in Matthew 5:

For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished. Therefore anyone who sets aside one of the least of these commands and teaches others accordingly will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever practices and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven.

There are good reasons why the atheist adversary can trivially breach the Christian lines and easily overrun their positions. In fact, and as expected, the atheist adversary is effectively wiping the floor with them.

What else do you think that the result would be, of the Christian willful insubordination to the explicit orders of their own supreme commander?

Jews and Muslims are actually much better at carefully implementing the detailed instructions and operational guidelines issued by the headquarters of the Christian supreme command.

That is why Judaism and Islam are doing absolutely fine, while the vessels of the Christian navy, sailing on the high seas, end up, one by one, hit by a torpedo and irrevocably lost in action.

The religious flatter themselves if they think that atheists need to wipe floors with their religious "adversaries". Just as a Spanish speaker doesn't need to "vanquish" French speakers, in order to communicate in Spanish, each religious and non-religious individual decides for themselves what their moral code will be. As has been shown elsewhere, the religious do NOT exclusively use religious teachings to determine their moral codes, and many if not most of the moral code of atheists overlap with religious teachings. Not because of religion per se, but because most everyone agrees murder is wrong, completely separate from Commandments and other Iron Age mythology. Religions do not have exclusive ownership of common human decency.

[heracleitos]

each religious and non-religious individual decides for themselves what their moral code will be.

Religious individuals join a large consensus with other religious individuals concerning morality. Atheists obviously do not. If there are five atheists sitting around the table, you will hear twelve different views on morality, depending on whether you ask in the morning or in the afternoon. Such lack of consensus about what is right and what is wrong can easily turn into a serious problem, especially in contractual situations such as but not limited to marriage.

many if not most of the moral code of atheists overlap with religious teachings.

They somehow overlap ... for now.

The situation amongst atheists is in continuous degeneration. Example:

Sex-positivity is "an attitude towards human sexuality that regards all consensual sexual activities as fundamentally healthy and pleasurable, encouraging sexual pleasure and experimentation."

Even though not all sexual activity will lead to children, the overwhelming majority of children are produced through sexual activity. That is why sexual activity is a regulated behavior and not just a matter of "pleasurable experimentation". There are clearly also issues of responsibility and accountability.

The real problem is not that some people engage in frivolous pastimes such as "pleasurable experimentation". In religion, sex without having at least some contract with the counterpart is merely considered a sin. The real problem is that these people publicly advocate that behavior to others. They actually want more people to get into all kinds of trouble. These advocates of sex-positivity are actively fuelling the growth of the problem.

Religion, on the other hand, tries to convince as many people as possible to establish long-term arrangements that can handle situations in which they may also be able to raise children. The other ones will still routinely engage in casual sex, but the benefit of religious advocacy is that at least not everybody will be doing that.

[Pattern-chaser]

OK, your attacks weren't ad homs, they were illogical, unpleasant, and unconvincing.

This term does not apply when it is not a personal attack against the person making an argument .

No, it was an "attack against the people making an argument "! Do you really think a shift from singular to plural makes that much of a difference? You attack, in this case, the believer(s) and not the belief. This is as close to ad hom as you're likely to get, I think.

The point is that your attack was and is illogical, unpleasant and unconvincing.

[Pattern-chaser]

Historically, there has always been a scripture at the core of moral theory. Tweaking the scripture itself has always been considered not done.

Human morality, in practice, not theory, long pre-dates any scripture you care to name; it predates writing, I think.

[paradox]

Historically, there has always been a scripture at the core of moral theory. Tweaking the scripture itself has always been considered not done.

Human morality, in practice, not theory, long pre-dates any scripture you care to name; it predates writing, I think.

absolutely true, even God predates writing, there is no need for documentation.

[heracleitos]

Historically, there has always been a scripture at the core of moral theory. Tweaking the scripture itself has always been considered not done.

Human morality, in practice, not theory, long pre-dates any scripture you care to name; it predates writing, I think.

Yes, agreed. Abrahamic morality was transmitted verbally for a long time before it was finally committed to writing. The pressure to corrupt morality was also substantially less in a pastoralist society than in the much larger agricultural society that succeeded it. For religion, writing is a tool against surreptitious alteration.

[Pattern-chaser]

Historically, there has always been a scripture at the core of moral theory. Tweaking the scripture itself has always been considered not done.

Human morality, in practice, not theory, long pre-dates any scripture you care to name; it predates writing, I think.

Yes, agreed. Abrahamic morality was transmitted verbally for a long time before it was finally committed to writing.

Christianity is only 2000 years old. Judaism, the first of the Abrahamic religions, is around 4000 years old. Humanity is a lot older than that, and human morality surely started when the first families and tribes formed/emerged. I assume maybe we had to wait for speech and language first, before we could agree on any 'morality', but it must still have taken place a long time before the emergence of 'Abrahamism'.

[Pattern-chaser]

I assume maybe we had to wait for speech and language first, before we could agree on any 'morality', but it must still have taken place a long time before the emergence of 'Abrahamism'.

Using statistical methods to estimate the time required to achieve the current spread and diversity in modern languages today, Johanna Nichols — a linguist at the University of California, Berkeley — argued in 1998 that vocal languages must have begun diversifying in our species at least 100,000 years ago.

Link to full Wikipedia article.

So it seems we don't really know when language began, but it looks like it was a long time before Judaism started.

[heracleitos]

Historically, there has always been a scripture at the core of moral theory. Tweaking the scripture itself has always been considered not done.

Human morality, in practice, not theory, long pre-dates any scripture you care to name; it predates writing, I think.

Yes, agreed. Abrahamic morality was transmitted verbally for a long time before it was finally committed to writing.

Christianity is only 2000 years old. Judaism, the first of the Abrahamic religions, is around 4000 years old. Humanity is a lot older than that, and human morality surely started when the first families and tribes formed/emerged. I assume maybe we had to wait for speech and language first, before we could agree on any 'morality', but it must still have taken place a long time before the emergence of 'Abrahamism'.

Yes, agreed. The problem is that we don't know particularly much about humanity before humans started writing. It's mostly limited to archeological finds.

[Pattern-chaser]

The problem is that we don't know particularly much about humanity before humans started writing.

Yes, agreed, and yet you said this:

Historically, there has always been a scripture at the core of moral theory.

In the context of the history of human morality, scriptures are late-comers to the party. Your thesis seems to be poorly-informed, as in the past, there was never (until recently) scripture "at the core of moral theory".