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Politics : Sharks in the Septic Tank -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: The Philosopher who wrote (5628)	2/13/2001 6:44:06 PM
From: Lane3	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 82486

But the premise that has been going around, that I think he was referring to, is that there is no absolute morality, only what any given society at any given time says is moral. By definition, almost, there is no anchor for such a "moral" system -- it floats in the breeze. There's lots of room between absolute morality and floating in the breeze. On one end you have some deity-defined authoritarian set of rule--omnipresent and eternal. On the other end you have virtual amorality. I don't see that as an either/or choice. The issue, IMO, is not whether the anchor is based on deity or based on what the founders called "inalienable rights." The issue is whether there are any such inalienable rights at all, whether based on the sacred or the secular. I believe in the founding tenets of the US--life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. I believe in the virtue of caring for our planet. I believe in the wonder that is human life and our potential to rise above our limbic roots. I believe that we all need to find a way to get along and advance our civilization for the benefit of our posterity. And I believe in tolerance and civility. I don't get any of those beliefs from a deity, at least not directly or bundled. I don't think that my rights as a US citizen are inalienable or endowed by the Creator. They just make sense to me given what I know of history and logic and the human spirit. If I had been born in a different time and place or wired differently than I am, I might have an entirely different set of beliefs. There's nothing absolute about my beliefs, but they're hardly a feather floating in the breeze. They're quite well anchored. One hundred years from now they might not make any sense, but they'll still make sense next week and next year and probably the rest of my life. I like science fiction--the kind about other paradigms, not the space cowboys type. One of the first sci fi books I ever read was about a society on the moon that developed after it had been used as a penal colony, much like Australia. That society had a different concept of marriage and family. When you were of age, you married into a family where you had multiple husbands and wives. Children were raised communally until they left to marry into another family. I remember finding that interesting and I don't dismiss that system out of hand. In that place and time, another paradigm of morality could make perfect sense. There's not just one absolute morality handed down from on high, IMO. . There is such a fundamental disconnect between principle and belief that IMO it simply proves the invalidity of the principle People on both ends of the political spectrum spout principles. Many individuals on both ends conveniently forget their principles when their pet interests are at stake. That doesn't invalidate the principles. It only highlights the hypocrisy of some practitioners. Karen