"Who do you think is buried in Grant's tomb anyway?
So I guess you are finally agreeing that my header was fitting the shoes on the right feet. Thanks.
"Of course as a materialist, you can't account for any of those immaterial tools"
What immaterial tools?
"you can't account for the rightness of choosing them as opposed to choosing others."
I don't know what you are saying or asking. Can you try to clarify your thought a bit?
"You keep affirming that your morality is in fact NOT based on reason, but on subjective emotional feelings"
No, no, no, no, no. You are misunderstanding. A rational morality is based strictly on reason. The desire part is simply a premise in the argument. Let me help you. It is innate and natural for most humans to avoid pain and to seek comfort and happiness. The purpose of ethical guidelines is therefore to avoid human injury and unhappiness. One way to do this is to live apart from others in which case no ethical guidelines (as relating to right action towards others is necessary). Most people choose to live amongst others in family or community. Partly this is because living in isolation does tend to be painful.
So we start with the need for ethical guidelines and we identify the need as being the fact that people interact with one another and those interactions can further happiness or mitigate happiness. At this basic level of morality, rational (and even stupid people) agree that ahimsa or non-injury is a great moral beginning. (Note that the bible is so primitive that it violates even this most fundamental of ethical beginnings).
Now rational people carry this basic premise somewhat further and they get down to corollaries and details. How can we be happy if we are not free? How can we be happy if people steal our food? How can we be happy if we are not permitted to express our thoughts? How can we be happy if if if.
All rational guidelines are (guess what)...RATIONAL.
"The original critique of Rand and yourself for that matter was that simply declaring happiness and well being as an ultimate moral absolute is completely subjective."
If you wish to say that choosing to live is "subjective" then be my guest! But IF you choose to live then all the rest follows in the most wonderful and unassailable logic!
"there is only one fundamental alternative in the universe: existence or non-existence—and it pertains to a single class of entities: to living organisms. The existence of inanimate matter is unconditional, the existence of life is not: it depends on a specific course of action... It is only a living organism that faces a constant alternative: the issue of life or death"
"A typically arrogant response from atheists (the Brights) who think they know what's best for everyone else (the Dulls)"
It wasn't arrogant, at all. Your response is just stupid and dull. You had asked me why I didn't take my own advice (to go to Sunday School). I relied that the advice was intended for you and not for me. To make it clear once again: I don't advice someone looking for shoes to buy a head of lettuce. I advised you to go to Sunday School because you are superstitious and could possibly find something of value in discussing your superstitions. Sunday School would hold no value for me. Do you understand this yet or will you still show confusion in your response?
"is evil (as arbitrarily defined by you), evil?
I use the word "evil" simply out of courteous convention. What falls under the aegis of "evil" is simply actions which are hurtful AND wrong. Rand's philosophy shows clearly and objectively what actions are hurtful AND wrong. There is nothing arbitrary about it.
"An absolute statement if there ever was one"
Absolute statements exist in logic but Godel's incompleteness theory tells us that we cannot claim with certainty that the statement is true. Nevertheless, this is like arguing that we cannot prove that we are not dreaming our life and about to wake up at any moment (and not being able to prove that the waking state is not another dream within a dream).
I think you know very well that our discussion about the ABSOLUTISM (the omnipotence, omnipresence, omniscience of God and likewise of moral "oughts") is different than the certainty (absolutism) of certain statements in logic or mathematics. For instance, there are no circles with three equal sides.
When I made reference that "Absolute thinking is the garment of extreme intolerance and human pomposity" I was not attacking philosophers or mathematicians. Rather, I was referring to people who pronounce ultimate truths on supernatural authority which cannot be objectively falsified through logic or experiment. This is the sort of "Absolute thinking" that rational people consider often dangerous and always without value.
"You keep making my points for me"
I have refuted all your points just as I've shown your superstitious beliefs to be childish, irrational, and infantile. |
